The game season is in full swing and hopefully everyone has enjoyed a pheasant or two so far this season. They are easy to come by and if like me you prefer to cook the breast and legs separately, then this recipe is an ideal one to use up the pheasant legs that have accumulated during the season.

You will be pleasantly surprised how much meat is on a pheasant’s leg, quite a lot once it’s cooked well and you flake the meat from the bone. The leg meat can be quite dry and mixing it with the drunken prunes and sausagemeat, turns it into delicious succulent little snacks.

The reason I call these ‘pheasants on horseback’ is because ‘devils on horseback’ are prunes soaked in either brandy or Armagnac, then wrapped in bacon. In this case, I have gone a step further and combined the drunken prunes with the cooked pheasant meat, and there you have it, ta da!

All those years of being in the company of my mother’s boring pre-Christmas dinner parties has finally paid off, as the inspiration for these came from one of those tedious chores of sitting by the kitchen table wrapping prunes in bacon.

They say that retro classics are back, in this case with a breath of new life.

They are ideal for lunch boxes, picnics or served as a snack at a drinks parties. Steve makes these every day so his hand is very well trained by now shaping and making them. Shaping the pasties takes a bit of practice, it’s good fun and you can encourage the whole family to get involved. If you like the look of them make a large enough batch, freeze the raw pasties in layers divided with parchment paper and defrost the amount you need as and when required. I recommend that you defrost them completely before cooling in the fridge over night.

To create the pasty shape you need to cut a large enough circular piece of pastry, we use a good quality puff pastry, then spoon a generous amount of mix in the centre of the pastry, brush the edges with egg yolk and then fold the pastry in half to create a half moon shape. Crimp the rounded edge by pinching the pastry to create a scalloped edge. Once shaped let them rest in the fridge for about an hour before baking. This will ensure the pastry rests and prevents it from losing its shape when baking.

You can create your own flavour combination for the filling. If you are using meat and making the pasties this small I recommend you cook the meat first, and ensure the mix is as dry as possible to prevent it from leaking. If using cheese choose a strong tasting cheese, the cheddar we used is mighty strong, it’s too strong to eat neat however once cooked and mixed into something it’s perfect and very tasty indeed.

Other flavour combinations that will be just as tasty:

• Broccoli, Walnut and Stilton (use raw broccoli, finely chopped, mix in a generous amount of crumbed stilton and toasted crumbed walnuts)
• Curried Lamb and Swede (use lamb mince that is cooked with curry spices and plenty of grated swede, once the cooked mix is cooled stir in a few spoons of thick mango chutney)
• Fennel, Apple Chutney and Rocket (finely shaved fennel; mix with apple chutney and mix in chopped rocket leaves)
• Ras-al-hanout, Spiced Butternut Squash and Chickpea (grated butternut squash, add soaked sultanas, ras-al-hanout and roughly crushed chickpeas, stir in some tahini paste a spoon of honey add a dash of lemon juice)
• Chicken, Sage and Celeriac (roast chicken finely flaked - brown and white meat mixed - grated celeriac, chopped fresh sage and plenty of grain mustard)

I came up with two recipes for the use of our assignment of cod’s cheeks. One is a “cheeky sandwich” and the other is ”crispy cod’s cheek nugget salad”. The salad and vegetables are from Maple Farm, an organic farm a few miles from the British Larder that produces the most amazing ingredients with a very diverse range.

For both these recipes the cod’s cheeks were coated in either a batter or a crust and then deep fried. The crisp exterior biting into the soft flaky interior makes these little gems rather delicious. It’s a challenge for us to sell these dishes as most people find the thought not as appetizing as I find it interesting. However, perseverance, creative thinking and dish compilation made these two dishes a winner here at the British Larder.

Maple farm is a magical place. A farmer’s dream and a cook’s heaven. From chickens that lay fresh eggs to organic spelt and flour, salad leaves and organic pig. If it can or could be grown or produced organically then they will do so.

Their little farm shop that operates on an honesty basis is usually packed with the finest eggs, perky fresh salad leaves and an array of other organic vegetable, flour and spelt grain and last but not least a freezer stocked with pig.

We love baking with Maple Farm eggs; the yolks are such a vibrant yellow colour that one might be mistaken that food colouring might have been involved.

Moving to Suffolk always was and still is about the quality of ingredients on offer. We made it our business to move into a region unknown to us and to adapt, absorb and work with the local area. It’s not always been an easy ride however after 10 months we can safely say we still feel the same drive as when we first moved here. We have met some fantastic people along the way and Mark Hayward from Dingley Dell has taken us “under his wing” and supported and helped us along the way. He has also in an indirect way helped us firmly confirm our ethos and what the British Larder stands for.

