February menu, Valentine truffles and ethical veal

I hope you had a lovely Christmas and a happy New Year. I wonder if you have made any healthy-eating resolutions for 2015? Mr Supper Table and I resolved to eat wholegrain and whole foods only, but have already made the odd slip with Coca Cola, chocolate and Chinese - oops! Just because I'm a chef doesn't mean I can resist the allure of a Friday night takeaway occasionally, more's the pity.  Anyway, I'm (evilly) hoping that February's menu will entice you to make an exception to your diet. At least I can promise that everything is fresh and homemade by me from scratch, no nasty additives or unrecognisable ingredients.

 

February 21st Menu

As always, the evening starts at 7.30 with a complementary aperitif and nibbles, then everyone sits down together around 8 o'clock. We serve a three-course meal followed by coffee and petits fours, all for £27.50. Come alone or with a group of friends, everyone is welcome.

Aperitif and nibbles
~
Mussels in a coconut, chilli & lemongrass broth, with crusty brown bread
~
Slow-roast pork belly, balsamic carrots, potato rösti, apple purée, cider jus
~
Lemon parfait, sable biscuit & butterscotch sauce
~
Coffee or tea with petits fours
 

Please email me to book your place. When booking, please let me know of any dietary requirements, as I am very happy to provide an alternative so you can enjoy the meal as much as everyone else. And don't forget to bring a bottle!
 

Added extras and Valentines day

I have been busy making my award-winning* whisky marmalade and blueberry jam. For those of you who come to supper club, you might want to bring a few pound coins for purchasing a £3 jar.

*in my old, 'proper' office job, we had a jam competition one year and my marmalade won! Ok, so it's not quite Masterchef Professional, but the marmalade was a big hit.

It's also coming up to Valentines Day. I will be making boxes of truffles for presents, so please let me know if you would like to order one.  It will be a box of 6, for £5, and will include G&T truffles, chocolate salted caramels and chocolate ginger truffles.


 

March menu and the ethics of veal

I am also nearly ready to publish the March 21st menu. Pudding is likely to be good old-fashioned treacle tart, and homemade ice-cream - ginger would go well. I am considering British rose veal for the main course, possibly a brave choice, please let me know if you are interested! Far from the old-fashioned yet brutal methods of raising bull calves for veal meat, British veal is actually an ethical choice for meat eaters. It obviously helps that it also tastes really good too.

Bull calves are an unavoidable result of the dairy industry. In the past, they have either been shot not long after birth or raised in horrific conditions across the UK and Europe with no light or access to the outside, sometimes kept in crates where they cannot even sit or turn around. However, British standards are now much higher, and more humane, than in the past, and I would argue it is actually more ethical to eat high-welfare veal, than for calves to die at birth and be discarded because they are no good for milking.

If you are interested in more information, please see the following links, but the main thing is to check that you are eating British rose veal, as this has much higher welfare standards than traditional veal.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/may/27/rose-veal-jimmy-doherty
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/foodanddrinknews/10770703/Why-its-time-to-welcome-back-veal.html
 

Upcoming Dates

• February 21st
• March 21st
• April 11th 

Hope to see you all at supper club soon!

Best wishes,
Clare

Feeling festive

Well, I've had a great month of private bookings with my new private chef company The Supper Table, and I'll finish off a busy four weeks with a supper club on Saturday.  In amongst all this cooking, I've also finalised the menu for the December supper club, on the 6th December.  It's a little bit festive, to get you in the mood for Christmas, but I've kept well away from turkey, sprouts, etc as I'm sure you will all be eating enough of those in December!

Menu
- mulled cider & nibbles

- scallops, lime & ginger butter, mango salsa
  (V - sweetcorn fritters)

- duck breast, juniper red cabbage, winter greens, roasties and orange & cranberry sauce
  (V - chestnut & shallot tarte tatin)

- cherry & chocolate tart, Christmas pudding ice-cream, cherry compote

- coffee & petit fours

The evening costs £27.50. Please email me to book your place. When booking, do let me know if you would prefer the vegetarian option. Please let me know of any dietary requirements, as I am very happy to provide an alternative so you can enjoy the meal as much as everyone else. And don't forget to bring a bottle!

To whet your appetite, here are a few of the things I've been cooking for private parties recently....

Smoked salmon roulade                                        Wild mushroom tortellini

Roast partridge, parsnip puree, barley                Rose & pistachio marshmallows

Now I'm sure some of you are very organised and already thinking about Christmas presents. What about buying someone a voucher for supper club? You can choose the amount you want to spend, and I will send out a voucher.

I'm also making batches of cranberry, fig & date chutney which will be available to buy at the December supper club.
 

If you want to plan as far as next year, I am taking bookings for forthcoming dates, as follows

• Saturday 17th January
• Saturday 21st February

Hope to see you all soon at supper club!

