Mai Pen Rai!

I can't believe I have been penning this blog for nigh on a year and have not yet got around to mentioning Thai Boran.  This is a Derby institution tucked away out of town half way up Green Lane.  It appears unpreposessing from the exterior, with the aura of a greasy cafe.  They do open for breakfast but don't let that put you off.  This is by far the best, most authentic and consistently good Thai restaurant in Derby.  I come here at least once every 6 months or so (I last ate here in January but didn't blog, lazy).
There were 10 of us in attendance for a birthday celebration.
I'm guilty of usually having the same thing; the Tom Yum soup and the Laab being especially good.  Tonight the boy strictly informed me that I ought to try something else for a change.  The problem is that there is too much choice, a proliferation of delightful specials on offer. 
I went for the Thai fish cakes to start, something that others often have and i covet, but I've never actually ordered myself.  They proved delicious, crispy, hot and with a fantastically tasty sweet chilli dipping sauce to accompany them.
Next course I decided to be adventurous with my meat and went for duck for a change, duck choo chee to be exact. Choo chee is basically a red curry sauce without the coriander seeds or cumin.  I had a side order of jasmine rice and Som Tum salad, the spicy unripe papaya salad with dried shrimp and peanuts.  All were outstanding, especially the Som Tum, which I must try to re-create at home.

The food here is extremely good value, quality, authentic Thai food, presented with care and attention.  The staff are unwaveringly lovely and friendly, even when I decided to practice my non existent Thai on them after a few glasses of wine.  The birthday girl even got cake.  As ever, we'll be back.

Birthday Girl in the Greyhound.

IMAG0206, a photo by Gingerferret2008 on Flickr.

The Birthday Girl in the pub before Thai Boran.

Last night I went to Spice Lounge, the new (ish) Indian restaurant on Friargate in Derby.  Alright, it has been there a while now, but my relationship with curry has cooled substantially of late, following an unfortunate episode of food poisoning.  Not the curry's fault but that was what was coming up during the bout, and it has scarred me deep.  So anyway I'd wanted to try Spice Lounge for a while and had heard good things about it, but my desire for curry had been fairly lukewarm.  I went with the boy, the brother and a very old German friend who was staying in Derby on his whistle stop tour of the UK, collecting a car full of Walker's crisps, John Smith's bitter and Cadbury's chocolate.  Said German is rather eccentric.  I don't know why we thought curry would be a good idea, kind of a traditional English night out maybe?  Lots of lager and a Ruby Murray?  Anyway, it turned out he doesn't like spice of any description; so not the best start.  However we assured him there would be a non spicy option on the menu (there was) and continued with the plan.
Spice Lounge's menu is not cheap so we took advantage of their early bird offer; 7 days a week before 8pm you get poppadoms and pickles, a main course, rice, naan and a drink for £13.50, not bad.  Spice Lounge sells itself as an upmarket, gourmet option, not your run of the mill flock wallpapered establishment.  We arrived at 7.30pm and the place was heaving, the offer is shrewd as traditionally people tend to go out later for a curry, after  more lager, so this was getting them through the door from the beginning of the evening.  We were seated, in a flock wallpapered corner, and immediately brought our poppadoms, pickles and drinks.  Poppadoms were good, fresh and crispy, and pickles were usual, nothing that stood out as taking things to the next level yet.  Then came a wait of well over half an hour for our main course.  We finished our drinks and ordered another and it did cross my mind that the long wait was a cynical ploy to ensure you did just that.  During the wait we were "entertained" by increasing loud drunken screeching from the harridans at the table opposite...prompting our German guest to comment that this wasn't usual in Germany.  We assured him it wasn't usual here either (thankfully).  Surely they can't have been that hammered already?
Mains came eventually, and were perfectly pleasant, the boys chicken was tender and my paneer was lovely.  The German got his spice free butter chicken although felt it was a bit heavy handed on the sauce.  Mains come in at well over a tenner but I didn't feel they delivered on the "creative twist" claim made on their menu.  I'd rather go to somewhere like Balti International on the Uttoxeter road, food just as good and a lot cheaper, and bring your own booze.  Perhaps the place has bitten off more than it can chew with the demand for the early bird menu, they were trying to cram in too many covers, and staff were literally running around.  I wouldn't make a point of going again but it wasn't bad, just lacking the courage of its convictions and the comfortable and relaxed atmosphere of a lounge.
http://www.spicelounge-friargate.co.uk/index.html

Yes please Yamas!

