CHRISTMAS!

Hands up who has a tin of Quality Street in their house at Christmas? Me!

Quality Street signifies the festive season over any other chocolate and reminds me of trees, presents, my grandad pinching all the penny toffees (well, someone’s got to eat them). Which is is why I felt it important to start cracking them open a few weeks ago, to help get me in the Christmassy mood you see. I find it fascinating that everyone’s favourite Quality Street is different (OK when I write that it sounds so obvious) but they’re just never the same. I bet every family has a different couple of ones left at the bottom of the tin that no-one wants. Prime example, quick straw poll of my family reveals -  my mum’s favourite - the toffee, coconut (really, mum?) and fudge. My best friend’s – strawberry cream and green triangle. Mine – green chocolate block, solid chocolate orange block and caramel. See – fascinating (what do you mean you don’t care?)

Fact for you. Did you know Quality Street is a whopping 75 years old this year? What I love about the brand is that it’s kept it’s British roots and nostalgic associations but has managed to modernise and appeal to youngsters. Take the green chocolate block sweet you now find in the tins. You wouldn’t have found that in the tin twenty years ago would you? I also love how Mackintosh, the British owners of Quality Street, has capitalised on the popularity of its most famous sweets like the ‘big purple one’ or the ‘green triangle’ and created larger, individual versions of these sweets. Harry Wallop from the Telegraph recently visited the Quality Street factory which sounds like a chocolate fanatic’s  DREAM, I highly recommend you read the article here.

I also recommend you pick up one of these tins for Christmas, as the festive season just wouldn’t be the same without it. You can find some brand spanking new 75th anniversary ones in store at the moment and Tesco, Asda and Sainsbury’s often sell them for £4 or £5 which, quite frankly, is bargain for a necessary element of Christmas if you ask me.

…let it be a bag of Asda Extra Special roast pork and crackling crisps.  Let’s face it though, who the hell buys just one bag of crisps at Christmas? If you’re as much of a crisp addict as my family, it’s probably at least six, if not 10 sharing bags. Best to be prepared for whenever unannounced guests call in of course (by unannounced guests I mean my stomach FYI).

These are actually some of the best crisps I’ve ever tasted in my life, words can’t describe the deliciously flavoursome flavour on them. I’m not even going to attempt to explain how good they are as I don’t think I could do them justice, I think you all just need to pop down to Asda and buy a bag or three for yourselves. You’ll see what I mean once you place one of these crisp, crunchy, salty roast pork flavour crisps on your tongue. I guarantee you’ll finish the bag in one go.

As a foodie PR and blogger living in London I’m constantly amazed at the amount of tapas bars we have. I’m probably more aware of this than most as two of my wine clients (Wines from Rioja and Tio Pepe) match particularly well with tapas so this food stuff is a constant source for generating ideas. My agency recently teamed up one of my clients, Wines from Rioja, with the London Restaurant Festival to bring Londoners the ‘Tapas Tour’, designed to recreate traditional Spanish style bar hopping that’s typical to Logroño, the capital of Rioja. This got me thinking about just how many tapas bars we have in London, in particular, Soho, and why we just can’t seem to get enough of the Spanish cuisine.

The premise of the ‘Tapas Tour’ was that you ‘bar hop’ around five of Soho’s best tapas restaurants tasting the speciality tapas dish of each bar matched with a glass of Rioja. Soho really is the new ‘Spanish Quarter’ as tucked away in its little back streets you can find tapas bars such as Fernandez and Wells, Brindisa Soho, Pix, Copita and Barrica, with Iberico a tad further up north, astonishing if you think about the fact that these are basically within a square mile of one another.

Why is there such an appetite for so many tapas bars so close to one another, and why do we love tapas so much? Personally, I love the relaxed atmosphere and the fact that each bar has its own feel and identity.

You can either pop in for a quick drink and some habas fritas on your way to somewhere, or alternatively you can dig your heels in for the night and slowly work your way down the wine and sherry list, ordering copious plates of tapas alongside.