Dingley Dell farm is no more 2.5 miles from us and and having this high quality ingredient so close provides that all important reassurance we require to ensure that we have made the right choice. We are continuously working with Mark either on new recipes or new concepts. Dingley Dell is a Freedoms Food approved farm and has consequently introduced us to the wonderful world of Freedom Foods. We are proud to say that we take part in the Freedoms Foods Simply Ask campaign and tick six boxes in the freedom food categories of high animal welfare! That is stupendously impressive. We are working hard to tick the final three.

I have a conscience and certainly do not want it to be a guilty one!

Well it all just simply makes sense. I would not serve yet alone work with ingredients where I know an animal might have suffered. Why should my customers have to eat it? I make it my business to know where our food comes from and I know that our customers trust that we take animal welfare and indeed customer welfare to heart. We are also serious about food miles; the closer and more local the better for us.

It’s not always easy as these ingredients sometimes cost more due to not being mass bread, as they are usually from small independent businesses. Ross and I made a promise to support small local producers, farmers and suppliers as we believe that our penny and pound spend  in the county we live in will boost the local economy and those farmers, producers and suppliers can become stronger, develop and consequently deliver better quality and standards for our customers to enjoy. It’s all one vicious circle and it’s hard to stay inside and do the hamster run with it, but most importantly we must not fall out, keep working at it and persevere. So no foie grass for us then!

These magical scotch eggs are perhaps the single most popular dish here at the British Larder. We have a scotch egg for every season. During the game season the Dingley dell smoked ham are substituted for either venison or pheasant scotch egg.

Our secret to the perfect scotch egg is simple:

1. Use free range organic eggs, large preferably

2. Cook the eggs for 7 minutes and dunk them immediately in ice water after 7 minutes

3. Make sure the sausage meat mixture on the outside is tasty, well seasoned and contains the best ingredients you can find.

Simple! The magical scotch egg…done!

There is a very true saying that all good things take time to create and nurture. Well these two recipes will certainly test your patience - and they did test mine! I’m a bit impatient and want everything to have happened yesterday. Well I had to wait two weeks for these pickled eggs to be pickled and the pork scratchings also need 5 days salting before anything else can be done with them.

To create and complete these two recipes required a lot of reading, testing and eating. The fact of the matter is that there’s not much written word about pickled eggs; hence us making up our own, whereas on the other hand pork scratchings had a lot of references. The panel of tasters, developers and testers consist of James who lead the project and did the most of the doing, Tall Dan (he boiled the eggs), Skinny Dan (mainly eating the pickled eggs), Steve, Ross and myself (the three wise ones). Actually I just do the delegating, talking and eating and the rest are doing the deed! Well I’m a girl who knows what I like so they had to do it until we liked it! Simples!

We tried and tested several versions of the scratchings - 8 month’s worth to be honest. However, finally the literary word that won the taste test was the incredibly well-written Pork Scratchings, A Version Of by Fergus Henderson & Justin Piers Gellatly from ‘Beyond Nose To Tail’. We did however put our own twist on this well created recipe as one does, but the principle of the recipe remains the same.

The pickled eggs are kept in a pickle laden with spice so the pork scratchings had to follow suit.

We highly recommend both these recipes and sell the dishes with pride at the British Larder, however it must come with a health warning. “Consume responsibly in small quantities as sensitive teeth might suffer and a slightly tired heart and well-lived body might feel the strain if consumed in large, lavish quantities.” Or if you have a life motto like mine, “eat and enjoy, you only live once!”

My palate always used to be known as a good one, I had the privilege to taste the food in the restaurant as I was the only lady in the kitchen at that time. They said a woman’s palate is more refined and finely tuned. I loved every moment of the “glory” as I managed to taste nearly everything we served. It honed my palate and made me a very interesting chef. I was looking for perfection with the desire to taste every ingredient and it had to be  perfect otherwise it would have not passed my taste bud test. So I felt privileged that I was not only  learning the very best tricks of the trade but I had something that no one else had at that time in that Michelin kitchen, that’s pretty spectacular. It was so finely tuned that when I went on a wine tasting and palate identification course I guessed 50 out of 50 of the ingredients we had to taste, the gentleman was bemused and lost for words.