Last week I started working a day a week as a kind of marketing assistant for Perkins restaurant, escabeche and the Carriage Hall in Nottingham.  This means I have been rather busy setting stuff up for them but I just wanted to take 5 minutes to tell you about a fantastic little restaurant called Yamas which I went to in Nottingham over the bank holiday weekend.
Yamas bills itself as Greek and Spanish mezze and tapas, but I'd say it was more Cypriot than anything else, with a heavy emphasis on Halloumi (of which I can't get enough) and Cypriot beers on the menu.  It is tucked away down a side street (Thurland Street) in Nottingham city centre and was recommended heartily by several trusted food loving individuals.  We went at lunchtime on a Saturday, and although the interior decor is rather unprepossessing I couldn't help being struck by the lively atmosphere; it reminded me of the vibe having lunch at Polpo in Soho in London, lots of people having a really good time and some really good food and drink.
The staff were very welcoming and friendly and we were seated at a cosy corner table where we could people watch everyone enjoying their grub.  There are obviously a lot of regulars who come back again and again.  The lunch menu was disturbingly cheap at £6.95 for 3 dishes each so we decided to go for a sharing starter as well, this proved greedy.  We got a meat and cheese platter with the aforementioned halloumi, cheese stuffed peppers, and various cold meats.  This was accompanied by a basket of beautifully fresh, warmed pitta bread, obviously homemade.  The mezze came thick and fast after that, we ordered a selection which included Kalamari, Stifado, and delicious little deep fried whitebait with alioli.  We couldn't finish all the food which was a crying shame, so if you go for lunch then the lunch menu alone is adequate, you don't need to pimp it!  I look forward to going again, they do some cracking set menus in the evening.  Check it out.
http://www.yamasbar.co.uk/

Cock-a-hoop in Camden.

Recent weeks have rather been taken up with excessive booze intake and hen hilarity, as this year heralds the knot tying of some very dear friends indeed.  First up, the lovely Cat.  A weekend in London, staying in a fab little flat in Camden, culminated in fifteen or so of us partaking in a massively decadent and delicious meal at Pasha in Kensington. 
http://www.pasha-restaurant.co.uk/
Pasha specialises in North African cuisine and isn't cheap but it was a very special occasion and the decor didn't disappoint.  It was the epitome of opulence with carved tables, rose petals scattered everywhere and the air heavy with the smell of incense and hookah pipes.
We started proceedings with cocktails, mine was called a Sapphire Rose, and consisted of gin, lychee, pink grapefruit, lemon juice and rose petals.  It cost the best part of a tenner but it was so worth it....delectable.
We had all ordered a "feast" menu which consisted of several cold starter dishes or "Kemia" to share, followed by hot Kemia, a main of your choice and then dessert dishes to share.  I don't think any of us were expecting the sheer volume of food; it just kept coming!  Brought out in a continuous flow, it started off very healthy with lentil salads, hoummous, tabbouleh and the like.  Then came little hot pastries of chicken, feta and spinach and, not so healthy now, deep fried cheese.
All this was washed down with copious amounts of house wine.  The Kemia courses were rounded off by one very hot (and I don't mean temperature wise!) belly dancer gyrating right by our table, as we tried not to look her in the eye for too long in case she persuaded us to dance with her.  (Of course Cat and I were up dancing before the end of the night!)
The Kemia would have been a lovely meal in itself, but no, this was a feast, which meant everyone had to be uncomfortably groaning by the end of the evening!  I had chosen the "grill" option, as had most.  This was marinated chicken, lamb and delicious, spicy merguez sausages, served with a pile of cous cous and salad.  I didn't want to waste any food and it was gorgeous, the meat meltingly tender, but I was stuffed.  Fortunately I struck on that age old British tradition of asking for a doggy bag!  Hey presto, cold hangover feast for on the train back tomorrow.  (It went down very well indeed).  After more belly dancing dessert came and most of that went into the doggy bag too.  The meal was rounded off with an electric hookah pipe inside and an authentic shisha one outside, most enjoyable.  I drank gallons of mint tea which sorted me out and prepared me for the next phase of the evening; Mr Scruff at Koko in Camden, but that's another story...

A Spanish Fe-ast-a!

The boy's parents went to Lloret in Spain and returned bearing foody gifts; a bottle of rioja and a packet of saffron.  It would have been so rude not to use this fabulous saffron in making a paella, so that is exactly what I did.  Paella was also a good excuse to utilise the paprika I purchased at Gelupo in London.

I followed a basic recipe in Carlos Horrillo and Patrick Morcas's Tapas book, which is full of simple and lovely Spanish recipes.  The one glaring omission from Horrillo's recipe (in my humble opinion) is chorizo.  Whenever possible I buy my cooking chorizo from a little Polish stall in the Guildhall market, Derby.  It cannot be beaten on taste or price.  I hotfooted it to the market on Saturday and purchased said chorizo, chicken legs from the poultry stall which they cut up into portions for me, and massive raw gambas (prawns) from the fishmongers.  That's the meat selection covered, and not a sniff of supermarket.

 Paella.