I love the intensity of flavours and the fact that it’s not just acceptable, rather, encouraged, to pick as many dishes as you like. I’m such an indecisive orderer and I feel now, more than ever, we live in a world where we want everything. One of my main struggles when going out to eat is settling on just one dish to order and I find myself a victim of food envy on a daily basis. Go out to dinner with me and you’ll be met by the dreaded ‘why don’t we order these two dishes and we can share’ or ‘can I have a few bites of yours’ or ‘are you going to finish that?’ On the other side, can you imagine the indecisive me rocking up to my local pub and saying “please can I order, just for myself, the fish and chips, the steak and kidney pie, the roast, the meat platter and a burger as I just fancy a bit of everything?” I’d imagine I’d be met with looks of disbelief and also a question asking if I’d like to be rolled out of the place. But in a tapas bar this is acceptable. You can say, “yes please, I would like the padrón peppers, the whitebait, the chorizo, the veal cheeks, the patatas bravas and the ibérico pork” and the waiter will look at you with approval rather than as if you were a massive fatty. You are not being greedy, rather, you have an appreciation for great food.

The premise of tapas is that, yes, you get small portions, but the dishes are freshly made with the best ingredients, and actually now, we’re prepared to pay for the best and relish doing so. On paper you pay £20 for a plate of ham. But in a tapas bar you pay £20 for a plate of the finest Jamón ibérico from acorn fed pigs, where the saltiness of the ham cuts through the fat to create a taste explosion in your mouth. We all know you can’t do great tapas cheaply (have you ever been to La Tasca?) so the point is that we get quality food for the money we do spend, and we opt to pay for it. I particularly find it interesting that in spite of the recession tapas bars are continuing to open all over the place, rather than close. In a recession we like to treat ourselves but it really interests me that there is more of an appetite for eating out in tapas bars – is it because there’s always the option of spending under a tenner on a small sharing dish rather than having to fork out for a whole meal? I slightly disprove my own theory however this as when I go to a tapas bar intending to just have a little nibble I then get swayed by the smell and sight of other people’s dishes so end up spending a small fortune.

And if I were to recommend one tapas bar to go to? Copita (opened in October) wins hands down for me at the moment, even though I know José is very en-vogue with all the food bloggers/ food industry (indeed, just as an FYI, when I visited recently I spotted Angela Hartnett). For me, Copita is roomier than José but still manages that authentic Spanish feel to perfection with beautiful tiles and wooden benches. I highly recommend going there if alone for the amazing goat’s cheese and pea croquettes and a beautiful melt in your mouth pork dish that the Chef brought out to us (compliments of course – the PR card works every time). I’m already planning my next visit (and not forgetting my PR hat, washed down with a glass of Rioja).

I quite like pickle but I’m not a pickle obsessive. I don’t mind a touch of pickle in a ham sandwich but truth be told, I’d choose a nice chutney over pickle any day. I do however recognise that there are a lot of pickle nuts out there, people that are truly obsessed with the brand. That’s why I think Branston is on to a winner with its new Branston Peanuts and Crackers. They’ve followed suit in the steps of Marmite and Levi Roots and ventured into the nut market. Everyone loves a nice bag of nuts which is why I think these strong flavoured food brands are on to a winner by venturing into the nut sector – they tap into their existing audience whilst reaching out to a new nut based one.

So what do they taste like? Like I said I’m not a massive pickle fan but wanted to try them out of curiosity. To be honest, I thought the crunch of the peanut against the pickle flavour wasn’t going to work as pickle is used for spreading so by logic shouldn’t be spread over nuts. Weird. I wasn’t too sure about them in the first few mouthfuls, it took a while to adjust to the pickley flavour, but I ended up devouring the bag within ten minutes (I was pissed allright?) and now I’m officially a convert. Go pickle. These things are officially on my snack radar now, which is a pretty good thing to be on I tell you.

