Adventure 35: Funnel Blower

Last night at the Western, we bumped into a nice group of people, who recommended the Maltings Beer Festival to us in Newton Abbot. After a long chat about Real Ale in this neck of the woods and meeting the marketing guy from the Brewery at Lyme Regis, we left with a definite Saturday plan and free beer tokens. Its been a hideous, cold, wet Saturday afternoon in Devon and a perfect time to hit the beer festival with what seemed like a billion different beers from all over the south west. My favorite has to be the 'Funnel Blower' by Box Steam, a mild that tasted and smelt like vanilla which was utterly heavenly. Though heaving, this is a festival we'll be back to next year for sure. 

Adventure 34: Let's Chive!

TOR BAY, a bay in the SE of Devon; extending from Hope Nose on the N to Berry Head on the S. It measures 4½ miles across the entrance, and 3½ to the head; makes a nearly semi-circular sweep into the land; presents and commands very fine scenery; was the landing-place of the Prince of Orange on 5 Nov. 1688; was a common resort and anchoring-ground of the channel-fleet under Lord St. Vincent; and was pronounced by Bonaparte, when brought to it in the Bellerophon in 1815, to resemble Port Ferrajo in Corsica. See Torquay.

- John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales, 1870

One thing I love about Devon, is that at one o'clock in the afternoon, you can be umming and ahhing on the sofa about what you should do the rest of the day and then less than two hours later you can be walking in the brilliant sunshine, looking over the sea and beautiful beaches. We got the train to Paignton, in Torbay near where my great grandmother had a house, and my father caught mackerel as a kid and cooked them with bay leaves from the garden and Grandad watched the 1966 World Cup Final. Though modern Paignton is really not to my taste, we had a wonderful walk along the cliffs to nearby Brixham with my trusty carrier bag in my pocket just in case...

First find of the day, was MORE wild garlic in the woods by Churston Golf Course. After months of hunting for it, its lost its novelty value, but the smell in the air was still good - just shows how your sense of smell is important when you're out foraging... we smelt it before we saw it.

More exciting was finding my first load of wild chives in the park near Fishcombe Cove - yippee! Its a bit stragglier than bought chives and has a sweet oniony taste. There was so much of it, it took all my might not to get over excited a take only a little home to experiment with.

Finally, after climbing a billion hills we reached Brixham where William of Orange apparently landed during the Glorious Revolution in 1689. A sleepy, seaside town, famous for its fresh crab and its replica of the Golden Hind in the harbour, we were also delighted to find that it had a CAMRA award winning pub in its midst!

The Queen's Arms (http://www.thequeensarmsbrixham.co.uk/) is South Devon Pub of the year and fully deserving of the title. It was so friendly (the landlord popped over to see how we were) and a great selection of ale and a sleeping pub cat (cuteness!) by the bar. We enjoyed a nice pint of Queen Arms Defender Ale and the cosy atmosphere.

Back at home it was time to get to work on the chives. I decided I wanted to make Cheese and Chive muffins based on this recipe http://www.food.com/recipe/cocktail-cheese-chive-muffins-343675. Not entirely healthy - I shudder when I think of all that cheese clogging me up - but very tasty nonetheless.

Back at work tomorrow (nooooo!) but wish you all a very Happy Easter Bank Holiday from Devon. 

Adventure 33: Dandelion will make you wise

Prince or pauper, beggar man or thing

Play the game with ev'ry flower you bring

Dandelion don't tell no lies

Dandelion will make you wise

Tell me if she laughs or cries

Blow away dandelion

- Rolling Stones

Dandelions = cheap, plentiful, free food. 

With all the sunshine last week (and trying to put off all my marking as long as possible before term starts) I headed over to the island in the Exe near my house with a bag and looking a bit like a mad, cat lady picked half a carrier bag full of dandelion flowers. You can eat all the dandelion - the leaves (free salad), the roots (make caffeine free coffee) and flowers which is what I was concentrating on. They're just so beautiful and yellow! 

The pain staking part was separating the leaves from the recepticle (the green bit at the bottom holding it all together) which took a good hour (made longer by me finding the courage to put the spider I found outside without screaming) but I did end up with a beautiful yellow tray of petals with which I could start cooking!

Recipe 1: Dandelion Burgers 

(based on:  http://www.prairielandherbs.com/dandelionburgers.htm)

1 cup dandelion flowers 

1/2 cup plain flour
1/2 tsp salt 
1/4 cup chopped red onions onions
1/4 tsp mixed herbs
1 egg
fresh ground pepper

Mix the dry and wet ingredients separately, then mix together to form a batter and fry in a pan. 

Verdict: fairly tasty, without onions and spices would have been bland but the dandelions really mesh all the ingredients together and provide a great alternative to quorn or potato based veggie burgers

Recipe 2: Dandelion Bread 

(based on: http://fat-of-the-land.blogspot.co.uk/2008/04/dandy-muffins-and-bread.html)

2 cups white flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup dandelion petals
4 tbsp honey
1 egg

mix ingredients together and spoon into muffin cases, cook at 220 °C for 20 minutes

Verdict: sweet and tasty with butter and a bowl of carrot and coriander soup! Will make this one again.

