I am a big beer drinker. I love it as much as I do wine and increasingly, I love it more. Nothing can beat the refreshment of an ice cold burst of hops and bubbles. When I was tempted by the offer of this food and beer matching hamper from the people at Innis and Gunn, I put the feelers out a little and asked my beer blogging pal for his opinion on I & G (I’m not familiar with their beers and tend to stick to what I know - Brew Dog) and he directed me to this post where opinions are pretty much divided. It seems many beer aficionados feel they have ‘moved on’ from I & G but some still enjoy it as much as ever. I had to try it.

I must admit, my little face lit up when I received the hamper. Arbroath smokies, smoked salmon, smoked venison; a delicious looking, if rather smoky, range of foods. We laid the whole lot out in one big spread (complete with tartan tablecloth) and got right down to business.

Our first match was the I & G ‘Blonde’ with Inverawe organic smoked salmon: skilfully smoked fish which surprised us with its cheeky waves of smoke, then salmon, then smoke and oaky depth. A slosh of Blonde in the mix made our tastebuds happy with notes of caramel and vanilla winding down to a slight bitterness to foil the rich, meaty fish. Overall I enjoyed this uncomplicated match, although I probably wouldn’t drink the beer on its own as I prefer a bit more of a challenge and punch to my tipple; this was a little too mainstream for my taste.

The ‘Rum Cask’ was paired with cold smoked venison from Rannoch Smokery: wintry, dark and surprisingly sweet with an irony, gamey tang and a texture like the missing link between raw meat and jerky. Together with a slurp of fruit, spice and rum scented beer it combined into something luxurious and festive. My favourite match by a deer-roamed country mile.

After three successful combinations (some hot, buttered Arbroath smokies were also devoured in minutes), we moved on to the cheese. The first to step up, a Strathdon Blue from Ruaraidh Stone, Ross Shire, was very mellow and creamy; easy-going, not particularly sharp or salty but pleasantly earthy and subtle. This was matched with an IPA, which unfortunately didn’t stand up to the challenge very well. The cheese, although mellow, was a blue nonetheless and all we got was a big hit of cheese and a vague taste of alcohol from the IPA, with the exception of a slightly malty false start.

The second cheese match, a smoked cheddar and I & G ‘Original’ fared slightly better, with Chris rather ‘getting into it’ after a few mouthfuls. The cheese had an incredibly light texture almost like it had been whipped and a rich, subtly smoked flavour. For me though, this cheese was a little bit odd; I found the taste and texture rather alien and artificial (Chris finished the lot). The beer did well to punch through with a hoppy bitter finish, but for me the cheeses came last in the race; a shame as I really like the idea of matching beer with cheese. If anyone has any suggestions then do please share them.

Things rather tailed off here, as the oatcakes-jam-beer combo went straight into the ‘let us never speak of this again’ category and we just concentrated on finishing off the beer, which, incidentally, I rather enjoyed. The Blonde was a touch dizzy and vacuous but the rum cask aged number was more of an exciting lean towards the dark side. Overall, a thoroughly enjoyable learning experience and a definite kick up the bum to start matching more food and beer. I’m keen to start using more in cooking too, after success with the Punk IPA batter for posh fish fingers and plans in place to use one of the darker beers in a stew.

I think Innis and Gunn have done well to match these beers with foods but have perhaps been slightly distracted by the concept, which is to use products from the surrounding local area; some of the matches seemed to require too much stretching of the imagination. The savoury, smoked foods (cheese excepted) though, worked an absolute treat and I can see myself enjoying a beer and cold collation come Christmas. Then I’ll switch to sherry for dessert.

My new year’s resolution for 2009 was to learn more about wine. I’m not into the kind of resolution where I have to give something up, adding something else in always seems much more attractive and achievable. Of course, wine is a vast subject so I still know very little about it in general and I certainly knew absolutely zilch about English wine until Saturday. I wasn’t even sure if I’d ever tasted an English wine but I’d heard rumours about it and they definitely weren’t good. For this reason then, I was extremely curious when Andrew invited me down to Wallingford (Oxfordshire) for a tour and tasting at Brightwell vineyard.

