Salt and Woodsmoke

I’ll keep it brief because (a) I am very bad at forming an opinion and holding it until the end of a post (b) I’m tired and I need to go and pack© I’m not sure that you are really that interested.

By the time I got there I wanted to sit down and sleep, I didn’t want to eat anything. I had, after all lunched on “Grilled duck hearts and livers, big chips, Béarnaise sauce“. More on that later though.

There was a lot to try and a lot of producers I hadn’t seen before. Along with Ummera, there were two Irish smokeries I hadn’t heard of before as well as one from Orkney. I had a good chat with Anthony – Hello Anthony – and tasted his obviously very inferior smoked salmon (ahem – cough).

I also met this chap who appears to have some uber-smokery in Sussex, smoking Maldon sea salt, and spices for all manner of big companies. An ex EHO too. He had some good looking smoked garlic on his stand along with smoked potatoes.

I won’t go on to list everything else I tasted as that would be tiresome for the few of you who have made this far. I would just like to talk fudge though.

I’m not a food show veteran. I’ve been to ten or so. All of them have fudge. Lots of it. Stall after stall of fudge. Fudge is almost as omnipresent as chutney, but chutney has a purpose. Fudge? I can’t see the point. I mean it’s easy to make and it probably lasts a long time but … I mean who needs it? Do you ever crave the fudge? Nope, me neither. Fudge off! Even Real fudge can fudge off.

The debate advertised as “IS CHEAP FOOD COSTING THE EARTH?” was really a rather rambling general discussion on food ‘chaired’ by that chap off the telly who cried before a cow was killed on Full on Food (geddit?).

This was a missed opportunity. Tim Lang is a food politics heavyweight and getting him and Mark Price of Waitrose was a coup. There were a lot of people in the audience who wanted to be heard though few of them were given a real opportunity. Next time lets have a couple of hours and a chair who has some kind of clue.

Oh and who thought getting Trudie Styler in was a good idea?

As I said previously, I’ll be in London today for the Real Food Festival and lunch at Bord-eaux at the Grosvenor House Hotel (Park Lane).

I’m lunching alone, which I am never that keen on so if anyone would like to join me then let me know.

Thursday finds me departing River Farm Smokery HQ for the even smokier Lahndan Town – dahn sarf. Cor blimey wot a pea soupah. etc.

Under managament’s instruction I am being despatched to the Real Food Festival.

As I understand it, this is a festival of Real food. Not just a food festival but a Real food festival. So, nothing masquerading as food just actual Real food.

I ahve little experience of this Real food and I am worried that I may return having learned that what I have been eating for the last 30 odd years of my life was not actually real. Maybe I have grown to this age and size consuming pretend food. Built from faux food. What could that have done to me? What would I be like now if I had only eaten Real food?

[shudder] Doesn’t bear thinking about.

Anyway, I’m going. Not entirely sure why. But I am. I will get to meet the enemy*. Maybe I could sabotage their stand. And obviously I will tip my boater to the bhajiman. Also, Tim Lang is taking part in a (real?) food debate going on later in the day. That should be good.

More excitingly I am going to a fancy new Lahndahn Tahn restaurant by the name of Bord’eaux (those of you who dislike flash do not click on that link). Where top chef Ollie Couillaud is using River Farm Smokery smoked salmon to entice punters to his gaff. What is enticing me is “Grilled duck hearts and livers, big chips, Béarnaise sauce“. [drool]

All this and I get to spend a fair part of my day with Andrew from Eating Albion. Which is good.

That said, I’ve never met the guy. He could be awful

Oh and if anyone else reading this is gonna be there and would like to hook up for some glutenfreefairtradedecaffinated Real tea, then drop me a line.

Oh, and if you want to go but think it is too expensive then go and see the Ummera blog for details on how to get a reduction on your ticket price.

[* – Just joking there Anthony]

This blog is temporarily suffering from writers block. A weeks holiday in Cornwall should ease this a little. This literary constipation is not being helped by the arrival of the Wire Season 3.

Apologies.

To keep you occupied here is a picture of some hams:

PS. Is anyone still out there?