These sweeties are pretty special but at the same time I think they are an acquired taste. I planted the camomile bush in my garden two years ago but overtime I had forgotten what it was as the tag had disappeared. Only when Mum came to visit last year she pointed out that it was camomile.  It makes me laugh as I’m so forgetful and a real plonker at the best of times but what a lovely find. When we moved to Suffolk we brought most of our unusual herbs along and luckily this time we tagged them all, just to avoid the confusion.

The smoking process is a interesting but equally tricky one. Suffolk is known for it’s wonderful smoke houses and there are plenty of them around. All with their own style and their own interesting smoked items.

The smoking process for these pears must be controlled, if you smoke the pears too much it will overpower the rest of the flavours and consequently if you to serve it at the end of a meal it could be a bit too strong. Serve them as petit fours or bag them up in pretty see- through cellophane bags and give them as a gift, it makes a pretty decent treat.

It might seem as if I wish my life away but what I’m actually doing is being prepared, one step in front and trying to not be stressed when it’s time to show my wares.

As a matter of fact I’m involved with drinks and canapé events all the year round so the need for inspiration and creativity is a constant demand.

I’m busy compiling another of my chef’s tips and fact sheets similar to the ones on gelatine and agar agar, this time it’s about espumas / culinary foams. Normally the information and techniques are in my head but the whole idea behind the British Larder is for me to share my knowledge and skill so that others can play and do it themselves. I find this immensely satisfying and rewarding.

Most chefs might cringe at the thought of a cheese foam as they think it’s passé; but then I’m so pleased food is subjective and it works for me. It’s a technique developed in my cooking era, something not  from the Larousse and a technique I think that will last for a while and will make it’s mark on the culinary map.

I have chosen to use Montgomery cheddar for this cheesy foam as it’s strong, packs a punch and a very little goes a long way. The crispy bacon adds a meaty smoky saltiness to this delicious canapé the only thing missing is a glass of bubbly! Salute!

We arrived at  1am and with only 1 1/2 hours sleep we were both slightly delirious, it was a bitterly cold morning and one found it rather difficult to believe it was spring. As you can see  some of my photos were slightly shaky, I’m not one hundred percent sure if that is down to me shivering due to the cold or the lack of sleep or  too much coffee, it could be  a combination of all three.

Anyhow we had fun and that was the main aim, we cooked three delicious recipes and it was a sheer joy to watch the “locals”, market stall holders and customers tucking in. It was convincing enough and our tactics worked as some customers were inspired to go and buy boxes of asparagus.

The arrival of the British asparagus season is a joyous one as it’s almost an indication that summer is on it’s way. British Asparagus is classed as the best in the world and is corroborated by our national consumption figures, which shows that we have a healthy appetite for these delicate stems. Most people still class asparagus as a delicacy and when the British season starts it features with pride on most restaurant menus. The season normally runs from May till June, but with the very cold winter and a chilly and slow start to the spring the British asparagus season has suffered slightly.

There are many classic asparagus recipes and a few ingredients that are synonymous pairing with asparagus and just to mention a few :-  egg, mayonnaise  and Parma ham. Asparagus requires care and attention when cooking, it needs to be quick to prevent over cooking, which will spoil the taste and cause discolouration.

I have recreated the asparagus soup that I cooked for the NCGM event in May. The method is straight forward as I cook the soup base with plenty of onions, sliced potatoes, white wine and stock. Once the soup base is ready I pan fry the asparagus stalks and heads quickly in olive oil and blend it all together with a dash of double cream. I use as much of the asparagus spear as possible, the only part that is not edible is the very tip of the stalk which is  woody and tough.

Visiting New Covent Garden Market  brought back plenty of lovely memories of when I was a young chef working in London. I worked for a short while at a delicatessen where we used to go to the market early in the morning to buy our ingredients. We used to do that twice a week and for busy weekends when we had functions I made the odd third trip too. As a real girl liking all pretty things in life we used to stop every now and then at the flower market next door to indulge in the array and display of colour. The fruit and vegetable market was just as impressive as I remembered it with large piles of vegetables beautifully displayed.