We started with the tour, which was beautiful, a hundred shades of green lit up in the glorious sunshine. This was my first ever vineyard visit so I learned a lot about the maintainence of the vines, including their enemies – snails and rabbits and mildew apparently – the latter being a particular problem in the UK as we have the perfect climate for it, temperate and damp. The Brightwell vineyard was apparently out of production for three years because of mildew. That must have hurt.

We then moved on from the vines to a walk around the lake, after which I was feeling rather thirsty and more than ready to get around to the actual tasting, although not before we had stopped off to have a look at the pigs.

The swines came trotting over expecting food of course and when I crouched down to get a close up shot, one of them actually tried to eat me. Well, my skirt anyway. Perhaps it wanted revenge for my consumption of goodness knows how many of its distant relatives over the years. I don’t know if you’ve ever had a tug of war with a pig but take it from me that their jaws are surprisingly powerful. I did eventually manage to retrieve my skirt, along with a considerable blob of pig saliva. Nice.

The pigs currently reside on the land where Brightwell are intending to grow Pinot Noir, something which Andrew told me sounds very ambitious. This is because the UK has a far from perfect climate for producing red wines, which is why the following tasting really surprised everyone.

If I’m totally honest, the whites weren’t really anything to write home about but the red was the star of the show (Oxford Regatta 2006), really spicy, lots of black pepper but still some good fruit and with an irony, blood-like tang. Apparently the wine is benefitting enormously from bottle ageing.

I learned that the best English wines though are generally the sparklers, although Brightwell don’t offer it at their tastings as they simply don’t have enough so we bought a bottle and took it back to Andrew’s place for round two. It was a bit cheesy on the nose, very green tasting. It was nice but didn’t blow me away. We tasted some wines from other producers too though and my favourite was probably the Limney Horsmonden 2007 which had a hint of green pepper and a toasty coconut finish, although not everyone could agree on the coconut part.

It became apparent that Mark and I have similar noses and tastebuds as he said, ‘I’m getting passionfruit on the nose’ and me with a ‘yes! passionfruit that’s been hanging around for a week’, while others looked on nonplussed. This was definitely one of my favourites. Turns out slightly funky passionfruit rocks my world.

A very short while ago I would not have had the confidence to write about wine on this blog like I do now. First, there was my mini wine epiphany, encouraged by Rob at this meal, then I started to tentatively trust my own senses with wine, just like I do with food and all of a sudden here I am, blogging about it good and proper. I’ve learned that not everyone picks up the same aromas and flavours in wine and that this is perfectly normal, which was like cutting a ball and chain – I feel more free to blog about it now I don’t have to worry if I’m not getting bloody peaches on the nose when someone else is. Aaaand relax…

You can see the full set of photos from the day here and more detailed notes from our Twitter tasting session here.

Ever since I met Bompas and Parr back in January, I’ve been a truly devoted fan. I mean, who can fail to like people who make jelly for a living? And when they offered to whip me up some jellies for an upcoming bloggers dinner party (a ‘pork belly summit’ – a celebration of well, pork belly), I liked them even more. I nearly bit Sam’s arm off graciously accepted, a jelly exchange took place and after some brief unmoulding instructions via telephone – ta da! They were resplendent on the plate, wobbling and sliding around like nobody’s business.

The jellies were based on the shape of cogs and flavoured with Prosecco and fruit. My favourite was this rather glam version with gold leaf in the centre.

As three of the other bloggers were cooking a pork belly dish for the summit, I decided to make something different – another little homage to B & P in fact, something they served up at their Monnow Valley Drive Thru event – the magnificently named ‘Luther Burger’ (below). It is exactly what you think it is by the way – a Krispy Kreme with bacon in the middle. Now before you recoil in horror, think about it – sweet stuff works with bacon – take maple syrup for example. Don’t get me wrong, I found the idea slightly daunting to begin with but I was pleasantly surprised to find it does actually work (although as Sam himself admits – it is a seriously guilty pleasure).

