Lady Aga

Pig & Butcher - Gastro Pub birthday brilliance in Islington

Whilst The Blonde may have just celebrated his 30th birthday, I’d like to draw the focus right back to the one who reached that grand old age three weeks beforehand - yep, that’d be me: Cougar Town.  

The choice of venue for my birthday lunch was based on a nice visit to The Pig and Butcher last summer where we parked ourselves on the benches outside and had a few things from the snack menu. We dug the mini burger and The Blonde was particularly enamoured with the ‘mustard dance’- a serving phenomena exclusive to The Pig and Butcher (as far as I’m aware, anyway) whereby a charming waitress in a low cut top helps you to mustard.  There’s a bit of dipping towards the table, a fair amount of jiggling as the condiment is tapped off the spoon onto the plate, and then there’s three varieties of mustard to work your way through.  Beyonce aint got nothing on these girls.

Anyway, enough of that, Here’s a blow by blow account of what I ate with my friends by way of partay.

Le menu;

a particularly wonderful bloody Mary with plenty of spice and feist;

great ales and prosecco, plus the fab English ‘champs’, Nyetimber.

A pre-lunch snack of salt cod croquettes with aioli and slices of cured ham - a really nice touch that demonstrates the Pig & Butcher’s generosity of spirit in the kitchen when it comes to their customers.  There was also bread and dripping representing the carbs.

Next up, red mullet with artichokes, curd cheese and blood oranges,

Also, a pig’s head terrine with the soft-squidgy marbled texture of rillettes and black pudding on toast with a little pear and shallot salad.

For the main event, just a casual three beef joints.  We numbered nineteen and only two doggy bags made it out of the pub.  Animals.

The immaculately rare roast beef ribs came with Portobello mushrooms and a light rocket salad with mustard vinaigrette

Not forgetting the bone marrow haggerty- essentially daupinoise potato with double the fat content.  This might just be one of the tastiest carb dishes in existence; crispy top and unctuous insides with thin slivers of potato retaining just the slightest of bite.

The lovely manager, James, suggested we have half helpings of pudding and cheese, instead of choosing between the two- love that kind of blue sky thinking.

All applaud the pudding…

Torta caprese with hazelnut praline and mascarpone -  a chocolate hit without the flour, so no bloating.  Allegedly.  Regardless, it was beyond delicious.

To finish things off, the cheese board.

And then cake, round two, courtesy of Konditor & Cook

As meals go, this one was epic, with a great relaxed atmosphere and cool laid-back perfection that many gastro pubs aspire to but so rarely achieve.  Not only that, the three course Feasting Menu was a complete steal at £33 a head plus your service charge.  If that all seems a bit much to stomach, fear not, there is a much more manageable daily-changing menu, or you could just snack, these guys cater to all levels of greed.

The Pig & Butcher, 80 Liverpool Road, London N1 0QD

Tequila Time

Back in November last year, when The Blonde and I were quaffing our way around Mexico, we had the fortune to stumble upon a super cool open-to-the-elements pizzeria in Mexico City by the name of Cancino.  Here we became acquainted with an epic little cocktail by the name of Fresca Union.  That drink was mescal-based and diluted with a grapefruit flavoured beverage, but since tequila and Sprite are more readily available in our hood we went down that ingredient-route to fuel our bank holiday shenanigans.  Here’s how you make the refreshing, and super-potent, bev.  Whilst you may all be sick of the sight of booze by now, you can always bookmark this badboy for the next 3 day weekend, which is but 18 days away, and counting.

Ingredients:

Cucumber

Fresh Mint

Bitters (optional)

Tequila

Sprite

Using a Y-peeler, peel four strips of cucumber and drop into your tumbler along with the torn-up-leaves from one sprig of mint

Muddle with a double shot of tequila and a few drops of bitters

Add a good amount of ice and top with Sprite

Sip through a straw

Cancino Pizza, Plaza Villa Madrid 13, Mexico City

Bar del Pla, Barcelona

After much procrastination, here’s my deeply overdue report on an awesome tapas bar in Barcelona’s Born region by the name of Bar del Pla.  Seeing as holiday season is fast approaching and Barcelona’s musical offerings of Sonar and Primavera festivals are just around the corner, I thought this might be a good time to tell you all about THE place to mange.  Foes of foie gras might wish to avert their gaze. 