Best wishes,
Clare

The circle of life (and food)

It feels like ages since my last post so apologies for the lack of communication. It has been a strange and busy time. In the last four months, I have graduated from chef school and got married, but also I lost my mum very suddenly and unexpectedly. I am proud to say she was a big inspiration behind my cooking career. She encouraged me and my sister to cook from a very young age - I remember pretending to be Delia, aged about 9 years old, talking to the imaginary TV camera! She was also a fantastic hostess and cook herself, always entertaining and putting on fabulous lunches and dinner parties. She will be very much missed by all her family and friends.

However, life carries on for the rest of us, and we did manage to enjoy a wonderful wedding, then honeymoon in Italy, eating lots of fantastic seafood pasta in small trattorie by the sea. I am now feeling refreshed and raring to go with Supper Club.  I also could not resist being involved food-wise in the wedding. After faithfully promising my family not to do the catering, I did manage to make the cake and favours. As I'm known as somewhat of a chocaholic, the choice of cake was inevitable, although there was a token fruit layer - here is the three-tiered cake of a) sticky date & ginger b) chocolate truffle torte and c) chocolate orange.

Also, every guest received a jar of either whisky marmalade or Pimm's & strawberry jam, homemade by me and a team of hens!

Anyway, enough about weddings. The next supper club will be held on Saturday 15th November, and I've spent the morning having a great time planning the menu:

• Aperitif & nibbles
   
• Pheasant tortellini, chestnut & tarragon sauce, kale pesto
  (Butternut squash tortellini, chestnut & tarragon sauce, kale pesto - V)
   
• Pan-fried seabass, pancetta, sweet potato mash, asian greens
  (Mixed grain pilaf, fennel & sweet potato, asian greens - V)
   
• Pear parfait, liquorice jelly, spiced poached pears
   
• Coffee & petit fours

The evening costs £27.50. Please email me to book your place. When booking, do let me know if you would prefer the vegetarian option. And don't forget to bring a bottle!

Please let me know of any dietary requirements, as I am very happy to provide an alternative so you can enjoy the meal as much as everyone else. I only use top quality local butchers and sustainable fishmongers, so you know the animals have had a good life. Wherever possible, the fruit and vegetables are bought in season.

I am already taking bookings for forthcoming dates, as follows:

• Saturday 6th December
• Saturday 17th January
• Saturday 21st February

Hope to see you all soon at supper club!

Summer menu for August Supper Club

We had a lovely evening last Saturday for the first supper club since I finished chef school, and I'm pleased to say it was a great success. The weather cleared up just in time for an Elderflower Bellini in the garden, before sitting down for dinner. We had a great bunch of people - some new to supper club, and some returning guests. Thankfully I passed the before and after (chef school) test with flying colours, according to the regulars!

I am now planning the next supper club on Saturday 23rd August, and here is the menu.  Some spaces have already gone, so please contact me soon to reserve your seat.

• Roasted red onion, Taleggio & thyme ravioli with pine nuts and balsamic pearls
• Pesto-stuffed plaice, beetroot rösti, green beans, marinated courgette, white grape & basil sauce
• Elderflower & brambleberry pavlova with raspberry coulis

As usual we will start the evening with a complimentary drink and canapés. I came across a recipe from one of my favourite food writers Diana Henry for vin de pêches, a peach-based aperitif made with wine and vodka - how could I resist? I enjoy making these fruit-based drinks, and the pavlova will contain my own elderflower cordial. I made the cordial while still living in Devon, where I was delighted to discover elderflower in the back garden - can't get much more local than your own house!

I seem to have gone rather Italian with the starter and main - inspired by my forthcoming honeymoon to Italy I think. Less than two months to go until we can stuff ourselves silly with pizza and pasta on the Amalfi coast. My mum bought me a pasta maker for my birthday this year, so I will be making homemade ravioli for its first supper club outing.

The evening costs £27.50 per person, and we will finish off with coffee and homemade petit fours.  Don't forget to bring a bottle!
 

Hope to see you all soon at supper club!

A newly qualified professional chef!

I am very pleased to announce that I am now a fully qualified professional chef. Here I am at the graduation ceremony receiving my certificates and chef whites with my very own name on them! I am very proud of my five distinctions in fish, meat, pastry, menu planning and professional skills.

I finished my course in Devon two weeks ago, and Malvern Supper Club is back, even yummier than before!
 

Supper Club

The supper club evenings will follow the same format as before, but I hope to wow you with my newly learnt culinary master skills. The first supper club will be on Saturday 19th July. Nibbles and a complementary drink will be served on arrival at 7.30pm, before sitting down at about 8pm for a three-course meal, finishing off with coffee and homemade petit fours.

The obvious place to start is to cook you some of my favourite dishes inspired by the course, so here is the menu for July 19th...

