Monday 21 September 2015

Piccalilli from Paul's Pickles

Let me introduce you to Paul, for Paul is his name.




Paul makes pickle, a lot of pickle. I met Paul at Frosts Chilli festival selling jar upon jar of Chilli imbued chutney, pickle and various other conserve. Among those jars (and I tasted them all) was a pot of pure gold, it glowed from behind the wall of onion marmalade and spoke to me without words. As I dipped a small, broken piece of cracker into the silken liquid  I let out an involuntary shudder as the twangy scent tickled my nasal hairs.

Now, to set the scene, I would appreciate it if you could just indulge me for a moment while I briefly mis-quote Huey Lewis and The News:

Piccalilli is a curious thing.
Make a one man weep, and another man sing.
Change a hawk, to a little white dove,
More than a feeling, that's the power of.... piccalilli.

If you don't like piccalilli then please let this post pass you by like a shark that swims past Katie Hopkins in complete blissful ignorance of the tasty treats that are but a mere moment away. But if, like me however, you do like piccalilli then stop reading, go to www.pauls-pickles.co.uk, email Paul, demand that he send you at least two jars immediately, then come back here.



You don't need to know how the crunch of the veg reverberates through your soul as you devour spoonful after spoonful. You can ignore any understanding of how the perfect balance of natural sweetness versus the tangy vinegary mustard mix serenades your consciousness like an choir of pickled onions. And you certainly don't have to wait for anyone to tell you how graciously it enrobes cheese, ham, pork pies, scotch eggs, sausages, toast or pretty much anything upon which it can physically spread. 


I have no idea how Paul manages such pickled perfection, but what I do know is that I ate half a jar in a single sitting without realising it. Even now I am agitated by the fact that you are unable to try this amazing concoction, but then I take a deep breath and remember that if you followed my instructions you'll already have some rushing towards you by the second.

Friday 18 September 2015

Barracuda Cafe - Amersham

I'm sure it won't come as a surprise to all of you that when I'm under stress, I eat. Then, when I'm happy, I eat. In fact, during any excess of emotion of almost any kind I, say it with me, eat.

Over the past few days, I've been under a significant amount of sustained stress the like of which I found most unpleasant. As such, when given the opportunity, Mrs P and I decided to find some minutes of respite during lunch times and found the Barracuda Cafe at the end of the highstreet. Over the next few days, we found that this place was not only away from the emotional rocket ship that was our charge over that time, but also a venue that hits my 'top ten places you never knew you should go, but totally deserve your lunch money'. Yeah, that's totally a real thing as of now.

Eating in the same cafe four days in a row meant that we made some friends. Giancarlo owns the place and runs front of house with his brother keeping an eye on the kitchen. And Barracuda is all about family; on the second day we were treated back warmly, by the third day we were practically cousins and on day four we met the chefs as well as discussed Giancarlo's hopes for the future career of his daughter. So yes, I think it's fair to say that we were made welcome.

The atmosphere over lunch is light, airy and the open kitchen smells great. The portions sizes are immense and when it comes to value for money, well, the prices are fair to the point of criminal.

We ate, in no order of preference:





A mountain of thick, soft, pink beef served on doorstep slices of rye bread with crunchy, pickley pickles. In fairness, this salt beef was so good I actually had it several times and at £5.90 a sandwich, this was properly good. The meat just melted away in my mouth and generally provided me with 30 mins of happiness from the inside out. We were assured the beef was cooked in-house which is just unfair of them, because exactly how impressed did they need me to be? At the end of the day, stop and take a look at it. Yeah, I want some more too.



A margarita pizza with dough so thin that even though it wasn't cooked off in a brick built, wood fired oven at 500 degrees, it tasted really good with a deep tommy sauce and creamy mozzarella, but more on that dough in a moment. 


Next, a cheese and bacon burger so large that Mrs P couldn't finish it off - when you talk about value, a homemade burger this big for under 6 quid is frankly ridiculous. OK so it suffered a little from being a touch dry (a result of using meat that was too lean I suspect) and a bun that quite literally disintegrated during the process of eating it but do I need to say it again? This thing was massive. But then speaking of massive...



