All things drink – recipes, buying guides, visits to producers.
Last week saw me doing more baking than drinking, as I found myself entering the Great Chocolate Cake-Off taking place at Chocolate Unwrapped. Although I thoroughly enjoy baking, in recent years it’s tended to be more bread based, so the prospect of coming up with a chocolate cake worthy of being eaten by anyone other ... Read more »
When invited by Bath Tourism Plus to spend a day in Bath, taking our advice on what to visit from twitter, Pete and I jumped at the chance. We started asking for suggestions in the run up to our visit and by the day itself, the advice was flowing in at a great rate. Both ... Read more »
How many pages do you think have been written on pairing food and wine? Google returns 2,140,000 results for “food and wine matching” and another 299,000 for “food and wine pairing”. To my surprise, “food and beer matching” does even better with more than 37 million hits, though I strongly suspect a quirk of the ... Read more »
Last summer we went strawberry picking. I enjoyed it so much I ended up with far too many strawberries. Some we ate fresh, of course – with and without cream. I made a lot into strawberry jam (though it didn’t set so I have several jars of what I’m calling strawberry sauce for ice-cream!). And ... Read more »
Last month, I attended the launch of JING‘s Coonoor Estate Nilgiri Black tea, hosted by The Cinnamon Club. I’d never heard of Nilgiri before so was curious to taste and learn more about this lesser-known Indian tea. David Hepburn, who introduced me to a range of Jing oolong and puerh teas a few months ago, ... Read more »
A visit to the Lake District really isn’t complete without visiting a few of the many small breweries that abound in this region. So during our week’s holiday to Windermere in July, Pete and I made our way to Coniston’s Black Bull, attached to the small Coniston Brewing Co. The pub is charmingly retro; it’s ... Read more »
I have a sweet tooth. Drinks of choice remain sugary concoctions such as Midori, Pimms & lemonade, Amarula, Dr Pepper, Coca Cola. Yes, really. No, I’m not fifteen. More accepted in adult circles is my deep and abiding love for dessert wines including honeyed French seducers Monbazillac, Coteaux du Layon and the various Muscats, aromatic ... Read more »
Vodka has a special place in my affections, so strongly does it feature in my memories of two rather splendid holidays during my youth. the only picture of me I have to hand from 1989 (and I was all dressed up and hadn’t hit the voddie yet) In 1989 I was one of a coach ... Read more »
You know how sometimes, you experience those perfect moments of serendipity which lead to wonderful moments and new friendships? One of those moments came together for me on the first Friday of this month. Just a few weeks before I started my blog, Pei Wang started his. In his case, he took a far deeper ... Read more »
Unusually for someone who didn’t grow up eating them (so I’m told) I love the big black tapioca pearls often served at the bottom of ice cold drinks in Chinese cafes. (Yes, I like grass jelly too!) In China Town for dim sum last week, but arriving earlier than my friend, I stopped for a ... Read more »
The Place of Onions, in old Lille. After last night’s rainstorm the intense sticky heat has broken and today is cool, breezy, fresh… I love it! A drop of… [more]
We went to Star Wars: Secrets of the Empire at The Void this morning, an amazing VR experience where we got to be Rebel Alliance members going undercover as… [more]