Pork Chop Night

I grew up in the 80’s, a kid of 2 working parents and consequently a lot of indifferent, frozen food featured heavily in my upbringing. Not everything was frozen though, on Pork Chop night things were freshly cooked, the chop dipped in egg-wash, then bright orange Ruskoline breadcrumbs and shallow fried, served with apple sauce from a jar, tinned peas and bland boiled potatoes. I’m shuddering at the memory even now; given all the wonderful things you can do with pork, I can’t understand why anyone would’ve chosen that.


So, now I’m a parent I’m avoiding the horrors of my youth and instead doing pork chop night thus:

Pork chops, thick cut and preferably from a rare breed like Saddleback or Old Spot – 1 per person, I get mine from Ballencreiff pigs or the Gosford Bothy .

Floury potatoes

½ an apple per person

½ red onion per person

So stick the oven on to 180° and a griddle pan on to a high heat, score the fat on the chop (this stops it twisting the meat when it shrinks) oil the chops well with something like groundnut or rapeseed oil and season well (seriously, pork loves salt).

Cut the apple into 1cm dice and toss in a little oil then stick on a tray in the now hot oven.

Dice the potato and boil in well salted water and then wait a few minutes.

Grill the chops for a couple of minutes and then turn 90° in the griddle pan and grill for another couple of minutes to give you a nice cross hatched pattern, turn over to cook the other side.

While that’s cooking, dice the red onion.

The potato should be cooked, drain it and let it steam dry in a colander, take the pork out of the griddle and put in the oven, beside the apple.

In the pan you cooked the potato, dump a lot of butter and start softening the onion, after a few minutes add the apple and cook gently to let the flavours infuse – you should have a lot of melted butter in the pan at this point, if not then add more butter.

Now would be a good time to check the pork (probably 12 minutes or so since it went into the oven), press it to see how it yields – it should be tender but not too spongy, if you’re happy with it then remove from oven and leave to rest, if not back into the oven...

So, once the pork is out and resting, return the potato to the pan with the apple and onion and stir well to mix and work the melted butter in, it’ll break up a bit but that’s not a problem. Check for seasoning.

Now, serve a big spoonful of the potato with the chop and whatever steamed green veg you have to hand (seems to go very well with broccoli) to some happy campers.

Could be fun...

So, following some furious Twitter action this morning, plans are being hatched for an Edinburgh Foodie's Tweetup (for those that don't speak Geek, it's a meeting organised over social media) sometime in September.

We're going to be working on details soon but already there's a Whisky tasting mooted and I might even have heard someone mention a charity supperclub at some point in the future.

Stay posted for details and get in touch if you'd like to be involved.

Meat Free Monday

So, according to the Meat Free Monday campaign, we should all abstain from eating meat on Mondays to help save the planet by cutting down on, ahem, harmful emissions from the raising and production of livestock.

Fair enough and nice in principle but frankly, they’re missing a trick a bit.

Now, I’m not adverse to the odd bit of vegetarianism as this previous post attests but Meat Free Monday is crazy, and against the natural order of things; life should go thus: on Sunday you have a roast and then on Monday you use the left-over meat in a shepherd’s pie, risotto, fajitas, it’s a long list.

This is the way things have been done by thrifty ancestors for years, getting at least 2 meals out of a cut (or bird) and if you have enough bones a stock as well (and you can use left over veggies in the stock too).

So wouldn’t it be more sensible having meat free Tuesday? By my calculations, that gives you at least 2 days where you’re not using any fresh animal protein – and surely that’s better than 1.

Right, enough advocacy of vegetables, I’m off for a burger.

The Wonders of Google Analytics

So, readers. It turns out that I have some. Wow.

When I installed Google Analytics, I really didn’t expect to find that anyone read this but seemingly quite a few people do – kinda regularly as well – and I post with terrible infrequency; I have no idea who you all are, especially those of you in America, Sweden, Japan and Australia, but thanks for reading.

Seriously, I’m touched by your interest. Please leave a comment or email me (itinerantappetite@googlemail.com ) to let me know if there’s anything you’d like from this blog, more recipes, more reviews or more general rambling?

I’m also really glad to hear from Sean Kelly, ex-head chef of Abstract in Edinburgh and, in my view, a serious talent; Sean’s one of the guys I would love to have heading up the kitchen if I ever manage to get enough cash together to open my dreamt of Restaurant with Rooms in East Lothian.

