hello my sweet little angel delights, it’s been too long! (a week.) Admittedly, that week was one of the more stressful ones I had, with an incredibly tense and excruciating feedback workshop on some new fiction I’m writing, an essay deadline where my internet stopped working the night before, and my phone somehow being lost in the post! It’s truly been a winning formula all around but while I still have no phone, that week did end (thank christ) and as promised I have returned with more food related goods!
I’ll be doing a normal list along with a pancake special as pancakes are for life, not just for Shrove Tuesday (also I don’t know about you guys but we have a metric ton of batter left and need to think of other toppings.) Also bar the religiously devout, who is honestly denying themselves anything this year for Lent?? (Depending on how my trip goes to the sorting office, maybe I will give up having a phone.) But anyway this is a long one, so let’s get cracking.
Saint Agur Creme
My favourite blue cheese is Saint Agur (my mum insists the Marks and Spencer edition is better than the branded and I don’t know how but I agree) so it was unsurprising I liked this. However, I was still admittedly skeptical. I wasn’t entirely sure what made it creme, but as we were making the classic mac and cheese as referenced in previous newsletters, it was the only Saint Agur in Sainsburys and we figured we would give it a go. It’s basically a blue cheese cream cheese, so perfect for spreading on a freshly toasted bagel, as a dip or as we discovered, as the filling in a jacket potato. I would especially recommend as a way into blue cheese if you haven’t tried it/don’t normally like it, as whilst it retains the tang, the flavour is far softer and the blended style is more palatable if the mould normally puts you off.
60 month Davidstow Special Reserve
So we very much got this by chance, as we were given it by a family friend as they have to get rid of it before the sell-by date, but truly a stellar extra mature cheddar. I didn’t realise until looking it up that it is normally used in Michelin restaurants, but you can now buy it directly from the company here.
Marks and Spencer San Francisco Sourdough Bread
For me, this is probably the platonic ideal of white bread. (if you are a bread company and wish to challenge me on this, I am more than willing to sample your goods). It has the softest yet airy filling and a chewy yet not too hard crust. Perfect with thickly spread lurpak as an accompaniment for soup or as part of a chip butty.
avocado and tomato with soy/sesame dressing and sesame seeds (served with fried gyoza)
I’ve been trying to incorporate some form of salad to one of my daily meals, and while I spent most of last week eating my avocado with my fave dressing (Brianna’s Home Style Honey and Mustard if you remember from previous editions), I thought I should switch it up at least once. The dressing I made became a hodge podge of sesame oil, soy sauce and balsamic vinegar (as well as the addition of the ready made dumpling dipping sauce when the soy sauce ran out), but turned out to be okay for both the dressing for the veg and as a dipping sauce for the gyoza. I think it needs tinkering for now, but will definitely explore in future.
homemade refried black beans (served in quesadillas)
This was another one where it tasted okay, but the concept is something I am definitely going to try again. After agreeing to make quesadillas for a remote shared Valentine’s day dinner, I realised not only that I had no refried beans but also that none of the shops near me had it in stock. I did have a tin of black beans however and my trusty food processor so after cooking for a little bit, chucking most spices I could find and blending with olive oil I had something usable. If anyone has a particular good and reliable recipe for refried beans of any variety though, I would be very much interested for the next time the supermarkets fail me.
peach juice!
The thing about living abroad is that you get attached to certain things you find in supermarkets and then come back to find they are rare/very expensive. From when I lived in Venice, there were a lot of things that filled this category. Cheap grated parmesan. Instant tomato risotto. Pumpkin soup. Actually ripe nectarines. But most importantly, peach juice. Peach juice is my favourite fruit juice as I love peach iced tea and it tastes less acidic to me than orange or pineapple. I had given up on finding it in the UK for less than £2.30 until on my search for refried beans I went to the other corner shop near me (which I had always avoided as it looked very small from the outside, only to be bigger than the Spar I usually go to). There it was, in it’s £1.39 glory on the shelf and now I have a new favourite corner shop. I can’t tell you for the life of me whether it’s good for you or what’s in it, but it is delicious, either on it’s own or diluted with sparkling water for a very refreshing beverage. (also good for homemade bellinis!) If you have a Best-One near you, it might be worth checking.
But now, onto what we’ve all been waiting for:
A History of the Best Pancakes I’ve Had.