This was their piece de resistance, their final stand, the granddaddy of them all. All week, Giancarlo was asking me to try the Calzone, 'everything is fresh today', he said (every day). 'We make everything here', he said (every day). And finally the killer blow came on day four - 'I'm so proud of my brothers cooking that if you don't like it, it's free.' 

Well, I'm sold. That right there, is a man who loves his family and he is right to do so. Not only was this folded pizza shaped beauty topped with fresh ragu but it was filled to the brim with some of the best salami and pepperoni that I've eaten outside of Pescara. Peppery, salty and uncommonly good, with ingredients this good, it's difficult to put a step wrong but to bring it all in for eight pounds is nothing short of amazing. The previously mentioned dough was showcased here superbly, as it was perfect for the Calzone style; seasoned and chewy. The ragu spooned over the top was deep, rich and powerful with the whole thing easily being enough for two to share, it  finished off what had been a remarkably eventful week in truly suitable style.

As we left, Giancarlo demanded that we return for their dinner menu and sitting here remembering the food we had, I cannot think of a single reason to say no.









Saturday 12 September 2015

Grillstock - London

Mrs P saw the first draft of this post and the following exchange happened.

Mrs P: You know, you might want to talk about the food rather than just posting a load of pictures of you having a laugh with Stu. People would be interested, that's why they read the blog after all.

Me: YOU CAN'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO. I'M TIRED. I'M GOING TO BED.

30 minutes later.

Me: I'm sorry babycakes. I think I may have over-reacted back there. Can I do anything to make up for it?

Mrs P: Never call me babycakes again. Ever.

Oh Kay... and with that point well and truly made, I bring you Grillstock London, through the eyes of Rob's Ribs and Mr Johnston:



Hi there!





A grand entrance into the event stood imposingly and directed us round the side and into the field itself where the party was starting to get under way. Understandably, we started with a burger and pulled pork:



On the recommendation of this man:



or at least, at the time I thought it was his grill. He was certainly standing next to it, but in retrospect he was handing out fliers advertising Oxford charcoal and on closer inspection, his T-shirt should have given me pause for thought. So, quite frankly who knows who this guy is and why he was there but he certainly gave me a good burger.

We wandered past a stretch of various food vans and stalls - of which there were an unsurprising number selling burgers and pulled pork,





but there were, thankfully, a few notable exceptions though:  



The bloke selling jambalaya convinced us to try a pot but unfortunately it only delivered in a  limited capacity.  Warming, soft rice, a prawn and a couple of sausage scrapings for a fiver. Ugh.



A chip stall with four different chip flavours was also unexpectedly welcome, we had the garlic and rosemary version which was totally over powered by the garlic powder which had been shaken like a polaroid picture all over the top. 

Most surprisingly though was the toastie stall.



Is this a 'thing' in London? Really? I mean really really? The best part of six quid for cheese and toast. I can understand the need to charge a fair price for quality ingredients but surely this is something that even the most hipster of hipsters gliding along in their skinny jeans, beards and pony tails couldn't take. But no, apparently the residents of London live to prove me wrong as these guys were chocka.

I also saw this fella:



He was on the telly with Jamie Oliver last year, he seemed nice.

But we were really there for the competition, and there were plenty of contestants. I would love to give you a full run down but I was hoping the website was going to keep track of the results. However, I've been checking and unfortunately they have not been that quick with their updates. So, while we wait for the official results, here are a few photos of us wandering around checking out the teams as they prepared for their chicken, pork ribs, pulled pork and beef brisket categories:




















I took a few notable shots, such as this one:



a bloke in a dress cooking and serving BBQ = winning.



How many guys does it take to cook a chicken thigh? 




A couple of serious custom made grills.


The judges came from a selection of invited guests and also members of the public who applied through the website, we caught up with a couple of them later on and they confirmed that in a sea of meat, there were only a handful of teams that really shone out.