Now, while we’re talking of readers, I’ve heard a rumour that some doctors forum has been debating my review of Ducks at Kilspindie; once again I’m glad you’ve got an interest in my hobby-blog-type-thing but please do remember that this blog is a hobby. I’ve got a real job, two brilliant but exhausting kids and when I go out for a meal I pay for it and want to enjoy it; it doesn’t matter if someone’s father was a respected GP – if you work in hospitality and then take my money, I’d like to be fed reasonably and served pleasantly. Not too much to ask, you’d think.

That’s all for now but I have a backlog of meals and recipes to write up which I’ll do as soon as work, kids and wife allow so expect more soon.

Duck’s Round 2 (or “a lesson in customer service”)

So, following my post on my experience at Ducks at Kilspindie, I received the following email from Malcolm Duck, Owner of Ducks at Kilspindie, Experienced Restaurateur and Chairman (for what seems like donkeys) of the Edinburgh Restaurateurs Association.

Mr Boyce,

I was absolutely aware of you last night while you were dining even though I was in Dublin. Here at Ducks we take what we do very seriously and the team has a great deal of pride in their work. Whilst you blog for fun we work for a living.

I take all comments, good and bad seriously and try to learn from them, we give every guest the chance to leave comments on the dockets which come with the bill. I read them this morning and as usual they made very pleasant reading.

I note your comments and I have discussed them with my staff. We will learn and move on. I will also take onboard the views of my wife who was there on the evening.

As you have made comments and published them about my business I will give you some constructive feedback which I hope you will also have the good grace to publish.

If you write and wish to be taken seriously, do your homework. The chefs at the bar had nothing to do with Ducks so your comments are wildly inaccurate and misleading, not to say offensive to those working hard in the kitchen. It also calls into question the validity of your entire essay! Serious reviewers do not announce themselves to all and sundry. Calling some one a 'prick' (Roy Bret review) is simply offensive, abusive and just plain wrong. There is a real danger some might just think the same of you!

I have copied my reply to my Wife and my general Manager.

Malcolm Duck

So, I guess that's me told; I gather that I'm wrong, the service was up to scratch and the food wasn't burnt.

Except, Malcolm, please do bear in mind that I have no pretentions to being a journalist (I couldn't take the pay cut for one thing) and as such I don't expense my meals; all visits, good or bad, are paid for meaning – and this might be a tricky concept for you – that I'm a paying customer.

So, attitude to customers noted Duck old bean.

 

Ondine - Update

I'm not going to review Ondine again, I promise.

Well, not for a while anyway, otherwise people will think I'm some cyber-stalker-blogger or summat; but I did pop in yesterday for lunch with my eldest (who tells me that, at three and a half, he's almost a grown up and will get to drive my car soon) and I thought I'd share a thought or two.

They were completely accommodating when we arrived, I asked if they thought the restaurant would be appropriate for a child and they welcomed him and made a fuss as appropriate but also seated us in a quieter corner so our chat didn't annoy other guests and meaning I wasn't bumping into anyone when helping Jamie cut his food which I appreciated. The food, as always, was very good (Jamie loved his "real" fish fingers and his Jelly though he wasn't too sure of the mushy peas) and the restaurant almost full which I liked to see (support you local sheriff chef) and the service was right on the money.

I'm really, really happy, patchy service was the only thing which let Ondine down previously and now we can but wait for showers of accolades to fall onto Roy and his team.