If you think the Luther Burger is wacky, let me tell you that previous B & P events have included a ‘scratch ‘n’ sniff cinema‘, ‘flavour tripping‘ and these past two weekends, ‘alcoholic architecture’ – a walk in, breathable cocktail of (Hendrick’s) gin and (Fever Tree) tonic.

I arrived for my intoxicating mist fix at 8pm to find the charming Sam (Bompas) working the door (top photo), while simultaneously being interviewed, filmed and politely informing curious passers-by that the event was all sold out.

I was becoming increasingly over-excited at the prospect of entering as people started to emerge – slightly sticky and giggling – from the previous session. Before my time arrived however, Sam asked me if I would mind doing him a little favour by ‘doing the door’ while he nipped off somewhere for ten minutes. A few brief instructions, a clipboard thrust into my hands and he was gone. Adapting quickly to my role I placed a hand firmly on the shoulder of a punter slipping past, unaware of the queue. When she turned around I was pleased to see the smiling face of Ms Marmite Lover – chef and patron of the Underground Restaurant and now my partner in boozy crime.

When Sam returned to relieve me of the clipboard I realised that door duty had the added bonus of leaving us firmly at the front of the queue, first to be handed boiler suits and ushered in to the sounds of Spandau Ballet or something similar.

We ducked through to find ourselves in the changing rooms where we donned our oh so flattering boiler suits before twitpiccing ourselves for the amusement of others and moving through to the bar for preliminary refreshments (double gin and tonics).

I even managed to get a sneaky shot into the boys changing rooms (above) – all perfectly clean fun thank you very much – the suits go on over your clothes – although Sam did report that he had to stop a few people from actually stripping off lest all be revealed when the suit starts to get damp in the mist.

Here we paused to arse about taking photos for a bit before following the sign downstairs…

A spooky red lightbulb hung above the entrance door…

And we’re in…and it’s misty and, and…it tastes like gin and tonic! At first, all we do is laugh and tweet and take pictures and laugh some more. I’m amazed I actually have enough signal to receive a phone call halfway through the session, ‘I’m in a breathable cocktail!’ ‘A what?!’

The foggy room was actually very small, there were perhaps just twenty of us in there, all suited and giggling and er, sniffing because breathable gin and tonic makes your nose run…

To create the mist, B & P used the same technnology as the brilliant ‘Blind Light’ installation by Anthony Gormley at the Hayward Gallery back in 2007. Anthony’s mist however, was much denser – you literally couldn’t see your hand in front of your face. I mentioned this to Sam and he explained that, aside from the tehnicalities of vapourising alcohol, health and safety blah blah blah, the Blind Light installation cost a mere 40p per litre to vapourise – gin and tonic costs more in the region of £40.

We emerged after 40 minutes feeling sticky, slightly giddy and smelling faintly of booze. It’s definitely the strangest evening out I’ve enjoyed since some late night shenanigans at Bestival in 2007, which started with me crawling through the back of a sofa and ended with a fortune teller. I wouldn’t be hugely surprised if I heard that Bompas and Parr were behind it.

Keep an eye on the Bompas and Parr website for details of future events.

Before this recent tasting at Tsuru Sushi, I knew nothing about sake except that I like it. For this reason then, I tried to pay close attention to our very knowledgeable and experienced teacher, Ngaire Takano and I’ll try now to make the most of the barely legible notes I scribbled down at the time.

The evening kicked off with a minor meeting point fail, after which myself and two mates hurried down from London Bridge to the restaurant, which is tucked away behind the Tate Modern. We sunk a couple of cheeky Asahi beers and nibbled on edamame for refreshment, before getting down to to the main event – four different sakes.

The first was a Daiginjo-Shu sake, made using rice which has been ‘polished’ to 50% of its original weight – apparently a very fine sake. It tasted surprisingly soft and sugary with a light, peachy fruityness – not at all harsh like the (obviously poor quality) sake I have tasted many times before.