You will of course have noticed the recent bite in the air . The chill in the morning when you leave for work when all you want to do is retreat under the covers and stay there all day and watch episodes back to back of 24, Don’t Tell the Bride and CSI Miami. I for one noticed Autumn was arriving when I had the urge to make my delicious sweet potato and butternut squash soup, the perfect Autumnal meal. Filling, bright orange and dirt cheap, could you get a better soup? Well yes – pea and mint. But that’s more of a summer soup so we won’t talk about that. So please find below for my heart warming bright orange soup, and please excuse the picture. One of our lights is broken and our landlord is rubbish so hasn’t got round to fixing it (it broke about 2 months ago) so it looks weird. Also it just occurred to me that this soup would make a good starter for a Halloween dinner party.

Bright Orange Sweet Potato and Butternut Squash Soup

Ingredients:
1 HUGE (if not huge lots of little) sweet potato
1 butternut squash
Few carrots
1 onion
3 chicken stock cubes
Boiling water
Salt and pepper
Few pinches of nutmeg

Method
1) Boil a kettle to the top while carrying out step two
2)  Peel and chop the sweet potato, butternut squash and carrots and onion
3) Pour boiling water into a large saucepan/ casserole dish and bung all of the veg in with the stock cubes, nutmeg and seasoning
4) Leave to simmer for about 30-40 minutes, checking occasionally
5) Use a handheld blender/mixer and whizz while it’s in the pan (but obvs off the heat), blending until nearly smooth but has a few lumps in for texture
6) Leave to simmer for 5 more minutes
7) Serve alongside some lovely homemade crusty granary bread (or from the in-house bakery at your nearest supermarket) and proper butter

I took this with my phone so it looks rank but it's truly delicious & a lovely bright orange colour in real life

So, Alex James has launched a new range of cheeses for Asda. Unless you’ve been in a cheeseless cave somewhere for the past month you will of course already know this. Prior to launching his collection for Asda Alex James won awards for his cheeses Little Wallop and Blue Monday and sees himself as somewhat of a cheese connoisseur. Which is why so many were so surprised when he launched his range for Asda. Unsurprisingly the range has been slated by food critics for appealing to the mass market and including flavours such as tomato ketchup cheese and tikka massala. It’s not just the flavours the critics object to though – it’s the production of cheese into blankets and cube form, meant for heating, spreading and pouring on jacket potatoes and toast that really get these lot’s backs up. Just check out Xanthe Clay’s Telegraph article and The Independent’s review to get an idea of the strong flavour of objections out there.

I suspect none of this coverage (good or bad) has harmed sales of Alex James’ new range and Asda, ever the brilliant PRs, were quick to respond to critics describing them as ‘cheese snobs.’ Asda has hit this nail on the head, foodies and food snobs aren’t going to buy into this range  - Asda’s customers aren’t looking for the best ever cheese, they’re looking for fun things that appeal to their children and flavours like tomato and ketchup are obviously going to.

And what’s my take on the cheese range? I’m not a massive fan of the packaging. It’s pretty dull and the navy blue colour doesn’t really reflect cheese nor its appeal to kids and families which is a bit of a shame. I can only gather that by choosing this look Asda were going for more of an upmarket vibe, but have they got this wrong if they’re trying to appeal to the average cheese eater on the street? Obviously priced at £2 a packet it’s not going to be the best cheese in the world but I liked Alex’s Best Ever Mature Chedder and the Cheddar and Sweet Chilli flavour definitely added a great kick to my omelettes (see the half eaten pack above). It doesn’t really matter what I think however as I’m not really Asda’s target market – you’ve got to take the range at face value as these sorts of flavours will be popular with families. Combined with the talkability factor surrounding the launch I reckon this range will have already been a success for Asda.  As Alex Bradbury, Cheese Buyer at Asda said in their press release (I never quote releases but I couldn’t help myself) “We jumped at the chance to make something fun that customers wouldn’t have seen before and are delighted that Alex chose us to launch his first widely available range – it’s a real a-cheesement for the team here.” Love it.

