Why do celebrity chefs pose like this?

What is it about celebrity chefs that makes them pose with their arms crossed on the front cover of their books? I saw these books by James Martin and Wozzer side by side in Waitrose and wondered whether it was a trait that other chefs had too. You can see below that Jamie has also dabbled with the arms crossed technique. But not in anyway near the way that Wozzer and James Martin do.





If you have a look at Jamie's other front covers a patern emerges. The arms crossed thing is a bit of a red herring. In all of his front covers he looks relaxed. Informal. Making cooking look like a piece of piss. He doesn't need to do the whole arms crossed thing to look important or commanding.









Maybe you could say that Jamie's got his arms crossed to add a bit of gravitas to his "Cook" book. And in the Jamie at Home book it's a fairly relaxed bit of arm crossing afterall.

Gordon's front covers are interesting too. But a bit harder to decypher. It seems that he's gone from being a bit shy about his face by covering up his chin and not looking to camera to a place where he is now very happy to act as a model - almost like Tom Cruise in Cocktail. See what you think...









During the course of Gordon's rise to fame loads of girls have fallen head over heals with Gordon for his gruff, assertive masculinity. His contoured face has become iconic and he's stopped hiding it away.

Hugh's front covers are the most consistent of all. Very Hugh. You get a picture of Hugh eating or holding whatever sums up his latest book. Simple. So Wittingstall.







It all goes to show that celebrity chefs are major brands these days. The same rules of branding apply to them as they would to any of the brands I work on. The look and feel is crucial and consistency of image is really imporant too.

I hope my amateur interest in body language hasn't bored anyone too much!

Salmon Teryaki

Inspired by our delicious salmon teryaki at Roka and remembering my first encounter with dark, salty, sweet, soft salmon at Sosumi in Cape Town, I was eager to create the perfect version of it.

The beauty of it is that it is so soft, almost raw. Bright pink yet salty and deep with flesh that falls apart at the seams. Just like it should. You touch it with a chopstick and it yields.

I put my Heston hat on and decided to give the salmon a good burst of marinating. A combination of teryaki sauce, shallot, galang galang, chile, coriander, mirin and a drop of sesame oil worked its way into the firm fillets for about 3 hours before I popped them in their own little Baco sous vide bags.



When we've tried the boil in the bag method before we've had great results in terms of taste but have tended to slightly over do the cooking. To avoid this we used a far bigger pan and used the lowest flame. To keep the temperature down even more we added a handful of ice cubes to the warm/hot water so that it wouldn't even think of overcooking whilst we had a bath.



I got a bit carried away with the whole water bath thing and went to check on my salmon with a towel wrapped around me. For a bit of a laugh I gave Cowie a shock by bringing one of the salmon parcels up to the bath with me and dropped it in the bath! Cowie was shocked! And even more so when I got my camera out!



But it makes an interesting point. The bath was at the ideal temperature to sous vide my salmon. It was probably at a better temperature than the pan on the stove!

When the flesh went from being firm to yielding a little when I poked it we whipped it out of the pan and opened up the pouches and drained them both into a bowl. The flesh was perfectly rare and they were deeply coloured and still, thankfully, in tact.



I took the fillets out of their juice and seared them skin side down on a griddle so the skin crisped up. There are few flavours I love more than crispy fish skin. Delicious.



In the meantime Cowie created a masterful stir fry featuring a variety of oriental mushrooms, seared pepper, sweetcorn and other oriental nibbles.



And it was stunning. Slow cooking, marinating and sous vide are the way forward. Especially when you get a bit of searing in there as well.



For our next trick we'll be cooking venison on our car engine!

Creme de la Crepe, Borough Market

Anna's entry into Cowie's pancake competition was inspired, or more accurately stolen from Creme de la Crepe's menu. Anna confessed under torture, but we were kind and allowed her to compete in the contest - not disimmilar to the Dwain Chambers fiasco recently.

Anna insisted we try out the pancakes at Creme de la Crepe which can now be found in the alleyway from Borough Market that leads up to the main part of London Bridge station.



Anna was at school with Katie who is Nick's girlfriend. Nick is Mr Crepe. Cowie and I had a good potter around Borough Market to work up an apetite for our pancakes, picking up some salmon for supper and some delicious apples to turn into juice to refresh us after squash. When eventually we'd exhausted all the stalls and Cowie had accidentally stollen some ham that she thought was a free taster but was actually someone's prized purchase, we joined the snaking queue for our crepe.