Here’s what I ate there whilst on my hen do last September - some events of that weekend did not make it into my permanent memory bank but this meal was not for forgetting. 

The tourist menu en ingles:

The main problem here is deciding what not to eat- it’s all so muy muy bueno.

The classic Spanish pre-meal staple of grilled bread- tomato and garlic rubbed and olive oil drizzled.

Squid ink croquettes, exterior shot

Squid ink croquettes on the inside - these bad boys had the consistency of creamy black pudding which is always going to float my boat.

The ubiquitous padron- old time followers of this blog will know just how enamoured I am with these finger-licking snacks.

Sliced mushrooms, gooey fresh figs, toasted pine nuts and shavings of Parmesan all drizzled with truffle oil.

Crispy beef wrapped up in a filo parcel, deep fried and topped with a tender caramelised hunk of squidgy foie gras that literally melted in the mouth.  This dish had us all in various states of ecstasy.

The super quaffable house vino

Mussels and prawns in a chilli garlic broth- the perfect bed fellow for your pane con tomate

That looks like tuna straight from the can, doesn’t it?  It’s not, it’s ridiculously generous chunks of foie gras atop a heap of green-chilli seasoned beef tartare.  Bar Del Pla really has a way with the foie.

Crunchy Spanish melba toast to spoon the tartare into your gob.

Pork: slow and low-cooked (12 hours from memory), melt-in-the-mouth consistency with a crackly crunchy coat, served with quince paste, dotted with aged balsamic and scattered with pine nuts.  The Iberian pig really has to be tasted to be believed, if you’re looking for a similar hog hit in the UK you’d have to go for a suckling pig, and I’m still not convinced it’s quite as good.

Whilst not having had visuals of BDP’s bill, I gather the prices are fair.   If you are venturing as a group you should ask for the marble bar/ table at the back where you can perch on stools and feast away in a slightly more secluded environment- good for rowdier bunches. 

This delectable selection of tapas were honestly some of the best I’ve had- albeit my ventures to Barcelona number a mere two but in those four days combined the City was sized-up pretty well.  Just to give you an idea of the eating offerings, the blonde and I were ‘forced’ to have two dinners each night when we were there in 2011.  Hard times. 

Bar del Pla, Placeta Montcada, 2  08003 Barcelona, Spain

Those after a more formal setting should hit-up their new restaurant, Pla.

Lady A-bout Town: April instalment

With a milestone birthday on the calendar, there has been a fair amount of feasting going down.  Consider this my ‘purge post’ if you will - because a calorie shared is a calorie halved, right?  Right.  So here’s what’s been gracing my plate over the past week:

Oyster selection with spicy wild boar mini sausages on the side at the super-opulent Scott’s restaurant in Mayfair, furnished with all the extravagance and comfort you would expect from a Caprice Holdings establishment and with eye-watering price points (just short of £5 for a plate of chips, sorry Daddy!).

Onwards and Eastwards to Hoxton’s hottest eatery, new kid on the block, Beagle.  Here The Blonde and I merrily ploughed our way through a plate of crisy fritto misto with punchy aioli, followed by a rare wing rib with duck fat chips, all washed down with anchovy-jus-spiked dirty martinis and a very quaffable bottle of Bobal (Spanish rouge). The kitchen is helmed by ex Rochelle Canteen chef, James Ferguson, who also trained under Angela Hartnet so you’re in for a culinary treat. More staff tattoos than you can shake a stick at - if you ain’t got inspirational ink, you’re not going on the Beagle payroll.

Incidentally, Beagle’s poached rhubarb with set cream looks pretty familiar, non?  Granted there are only a number of ways to present this dish and I’m not complaining when they both taste like a wobbly piece of heaven on a plate.