• Salmon gravadlax, marinated cucumber, honey & mustard dressing
• Olive crusted loin of lamb, confit lamb shoulder, new potatoes, fennel purée, roasted cherry tomatoes & a red wine jus
• Chocolate orange teardrop, orange confit ice-cream, hazelnut praline

The evening costs £27.50. Please email me to book your place. Don't forget to bring a bottle!

Please let me know of any dietary requirements, as I am very happy to provide an alternative so you can enjoy the meal as much as everyone else. I only use top quality local butchers and sustainable fishmongers, so you know the animals have had a good life. Wherever possible, the fruit and vegetables are bought in season.

Forthcoming dates are as follows:

• Saturday 23rd August
• Saturday 13th September
• Saturday 11th October

 

Ashburton Chef Academy - Term 3

Term three was quite a mixture of classes, demonstrations, exams and dining events - very different to the first two terms. I also narrowly missed out on an interview with the Daily Mail, but they decided my glamorous yacht chef friend was more interesting than my supper club!

One of the highlights was the vegetarian week. Our chef tutor Tom absolutely rose to the challenge of making vegetarian dishes delicious, exciting, and a meal in their own right, rather than something stuck on the menu as an afterthought. The whole week I kept thinking, my vegetarian regulars are going to love this. (You know who you are...)

You can see just some of the offerings above - veggie burger with the most amazing smoked mayonnaise; butternut squash tortelloni; assiette of summer vegetables with goats cheese chantilly; blue cheese soufflé; pannacotta and gingerbread.

The following week was a total change of scene, and we learnt some authentic Indian and Thai recipes. After weeks of precision cooking and being scolded for not dicing our onions finely enough, we suddenly found ourselves roughly chopping everything and bunging it in a pot! But what a delicious pot it was! Highlights included garlic naan, smoked aubergine, Pad Thai, galangal soup and tiger prawn firecrackers.


Grownup ice-cream - rosewater kulfi with basil sugar, toasted coconut & candied chilli

As part of our assessment, we were also asked to create a menu and cook it for the general public. We were split into groups of four, and with a list of available ingredients, each team put together a menu for 35 guests. On the day, our fellow students were front of house staff, while my team beavered away in the kitchen from 8.30am, preparing a five course meal for the customers. I was in charge of the lamb dish - which was so well received I thought I would put it on this month's menu.


Olive crusted loin of lamb, confit lamb shoulder, crushed potatoes, aubergine purée, roasted cherry tomatoes & a red wine jus

Then after weeks of exams, assessments and written assignments, the course was suddenly over. We made our own canapés and truffles for the graduation ceremony, but our final treat was lunch at Gidleigh Park Hotel, where the restaurant is run by two-Michelin-starred chef Michael Caines (no, not THAT Michael Caine). A superb end to a superb course.

Hope to see you all soon at supper club!

Best wishes,
Clare

Ashburton Chefs Academy - Part 2

Amazing how time flies, I am now into my third and final term at Ashburton Chef Academy. I am very excited about my cooking future, but equally I will be very sad to leave this wonderful learning environment and all my lovely new foodie friends. Here is an update as to how I'm getting on...

Last term was full of great field trips, and our first involved a very early start in order to get to Brixham fish market during trading. We had a fascinating tour of the premises and watched the early morning auction for the previous evening's haul. I also had a close encounter with a crab as you can see below (note the ever so stylish hat).

I was far too busy posing for a photograph to notice that the crab was grabbing my thumb in a vice like grip. Thankfully, the sturdy fisherman and burly chef tutor were able to fend him off. I got my own back the following day – all I can say is "Delicious"!

Crab cakes with mango salsa

Another trip was to Sharpham Vineyard where we were given a tour of the estate, and very begrudgingly tasted all their cheese and wines. We were ably led by the lovely Rebecca Mitchell who gave us a very thorough introduction to wine tasting, and food and wine matching. The food and wine matching was particularly interesting, and I may well be suggesting suitable wines to go with forthcoming supper club menus.

Back in the kitchen, we have been expanding our butchery skills. One of our exam tasks was to debone a quail. (Look away now if you are of a squeamish nature). I feel quite sorry for the poor little thing, but I'm rather proud of it and it was an excellent way to show off my new knife skills.

One week was all about cooking with game, including venison, rabbit and pheasant. The venison dish with chocolate jus will definitely be appearing on the supper club menu at some point. It only has a sprinkle of chocolate added, but it tastes absolutely delicious. Our chef tutor Joe also made an excellent job of using up an entire saddle of venison, real "nose to tail" cooking in action, and you can read all about it on his blog.

Venison loin, Pomme Anna, honey-roasted fig, chocolate jus

From savoury to sweet, we have been learning some impressive desserts. I am a big fan of chocolate, so I have to say this is one of my favourites. Quite a lot of work goes into the teardrop shaped case and the caramel sugar springs, but I think the end result looks and tastes fantastic.