I used to eat Snackajacks regularly. I’m not sure why as they taste like cardboard and sort of used to squeak on my teeth. That was a couple of years ago though when there was little alternative for women who wanted a crisp based snack after their lunch but without tonnes of calories. This year I’ve been eating lots of popcorn, it’s pretty on trend at the moment. First I tried out Diva, which I feel is the popcorn equivalent of Snackajacks (ie. dusted with lots of flavour and a weird texture) but I haven’t seen this on sale for love nor money anywhere in London. Then I went through a stage of MetCalfe’s Skinny popcorn, you know the sort you see in Pret. Which is pretty good quality, and you just get SO much for so little calories.

Now, provided I can see them on sale somewhere in London – which I haven’t so far I have to say, my new thing is Pitta Chips. Being a snack connoisseur I’ve tried these out before in America. America is so ahead of England in terms of snack based products and they’ve had pitta chips for years. But now we have them. From Warburtons. See what they’ve done? Warburtons = bread. Bread = pitta. Pitta = pitta chips. What a nice way for Warburtons to break into the snack market.

Pitta chips are exactly what they say in the name. They’re triangles (in America they’re squares) of pitta bread. That are baked. They’re pretty good for dipping too. Think Doritoes but less grease. I’d suggest Warburton’s Sea Salt and Cracked Black Pepper flavour alongside some hummus for a ‘healthy’ snack (ie. better than crisps but you’re not going to shed the pounds if you tuck into a vast amount of these every day).  64p for a 40g pack and £1.79 for 150g sharing pack available from I’m not sure where but if you see them on sale anywhere let me know.

…A giant one! I got sent a lovely, chewy, rather large cookie by a friend of a friend who’s just set up her own giant cookie company, which was immensely pleasing to get delivered to my desk let me tell you. I read an article recently that commented ‘every bored house wife nowadays seems to set up a cupcake company’. I can’t remember who wrote it but it is so true. Cupcakes are so 2008. I feel like something new needs to hit the bakery world. Macaroons, mini macaroons, whoopie pies… they were all tipped to be the next best thing but I just don’t think these ever really took off in the way the cupcake craze did. Plus, apparently (not that I’ve tried as far too labour intensive) they’re all super tricky to make. Anyhoo, this giant cookie idea seems like a pretty good one to me, and original. And, the owner sends them out to the armed forces, a definite USP. Giant cookies tipped to be the craze of 2011 I reckon.

This post isn’t as depressing as it sounds. I struggle quite a lot to come up with cheap, imaginative, healthy dinners for myself, and as such, my meals in comparison to the girls at work are perceived as pretty random. We’re all obsessed with food therefore always discuss what we ate the night before or what we’ll be eating for dinner that evening. My colleagues usually come up with delicious sounding food stuffs such as stuffed peppers, amazing combinations of salad with feta cheese, sausage casserole, mezze plates etc etc, you get my drift. The interesting thing is, that these people all cook for more than one person. The contrast between their meals and mine are huge. I just cook for little old me every evening you see and my problem is that by the time I get in from a hard day’s work via the gym, I’m absolutely ravenous. I therefore tend to nail a slice of seeded bread as soon as I get in before my stomach eats itself.

I like to cook something thats healthy, cheap, and made from scratch, with minimal fuss. I will also NEVER touch a ready meal. They just make me feel sick with their processed meat (please note I do not look down on you if you consume such meals, rather this is a personal preference). I also find buying food for one is pretty expensive. for example, five chicken breasts works out cheaper per portion than a pack of two. But who has that need to consume five chicken breasts before the sell by date? It’s not as if freezing it for in a couple of weeks time is an option – our miniscule freezer is as jam packed as a bunch of Eskimos in an igloo.

See my problems?? Due to the above I usually end up consuming one the following combinations for dinner:

• Half a carton of lentil/tomato and basil soup with a boiled egg
• Half a carton of lentil/tomato and basil soup with a side salad
• Half a carton of lentil/tomato and basil soup with corn on the cob
• 2 egg omelette with side salad
• 2 egg omelette with broad beans
• 1 or 2 fishcakes with side salad with half a slice of seeded bread (if it’s half a slice then it’s as if I haven’t had it.)

