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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Flo's Quick Review: Yalla Yalla

This Lebanese cafe has been on my 'to go' list for a while since I love Middle Eastern cuisine, mezze style dining, and eating out at a guilt free price! I first went upon the suggestion of a friend but work overran and I only arrived in time to have a little snackette. This time I more than made up for my deprived first encounter...

A quick note to begin however, there are two Yalla Yalla restaurants (and one Shoreditch pop-up). I realised this rather late in the day... when absolutely starving in Oxford Street I remembered it being very close by, suggested it and then walked for around ten minutes before realising that we must be going somewhere else. When I saw that Google maps was taking us to their other joint I thought we could give it a go but the Green's Court one is tiny and the waitress a little abrasive (she was visibly angry that we had been queueing without having let her know we were waiting for a table!). We swiftly returned to the Winsley Street one which is much bigger and therefore has a faster moving queue - no bookings I am afraid. This review was impromptu so sorry about the lack of HD photos.

smaller Green's Court Restaurant

The cocktails are apparently good but I decided to forgo in order to order as much as I could possibly eat! To begin with we had the hommos shawarma (their spelling) which comes with a surprisingly generous portion of marinated lamb on top of it, the baba ganoush (delicious and creamy but a little less smoky than I like).

Next came the Arayes - spicy minced lamb in crispy grilled pitta bread with pomegranate scattered on top were possibly my favourite - they look somewhat disappointing in stature since the mince is packed into a thin layer between the flat breads but they really pack a punch in terms of flavour. I also had the sawda dej (liver which are glazed in a sweet and sharp pomegranate sauce) which were delicious if you too are into offal. It is also wonderful to have them done in a such a different way rather than the usual Frenchified buttery type dishes. 

Last I had some kofte of the main dishes that I wouldn't really recommend since it's not the best kofte I've had in London (see my Best Mangal review) and the sharing plates are much more fun. A fabulous place for a quick and causal date or to meet with a few friends, I will certainly be returning soon. 

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The Gift of Japanese Cooking: Everyday Harumi

It was actually Flo who first introduced me to Everyday Harumi - the essential Japanese cookery book that has fast become my favourite over the last few months. The principle of this book is that if you go to one specialist shop and buy a few Japanese store cupboard essentials, then you can just shop at regular supermarkets to get the rest as you go. There you have it, Everyday Harumi - every day.

I'd recommend this book as a great present for anyone who loves food let alone cooking. Nothing in it is hard to make and it opens up a whole new repertoire of flavours to your other cooking. Being a somewhat experimental chef, this is a wonderful experience for me - I have no idea what some dishes are going to taste like until they're done. It's good discipline!

Your store cupboard essentials:
Soy sauce
Dashi stock
Mirin rice wine vinegar
Sake (for cooking and for drinking)
Seaweed wraps
Good sushi rice

Here are my first 7 dishes, all cooked on school nights. Some on their own, some as accompaniments to other things. The measurements I use here feed 2 hungry people or three if you have a few things. Make one or two, or if you're feeling adventurous make all 7 for a Japanese dinner party. 

Dish no. 1: Beef and Finely-shredded Vegetable Soup

For the beef:
200g thinly sliced beef
60-75ml soy sauce
1 tbs soy sauce
1-2 teaspoons caster sugar

For the soup:
50g carrots
70g celery
20g watercress (trimmed from the stems)
20g fresh ginger
1.2 litres of dashi stock (made from dashi stock powder or use Harumi's fish flake version in her opening chapter)
1 chilli pepper

You start by marinating your beef. Cut thinly sliced beef into 4-5cm long strips. Place in a bowl and add the soy, sugar, mirin and sake. Marinate for ten minutes whilst you prepare your soup ingredients. Slice your carrots, ginger and celery into julienne strips. Put your dashi stock into a large saucepan and heat until it comes to a gentle boil. At this point tip the contents of the marinating beef bowl into your pan. Skim the surface of any scum that forms. Add the carrots, celery, ginger and watercress in that order and simmer for a few minutes - the vegetables should still be crispy when serving.

