Supperclub: The Water House Project in Bethnal Green

Gabriel Waterhouse, Chef (left) & Brother (right)

This season is all about supper clubbing and chef's tables... Why go to a regular restaurant when you can try something unique, bring your own wine and meet interesting people?

If you aren't yet sold on the idea, the Water House Project's menu, skill and general deliciousness should sway you...
Here goes:

Watercress velouté with a hens egg and asparagus (this was fresh and summery with a beautiful rich, orange egg yolk in the middle)

Flamed mackerel with rhubarb and beetroot (subtle, charcoal-y fish with earthy beetroot and tart rhubarb was a match made in heaven)

Cumbrian Herdwick lamb with pea, mint and goats curd (by god this lamb was good, and it shone through as the main element in this traditional combination)

Brillat-savarin and white chocolate ganache, strawberry and basil soup, strawberry sorbet (a lovely, light end to the meal)

Or so I thought... we topped it off with Androuet cheeses with sourdough bread (fantastic selection, so good I couldn't resist and left feeling uncomfortably full!)

All this with wonderful company, what more could you wish for? 

We also booked as a relatively large group (six of the fourteen) so it was almost like having you own private dinner party.

Gabriel Waterhouse is a truly talented chef who I am sure will go onto great things... watch this space but in the mean time, treat yourself! 

You can book into the next one here...

N15 Chestnuts Market

Take a look at these mouth watering pictures? Where are they taken? Any of the many trendy street food fests in East or South London? No! This is all happening in N15 every Sunday which is probably the best news, like, ever if you're from the area or have recently moved here like me.

The Chestnuts Market has been up and running for just over a month now and has been attracting some serious food and craft talent from the off. It's run by a lovely local couple and takes place in The Chestnuts Primary school right next to Chestnuts Park. 

Get a crumpet on the go from Knead, or better still pick up a whole pot of their salted caramel PB!

I've got to include a special shout out to the boys and girls from Craving Coffee - my new favourite local coffee and breakfast shop in Totenham. They have a stall every Sunday and make the best flat white in town, but you can also find them permanently here.  Follow them for evening event info too as they often do pop ups and events.

The regular butcher from Marsh Produce is very good value for money and the lady who runs the stall gives great cooking advice too. The beef topside is so good, I've bought it twice in two weeks before. Be sure to queue and talk her through what you're planning as she's bound to help. Lockie's fishmongers is great too but unfortunately I don't have pictures so you'll have to take my word for it. I've cooked a large bag of fresh clams as well as delicious scallops from her before. They were the star of my dinner party both times.

The Marsh Produce vegetable table:

Home made Italian produce... 

Oh... and don't forget to arrive hungry and get one of these bad boys into your face. Back Street Diner does a delicious one. 

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An alternative to boredom: Lost Lectures

If you haven't yet been to The Lost Lectures, you must. This series of talks that open up new dimensions in your thinking, export you to previously undiscovered venues and provide you with a totally different kind of night out to the default: go down the pub/ out for a meal with the beard or the bird/ fall over face first into a kebab.

I went to Lost Lectures towards the end of last year and had a refreshing time drinking mulled wine, avoiding other people's squeezey mustard hotdogs (we had already eaten), and listening to a wonderful variety of talks from Ruby Wax, Simon Baron Cohen (yes, that is Sacha's brother but more importantly he is a neuroscientist) and a rap vs. poetry battle. The whole thing took place in Bethnal Green's working boxing ring, giving it a rough and ready atmosphere and filling the speakers with adrenaline which most of them couldn't help but comment on.

Unfortunately, if you follow my advice and book for their next talk, you will not have the same experience that I had. The point of Lost Lectures is to enlighten you differently every time you go. I was lucky enough to hear Ruby Wax speak out about mental illness which was both brilliantly inspiring and... well, a little bit mental. This is an aside, but I was quite shocked by the horrible playground tittering that was going on behind me at one point. Whilst everyone else was mesmerised by the bravery of her honest personal account, there were a few who found it easier to laugh at the problem she was highlighting. Ironically, she spoke of the denial by 'polite society' of mental illness and how when it's something that people can actually see, they are far more sympathetic. Sorry for this tangent but I have to send a message to the haters that their hating comes from weakness and their judgement was misplaced as well as just plain RUDE. Ruby - you are right: you are quite mad but we love you all the more for it.

This January, Lost Lectures is putting on The Festival of The Imagination so if you're looking for a little more inspiration this January than dry nights, 'New Year, New You' drizzle and Orange Wednesdays then look no further than here. You won't regret it. You would however regret waking up unenlightened, bored of your own brain and face down in a kebab once again. This, friends is the alternative. Think about it.