We were also served some food throughout the evening (although not to be strictly matched with the sake) and with the first drink arrived these light gyoza along with really good, seriously sticky teryaki chicken. I was pretty hungry what with it being dinner time and I could easily have demolished a whole pile of both.

Sake number two was also Daiginjo-Shu. This was crisper with a more intense flavour than the first sake – it also has more alcohol added to it. Apparently some sakes such as these need to be watched for 72 hours straight to ensure that the quality of the drink is maintained. During this time it is constantly tasted to make certain that the delicate balance of ingredients is just right. That’s some serious dedication. I can’t say I wouldn’t nod off. In fact, just how do they stay awake?

Us ladies weren’t allowed the ‘privilege’ of watching sake brew for 72 hours back in the day however. In fact, we weren’t even allowed near it as it was thought that our higher body temperatures would make the sake turn sour. At this point Ngaire took great pleasure in telling us that female sake makers today are actually producing a superior quality drink. Maybe it’s all that extra heat coming off us.

Our third sake was a Ginjo-Umeshu, made by preserving plums in ginjo sake (from what I remember ginjo has a little distilled alcohol added to it, to increase the aroma). This was a gorgeous brown colour from the fruit and was very sweet – almost like a dessert wine. Smooth and subtle. Between this and our last drink, we enjoyed some generous veggie and non-veggie sushi plates. A highlight for me was surprisingly the inarizushi (below) – sweet, delicious and partly responsible for my recent acceptance of tofu. We also enjoyed the rolls which my friend and I were delighted to find contained pickles. We really heart pickles.

Our fourth and final sake was a change to the advertised line-up – a Genmai aged brown rice sake, which we tried with a piece of chocolate brownie – a bit of a surprise combination to all of us but it worked well. The brownie was good, squidgy and chocolately and although the sake was a little heavy on its own, with the brownie it took on a more syrupy quality, again like a dessert wine or sherry.

Sake is a drink with an interesting history but is very labour intensive to produce and is generally shrinking in popularity due to the influx of wine and beer. There are a few sake lovers out there championing the cause however and we learned how some of these people are even starting to play around with flavours, infusing the sake with ginger, garlic or lemongrass for example. I assume this is intended for use in cooking. Glass of garlic sake anyone? No, didn’t think so.

I shall definitely be making an effort to drink more sake from now on, as I was pleasantly surprised by just how different the various types tasted. I found the evening very informative and the credit should definitely go to Ngaire Takano for this – her informal and fun style is backed up by fact that she really knows her stuff. Our tasting on this occasion was complementary, although I must add that was a complete surprise – I was there under the assumption I would be paying £18 for the evening and I won’t hesistate to recommend that you do the same.

Tsuru
4 Canvey Street
London
SE1 9AN
0207 928 2228
www.tsuru-sushi.co.uk/

Sigh. It’s a tough life being a food blogger. I mean, having to traipse around top London venues drinking fabulous cocktails, all based around the premium brand, multi-award winning Whitley-Neill gin. I mean, really. Earlier this year, Whitley-Neill threw down a challenge to create a cocktail based around the spirit, using only ingredients that originate from a tree (the gin is made with juniper berries and other natural stuff – hence the tree link), with the people at WN also donating some of the profits to Tree Aid. So, considering that I was drinking for a good cause, I thought it only right and proper to dive in head first.

As far as I am aware, the judging for the competition is currently in progress. In the meantime, a gaggle of lucky bloggers embarked on a mini crawl around the capital to sample the entries. Our first stop and meeting place was the lobby bar at One Aldwych – our first cocktail a spiced, warming creation named ‘Africa’, sweetened with a touch of amaretto. Despite the reference to far flung shores (Whitley Neill was inspired by Africa and contains two African botanicals), the cocktail was rather wintery with subtle scents of anise and cinnamon, a welcome tonic to the bitter weather outside (especially for me – I got lost, as usual). Continuing with the African theme, our second tipple, ‘Savannah Plain’ (top photo), was considerably sweeter than the first with a predominant flavour of mango and, although I enjoyed the sunny tropical vibe, it was a little on the syrupy side for my taste.