Anyway, it was around my fourth night in a row of having an omelette when the girls at work insisted enough was enough – I had to broaden my horizons. That day I made a vow to be more adventurous with my ways and that very evening made a Spanish style omelette as suggested by the girl that sits opposite me. I microwaved a sweet potato and chopped into small wedges. I then whisked two eggs with a dash of milk, peas and seasoning. I then made an omelette and half way through cooked added the sweet potato. It was delish and very filling – much more than my usual omelette options.

Since then I’ve tried to be a bit more adventurous with my salads too. E.g. going for little gem lettuce instead of iceburg, and also mixing with broad beans and peas (with balsamic and olive oil) to make a yummy warm salad. The other night I even had some sweet potato and smoked haddock flavour soup. It was equally as delicious as the Spanish style omelette and much more exciting than lentil flavour. See, times are changing. The News of the World has closed, Rebecca Brooks has been sacked, I’ve eaten haddock soup and now have warm salads in the evenings. The next thing you know I’ll be eating rocket* instead little gem.

* NB I’ve always had a huge hatred of rocket

I present to you: the best chocolate products on the shelves at the moment. This month I’ve been busy testing out all the latest chocolate based goods in the name of ‘research’. Obviously you guys clearly are unable to test out chocolate products yourselves *coughs* so I had to do all of the taste testing for you (yes I know I’m supposed to be on a diet..)

First up is Dorset Cereals. I love Dorset Cereals as a brand and their packaging makes me totally buy into them (I’ve raved about their cereals bars in a previous blog post). Opening this box of chocolate granola and macadamia nuts is like unwrapping a birthday present – you know it’s presented beautifully but you don’t give a sh*t about the wrapping paper as you just want what’s inside. Sweet baby Jesus -when you rip away the packaging the whiff of chocolate is enough to make you want to pour the entire box of cereal right down your throat there and then. Just the thing if you are looking for a ‘naughty’ cereal at the weekend, there are no actual chocolate chunks -rather a general flavour of chocolate weaved through plenty of oats and macadamia nuts. During the height of my obsession with this cereal I was partial to half a mug of it as a little after dinner snackette (not ideal when trying to ‘healthy eat’.) The cereal gets a bit softer with the milk and the chocolate blends perfectly. I find now it’s best I buy it ocassionally otherwise I’d literally eat it all day if I could. You can also get Dorset Cereal chocolate and macadamia granola bars and I’ve just seen a marmalade granola which I’ll definitely be trying out. YUM. You can buy a box of this great stuff from Sainsbury’s, Waitrose and Dorset Cereals themselves (£4.79 RRP).

One rainy June afternoon a chocolate sandwich happened upon my desk, which, I suspect, made me colleague of the week. The girls sitting on my desk swarmed around this as if Mr Darcy had just walked in the door. It was as if Maison Blanc had created this chocolate sandwich especially for me just to give me an afternoon treat. It’s basically like sweet bread dusted in icing sugar with a chocolate filling inside (just like Nutella). Delicious. But so chocolatey I would definitely advise sharing it with someone. You also get a few berries on side which add in a fruit portion. You can visit any Maison Blanc and gobble one of these down for £5.95. And I highly recommend you do. Please see below for the official pic of the chocolate sandwich and the pic I took. Please note we were so excited to eat this I only remembered to take a pic once a colleague reminded me to hence how demolished it looks.

Before

um...after

Another appearance from my mum in this post as she bought this ice-cream during one of my visits home. Waitrose’s seriously creamy white chocolate ice-cream is seriously good. Usually retailing at £3.45 for a 500ml tub, it’s on offer for 2 for £4.00 at the moment so I suggest you stock up. It’s probably a good job it’s on offer as you’ll need two tubs once you get your teeth into this. Deliciously chocolately and smooth, I would say it’s now actually at the top of my list of favourite ice-creams. Next on my list to try is Heston for Waitrose’s salted caramel popcorn flavour – I’ll let you know what it tastes like.