Unfortunately Nick had run out of ham and bacon which ruled out the croque monseir and the piggy went to market options so I went for "The Italian Job" which features sun dried tomatoes, lashings of pesto, roquette and goats cheese. Just like Anna made for our pancake party. Cowie was less adventurous and went for lemon and sugar which was really good too.

We had a good chat with Nick and Katie who are lovely and tried not to distract them too much from their feverish pancake making. The crepes were beautifully cooked and it's great fun to watch them being made. The batter is pumped out from two taps and they then use a little wooden spreader to coat the hot plate. It doesn't take long before you're handed a wonderfully oragamied crepe oozing with goodies.

Nick and Katie are hoping to set up a pitch at Covent Garden and will cater for any event. What better way to end up a party than to have a crepe man. They've got a great website and sell goodies such as hoodies and t-shirts.

Valentine's Day Cookery

Cowie and I are equally obsessed with food. I guess it's a shared passion. We land up going on holidays based around an oyster festival, a place having a great reputation for langoustines, an awesome market. I doubt we'd go on holiday to a place that didn't have good food, or the very least an interesting culinary adventure to be had.

Valentine's Day is probably the busiest night of the year for the restaurant industry. I landed up having a chat with the head waiter at the Galvin in the afternoon over a cup of coffee and a chat about his cognacs - they had been fully booked for 5 months and had to completely transform the restaurant layout so that it could accommodate a school classroom style arrangement of tables for 2. They keep their menu very staightforward and offer amuse bouches and little petit fours and going away presents for the ladies. All lovely touches. Cowie and I tend to shun the cliched visit to an intimate restaurant for Valentine's day. Far better to avoid the en masse romance and cook something intimate and romantic at home.

So we went to Roka on the 13th which was amazing, and then pottered back to Cowie's to cook some cod and have some fun with some souffles for Valentine's Day.

I took charge of the cod, wrapping it in top quality bacon and seasoning it generously with Cowie's speciality salt and pepper. A splash of flat champagne from last week and 2 sprigs of bright red tomatoes from M&S finished it off before it went into a medium oven to work its magic.

In the meantime I did what I always land up doing with peppers. I cut them in half and blackened them on in the gas flame until they blistered and became stunningly smokey.

Cowie suggested a cheeky little tomato sauce might not be such a bad idea - so I grabbed the left over bruchetta spread that Blades and Heather brought to our pancake party, added some shallots and tinned tomatoes and simmed it down to a rich deep tomato sauce to accompany the cod. Cowie popped in a few prawns, I removed the beautifully cooked cod from the oven and then we swooned over our creation. Gorgeous.



Cowie took charge of dessert. She delved into our souffle book and rustled up what should have been a mango number but landed up tasting delicious but quite plain. They rose perfectly and held their shape well. There's something really nerve racking about the 10 mintutes that souffles take to transform in the oven. Are they going to rise? Are they going to flop? Have I remembered to butter and sugar the ramekins? Should I check them? Will they collapse once they are taken out of the oven?



You can tell from the pictures that Cowie did a great job. We're giving them another go tonight, so stay tuned. I think it's going to be apricots and honey this time.

Poor old Ainsley

Pre Valentine's Day Roka Extravaganza

I had promised to take Cowie to Tsunami in Clapham for our pre-Valentine's day meal. But I never booked it. Instead I was really sneaky and booked us into Roka which we had wanted to go to for ages.

We've got a history of trying to surprise each other but we normally either get too excited and spill the beans too early or the we see through each other and guess! But not this time. I managed to get Cowie hook line and sinker.

We met on Charlotte Street and went for a casual drink in a pub next to Finos and guzzled down some wine that meant we saved a few quid rather than paying through the nose in "Tsunami/Roka". The more time passed the more itchy Cowie's feet became until it was pretty obvious we couldn't make it to Clapham in time for our booking at Tsunami.

I smiled at Cowie and explained my surprise, but before I could say where we were going instead she had guess it! That's the closest I've got to surprising her properly!

We pottered up to Roka with a very bouncy spring in our steps: partly to do with the booze, a bit to do with the excitement of the surprise and also because we had been dying to go to Roka ever since we heard of it.

You can always tell it's going to be a good meal when we ask to move seats and are plonked in the best spot. This time we were moved from the goldfish bowl seats by the window to prime real estate at the central bar overlooking the chefs doing their BBQing. It's a great site to see such amazing chefs cooking live in front of you. It must be a great way of getting people to buy extra things just because they see them being cooked! Flames. Action. Food porn!