Review – Duck’s at Kilspindie

Dear Malcolm Duck,
I understand you are away watching the rugby this weekend (great result wasn't it?) and so I thought I'd drop you a note to let you know how Ducks at Kilspindie runs when you're not around to supervise.
I suppose we should all expect people to take their eye off the ball slightly when the boss is away, but when one is a paying customer should we be the ones expected to compromise? Well at Kilspindie it seems the answer is yes.
The meal had an inauspicious start with the restaurant manager greeting us with the wrong name and then, when leading us to the table, stopping in the bar to chat to another party. Leaving us to stand in the middle of the bar waiting for their conversation to end.
When we finally got to our table the situation improved, a delightful waitress (Helen I believe) and an interesting menu which suggested ambition; the wine list was good, if a bit too biased to the pricier end of the spectrum, but it did hold a gem in the form of a Chinon of decent age for only £19 so we can forgive that.
So, decisions made and order taken we found our starters arriving quite quickly, before the wine in fact, with a couple of plates being passed over my head to the diners on the other side of the table. Service faux pas aside, the Gravadlax was pronounced very nice, the crab and shrimp tian fair and the quail bland and under seasoned.
Mains came, again with plates passed across the table as if serving to a chimps' tea party, and the slow-roast pork belly was promptly returned due to burnt crackling. Now, I know that most blogging, and most especially food blogging is an act of vanity on the bloggers' part and that the wide majority really don't care about our opinions but please, if I care enough about food enough to write about it as a hobby, perhaps I know a little. I certainly know the difference between cooked and burnt and so was more than a little offended when the same plate was brought back a minute later with the offending carbon scraped and trimmed from the crackling with an accompanying explanation that it wasn't over done and that was the way pork belly is cooked. I love pork belly, it's a luscious, meltingly tender piece of beauty when prepared properly; at Duck's it wasn't prepared properly. It may have been cooked slowly but not slowly enough and at too high a temperature, the fat hadn't rendered and the meat was tough and chewy; the accompanying braised shoulder was the best thing on the plate but too small, the dauphinoise potatoes underdone and the roasted shallot puree would have been a fitting sauce had the pork been edible.
The others all had the Duck (when in Ducks etc..) and found it uninspiring, not as tender as it could be and under seasoned.
Had dessert not been included in the carte (3 courses, £28) we'd probably have left at this point, but as it was paid for: the Ice-Cream was "acceptable", the apple tart was a semolina cake, the chocolate fondant underdone and burst before it hit the table and the cheese had been pre-cut and was beyond its best (with wrinkled, brown grapes accompanying it).
Funnily enough, we left on a positive note when our main waitress, Helen, embarrassed about the quality of the meal, asked for my card so the proprietor could contact me. I wonder if he will.
As we left, we noticed two chaps in chef's tunics sitting with a couple of pints at the bar; now I'm not certain they were the chefs from Ducks, but as the meal seemed prepared without love or pride, perhaps by someone who just wanted to get things done before starting their Saturday night, I have my suspicions. At £208 (plus tip) for four I'd rather not feel like an impediment to someone's drinking time.
So, will we be back? As Duck's at Kilspindie is the closest restaurant to me then I'm sure I will, probably when snow or storm have prevented me from making it into Edinburgh where I'll get better food and service for the same price.
Yours etc.
Ross
The Itinerant Appetite

Well done Wales

And Wales now has 3 new Michelin starred establishments, that's 4 in total.

4 Stars eh?

Well done Wales.

Obviously Edinburgh has 5 stars alone, before we look at the rest of Scotland, but it's not a competition. Is it Glasgow (no stars for it's deep fried cuisine)?

Good News / Bad News

So, the Michelin list for 2010 has managed to be leaked in time for the weekend papers again, someone at the Guardian wrote, what a surprise.

Still, I don't think it really matters if we find out today or next Tuesday so let's start by congratulating Paul and Katie at 21212 on their Michelin star, well deserved - come to think of it, didn't I predict they'd get a star when I reviewed 21212 in May? Oh, I did; well done me.

A glaring omission is Martin Wishart from the ranks of 2* holders, every meal I've had at Wisharts in the past few years has been consistently as good, if not better, than many 2*s I've eaten at (specifically Hibiscus and Pied A Terre - and I enjoyed them). Shame on you Michelin.

In other sad news, the Edinburgh outpost of Abstract will not reopen for 2010; I know Abstract lost it's joie de vivre when Sean Kelly left (for reasons and to destinations unknown - does anyone know where he went? He was a talented chap and I'd like to try his food again) and then became a glorified steak and chop house but the food was good quality and the service excellent.

To finish on an upbeat note, well done to Tony's Table in Castle St. for it's Bib Gourmand; it's also 3 minutes from my office so is very handy for good lunches and well done to the Peat Inn for it's star.

Tweet, To-whit, Towoo....

So, I've now joined the microblogging ranks and am tweeting updates on what I'm cooking, eating and drinking as I cook, eat and drink.

So far there's also been a couple of sweary-rants (not my fault, honest; blame the Bastard Taxi Driver who soaked me the other morning), but I doubt many kids read this stuff so let's not worry about a watershed.

My tweeting can be found at: www.twitter.com/happy_appetite - seemingly "itinerant" was too long and I was in too good a mood to use "moody_appetite".

Also I can now be contacted at itinerantappetite@googlemail.com for praise, abuse and invitations to restaurant launches (please?)