Another review (sorry it's been so long, I don't get out much) - Kitch

Inspiration comes in many forms. Some people need an open grassland with wildebeest grazing in a serpentine pattern, others find it in a stormy sea and more still draw that elusive of all things from a woodland walk. Recently I was inspired by home-made baked beans.

Okay, not just the beans but they were the spark. I frequent this place in Canterbury called Kitch. Usually it's just for a takeaway (deep breath): spicy cacao, hold the maple, with a shot of espresso. This is a magnificent concoction of unsweetened cacao mixed with ginger, cinnamon and cayenne, usually with a shot of maple syrup, made up with almond milk. Adding the espresso has become known as making it dirty ie. a dirty cacao.

Anyway, the other day I stopped in to get myself some breakfast after dropping Betty and The Spud at the train station. It is just such a fantastic place to visit. The atmosphere is really friendly and relaxed with lovely retro tea room style decor.

I went for the Full Veggie this particular morning and it was something else. It has on it sweet potato falafel, avocado, poached egg, wilted spinach, and HOMEMADE BAKED BEANS! It comes with a side of addictive wholemeal, multigrain, sourdough toast too, but seriously...baked beans that are actually homemade.

The falafel are fantastic, sweet with a slight curried flavour from cumin they go amazingly with the egg and spinach giving a cross between eggs Florentine and kedgeree. Avocado is always a winner with me so I'll never complain about a wedge of it on my plate but seriously these beans, right, were beautiful. A millions times nicer than the tinned variety with a fresh tomato sauce and fat soft haricot beans (I think).

This also comes with grilled mushrooms. I'll just leave that there. People who know me know, everyone else can guess.

I had, with my breakfast, a matcha latte made with coconut soya milk. I thought it was a bit too early in the morning for my usual. I was happy with my choice. How couldn't I be with a beautifully made, slightly sweet, cup of frothy heaven?

All in all an amazing experience. Kitch like to make fresh, seasonal, whole food and they do a damn fine job of it. There is always a smile when you go in the door and there's never a rush to get you fed and back out again. Also they tend to remember people and regular orders.

If you're in Canterbury at any stage do make sure to visit. You won't regret it.

Restaurant Review- Deeson's in Canterbury

Haven't updated this in a while, and we had a great meal out the other night, so thought I'd share.

Located on lovely cobbled streets a short walk from the cathedral, this modern English restaurant is easily one of the finest in Canterbury. Being in the city centre it is within walking distance of the bus terminus, and all of the car parks.

With a comfortable, welcoming atmosphere it is a fantastic place to spend a couple of hours. The layout is such that there is an element of privacy, and a sense of space. Having appropriate disabled facilities, and even a baby changing area make it welcoming to everybody.

The waiting staff were attentive and knowledgeable; when asked about the eggs in the mayonnaise our server knew immediately that they were pasteurized. There was also no feeling of urgency, they encouraged us to take our time choosing our food.

An extensive menu was complemented with a drinks list which had, along with a good selection of wines from around the world, plenty of English wines, beers and ciders. The selection of fish and vegetarian options on the menu was good, however we did note a lack of any vegan options.

A really special thing I found about this place was that it grows a lot of its own food. This is something close to my heart, as those who know me will know, and I love it about this place. They have a 5 acre small holding called 'The Bunker' near Canterbury, where they grow as much of the food as they can for the restaurant. So the food is fresher than fresh, and better for the environment.

The food itself was close to faultless. Before we started we were brought warm bread rolls, with a choice of smoked or salted butter. The smoked eel in my starter went great with the samphire and apple jelly, cut through with slices of pickled cucumber. The other starter of celeriac and apple soup was creamy and delicious, and was complimented beautifully by garlic croutons. The starters were quite reserved in size; at the time they seemed a bit too small, but with such intense flavours and with what was to come it was actually just right.

We went with the belly pork and sea bass for mains. The slow cooked, pressed pork with impossibly thin, crispy skin was topped with a cider braised cheek with apple sauce - classic but perfect. We were surprised to see sea bass with orange sauce, but we weren’t disappointed. In fact the aforementioned mayonnaise mixed with crab brought the two together beautifully.

The dessert was the reason the small starters were so clever. They were big, and they were good. Trio of chocolate with mousse, brownie and dark chocolate sorbet sounds a bit heavy perhaps, but with the clever addition of minted orange and sticky-sweet honeycomb it was practically ambrosia. Bramley apple and quince crumble was the other dessert, and it was good, very good. The one down point was that the custard with it was a little runny, delicious, but could have been thicker. That being said when it was poured into the little copper pan used to serve the crumble, the taste was great.

It was certainly a place we would visit again soon.

Sausage Rolls

Nothing too complicated here, but I was just so damn proud of these babies that I just had to put them on my blog! The puff pastry recipe is on the blog too, take a look why don't ya. Apart from that it's mostly assembly.