Still inside half an hour and we are on to our third, which I think was the ‘Maple Neill Kumquat’. You can hardly blame me if I get them mixed up now can you? Flavoured with maple syrup and kumquat, it tasted almost confected – sticky and jammy.

It was at this point that a plate of the most amazing buttery olives appeared that had us cooing for the next, ooh, twenty minutes over just how fantastic they were – Italian, apparently (according to the bartender), from ‘the heel of the boot’, to be precise (pointing to his heel in order to make the point clear). We could hardly express our delight over the olives through mouthfuls of juicy little physalis coated in caramel, like teeny weeny toffee apples but just better in every way.

Our fourth and final cocktail in the lobby was ‘The Lost Cherry’ (above), a rose and maraschino cherry perfumed mixture. Strong and scented like Turkish delight, it was delicious and, although I loved this (I adore the flavour of rose), I would have liked a touch more cherry – a little too ‘lost’ perhaps. A strong contender at this stage nonetheless.

Four cocktails down and on to the next venue, Quo Vadis. We were ushered upstairs to a rather swanky bar (think books, sofas, piano – one of those members places decked out like someone’s house) where the highlight of my evening was to occur – a skilfully hilarious rendition of Michael Jackson’s Thriller, on a piano. The pianist was really rather brilliant, actually and not camera shy, either.

The ripples of giggles in the room at this point were down to the combination of the piano playing, rapid gin consumption and these undeniably phallic ice cubes. Very mature, us bloggers.

Here we sampled two cocktails, the first, ‘Une Amandine’ featured elderflower (I would have liked a bit more but then I do love it) and a dash of absinthe (just what we needed..). Next up, my favourite cocktail of the evening – the ‘Reciprocal Cocktail’ – the most beautifully complex drink I have had the pleasure of quaffing in recent memory. Featuring flavours of licorice, pink peppercorns and grapefruit zest, the layers of flavour were really rather impressive (and no, I don’t normally prattle on about ‘layers’ and the like). I could have easily downed another and probably, another. It was so refreshing to taste a cocktail that wasn’t predominantly sweet and fruity.

Soldiering on to our next port of call, (Bureau at Kingly Court), we apparently crashed right into a speech by Dianne Abbott celebrating the election of Barack Obama, and most of us didn’t even notice! I blame the gin induced haze…Here we guzzled a ‘Tippler’s Tree’ (maple syrup, lime and chocolate bitters), followed by a ‘Passing Thyme’, (above – truly delicious and definitely my ‘runner up’, hooray for herbs in cocktails!) followed by a ‘Rise Marmalade’ (below), sweetly spicy and orange scented.

Our fourth and final destination was Match, where we finally caved to the hunger (none of us had eaten dinner) and ordered the (now typical in bars and pubs everywhere), arrangement of things on a wooden board, which was really rather average to be perfectly frank.

The cocktails here were ‘The Whitley Angel’, flavoured with rhubarb and lemon and ‘Whitley Bay’ with kaffir lime and sambuca which both sound fantastic although my memory of them is not entirely clear. To be honest, you guys were a bit unlucky coming in at the end. I mean, just look at how much gin we have consumed by this point. Good job we’re not the professional judges…

While the ‘Reciprocal’ was the clear winner for me, ‘Passing Thyme’ came a very close second and also planted the idea firmly in my head that I wish to enjoy herbs in my cocktails forever more. This was strengthened by the fantastic ‘raspberry’ sour’ with rosemary that Chris and I ordered (not part of the competition), because obviously we just hadn’t tried enough cocktails already….

The evening definitely opened my eyes to the versatility of gin and also to just what I’ve been missing by always ordering the same damn cocktails. I wish the best of luck to all the competitiors and thank you to all my blogging friends and peers for another lovely evening. (Lizzie, Niamh, Chris, Tim, tikichris, Annie, life on the edge and Melanie). Thank you also to Johnny Neill (creator of Whitley-Neill gin), Sally from Relish PR and of course to the bar tenders for contributing yet further to the demise of my liver with those fabulous drinks – what a way to go…