A quick mention of Cambridge Poultry who are neighbours of River Farm Smokery. No we don’t smoke their birds.

We were dealt a blow recently when we discovered that one of our newly arrived hens had lost one of her legs; we assume as the result of a cunning fox. I had to cull her which was not a job I took any pleasure in.

The next day I popped over to see Adam who has an ever expanding flock of point of lays. If you are looking for a new bird in or around Cambridge, he’s your man. Our new hen is being a pecked a bit but is slowly settling in.

This chap (after a week hanging in my garage) got turned into a French take on Jugged Hare. Underwhelming.

As you are all well aware, last week was British Pie Week. I though I would belatedly share my thoughts on the pork pie.

I always recommend the best pork pie available in Britain. A pie not produced by some ruddy-face ginger-haired Norfolk artisan, nor in the back of a timber framed butchers’ shop in Melton Mowbray. Not lovingly crafted from the best cuts of Gloucester Old Spot and organic stone ground flour. Nor home made by me from an original 18th Century farmhouse recipe.

Oh no. The pie I am talking about is manufactured in a vast factory[1] on the outskirts of Leicester in huge quanitities for the supermarkets.

That pie is the Walker’s pork pie. Available to all pie lovers in Tescos and Waitrose as well as in Walkers butchers shops in the true heartland of the pork pie, Leicester.

I, like all men of my generation, have eaten a lot of pork pies. I’ve eaten a lot of hand rasied ones from butchers and farmers markets and a lot of shitty mass produced ones from the supermarkets. But none can touch the porky prime cut that is the Walkers.

There is something about the crust (crunchy and biscuity), the strong jelly, the peppery filling that just makes it right. Admittedly these pies are the pies I was raised on and I judge every pie I eat against it.

It’s also worth pointing out that these pies originate from the same butchers as Walkers crisps which are, in many senses, the crisp against which to judge others.

So what pie did you have last week?

[1. I once spent a week or two working in that factory when I was a long haired and apathetic student. I worked in the pastry room collecting the pre-formed pastry cases for those mini pork pies you get from the supermarkets.

Things I remember about working there:

– The giant size Kenwood mixer that the pastry was in. – The giant size blocks of lard that were wrapped in blue plastic – The store room that smelt wonderful (mainly because of the garlic) – Having the frayed bottoms of my baggy jeans coated in pastry by the end of every night – The guy I worked with hating students
]

As at least one of you (hello Antonia) will know that Local Flavour and River Farm Smokery appeared at Feast East over the weekend. I have to admit that it was a bit of a wash out for us.

We didn’t go last year but two years ago I remember things being a lot busier. We sold a lot more stock, made a lot more contacts, and generally had a better show. This year was super quiet on Friday and not great on the Sunday.

This gave me plenty of chance to go round the show and eat pork pies, snails, ice cream, etc. It also proved very useful to have St Peter’s and Aspall’s there to help lubricate proceedings.

These rather huge (if you click on the photo you’ll see a Bic biro which will give you an indication of the size) slices of streaky bacon were a gift from our friend Drew at Shelford Deli. He recently slaughtered a Tamworth pig that he had a hand in raising.

The resultant (gutted) carcass was 300lbs. That is one big pig. So, along with some sausages, Drew brought over some bellies he had turned into bacon for me to smoke. The streaky bacon we normally get must come from scrawny pigs half the size. These bellies were HUGE.

Arguably, you could say that there was a little too much fat but that would be churlish woulnd’t it? After all, you have to have something to fry your eggs in don’t you?

Chuck a couple of bricks at the problem that will sort it out.

Daniel Clifford backs down from the Animal Liberation Front.

Do you think that if I chucked a bricks through Prezzo’s window they would stop serving such godawful rubbish?

It could be said that things are occupying our minds at present that should not be occupying our minds.

Our stock control software is proving time saving and time consuming in equal parts.

Then it throws up stock figures that conflict with manual counts. Usually telling us that we have more stock than we can see. Almost like stock is vanishing. Into the cold dark night. Like a wisp of smoke into the wind.