Chocolate teardrop, raspberry mousse, caramel spring

We have also been learning to make puff pastry, which has been incredibly interesting. It is one of those things that chefs, even those in high-end restaurants, tend to buy in as it involves a rather time-consuming process and is difficult to achieve a consistent result. However, I think it is rather good to be able to say you can make your own! Here are some classic French desserts for you to dribble over.

Tart tatin, raspberry millefeuille, gateau pithivier, Calvados custard

If you want to see more of the food I've been cooking, please take a look at my facebook page, or follow me on Twitter for the latest pics.

Supper club will be back in early July, held monthly, and I can't wait to show off some of my new culinary skills. The plan is also to open a catering company from July onwards, so if you have any special celebrations coming up, and just can't face doing the cooking, why not let me do the hard work, cooking up something wonderful in your own kitchen while you relax and enjoy spending time with your guests.

Best wishes,
Clare

Riverford Field Kitchen - an evening with Guy Watson

On Wednesday night, a few of us from Ashburton Chef Academy treated ourselves to an evening at my favourite restaurant – Riverford Field Kitchen in Buckfastleigh, near Totnes. This is run by the Watson family, who started the Riverford organic vegetable box scheme. As we learnt from Guy Watson himself, he started delivering just 30 boxes of vegetables a week, now up to 40,000 boxes across the country – quite a feat. They also have a couple of excellent shops, and I am a frequent visitor to their farm shop just down the road from the field kitchen. I'm going to miss it when I return to Worcestershire in June!

Riverford Field Kitchen doesn't work quite like your average restaurant, but this is part of its wonderful charm. In fact, it's almost like a supper club! Long wooden tables fill the spacious and airy barn, and everyone, strangers and friends, all sit together. On arrival you are offered a drink, perhaps a local cider to go with your meal, and in the summer there is a pretty terrace to sit and enjoy your aperitif before dinner ( I can recommend the Prosecco...). There is a very relaxed feel to the place which I love, definitely no starched tablecloths, strict dress codes or stuffy waiters.

There is always a set menu of three courses, with a strong emphasis on fresh and seasonable vegetables. In fact, the meat served often feels like an accompaniment to all the delicious veg offered – quite the reverse of typical restaurant menus. But for those carnivores among you, please don't be put off, the vegetable dishes are quite capable of standing up on their own two feet! Mr Supper Club is a simple meat and two veg man, with the meat usually being the star of the show, but Riverford Field Kitchen is his favourite place to eat.

Photo courtesy of Charlie Hoare (friend and fellow chef)

Last night was rather special, as we also had the founder himself, Guy Watson, entertaining us between courses with a bit of history about how he and his family started the Riverford business. The diners were also encouraged to ask questions (anonymously, if you were feeling shy) which added a lovely personal feel to the evening. As a result we learnt Guy's views on all sorts of weird and wonderful topics - from whether storing apples for 6 months before eating was acceptable (yes, no problem) to discovering that if torrential rain and floods are going to happen at all, the first two months of the year are actually the best in terms of growing crops.  It turns out that Guy's favourite vegetable, the Jerusalem artichoke, can sometimes be inexplicably unpopular - perhaps something to do with the flatulence effects? He also doesn't have much time for "trendy" vegetables, and thinks we should all just eat good healthy veg, and not religiously follow fads for the latest "superfood". He's a very engaging speaker, both informative and funny.

Photo courtesy of Charlie Hoare

And of course, you will all be wondering, what did we actually eat? Starter consisted of a tempting selection of salads – roast parsnips & crispy kale; shaved fennel, blue cheese & red onion; grilled asparagus with a buttery dressing - served with homemade bread and a yummy beetroot dip. Main course was roast chicken, beautifully aromatic red cabbage, potato & mushroom gratin, roast carrots, chargrilled leeks, surprisingly delicious braised chard, the list goes on! Eveything is incredibly tasty, yet so simple. I had to stop myself from eating too much, so I could save a little bit of room for pudding. Once the tables have been cleared, each table is called up to the kitchen in turn to choose dessert. There were several options including sticky date pudding, baked chocolate mousse, lemon cheesecake and apple & cinnamon cake. I opted for a very enjoyable slice of poached pear pavlova .

Photo courtesy of Charlie Hoare

Feeling very full at the end of a lovely evening, we waddled out past the chefs putting sourdough into baskets to prove for the next day.  By happy coincidence, it turned out that one of them was a graduate of Ashburton Chef Academy, and asked us to pass on his regards to our tutors. Maybe we need a restaurant like this in Worcestershire? Otherwise, if you find yourself in Devon for a holiday, I thoroughly recommend a meal at Riverford.