Now that Summer looks to be peeking her head over the parapet, these seem like an appropriate baking offering

Just dollop a spoonfull of vanilla sponge mix into your ice cream cone, bake for around 20 minutes, cool and pipe with buttercream frosting, spike with a 99 flake and go to town on your sprinkles and edible glitter.

Best eaten immediately as your cone wafer is an absorbent beast with a tendency to go stale quickly.

You might remember this dapper young fella on the right from the peanut butter Oreo snickers extravagance post earlier this year. 

He is the author of Feasting on Scraps and founder of Swamp Things, who had their first foray into pop-up Cajun/ Creole dining on Monday night at the Dead Dolls Club on Kingsland Road (E8). 

He served us up course after course of Louisiana loveliness - corn fritters (studded with healthy chunks of crawfish courtesy of the enigmatic sounding Crayfish Bob) with chilli jam & remoulade

followed chicken andouille with gumbo and rice, culminating in a mind-blowing pudding of beignets (mini doughnuts) with salted praline dipping sauce and a classy chicory cafe-au-lait mousse in three layers. Oh. My. Gosh.   The gumbo was topped with chicken crackling and Bloody Marys served by the pint. I’m counting down the days till the next event and you’d be wise to hop on this bandwagon.  Big things beckon.

Zucca Restaurant

Anyone after a leisurely Saturday of foodie heaven, real estate envy and mooching should take themselves for a stroll down London’s super chic Bermondsey Street, conveniently located a few minutes from Borough Market.  To borrow a phrase from Will.i.am, it’s the bomb dot com.  The line up of quality restaurants on this strada is second to none- you’ve got Jose Pizarro’s teeny tapas and sherry bar, Jose, at 104, as well as his fully-fledged Spanish restaurant, Pizarro (194 Bermondsey Street).  Newbie Italian, Antico, is at number 214 and Maltby Street Market and 40 Maltby Street are just around the corner.  There’s also the White Cube gallery for your contemporary art fix.  Look up and, Oh, there’s that Shard! Last, but certainly not least, is the don, the daddy, Zucca.

Oh Zucca, let me count the ways… elegant, seasonal and simplicity have become slightly cliched buzz-words for modern Italian dining but there’s a reason for this.  It’s a winning formula and if it ain’t broke… another of Zucca’s joys lies in their thoroughly affordable menu; on the latest visit there wasn’t a main course over £17. 

If one was to draw comparisons, I guess a more casual and approachable version of the River Cafe is as close as it gets.  There’s an open kitchen along one wall, light airy dining room and minimalist design, a specialty house olive oil and an ambient room housed above the restaurant where they smoke and cure their own meats (River Cafe actually has a cheese room - same, same, but different).

Here are some mouth-watering examples of their kitchen’s wares.

Zucca’s signature dish- Zucca fritti, battered and deep-fried sweet pumpkin encased in light salty batter with crispy sage leaves.  Unbelievable.  Also pictured, burrata with pappa al pomodoro (a sort of flavourful tomato-bread mush).  Utterly delicious and drizzled with their fabulous peppery house olive oil.

Next up, tagliatelle with gorgonzola, walnuts and cima di rapa all bound up in a delicious brodo-esque sauce that was simultaneously light and rich.  If such a thing is possible?

Followed by tender charred octopus with cianfotto (a caponata-style summer vegetable stew), capers and garlic with a scattering of mint, all doused in that delectable Zucca olive oil.

Also scoffed, but not featured photographically, was an amazing stew of monkfish, clams and ramson (wild garlic- tis the season). 

For pudding, it’s hard to resist their consistently stunning, wobbly, vanilla-flecked panacotta with poached rhubarb on the side.  Zucca’s version is so instantly recognisable and exemplary that, no sooner had I posted this photo to facebook, I had comments identifying the pud’s origins. 

Room for cheese?  6 varieties? Not a problem. 