12 dashes of olive oil
4 garlic cloves, finely sliced
2 medium onions, finely sliced
2 large tomatoes, roughly chopped
2 large red peppers, finely sliced (I only used one)
your choice of meat and fish, I used 2 small cooking chorizos, 4 bone in chicken portions and 6 massive gambas.  You can use squid, chicken breast, rabbit, mussels, clams, white fish.....
100ml white wine
1 tablespoon tomato puree
300g Paella rice of your choice
1.5 litres of stock of your choice (I used Kallo free range chicken)
pinch of saffron strands soaked in a splash of hot water
2 bay leaves
a teaspoon of paprika
1 dried chili
1 handful frozen peas, defrosted
chopped parsley
lemon wedges to serve

I used a big wok, as I don't have a paella pan.  Once you have everything sliced and diced, just heat the olive oil in the pan and stir fry the chorizo for a couple of minutes, then add the onion, garlic, tomato and pepper and stir fry on a gentle heat until soft.
Remove all this from the pan and add the chicken pieces and brown all over.  Remove the chicken and set aside.
Add the prawns and white wine, cover with a lid and simmer for a few minutes until pink.  Remove and set aside.

Return everything to the pan but the prawns.  Stir in the tomato puree and the rice.  Add half the stock, salt and pepper to taste, the paprika, saffron and bay leaves.
Bring to the boil and stir then simmer without stirring (you can give the pan a little shake from time to time) for around half an hour.  Add more stock as you go along, but don't stir, it isn't a risotto.

When the rice is cooked take the pan off the heat and stir in the peas, prawns and parsely.  Stand covered for five minutes.  Serve with lemon wedges on the side.  Make sure the chicken is cooked and the juices run clear.
The paprika, chili and parsley were my additions to this particular recipe, but are often included in paella.  The smooth and oaky rioja complemented the smoky, sweet and citrus flavours of the paella perfectly.
Lots of chopping but well easy to make after that, I'll definitely do this for guests next time as it made loads!  (Recipe is for four).

Manderley...Escabeche

Last night (I dreamt) I went to Escabeche again, this time with the boy in tow, to sample the new, summer menu that they have created.  The restaurant is really doing rather well and is packed every weekend.  The turn out on a Tuesday evening after bank holiday was impressive.  Thankfully the building site next door has gone and a terraced area has been set up with chairs and tables in front of the restaurant for al fresco dining, and possibly even some barbecues later in the year.  They have also completed work on their upstairs area where they have held some live music events and a wine tasting, I hope to sample both of these kinds of events in the near future! 
We drank a crisp and fruity white rioja from the impressive wine list and our venerable host, Jon Perkins, ordered a rather decadent number of dishes for us to sample.  A selection of breads came first, cheese focaccia with garlic butter and fresh, warm pitta with home made hummus, sunblush tomato pesto and a rustic tapenade.  All the dips positively zinged with flavour and freshness.  at under £3 each the breads are a cheap and filling starter.  Next came a courgette, basil and Parmesan gratin which had been fiercely recommended by front of house protege Kat, athough she claims that she dislikes courgettes!  This pleasingly understated dish tasted of pure summer, and was one of my favourites.  We had a board of cured meats with cornichons and what was described on the menu as seasonal slaw but was actually a delectable celeriac remoulade, a bonus indeed.  We also sampled marinated halloumi fritters with a harissa dip, a tuna and Tuscan bean salad, fish and chorizo croquettes with ravigote dressing (tomatoes, capers etc) which were the right side of crunchy on the outside and melting potato inside, with smoky chorizo perfectly complementing the fish.  We moved on to a dense and flavoursome Spanish omelette, light as air tempura squid and the piece de resistance for the boy; crispy skinned pork belly with cauliflower and manchego puree, mustard leeks and a rich jus, a kind of mini roast dinner, bursting with concentrated flavours (and morsels of fabulous crackling).  All the dishes range in price from £2.85 to a maximum of £7.95 for tapas of beef or scallop and smoked salmon.  The average is £5 and the portions are generous for tapas.  Two to three dishes per person are recommended plus bread or potatoes.  Yes, purists, this isn't Spanish tapas, but as I said in my first blog about Escabeche they have taken the concept of tapas and turned it on it's head and the result is some of the most inventive, creative and delicious cooking I've sampled in ages.  We finished our meal with tiny shots of amaretto with warm cream and churros with chocolate sauce that any self respecting churerro would be proud of.  Burp.  There is also an extensive breakfast menu including interesting dishes like Kedgeree and Piperade, fine coffee, lunch offers and an afternoon tapas menu.  Why anyone is still going to cafe nero across the road I don't know.  If you haven't been yet, why?  I'm aware my opening line echoes Daphne du Maurier, and actually no, I didn't dream it, it really was that good!
 http://www.perkins-family.co.uk/?i=214141