August 22 2022
The weekend's newspapers
Travel
UK
There’s a good roundup of seaside places from Essex to Norfolk in the Daily Mail including my favourites, Pinneys in Orford, Suffolk and the White Horse in Brancaster.
The best holiday lets for two in the UK according to the Telegraph and a review of the Grove in Narberth in the Daily Mail.
Europe
Useful guides to Bilbao in the Guardian and Madrid in the Times and to Nîmes in France in the Telegraph.
A trip along part of the Wild Atlantic Way in Ireland from Galway Bay to Five Finger Strand in the Times.
Eco-walking holidays with great food are lengthening the holiday season with one to the White Mountains in Crete and one in Sifnos in the Guardian.
USA
I’m breaking my rule of only mentioning European travel as in the Daily Mail, they went to New York from Gatwick on a new budget airline, Norse with return flights from £303. I went there this summer and with the current pound dollar exchange rate, it is now astonishingly expensive.
Restaurants
In the FT, Tim Hayward went to Tamil Prince Islington in London where he says dishes are executed with outrageous skill.
In the Guardian, Grace Dent went to Updown in Kent, a seventeenth century farmhouse in the countryside where she thought everything was extremely good.
In the Mail on Sunday, Tom Parker-Bowles went to Cavita, a Mexican restaurant in Marylebone, London which he liked.
In the Observer, Jay Rayner thought Walter’s in West Dulwich, was excellent.
There was also a fascinating article about how the legacy of the River Cafe in London has spread through chefs who worked there, Anna Tobias who is now chef-owner of Cafe Deco, Avinash Shashidhara, head chef, Pahli Hill Bandra Bhai, and Pegs Quinn, chef-owner, of Sonny Stores, Bristol. They have taken its ethos of a seasonal changing menu , using the best produce and cooking it simply into their own restaurants.
In the Telegraph, William Sitwell went to Edie’s, in St Austell, Cornwall one to remember when you’re there, as he raved about it even though there’s no view.
In the Times, Tony Turnbull lauded restaurants in Lamb’s Conduit Street, Holborn, London including the new Honey and Co, Noble Rot, La Fromagerie, and Ciao Bella.
In the Standard, David Ellis went to Isibani in Knightsbridge, London and wondered if it will make Victor Okunowo’s name with dishes drawn from across Africa.
In the Sunday Times, Marina O’Loughlin visited Newcastle to go to Solstice, where chef Kenny Atkinson is now cooking in a 14 cover restaurant where you prepay for a menu of 18 courses, although some are very small. She says there’s ‘nothing that’s isn’t delicious’.
Recipes
It’s harvest time and the end of the summer holidays and the recipes in the papers reflect that this week, using apricots, nectarines, melon, fig leaves and blackberries . After a holiday in Sicily, in the FT, Ravinder Bhogal gives recipes for caponata, pasta with sardines and an apricot ricotta cake. Sicily is the meeting place of at least two great traditions, Arabic and southern Italian.
Carrying on with the stone fruits, I like the sound of Eleanor Staefel’s warm nectarine and halloumi salad with basil and sumac in the Telegraph and Rachel Roddy’s recipe for peaches and basil in wine in the Guardian.
I think Diana Henry’s recipes are worth a subscription to the Telegraph for these alone. Out of her three recipes this week for melon, I made her cucumber, avocado and double melon salad on a hot summer’s evening, (illustrated above) and am now on a hunt for Thai basil to make the melon, lime and basil sorbet.
I also want to pick fig leaves from a friend’s garden to make Nigel Slater’s fig leaf and kefir milk ice. in the Observer. He also gives a recipe for damson gin.
Sue Quinn gives ideas on what to do with a glut of blackberries in the Telegraph They’ve finished in my part of London but they were plenty about in Hampshire this weekend and will soon be abundant in all points north of here.
Books
There’s a seasonal glut of books as well as September is the start of the new publishing season. I’ve put them in alphabetical order by the author’s name apart from………
Cooking: Simply And Well, For One or Many by Jeremy Lee
as this is the book I have on pre-order. The Observer extract includes recipes for hake with parsley, dill and anchovy sauce and a chocolate, almond and marmalade tart which sounds just right for Christmas.
Moro Easy by Samantha Clark & Samuel Clark
They’ve simplified their classic recipes in their first book for a while and I want to make the spinach, pine nuts and sultanas, and the fried potatoes with za’atar, peppers and feta.
Nadiya’s Everyday Baking by Nadiya Hussain.
She gives recipes for her best chocolate cakes and bakes.
Real Life Recipes by Tom Kerridge
In the extract he gives recipes for 30 minute dinners including a halloumi, green bean and red pepper salad, and pork fillet with fennel and chicory which reminded me that that I haven’t cooked pork fillet for a long time.
Small Batch Bakes by Ed Kimber
There were recipes in the Mail including an emergency chocolate cookie and a pistachio, raspberry and rose snack cake.
One by Jamie Oliver
There’s an interview with him, where he makes the honest comment that it’s a book for Middle England to help them get through the new economic climate. The recipes include slow roasted pulled pork with different ways to use it all up including pork noodle cups, pulled pork baps and pork and beans. The recipes from the accompanying TV series are on his website . Jamie's One-Pan Wonders, is on Monday, at 8.30pm, on Channel 4 and All4.