The homemade crackers with fennel and pumpkin seeds and the puffed-up parmesan biscuit were a lovely touch and the thoughtful flavour details echoed bread we received at the beginning of the meal (not pictured).  This was some of the most incredible soda bread in the darkest shade of treacle and studded with walnuts.  The recipe is, regrettably, top secret and the bread not for retail.  The loyal waiting staff weren’t giving anything away but apparently it’s made with wine.  It’s a crying shame they don’t sell loaves as it would seriously complement the olive oil and take away wines which they do sell.  That, Zucca, is your only fault, other than this I have nothing but love for you. 

Zucca, 184 Bermondsey Street, London SE1 3TQ

Closed Sunday dinner and Monday all day

Rhubarb vanilla polenta shortbread

I came across this recipe in an old copy of Stella magazine, and with rhubarb in season I couldn’t resist shoehorning the shortbread into a hectic Sunday baking schedule spanning eight hours.  It hails from the American food writer Sarah Leahey Benjamin.  Whilst being billed as ‘shortbread’, in truth we’re talking more of a soft tart with crumble topping.  Titles asides, it is utterly divine.   Sarah specifies a rectangular baking tray but I fancied triangular slices, rather than chunky squares, hence use of the cake tin.  Serve alone or with vanilla-whipped mascarpone.

It’s worth cooking up extra rhubarb since the compote makes for a delicious breakfast paired with Greek yogurt and a sprinkling of granola.

Makes 12 slices

Ingredients:

250g fresh rhubarb

1 vanilla pod, sliced down the vertical

50g caster sugar (for rhubarb poaching)

1 tbsp lemon juice

250g salted butter

2 large egg yolks

100g caster sugar (for the pastry)

225g self-raising flour

25g polenta or semolina

20g Icing sugar

Top and tail your rhubarb

Slice and wash well

Put the rhubarb in a pan with the vanilla, sugar and a tablespoon of water.

Cook for around 10 minutes, or until softened.  Stir in the lemon juice and leave to cool a little

Beat the butter until light and creamy

Add the egg yolks, one at a time beating between each addition, and then the sugar.  Continue to beat until pale and well incorporated

Add the flour and polenta/ semolina and mix until the dough comes together, comme ca

Ball-up the dough into two pieces, cling film and refrigerate for half an hour

Meanwhile, turn your oven on to 180 degrees and line a 9 inch spring-form tin with tin foil and grease lightly

Grate one ball of pastry into the tart tin 

push into the tin with your fingers so that the base is completely and evenly covered

Spread over the rhubarb mix

Grate over the remaining ball of pastry (don’t pat this down, you want crumbly crunchy texture when it bakes)

Bake for around 40 minutes or until lightly golden on top

As soon as the tart is out of the oven, sieve over the icing sugar.

The steam from the shortbread will cause the sugar to turn into an icing of sorts

Leave to cool a little and slice up to serve

BBQ Whisky Beer at The Wargrave Arms

How’s everyone feeling post Easter?  Utterly done with chocolate?  Gradually weaning yourself off a potent combo of Gaviscon and Rennie, as per The Blonde?  Would you like some light, zesty, health-focused food refreshment?  Sorry, not going to happen.  Not on this blog.  As my Mum and I like to say, ‘it’s not over till it’s over’; a phrase that can pretty much be loosely applied to anything, but right now is being used in reference to a feasting season that just refuses to end.  I’d blame the current arctic climate, however I suspect that labrador-like greed has as much to do with it as anything.

And so it came to pass, that after four straight days of joyful over-consumption the blonde, the photographer and I rolled ourselves into to The Wargrave Arms to sample the delights of BBQ Whisky Beer’s latest clue-is-in-the-name pop-up. 

BBQ Whisky Beer originally started out in Shepherd’s Bush, but has since moved to a far more accessible W1 postcode, housed in a really good looking Young’s pub.

But enough about the scenery, this is what we were here for (in print)

(and in chalk)

We weren’t, on this occasion, here for the whisky, but should one feel that way inclined there’s plenty to choose from, as their name would suggest.