After gasping at the price of the set menu we soon realised that we would be better off going off piste and constructing our own meal. Who needs vegetarian dishes when these guys are so good at fish and meat.

We kicked off with some yellow fin tuna tataki which was light, fresh, zingy and beautfiully textured. The only question mark we had next to it was the way it tasted very strongly of the kind of bad pre-ground pepper you got at school.

Then came some well salted edamame and otoro tuna sashimi which was delicious. By far the best I've ever had. I love the feel of it as it almost disolves in your mouth. Who needs teeth when you've got otoro!

Cowie's miso soup with scallops was a great success too. Warming, delicately flavoured and very subtle. It's a great broth that is as full of unami as it is lacking in colour. Pale and unasumming. But very pleasant indeed.

Things got really exciting when our grilled quail with a tart plum compote arrived. The meat was beautifully charred and almost raw. There's nothing quite like a bit of medium rare poultry to divide opinion. In this instance it was sensational. But I know a lot of people would have complained. The plum lifted the sweetness of the quail and cut through the oily skin leaving your mouth craving more. What a shame quails are so small!

If we thought our quail was good, the salmon teryaki took us up to another level. It was only £10 but was the best thing we ate. The salmon flesh was almost raw and fell apart at the very sight of a chopstick. The teryaki sauce was rich, dark and deep. The skin was crispy and a shinning example to the entire world about how to cook fish skin. There are few finer tastes than properly cooked fish skin. Gorgeous.

Beef and asparagus skewers were very vanilla. Perfectly fine but Wags do them just as well for less. And yuzu soy tuna was a bit dry but I enjoyed my first experience of yuzu. Kind of like tangerine but a lot more expensive!

We boycotted the wine and instead had green tea which meant that we spent well under £100 and left feeling perfectly full, deleriously happy and super keen to come back.

Pancake Competition Results

Pancake Day, AKA Shrove Tuesday is one of the most exciting days in the foodie calendar. It's the day when you are encouraged to gorge on all the good stuff before you fast for Lent. Given that I'm not religious and am not planning to give anything more significant than stamp collecting up for Lent, Pancake Day is essentially a wild card to tuck into whatever you want with impunity! Hahahah!

Cowie organised a brilliant event. About a month ago we invited some close friends to come round for a pancake party. At first it started out as being a simple affair with Cowie planning to cook an industrial amount of batter and do something simple with lemons and sugar. But this didn't last long. Instead we set up a competition whereby each couple had to supply a different filling with the most innovative filling winning the kudos of being the Paunch's 20008 Pancake Champion.

Being a competitive bunch of surveryors, lawyers, recruitment consultants, insurance brokes, university lecturers and ad men we took up the challenge and all brought our attempts at glory!

Anna and Edwin did a great job with their "Italian Job". A tasty combination of pesto, sundried tomatoes from Sainsbury's and supplemented by some San Lorenzo classics and finished off with some mozerellla was delicious. It was inspired by Anna's friend who has a pancake stall in Borough Market. Well done Anna and Edwin. Good depth of flavour and good originality.







Well done the Emissons. Top work.

Cowie and I supplied a delicious treat of smoked salmon with dill and creme fraiche. Simple. But utterly gorgeous. Very luxururious indeed. And great colours too.





It felt quite Russian. All we needed was some chilled vodka and some fur coats! Although it wasn't voted as being the best filling, I was still pretty proud as it was colourful and full of flavour.

Blades and Heather came to the party with goat's cheese and honey roasted ham. A great, simple combination that tasted gorgeous. Salty and full of creamy meatiness. And with a smear of bruchetta topping it was even better!







The beauty was that we could mix and match the various cheeses and cured meats that everyone had brought along. The demand for the large meat platter was pretty agressive, resulting in a Mexican stand off for the salmon, meat platter and Victoria's delicious and award winning wild mushroom and bacon sludge. It might not look that amazing, but it was sublime. Especially when you throw some goat's cheese and rocket in there as well!





Well done Victoria. Good stuff.

In return, we also had a prociutto, bufallo mozerella and balsamic tomato salad which was stunning. Sweet. Salty. Sharp. Mmmm.









Jack and Keira brought along some lovely Ementhal and some plastic ham which they intended to be made into an alpine racklette style pancake. Unfortunately, we didn't have the kit to make the most of it. But to be honest you can't go wrong with ham and cheese pancakes anyway!



Now for the sweet pancakes! In brief:

The San Lorenzo "Nutella" spread was amazing. So naughty and o so tasty!