Ingredients-

200g(ish) puff pastry-chilled
250g pork mince
1 small chilli finely chopped
1-2 cloves of garlic really finely chopped or minced preferably
1 tsp balsamic vinegar
salt and pepper
dried (or fresh) herbs-I used some sage about 1 tsp or so dry.
1 egg beaten

Method-

1. Make your filling by mixing all of the ingredients apart form the pastry (obviously), and leave it rest in the fridge for a half an hour or so.

2.  Roll out your pastry to about 0.5 cm thick, twice as wide as you would like your sausage rolls to be, and as long as the rest will allow. Then cut it in half (which I hadn't done before taking this picture) so that there is enough pastry for two long sausage rolls one above the other.

3. Spread the meat mixture evenly across the pastry about 2 cm from one side, then roll the pastry over the top and press the seam together with a little egg wash between to seal.

4. Cut into little or large sausage rolls, as many as it will allow and brush liberally with egg wash. Prick little holes, or slice the top artistically or don't. I'm not sure it really matters!

5. Bake in a preheated oven for 35 minutes and they should be puffed up nicely with a golden brown colour.

I find getting them off the baking tray straight away, and cooling them for as long as you can stand before scoffing them is a good idea. Also they are still amazing the next day!
The end ones aren't all that great I found-not enough meat when I did it. I have tweaked the recipe since I took the pics though, so there should be more meat all around.
I added onion instead of the chilli the last time and it was tasty. I would say don't add too much of either as they change it a bit, and make it a bit wet. Still good though.
I made some veggie ones for Betty recently too, which I will share soon. Promise.

Brew Dog (Mikkeller, Nøgne Ø)-Black Tokyo Horizon ABV 15.2%

Firstly this was a Christmas present from my good friend Noel. It's a collaboration of 3 brewers, but seems to be sold under Brew Dog's name. It's a fusion of stouts from these 3, making an absolutely amazing Imperial stout. For those who don't know an Imperial stout is a porter with a high ABV (over 8% I think...ask Wikipedia I'm sure they know).

Appearance-

I'm a sucker for a beer in a box, always fools me into thinking I'm onto something good. In this case it was justified. This may be pathetic fallacy but I swear when I opened it, it was smoking-yeah this stuff is so amazing it can't wait to get out of the bottle. The beer itself is a darker than dark brown, when held up to the light nothing passes through. It has a very short lived brown head too.

Nose-

Sweet coffee smell, very rich, almost sticky. It also has a slight burnt smell, which was nice with the coffee.

Taste-

Amazingly smooth and sweet. Almost too sweet, with a burnt hint which made it like a burnt caramel. There was also a bitter finish, just at the very end. It is slightly alcoholic tasting, but at that percentage I guess it would be hard for it not to be. I didn't feel this really diminished it. Over all something really special-cheers Noel.

A final note on this one: I have a notebook where I write down notes on my beers as I drink them, so I can write them here later-sad I know. Anyway, in capitals at the end of this one I've written: "DOESN'T GO WITH MCCOY'S". I have a vague recollection of this, I think it was near the end, when I was smashed, and I cracked open the crisps-so yeah, don't try this one with McCoy's you have been warned!

Puff Pastry

I've wanted to make puff pastry for ages, but I've always had a fear of it. It seems like a daunting undertaking, but it really, really isn't. It takes a bit of time, but not that much actual doing of anything, a lot of waiting, but who of you hasn't at some point recently spent a day off watching television or playing a game. It's really a lot nicer than shop bought stuff, not to mention cheaper. And for me it gives a wonderful sense of satisfaction at having made something yourself. One very important thing before you start-don't handle the dough too much, it needs to stay as cold as possible, so be quick, and get it back in the fridge as soon as you can.

Ingredients-
500g Flour
500g Butter (unsalted or slightly salted)
250ml(ish) water
1 tbsp lemon juice
Salt

Method:

1. Mix the flour and salt with one third of the butter (that's 166.6666666g annoyingly). I did this with my Magimix, but I'm sure doing it by hand would be just fine.

2. Add the lemon juice and as much of the water as it takes for the mixture to come together into a nice stretchy dough. As it get's closer to this point add the water slowly, because too much water and you get a sticky mess. I didn't need the full 250ml.

3. Press the dough into a square roughly 2cm thick and let it rest for an hour, wrapped in some greaseproof paper. At this point I also cut the remaining butter into 2cm thick slices, that when put together were slightly smaller than the square of dough. The other option here is to beat the butter between 2 sheets of greaseproof paper until it is this shape and thickness. Put this in the fridge also.

4. Take the dough out and roll out to twice it's length-a long rectangle. Place the butter on half of the dough and fold the other half over. Press the edges tightly and make sure you don't get any air pockets. Now you have a dough sandwich with the butter between. Roll this out to 1 cm thick once more, making sure no butter comes out the sides. Fold the dough by taking one side and folding it over one third of the total length, then take the other side and fold it over the original fold. That's called one 'turn'.