A well cooked but soggy chicken thigh covered in way too much sauce. While all the sauce here was, of course, homemade, it seemed to Mr Johnston and I all far too generic. The key differentiator between teams seemed to be not the quality of the sauce, rather the presence of the sauce at all. A team with the confidence to stand up and be counted with a rub that gives you everything you need; deep, deep notes of sweet, savoury and a hint of smoky chilli versus the use of the vinegary twang of a sauce that is all too often used to cover overcooked meat and inevitably just leads to too much sugar, too much vinegar and way too much disappointment.



Lazy Jack's cider from the Woodshed Brewing Company. This was such a massive hit with Mr Johnston that he went back no less than three times and was only denied his fourth cup of thirst quenching, sweet apple flavoured nectar because they had literally ran out and were packing away. Lazy Jack's is described as 'American style cloudy cider'. I was intrigued by this and asked the staff what about it's style could be unique enough as to be attributed to the America's, as opposed to the hundreds of years of cider making we have in England. The reply of 'Umm, they use American apples' came back with a less than convincing air of hope as opposed to authority. But, however they make it and whatever they do to give it a US stylee, they certainly won Mr Johnston over and sent him scuttling to the inter webs attempting to source it closer to home. High praise indeed.



I feel bad about not getting enough photos of the meat we tasted but we really only got scrapings as we made our way around the field speaking to the teams, discussing their techniques, equipment, highs, lows and general impressions of the weekend. You have to wait until the end of the day, about 5pm, to claim your meat picks because as I learned, the organisers who supply the meat actually give the teams far more than required to submit for the competition. The teams can then distribute the remains as they see fit ensuring that the members of the public can taste decent competition BBQ grub which is, as I see it, a genius plan with winners all round.

All in, Grillstock festival was a great way to spend an afternoon. Next year, though I will certainly try and get along to the Saturday because as we had to cut the Sunday short, we missed out on seeing the Headline act of the evening in 90's superband Razorlight, which for such diehard Razorlight fans as both Mr Johnston and I, was clearly a crushing blow. Unsurprisingly, there was also a huge amount of food to be had with vendors of all types on hand to take your money and if you are lucky, you could also get a taste of proper smokey, backyard BBQ inspiration. 

Finally, on our way back to the car, we were amazed by the confidence, glamour and just damn straight sex appeal that a simple hair cut can give you. I have found the man I want to be, and he wears a jerry curl.










Monday 7 September 2015

The Navigation - Cosgrove

There are several things that we are going to discuss in this review but the first being: without question, The Navigation looks lovely. The building is situated on the Grand Union Canal and sits with an air of historic proportions. Built in 1876, the Inn delivers on that heritage too and the garden looked so amazing decked out with the lights that our eating companions had to remind me that our table was unfortunately inside rather than on the terrace.





And a swift note on our table comrades for the evening; the Johnstons, otherwise known as the 'Jaysters', or 'Johnmondoes' were kind enough to spare some time in their busy social schedule to join us for dinner and stay out later than their usual bedtime of 9pm. After tracking the place down, we walked in and found ourselves by a bar and promptly ordered a drink. Looking around, things got even better as I noticed an open pass and a horde of chefs working like mad behind it. 



We sat and tried to make our way through the menu with page after page of dishes to choose. The emphasis is on Italian food with pizzas and multiple pasta dishes but in fact, I would say that the menu was just too large and the problems we saw later may well be mainly attributed to the shear volume of different dishes the team were forced to supply. Dinner started with what I like to consider, in hindsight, to be an unfortunate incident. Admittedly, it was entirely my own fault that I forgot that the Johnstons don't like olives as I unilaterally ordered bread and olives, but we'll gloss over that won't we, it's not as if I'll make two stupid mistakes in one night is it? 



They were tasty for sure but a lot for one person which led me to further issues when my second mistake of the evening appeared soon afterwards...



Oh dear, it seems I may have miscalculated, in fact, there were so many olives for even a man such as I to consume, that I had to wrap some up in foil and take them home. So olives aside, what else did we have here? Unfortunately, this brings me to my second point; to mis-quote the Black Eyed Peas (and let's be honest, who doesn't like to do that every once in a while), 'Where was the Love?'