Jack and Keira had an absolute blinder. Sultanas with cinamon and ice cream was immense and rightly picked up the sweet pancake of the year award! Well bowled!





Ian and Emma covered off the classic base with lemon and sugar which you simply can't go wrong with. Sharp and sweet. Nice.

As a finale I had bought some passion fruit and creme fraiche which brought back amazing memories of eating fresh chapatis in Zanzibar. That tropical clarity of taste. Yummy! Sadly this one was wolfed down so fast we didn't get a picture!

Well done everyone and especially to Cowie for hosting a brilliant event. Particular congratulations go to Jack and Keira for their sultana, cinamon and ice cream dessert and to Victoria and Alex for their delicious savoury bacon and mushroom extravaganza. I can't wait for the next Shrove Tuesday. Pancake Day rocks!



Jack's clearly praying that the white chocolate hasn't run out... and below, 2 very talented cyclists prepare to ride their tandem back to Pimlico!

Awesome Chocolate Keyboard

Geeky chocolate. Nice.

From Gizmondo.

Riverford Farm, lovely walk and an even better lunch

A colleauge who spends a fair amount of time in Devon came back from a relaxing week away from work raving about how amazing Riverford Farm is. No sooner had he told me about this remote jewel than I had sent Cowie the link and she had booked us in. Efficiency is one of Cowie's (many) strong points!

We tootled down to stay with Cowie's parents in Somerset on Friday night and then set off bright and early with a classic Somerset breakfast inside us. Poached eggs and plenty of bacon for me and some porridge for Cowie. I was wary that owing to Riverford Farm's planning regulations they force you to go on a yomp before you are even allowed in the field kitchen as they call it!

The weather couldn't have been more pleasant. The weak winter sun streamed through my passenger window thawing the harsh West Country frost by the time we had got out of third gear. A mixture of Classic FM, Radio 5 Live and Gemini FM gave us our soundscape as Cowie wizzed past anything that was dawdling along - whichever one had the least bad reception!

We arrived at the pristine farm at noon - giving us an hour to tackle the route march. We called in at the field kitchen and were greeted by the most charming people who welcomed and congratulated us on coming such a long way and getting there first! Unheard of for us. Unless there is food involved!

They handed over a map and very sleek MP3 player with a build in speaker. The numbers on the map correlated with the tracks on the MP3 player. Extraordinary! A bit like an audio guide in an art gallery... but far more fun and home-made.



We took Bella and Hector with us on our lap of the fields and they absolutely loved it. Cowie had checked earlier in the week that it was OK and they replied saying that they love having dogs to visit! Such nice people! We kept them both under a tight lead until we got to an empty pasture field where we set them loose! Two happier dogs you are unlikely to see.



The audio guide was brilliant. Even though the fields are pretty barren in early February Guy's friendly voice encourages you to look closely at what is going on. Rhubarb sprouting in one of the fields was great to see.



As was a bat box that is helping to keep the insect levels down in an eco fridnly way. I remember watching Oz Clark and James May potter around Nappa Valley - they visited a special vineyard that planted special plants that encouraged butterflies and birds which in turn kept their vines healthy and meant they didn't have to use chemicals. Very clever stuff. Well done the bats.



It was quite fun being the only ones out on the walk because we caught up with Guy recording February's new audio guide. We didn't want to get in his way or distract him so didn't get too close - but it was really fun to hear his live commentary as we went round. Apparently they feed all the children at the local school with Riverford Farm food - lucky kids! And they struggle to do it on £1.60.

we ended our trail by walking through a badger set surrounded by ash trees and then descended onto the field kitchen for a well earned lunch. Cowie and the dogs looked completely at home.



Now for the reason we came here. The food. Set in a newly built, barrel roofed building you are greeted with the apetite wheting smell of charred chicken. Fabulous. And the sight of an open kitchen full of eager young cooks busily preparing a fantastic spread. We sat on the table nearest the kitchen and immediately started chatting to our table mates. From the moment we said hello we never stopped chatting until the last drop of coffee had been slurped our coats were buttoned up. More charming, chatty people you will struggle to find anywhere. We talked about everything. From recent trips to River Cottage HQ, Istanbul, El Bulli, and the Fat Duck.... to the incredible success of Riverford Farm and the world of food, the West Country and Grand Designs! That's the joy of school dining room tables. Everyone just mucks in together.

We were treated to the widest spread of vegetables I've ever seen:

Sweet and sour leeks
Sweet baked carrots with feta and nuts
Baked beetroot with yoghurt and honey
Kale
Tender stem brocoli
Safron mashed potato

Wow!