5. Put it back in the fridge and let it cool, I tried 10 mins in the freezer followed by 15 in the fridge. Then take it out and do another turn, the opposite way to the previous, and repeat until you have done 6 turns.

6. Make the last turn as neat as possible, and let it rest for at least an hour before using it. I did it late in the day so mine was in the fridge overnight and it was fine the next day.

That's it, done. I hope you got the folding instructions ok. If in doubt, ask. This was my first time making it, and it was a resounding success, and so very easy. Coming soon I will show you two things I made with it; Sausage rolls and a Pizza-thing. This is definitely one to try though, so very easy, and the turns don't take much time, just pick a day you're doing nothing else and do it. One tip that I keep reading about puff pastry is that it's important to use good quality butter, and French butter at that. It has a higher melting point, so it behaves better when working with it, and stays between the layers better for flakier pastry. Have fun!

Rogue Voodoo Doughnut Bacon Maple Ale and Chocolate Peanut Butter & Banana Ale

The title of this post might just look like a jumble of words, but it is in fact the title of two beers drank by myself and 2 friends just recently. I was very excited about these two. As you can see they promise some really unusual flavours. They also cost enough for you to expect a very good quality of beer. You may notice that I haven't put an ABV down. This is because there is none on the bottles nor on the website, that I can see. I like the full list of ingredients that they give on the bottles, including the types of hops and malts. That's about all I liked about them though. I've written them both at once, as I'm not sure if they deserve two separate posts.

Appearance(s)-

Bright pink bottles! There's very little I can add to this, apart from; it didn't put me off at first. That was on the assumption that the beer would be fantastic. The Bacon Maple is a slightly cloudy amber colour, the Chocolate Peanut Butter and Banana was darker, possibly owing to the chocolate malt used in the brewing (great idea, credit where it's due). Both were quite fizzy and had decent lasting heads.

Nose(s)-

Put simply, they smell like the names suggest. The Bacon Maple one has a really strong smoky smell. It's almost too much, well it is too much really, no point sugar coating it. Frankly I couldn't smell much apart from the added flavours, in either.

Taste(s)-

Once again the Bacon Maple is very smoky. Also a bit weird, but not in a good way. Too much bacon, not enough maple I thought. The other wasn't great either, although less disturbing. The flavours just didn't add up. The beers underneath all of those flavours were also not that great, I thought. That could have been because it was masked though. Hard to know.

Conclusion-

You may have noticed, from my oh so subtle, and skilful writing that I didn't really take to these. I'm not saying don't try them, I would say do. It's something new, and different. I wouldn't be buying them again though. I think it might be because I don't really like adding a lot of extra things to beer. The cardinal four ingredients, and maybe another natural flavouring, like coffee beans, or cocoa or fruit juice at a push. Smoked bacon though? banana flavouring? not so sure. As usual though, don't take it from me, try it yourself, with trepidation (that one's for you Noel).

Siren Craft Brew-Rainbow IPA ABV 7.9%

Another winner here from Siren I think. I was just reading up on types of beers before writing this one up. It says on the bottle that it's 'A Belgian Golden style ale hopped to IPA levels'. So it turns out that a Golden Beer is obviously Belgian and apparently made with pilsner malt. IPA is a type of beer that was brewed during the English occupation of India, when they used to ship the beer to India (the 'I' in IPA) it used to go off. So they increased the amount of hops and alcohol in it, and IPA was created. And boy am I glad it was.

Appearance-

Great label again, Siren seem to be good with labels. My usual place (The Bottle Shop at The Goods Shed in Canterbury) has a few lined up on the shelf and they are a delight to look at. With their arty labels. Also I like the detail on it, like the info above about the type of beer. Handy for a nerd like me. The stuff itself is opaque kind of yellow/orange but not quite, maybe a little brown? Lovely white bubbly, short lived head. Quite fizzy this one, be careful pouring it.

Nose-

Now I love a good label as you know, but I should really stop reading them before I smell or taste the contents. I could definitely smell the good level of hops in this one, with the familiar citrus/grapefruit notes (oooh get me, notes). So, I also swear I could get a slight hint of apple, but it does say that there is apple juice in it on the label. Like I said above, though, I'm a bit impressionable, so take that one with a pinch of sugar (also on the ingredient list).

Taste-

Fantastic smack across the face that only an IPA can give. Beautiful citrus taste also, as expected. what I didn't expect really was the initial sour hit I got also. This combined with the tiny bit of sweetness makes it almost like a sour sweet...a bitter, ale flavoured sour sweet. Okay maybe not, but you get the idea. I would like to reiterate my above disclaimer here, but I swear there was a fruity character to this, aside from the citrus. Please try it for yourself though, and let me know, I would be interested.

Conclusion-

I was very impressed by this offering from Siren. After the heavy stouts I've had recently, I really appreciated the change. I do have a lovely stout ready for some time soon. The next 2 I am going to drink though come in pink bottles, and have flavours including bacon, and banana! Watch this space.