The menu for the NCGM event was:

Cream of Asparagus Soup

Asparagus wrapped in Parma Ham with a wasabi dip

Bruchetta with Asparagus spears and Gribiche

Ruth Holbrook compiled a leaflet with asparagus fun facts, with her consent I thought that it would be good to share these fun facts with you:

• Purple asparagus is a different variety and it is sweeter and softer than green.
• Wild or Bath asparagus(also know as spiked star of Bethlehem) is a rare plant found mainly around the City of Bath.
• White asparagus is our green favourite which has been deprived of sunlight and is very popular in Europe where it’s know as “white gold”.
• The Asparagus season is closely guarded by growers, with the first outside crops in late April (weather permitting) to the last on the Summer solstice. Every spear harvested after that depletes the flavour of the next years crop, this might explain why other countries’ asparagus isn’t so tasty.
• The aphrodisiac quality of asparagus is much touted, it was claimed by herbalist Nicholas Culpepper in the 1600′s to ‘stir up lust in man and woman’, and has been used as such ever since.It is recommend to eat it for three consecutive days to maximize the libido-enhancing effect!
• Different areas of Britain have distinct asparagus-growing qualities over others – Isle of Wight asparagus gets above average light and warmth so the season comes in early. Norfolk asparagus grows slowly giving it an intense flavour.
• In wholesale markets asparagus is called “grass”. This does not refer to how it looks or is grown, but comes from the 17th century folk slang which altered the latin word ‘asparagus’ into the more Anglo-friendly ‘Sparrowgrass’ – the name has stuck.
• Asparagus is not really a vegetable, it is in fact a member of the Lilly family, along with tulips and hyacinths.

I have fallen head over heals in love with Suffolk and like making day trips to places such as Aldeburgh, Southwold, Walberswick, Orford and Woodbridge. The love interest is not only for the beautiful villages, coast line and nature but also for the culinary delights. The Suffolk produce is second to none, the county is packed with a fantastic selection of various ingredients from grain, chicken, apples, beer, pork, milk, fish, beef, fruit and vegetables, wine and plenty more. There is a farmers market every first Saturday of the month at Snape Maltings, Aldeburgh and as I love the Suffolk produce I made a pilgrimage to this farmers market to savour Suffolk’s finest.

At the Snape farmers market I bought Asparagus, Sutton Hoo Chicken, Suffolk Gold Cheese, Spelt grain from Maple farm Kelsale, Woodbridge Mill Whole meal flour and other interesting goodies before headig off to Orford.

Orford is a beautiful and interesting village but full of contrasts from the grand stately red brick houses to chickens roaming round carefree on the grass verges. It gives you the feeling of wellbeing and I just simply feel safe in Orford. You can walk along the sea inlet verges picking sea purslane and looking at the lambs grazing on the salt marches gives you the sense of tranquility and makes you forget about all the pressing issues of the modern world. I cannot wait for later on in the year when the samphire will be plentiful once again and I can return to harvest handfuls to cook up with Orford-landed fish.

Orford has several smokehouses and I have already written about my favourite Richardson’s Smokehouse in a previous post. I went home with an array of smoked products including the treacle and cider smoked ham hock and smoked chorizo sausages which are the perfect combination for this utterly delicious warm dish served with spring barley salad and freshly baked Woodbridge mill rumpy rolls.

I refer to my bread rolls as rumpy rolls as they are free form and the round shape is by no means meant to be perfect. The Woosbrdige mill flour was a good find and I like the romance of the story behind the flour and the mill.

All in all it was a fantastic and relaxing day with yet plenty of food for thought, lots to write about, my spirits charged and my foodie hunger satisfied. It’s a gourmands dream day out.

On the 10th April this year British Larder  joined forces with Food Safari UK for a wonderful catch and cook event. It was a glorious spring day and we went out on the Panther with Mark Fleton to catch cod off the Suffolk coast at Walberswick.

Polly has asked me to prepare something easy and tasty for the boat trip and then later that afternoon I did a further cookery demonstration of Keralan Style Cod Loin En-Papilotte and Orange Soused Herrings.

I decided to take a jar of this incredibly delicious shallot, ginger and soy vinaigrette on board so that it could be served with wafer thin slithers of raw freshly caught cod.

I have had this recipe for many years and it’s interesting on how I have changed it along the way. At a certain stage of my cooking career I used to make this vinaigrette without the whole pieces of the diced shallot, crushed garlic and ginger.I used to puree it very finely, leave it to infuse and then pass it through a fine sieve to extract the flavour and obtain a smooth liquid.

I have now returned to the chunky vinaigrette with a bit of a bite, texture and contrast. It’s incredibly simple but immensely complex in flavour. This vinaigrette works very well with various ingredients such as carpaccio of beef, raw wafer thin slithers of beef or tossed into a salad of char-grilled chicken breast, finely sliced pak-choy, sauteed shiitake mushrooms and bean shoots.