Soggy toast topped with chopped tomatoes, accompanied by cold roast peppers, cold courgette, cold aubergine and ham with salami all fresh from fridge to plate with seemingly no time inbetween. Nice flavours but without any seasoning at all, it was a plate the The Child could, and in fact has in the past, put together better. She at least added some capers for seasoning even if she did also include ketchup.

The others fared marginally better - but only marginally, with the garlic prawns being OK but not amazing, the parfait from the specials menu coming with a distinct proportion issue between bread to parfait and with such a huge plate the whole thing just looked odd. Oddly though, the fish cakes had the entirely opposite problem being as they were; enormous but similarly suffering from lack of seasoning.






I'm afraid the mains were also a game of two halfs.




Let's start with the frankly colossal rack of ribs that were set in front of Mrs P. Well executed with soft juicy meat and a homemade sauce that tasted pleasantly more tart than the sugary sweet bottled standard and thus went down with suitably positive comments. The coleslaw was a mustardy effort which I thought brought something new to the coleslaw world and marked itself out from the default mass produced stuff. Unfortunately my thoughts were not echoed and I was left as a lone voice and therefore ignored as the leprous olive and coleslaw eater of the table. 




Mr Johnston tucked into what claimed to be roast pork with crackling but while the meat was soft, I'm afraid that grievously, so was the crackling. The fat simply hadn't rendered and so what was left was a quivering hunk of warm fatty meat wrapped in a chewy, skin flavoured tarpaulin.




I was asked when ordering my pollo picante (spicy chicken) if I wanted chips. I declined in favour of a salad (one must be careful, especially as Grillstock is only few days away), and more on that momentarily. When it arrived, the chicken was lovely and soft with a good crust of spices to live up to it's title. Again (third mistake of the evening), I forgot that none of my fellow diners liked Chilli and so couldn't share across plate-borders as the others were achieving. I also received a vine of warmed tomatoes. Not cooked, not oiled, salted or cared for in any way. Just warmed. I was, and remain, confused by this. Why would you go to the effort of warming a tomato? It seemed odd while eating it after a couple of pints of social beverage and now in the cold light of day, it shows itself to be positively weird.

However moving on, lets touch briefly on that salad; it had to be one of the most sorry excuses of a salad I have had the misfortune to try and eat. I've already mentioned the peppers served at a temperature between a chilly 2 to 4 degrees and they made a re-appearance here along with some equally frigid rocket and spinach leaves. These had been sat to the point that they had started to mush down. Unpleasant to the max.




Finally lets talk Mrs Johnstons duck. She seemed to enjoy it but said that while the elements were individually good, there was way too much gravy and the duck skin just wasn't crisp which seems like a cardinal sin for something as expensive as duck.



And lets be honest, the meal certainly wasn't cheap. £160 quid for four of us with drinks, although while I say we had drinks, it was a bit of a struggle as the waitress wasn't enormously responsive and we waited over 30 mins for refills through the meal and a further 20 mins with two reminders in between for the pudding menus. A pleasant and friendly conversationalist certainly but to say she was pushed would be being kind.

So on to the puds then and the theme continued with four perfectly adequate but over priced examples including white chocolate cheesecake, banoffee sundae, ice cream and chocolate brownie (which I don't seem to have a photo of - Mr Johnston if you could be so kind as to supply one, I will update this record!).





Now with added brownie:


The best thing, and something that we all agreed on was the delicious raspberry sorbet. 

In fairness, we visited on a Friday night and the place was heaving so a slight variation in service and quality could be expected but the salad that went back and was refunded and the crackling that didn't crackle were both just silly errors. 

In conclusion, I feel that The Navigation Inn suffers from a slight case of style over substance. The place looks great - thanks in part to the recent renovation that clearly cost an arm and a leg. Even the toilets look the part with their shabby chic sinks and taps.



But look closer and you find a couple of things that aren't quite hitting the mark. For example, in a place like this you would expect proper local beer but it's all mass produced stuff; you want simple food done well but you get a miss-matched selection of standard Italian classics prepared without the love and attention that that culinary culture demands..

Mrs P and I will certainly be coming back to try and establish if this was just an anomalous Friday night, but maybe next time we'll have a couple of drinks out by the canal. 

@thenavcosgrove
www.thenavigationcosgrove.co.uk