We started with a modest order of the following:

Baby back ribs

Chicken livers

And onion rings

The onion rings were perfection in batter, with a light crispiness that betrayed their true fat content, and we merrily crunched our way through a bowl of these moreish delights.  The ribs were tender with a nice whiskey-infused sauce that had you chasing  your finger round the plate to savour any excess.  Chicken livers were my number one with their minimalist coating of southern-fry batter, beautifully pink on the inside and offset with some fat piquant capers nonchalantly scattered into the bowl.

Just a casual light bar snack to get the digestive juices flowing.  Except, this lovely load was pretty much enough for a three person dinner. 

No matter.  Burger time.

Zooming in

This is what BBQ Whisky Beer refer to as the Beef Royal.  I’ve literally never seen a burger this large, it’s verging on comedic.  Featuring beef short rib, mushroom ketchup and onion rings, amongst the obligatory patty, bacon and cheese; there’s really very little that isn’t in this burger.

The one on the left is the rather more dainty (in relative terms) Classic Burger- 7oz patty, bacon and cheese, plus tomatoes and gherkins thrown in for good flavour measure.  It rocked my world until I got three quarters of the way through and collapsed back onto the sofa in total defeat.  That’s Iceberg Wedge looking all innocent in the background- blue cheese dressing, crispy bacon and croutons.  Chips are triple fried and rough around the edges for added texture and crispiness.  Some of the best out there.

Look at the burger juices go!  I heard a rumour somewhere online that they use beef with 30% fat for added ‘woah’ factor.  Let’s just say ignorance is, or was, bliss.

The Blonde’s BBQ pork number- pulled pork, burger, cheese, bacon and coleslaw.  This photo was taken before the point at which he remarked, ‘I’m just uncomfortably forcing things down now’, threw in the towel and requested a doggy bag.

Needless to say, after these show-stoppers we couldn’t really face pudding.  However, I have it on reliable authority that the brownie with peanut butter ice cream is to die for.  Whether or not that is meant literally remains to be seen, but going on the awesome items we sampled on Tuesday (ostentatious though they were in portion size), I’d be willing to take the risk.  Plus we never got round to trying the chicken wings.  For shame. 

BBQ Whisky Beer, we are not done yet- it’s not over till it’s over.  We will be back.

The Wargrave Arms, 40-42 Brendan Street, London W1H 5HE

Some photos courtesy of Jonny Lee Photography

Every Meal Matters: Supper Club Supreme

Before delving into this post I should apologise for my temporary awol status on the blog.  It would be great to say that this is due to some crazy-hectic-important life I’m now leading, mais non.  The truth of the matter is that I’ve gone over to the dark side, the world of crystal meth.  I’m hooked.  Purely in a televisual capacity, you understand; Breaking Bad, has literally taken over my life. This means that nights that should, in theory, be dedicated to Lady Aga, or indeed socialising, have been spent lounging on the sofa with the blonde, gazing dreamily into the eyes of the man I love, Jesse Pinkman

You get it, yo?

Anyway, now that we’ve got that dirty confession out of the way and we can all move on, let’s blog (bitch).

So Twitter celebrated its seventh birthday last week.  It therefore seems fitting to partially credit the microblogging network for a ridiculously good dinner I had the pleasure of manging on the eve of Comic Relief.  Whilst Twitter did not whip up a delectable Italian themed four course feast complete with aperitif in 140 characters, he/she/it did introduce me to the awesome Every Meal Matters (@LondonNed); a fellow North Yorkshire lass and North London resident who set up her food blog around the same time that Lady Aga was birthed.  Twitter, for this social facilitation I shall ever be grateful.

Every Meal Matters had taken on the somewhat daunting task of putting up and catering for 8 complete strangers in her own home, all in the name of charity.  The meal was beyond brilliant and the crescendo that was pudding… Bon Dieu, I’ve been telling anyone that will listen about that dessert.  Total death row dish.