And then the icing on the cake - charred Moroccan chiken with chorizo and beans. Stunning. Smokey, juicy, succulent. And what a treat to have such incredibly fresh, tasty veggies. Apparently Jane, the maestro in the kitchen is bringing a book out in June. I'm going to pre-order it and cook everything in it. The style is very similar to other River Cafe alumnae such as Jamie and Hugh - allowing flavours to speak for themselves.

My plum crumble was spectacular too. Sharp. Sweet. Crumbly. And adorned by perfectly creamy custard. Bliss. The vibe in the field kitchen was idyllic. Young and old. Families. Friends. Everyone having a great time eating gorgeous food. Cowie loved her firey ginger beer and I devoured my Luscombe cider. Great stuff!

It turned out the chap on our table was the head bean counter of Riverford Farm. Apparently they are sending out 33,000 veg boxes a week from the Devon depot alone. Around 50,000 around the entire country. That's a lot of organic veg. He pointed out that whilst veg boxes have a reputation for being expensive they are actually substantially cheaper than shopping at Waitrose, Tesco or Sainsbury when it comes to organic food. And whilst everyone is putting their prices up significantly Riverford have announced that they are only going to raise their prices by 5% this year. Far less than the supermarkets. They can afford to do so because they are their own suppliers! Riverford has gone from turning over £5million pounds a year several years ago to seven times that last year. Spectacular. I hope they continue to grow and flourish and drag the rest of the country kickking and screaming into the eco-foodie vision for the country that the likes of Guy, Hugh and Jamie are mapping out. I just hope the oncoming recession doesn't bugger things up!

We reluctantly left quite swiftly in order to get back for the rugby but also poppped in to their farm shop too. What a great place. They even had vast vats of Ecover products that you use to refil containers you've brought from home. Their veg wasn't bad either!





We drove back to Somerset with the wind at our back and the sun warming our faces - delighted with life. Happy to have experienced the perfect Saturday lunch.

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Loads of hits are coming in on this post from a Riverford Farm forum and I can't get into it to see the context and it's really frustrating! If you have found this post via that forum I would love to hear from you by commenting below.

Tom Ilic... FANTASTIC!

This was the secret location I have been keeping from Browny for weeks. To mark the end of January, I decided we should celebrate by going out somewhere special for dinner.

I stumbled across Tom Ilic's new restaurant purely by accident and by judging the reviews, I thought it was definitely worth a try. For us this a local... and a bloody good one at that!

The decor and style might not be to everyone's taste, but no one can argue about the superb qulaity of food and service. For a Thrusday night the place wasn't heaving but certainly full enough to create some atmosphere. We were dining on the toptable offer: 3 courses plus a glass of bubbliy for £23... what a bargain.

I have to admit I had been studying the menu for weeks, yet still I couldn't decide what to have! After much deliberation I opted for a trio of salmon... cured, baked and tartare. The entire dish was light, elegrant, busting with flavour and delivered an excellent contrast in textures. I was thrilled with my choice. As was Browny who opted for a very earthy and manly sort of dish.. Pigs cheeks with chiozto. Again it was cooked perfectly, exploded with flavour and not at all fatty or greasy. All in all, a great start.

For main, in hindsight I probably should have gone for the lamb. My breast of mallard was very good, rosy pink inside, but due to the nature of the bird it was slighty on the tough side. Browny on the other hand chose an absolute winner and a signature dish of Tom Ilic. It was pork belly with jerusalem artichokes, scallops, honey and hazelnuts. It was truly sensational...

(Browny):"... that was one of the best things I have ever eaten! I did everything but lick my plate clean."

Enough said I think!

The puddings also did not disappoint. My lemon tart was oozing with subtle citrus flavour and the texture was as smooth as a baby's bottom. Browny's chocolate fondant was naughty, wicked and heavenly... everything you would expect from such a classic.

Because the food bill was so reasonable we decided to make the most of a decent bottle wine. It was delicious. Light and very fruity. A bottle of South African Sauvignon Blanc that tasted of passion fruit and smelled of lyche.

To top off a great evening off, we were lucky enough to meet the man himself, who came out to chat to us after his epic performance in the kitchen. We were immediately taken by his cheerful, charming, honest and reflective nature; a very talented chef and thoroughly nice man.

We often rave and get excited about the places and restaurants we've eaten in, but this one has to be in my top 3. On a food front I really a barley think of a single bad thing to say about it.

So please, do the right thing and go and see for yourselves what a tresure this place really is.