Recipe 3: Dandelion Syrup

(based on: http://www.ediblewildfood.com/dandelion-syrup.aspx)

Boil dandelion petals for 15 minutes and sieve out the petals

For every pound of liquid add a pound of sugar and a dash of lemon juice

Reduce down (when it gets white bubbles on the top, I know I'm pretty much done

Cool in a tub in the fridge

Verdict: much nicer and more subtle than golden syrup/maple syrup and great on Greek yogurt in the mornings.

Will keep you updated when I finally get on to experimenting with leaves and roots! Ta rah!

Adventure 32: Lets Cwtch in Cardiff....

"Where we gonna go on a break, Levi?" I asked three weeks ago. We'd left it stupidly late to book anywhere in the UK and as we worked our way through booking.com our hopes of a holiday seemed to diminish before our eyes. We were looking for somewhere affordable, not too far and that we'd not been to before, and after some searching we decided on Cardiff, Wales' capital city. Not the first place you'd think of going on a holiday (reactions to this from friends and relatives included: 'Cardiff?' 'why?' and 'interesting...'). Still, we're positive people and with some excitement we packed our bags and headed off. And seriously, any doubts we might have had soon disappeared because Cardiff is frankly, quite awesome for a city break. 

Reason 1: The Beer

Cardiff: Home of Brains Brewery and good solid, beautiful, drinkable beer. 

By far the nicest pub in town for Real Ale fans has to be The City Arms (http://www.thecityarmscardiff.com/) near the stadium. It has wonderful guest ales as well as the usual Brains fare, its dark and dingy, has pump clips up the walls - a real old man pub and an absolute delight. By far my favourite pint there was Jolly Boat - absolutely delicious and Gorges Best by Cheddar Ales. Sweet and imensely quaffable - probably my best pint of 2014 so far. We liked the pub so much we went three times including Wednesday night with my friend Anna from university - it was lovely to catch up!

We also went to the Plymouth Arms (http://www.vintageinn.co.uk/theplymoutharmssaintfagans/) in St. Fagan. There is a big open air museum there with houses from all over Wales (http://www.museumwales.ac.uk/stfagans/) which is perfect for a nice sunny afternoon and the pub is right outside selling very good Brain's Bitter and SA Gold. 

By the Bay there is The Packet (http://www.sabrain.com/packet) another good Brain's pub selling a good pint of Brains Bitter. If you fancy wandering around the bay with the Welsh Assembly and the Norwegian Church where Roald Dahl was christened, this is perfect for a quick rest stop. 

Back in town, there are a number of other decent drinking establishments. The Goat Major (http://www.sabrain.com/goatmajor) has a very nice pint of Reverend James (and apparently good pies according to our friend Owain, though we didn't have time to sample them). Other places we enjoyed included The Cottage (great Brains Dark on tap - http://www.sabrain.com/cardiffcottage) and The Brewhouse (http://www.cardiffoldbreweryquarter.co.uk/) where we had a very hoppy American style ale and caught up with one of Levi's former colleagues from Exeter who lives in the area. There was also excellent beer to be had in Zero Degrees and The Taphouse, but more on those below.

Reason 2: The Food

Cardiff has great food on offer. It has a big indoor market with lots of fresh fish, meat and cake. I spied the most delicious Welsh Cakes (see below) and am planning on making some over the weekend (though I'm sure they won't be half as good as these babies...)

In nearby Caerphilly, I found some gorgeous Caerphilly cheese done in wax for freshness and I day dreamed about it all the way round Caerphilly Castle (http://cadw.wales.gov.uk/daysout/caerphilly-castle/?lang=en).  God, I love cheese! We also picked up some delicious home made sandwiches at a local bakery called Glanmors, where the customer service was fantastic (I spent ages umming and ahhing over the delicious fare, and it was all taken with a big smile and easy humour).

Evening meal wise, our favourite place to eat was the Urban Taphouse (http://www.urbantaphouse.co.uk/) which has twenty four beers on tap (I particularly liked Titanic Black) and the most delicious pork burger made with minced pork, black pudding and bacon, topped with yoghurt and apple sauce, fantastic fresh onion rings and fried gherkins. The American style brewtap Zero Degrees (http://www.zerodegrees.co.uk/cardiff/) round the corner was also very nice, with American style beer and big pizzas - mine was Gorgonzola and caramelised pear. Scrumptious. 

Reason 3: More Wild Garlic

Yeah... it doesn't rain, it it doesn't pour, it simply floods! Walking out to the gorgeous cathedral at Llandaff the sweet smell of wild garlic hung in the air and there it was in all its glory. If you're based in the area and want some, there's a load by the river at Llandaff Fields and a load more in the passageway as you come up to the Cathedral. Like bleeding tonnes of the stuff. 

So there you go. Three fantastic reasons to visit Cardiff - its a hidden gem and we'll be back next year for sure (but don't tell Stanley).