Dad’s Any Juice Topping
My dad would often get those readymade pancakes in for dessert during my college years, so there was a phase for a good couple of months where we would regularly have pancakes for dessert. He never had lemon juice however, so they woud always be topping with sugar and whatever fruit juice we had in the house. Personally I’m a big fan of a few drops of orange juice for a similarly zesty experience, but you can obviously experiment. (I have yet to try with peach.)
Hannah’s 2 Course Pancake Dinner
In my second year, me and my flatmate Hannah (who was allergic to cows milk) made a two course dinner of pancakes, with a savory course of lemon and herb fried mushrooms, goats cheese and rocket for main, followed by dairy free chocolate spread and dairy free vanilla ice cream for dessert. Firstly, you’ll be surprised how little dairy there is in chocolate spreads, but also the mushroom/cheese pancake blew my mind. I was converted to the savory pancake.
Crepe Solo
On my year abroad during a visit to Paris with my friend, I found myself surprisingly alone with an hour or two to kill before I had to head to the airport. I am terrified of travelling anywhere by myself, but one of my treasured memories is just ordering a simple butter and sugar crepe from a street stall and eating it alone while walking up to the Avenue des Champs-Élysées as the sun slowly started to set. It was one of those beautiful moments where I realised that my life has been sometimes ridiculous.
The Pancake Bakery
In the same year (my year abroad had some truly superb trips) I went to Amsterdam with my then-boyfriend, and for my birthday we went to The Pancake Bakery. I didn’t realise dutch pancakes were a big thing, and was pleasantly surprised with my order, an absolutely gigantic pancake with sundried tomato, goats cheese and pine nuts.
Harriette’s Gluten Free Pancakes
In the latter half of my year abroad, I lived with a lovely girl named Harriette who was a coeliac but loved pancakes, so we spent a good amount of evenings trying to perfect the gluten free pancake. In the end, we settled on soy flour as the best flour substitute, and would always eat them with Nutella, bananas and whipped cream. These were my favourite meals with Harriette, along with our almost daily trips for ice cream and a red wine risotto that she put so much wine in we were both slightly drunk by the end of it.
This Banana on a Pancake
Another pancake that year with the same ex, and while I often find restaurant pancakes can always do with more toppings, including this one, this caramelised banana was one of the best bananas I’ve had.
Whatever That Pancake Was In Dublin
Me and my current boyfriend took a holiday to Dublin about three years ago, which was a lovely respite for what was otherwise A Stressful Time™ and I maintain that Dublin has the best cat cafe I’ve been to. (I don’t know if it is still open, but it was full of kittens that needed rehoming - luckily they were too young otherwise I would have snuck them all back on Ryanair.) Anyway, I was looking through my photos and saw these pancakes we had in Dublin that were fantastic, but had no memory of what was on them and where they were from; I had to do a really deep dive on Google but I found it! They were from Brother Hubbard and they were their seasonal pancakes of poached pear with white chocolate and chestnut cream, warm date caramel sauce and topped with their sweet nut dukkah. Truly excellent and if Brother Hubbard ever want to do them again and open a shop in Manchester, that would be great. (Or just give me a recipe, that’s fine too.)
2021 Buttermilk Pancakes
And finally, onto this years pancakes. When it comes to making my own, I prefer American style for dessert pancakes and I use this recipe from John Torode (without the maple bacon); I find buttermilk recipes are the only kind for me that works to get that required thickness. This year’s favourite topping was kaya jam, a wonderful coconut jam popularised in Southeast Asia, topped with banana and homemade whipped cream. I did also try some savory toppings the next day for variation, where my favourites were garlic and herb sauce, cheese and fried egg, and slightly weirder but soy sauce and cheddar. (The latter was surprisingly good, although I normally have it on a jacket potato - the combo came about after a dinner at my friend Jess’s house where we couldn’t find any salt anywhere.)
Aims for the Future:
Currently I have to order my kaya jam online, however I have discovered Wing Yip Superstore, a massive Asian supermarket in Ancoats which according to their website sells both plain and pandan kaya, so will have to take a walk up there once mine is close to running out at some point to see if it is true.
My local veggie store was selling these Kallo French onion stock cubes, so bought them to see if it makes a difference in stock. (Honestly was just so excited to have an option when it came to veggie stocks).
That’s all for this week, but will try to stick to the new day of Thursday and as always do get in touch! I’d love to hear your recipes, ideas or just a nice meal you had.
If you enjoyed my writing or found it useful, you can donate to my Ko-Fi or Paypal here and hopefully eventually I’ll have a phone again to take nice food pictures with.