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Cornwall in Winter

This year, I wanted to get away between Christmas and New Years. I'm soon to be embarking on a project of a life time and renovating a very small and somewhat wonky dilapidated Victorian House, which I'm kind of in denial about because A. I can't really afford to, and B. I know nothing about renovating houses... *ahem*. Because of this, I entered into the post-Christmas stupor, both broke and in need of escapism. I am back now and ready to swap last year's sun-soaked sailing photographs for paint-speckled dungarees and riveting pantone chat (I will try to make this interesting, I promise). 

This mini break in St. Ives was exactly what I needed. 

Flo and I have both written about what St. Ives has to offer in the Summer and Autumn months but there's a whole different feel to the Cornish Coast in Winter. The pubs are cosy and warming, watching the waves batter the coast line is exhilarating, and the walks are more deserted. 

Where to stay: The Queens Hotel St. Ives

The Queens is a lovely Gastro pub with a hotel directly above. The rooms are simple which is reflected in the price, but they are put together with taste and serve their purpose well. The real benefit of staying here is that the food is fantastic. The breakfast, which is included leaves no detail spared - details like home cooked granola and home made bread make all the difference when you stay at a B&B. The hotel is run by a London couple who escaped the smoke permanently to move to Cornwall and run this and a great bar/ restaurant on the harbour, which we will get to in a moment. One day, I want their life.

Book here.

Where to eat (when you're not eating there):

The Loft

The boy and I had arrived in St. Ives on the 27th. Storms were predicted for that night, we had driven for hours and it looked as though most things along the main high street and the harbour were closed for business. Determined to have a proper good feed, we squirrelled away to our room with a bottle of bubbly and Love Actually on the iPad before calling all of the well reviewed restaurants in St. Ives. Finding no luck, we eventually ventured out in the pouring rain. We had passed The Loft earlier in the day and noticed that it was open, but other than that we knew nothing about what kind of food it served or how good it was. 

After walking through a completely deserted harbour (the weather warnings had gone from bad to worse over the afternoon), we stumbled back there and sheltered inside. Usually this is the point in the story where the food is awful or cold or they have run out of everything except for Pot Noodle and some soggy crisps and you just deal with it because the alternative is to go outside again and potentially find nothing. However, this did not happen. We totally lucked out...

Not only was The Loft the cosiest little romantic hideaway, it also served us the most delicious food from a fresh seafood menu. We had the mussles and bacon in a white wine sauce and a seared soy, sesame and beef salad to start, followed by Hake and battered squid in a saffron curry sauce with kale, sprouts fried with flaked almonds and honey roasted butternut squash on the side. Everything was mouthwateringly delicious, the service was perfect and the chef even gave me his recipe for perfectly roasting squash with the skin on. Book here.

The Coldstreamer 

This Gastro Pub is to be found in Gulval, between St. Ives and Penzance. It is a beautiful old building with a roaring fireplace, a great wine selection and a fantastic menu - which has to be a tribute to French management - not what you're expecting when you walk into a pub in a small Cornish Village.

We ordered a mixture of bar snacks and light bites all sea-themed and were very content. A pint of prawns with home made mayonnaise, a crab rarebit, marinaded sardines, a green salad and chips. It was exactly what we needed between two long beach walks. 

 Book here.

The Rum and Crab shack:

This bar and restaurant is owned by the same people as The Queens Hotel St. Ives. It is a lovely little cabin-like bar elevated above the harbour serving a great selection of spiced rums and sea food. I had the 'Corn & Oil' cocktail which consists of aged dark rum and cane sugar syrup - plantation style.

I was a little disappointed to find soft shell crab on their menu, as this is only ever shipped in from California or Japan and when you can literally see and breathe the sea from your seat it feels wrong to be serving seafood from so far away. That aside, the local seafood we ordered was cooked to Caribbean style perfection and made for a lovely and atmospheric evening. Book here.

...and then there were the walks. From Penzance to St. Ives, and little cobbled streets to harboursides, cliff walks and beach walks, it was all breathtakingly beautiful and exactly what we needed post-Christmas. The weather conditions meant that even when it wasn't stormy, the sea was rough and where it met rock, it was sending spray up more than thirty feet into the air creating billowing white clouds of water.

I will be back in the spring or the summer when I need to run away from my new house-related responsibilities. Let me know if there are any great spots that I have missed... 

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