 

 Dish 2: Tender stem broccoli with a peanut and soy dressing

Ingredients:

Peanut butter

Soy sauce

Tenderstem brocolli

  

 

Dish 3: Simmered pork in crepes 

400g pork shoulder joint
Sunflower oil for frying
100ml soy sauce
50ml sake
1 tbs caster sugar
1/2 a leek
1 pieces of fresh ginger, peeled and lightly crushed
2 hard boiled eggs peeled

For the crepes
*I used my go-to crepe recipe here though Harumi has her own

To serve:
1 cucumber, 2 spring onions sliced into julienne and washed and dried
A small packet of mixed washed salad leaves
Chopped basil, mint and corriander to taste  

Lightly brown the pork all over in the bottom of a heavy bottomed saucepan. Remove any excess oil in the pan with kitchen paper when done. Add the soy sauce, sake and sugar before pouring over just enough water to cover the pok. Add the stem of the leek and the ginger. Bring this mixture to the boil and then turn down to simmer, covering the pan with a dropped foil lid (see photos below for how to fashion yours). 

Simmer for about 1 hour, skimming the surface regularly for scum - this is actually the pork fat rising to the surface so you're left with leaner meat. After 45 minutes of the hour are up, add the boiled eggs so that the surface has time to take on the colour of the broth but they don't over cook - they should end up golden brown. In your last 15 minutes, cook your crepes using the recipe of your choice. 

When done, remove the pork and allow to rest before thinly slicing. Cut your eggs in half and arrange all the ingredients out on a table for guests to assemble for yourselves. 

Dish 4: Deep Fried Chicken Thighs in a Leek Sauce

250g boneless chicken thighs - skin on
1/2 tbs soy sauce
1/2 tbs sake
a mixture of flour and polenta to coat your chicken (Harumi uses potato starch but I struggled to find this as easily)
sunflower oil
1/2 leek
50ml soy sauce
1/2 tbs sake
15ml rice vinegar
1/2 tbs caster sugar
1/2 sunflower oil
1/2 red chilli no seeds roughly chopped     

Start by preparing your leek sauce. Stab your leek allover to tenderise it for chopping, then chop it as finely as you can. Mix together the soy sauce, sake, rice vinegar and sugar in a bowl. Lightly saute the leek and chilli in a frying pan - add the liquid and then when the sugar has dissolved, take it off the heat.

Marinade the chicken in the soy sauce and sake for 5 minutes. In the meantime, heat your oil. When the oil is hot, take each piece of chicken, coat it thoroughly and lower it into the pan. Allow to deep fry for at least 6 minutes, ensuring every piece is fully submerged. Remove the chicken and place on a wad of kitchen roll to remove the surface oil. Plate up or put into a serving bowl and pour the leek sauce over the top whist still steaming hot to serve.

Dish 5: Salmon Nanbanzuke

50g celery
40g peeled carrots
10g fresh ginger, peeled
1 red chilli
50g onion peeled
300g salmon fillets cubed into 3"x3" pieces
Salt and pepper to season
Plain flour to coat your fish
Sunflower oil for deep frying
1 lime sliced

For the Nanbanzuke Sauce
100ml dashi stock
35ml soy sauce
50ml rice vinegar
juice from 1/2 lemon

Start by making your bowl of Nanbanzuke sauce. You can serve your dish from this so use a serving bowl if deisred. Mix together your sauce ingredients and add salt as you wish. Chop the celery, carrots and ginger into julienne strips then finely slice both the chilli and the onion. Set aside. 

Prepare the salmon by heating a few inches of oil in a saucepan - enough to cover your fish when deep frying. Then take each piece of fish and coat lightly in flour. When the oil is hot enough, drop the salmon pieces in, taking care not to splash. Allow these to deep fry for a few minutes until crispy on the outside but still a little underdone inside. Remove with a slotted spoon to drain excess oil, dab with kitchen paper if needs be, then place immediately into your nambanzuke sauce to marinade. Add the celery, carrot, ginger, chilli and thinly sliced lime to your bowl, cover and allow to marinate for at least half an hour before serving.      

Dish 6: Green beans in a sesame dressing 

This dish could not be simpler or more delicious. 

50g sesame seeds
1 tbs soy sauce
1 tbs mirin
1 tbs white wine vinegar
1/2 tsp caster sugar

Place your sesame seeds into a pestle and mortar (or a food processor if you don't have one). Grind until a rough paste forms. Then add the rest of your ingredients and stir well. 

Steam your green beans until a little crispy but cooked through, remove from the heat, run under cold water and pat dry. Put into a serving bowl and dress.
  

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