After a couple of bellinis in her sitting room, we moved into the cozy candlelit garage for canape of pizette bianca.  Served up on boards with pizza wheels for that whole get-stuck-in vibe which always helps in social situations. 

Lightly charred and crisp to popping-in-the-mouth perfection all offset with creamy melting mozzarella, thyme and red onion.  Such a good way to kick things off- you just know when the pre-munch is this good you’re in for a serious gastronomic treat.

And so we were.  Next up was red pepper and goats cheese risotto

Followed by daube of pork cheeks with homemade tagliatelle.  The cheeks had been sozzled in red wine for twenty four hours prior to their slow cook session and were meltingly tender as a result. 

The tagliatelle was perfection and I’m always going to have mad food envy for anyone who can be bothered to make their own pasta.

We’d been happily sinking rouge for duration of the meal but at this point we suddenly found ourselves with three glasses in hand - dessert wine, champagne and grappa (a combination that could give the jagerbomb a run for its money).

Just as you thought things couldn’t possibly get any better, pud, aka the dreamboat, arrived.   Billed enigmatically as an Italian Eggstravaganza, we really had no idea what we were in for, which only served to heighten anticipation of the culinary genius that would soon be thrust upon us.

Homemade Easter eggs filled with tiramisu and panacotta with mango and lemon coulis served in egg shells.  The idea, for the former, being that you and four others (there were two eggs for our table) break off chunks of the shiny tempered chocolate and scoop away to your hearts content at the boozy tiramisu within.  For the shell-served vanilla-flecked panacotta we were provided with a diddy teaspoon for scooping out the wobbly cream.

Um, have you ever seen anything quite so cool and cute?

Except for, well, y’know

I digress.

This magnificent meal was available for a suggested donation of £25 with our super generous host laying out for all ingredients (no Northern pockets here), all we had to do was show up with booze. And then eventually leave (at 1.45am, oops).

For further details on the culinary logistics of this mega meal, see the host’s take.

Tartiflette

Seeing as this winter chill shows no signs of abating, one might as well seek solace in the holy trinity of savoury comfort food:  cheese, carb and pig.  Those lucky enough to get up a snowy mountain this skiing season can enjoy the real alpine deal in the form of tartiflette- a rich, bubbling bake of waxy potatoes, salty lardons and heaps of molten reblochon.   For the rest of us, stuck back in grey, damp and significantly less scenic UK, here’s a slightly bastardised version that should warm your cockles nonetheless.  Batten down the hatches and pair with a generous glass of rouge

Serves 2

6 rashers smoked streaky bacon

1 tbsp oil

1 tbsp butter

1 onion, or two sticks of celery, finely chopped

3 cloves garlic, chopped

2 tbsp plain flour

75ml white wine or a hefty splash of dry sherry or vermouth

400ml milk

120g strong (to the point of offensive) cheese; the Gorgonzola dolce I used had been our fridge resident for a good three months; his time had come

400g potatoes (Maris Piper are a classic), peeled and sliced to around half a centimetre thickness

Handful flat leaf parsley, roughly chopped

Handful fresh Parmesan/ Grana Padano, or any hard cheese, grated

Lay your bacon on a baking sheet (lined if you want to save on washing up), and cook until crispy, remove from the oven and leave to cool

Meanwhile, heat your oil and butter in a small Le Creusset-style heavy based casserole pan and fry your onion/ celery until softened (about 5 minutes)

Stir in the garlic and cook for a further minute

Stir in the flour, cook for a minute

Gradually pour in your wine, stirring all the time, to make the beginnings of your roux sauce

Do the same with the milk and keep stirring until you have a thick bechamel

Add the cheese and stir or whisk until melted and smooth

By now your bacon should have cooled enough to handle…

Chop with scissors of a sharp knife and add to the sauce with your peeled and sliced potatoes

Stir in your parsley and sprinkle over the parmesan

Bake at 220degrees for around 40 minutes, or until bronzed and bubbling.  You might want to check that the potatoes are cooked but still retaining a certain amount of bite

Revel in the creamy deliciousness and serve alongside a crisp green salad