Tag: Great Britain

Categories
Bakes Blog

VE Day 80 Scones

This week we’ve seen lots of events taking place across the UK, commemorating the 80th Anniversary of VE Day. VE Day is the day on 8th May 1945 when the Allied Nations’ Victory in Europe was confirmed, marking the end of World War Two across the continent.

The King, Queen and Royal Family have led the way, ensuring that the sacrifice made by so many is remembered. We’ve had the sharing of personal memories of veteran survivors in this week’s media, the lighting of beacons and special services in churches and cathedrals. There have been some timely messages, reminding the modern world that peace is hard won and should never be taken for granted.

The nation has been encouraged to join in through organising street and garden parties locally. Our local street party was well-attended, with lots of houses and gardens decorated with red, white and blue bunting, glinting in the early summer sun.

My contribution was some home-made scones, halved and topped with Cornish clotted cream and strawberry jam. The recipe I used is one of my stand-bys, already posted here on A Different Kitchen from a previous street party celebration, to mark the Coronation of our new King in May 2023: see Coronation Scones.

I’m pleased to say the scones went down well with the neighbours. In Britain, it seems we can always rely on the power of a large pot of tea and some home-made scones to bring communities together 🙂 .

I was chatting to an older gent who actually remembers VE Day – he was 4 years old in 1945 and has a vivid recollection of all the children in the neighbourhood sitting down together for some party food and drink. He said there were street parties everywhere. After going up to bed, he watched from the upstairs window as the adults carried on into the evening. It is difficult nowadays for us to imagine how much of a relief it must have been, to have finally brought an end to the bombings, the blackouts, and the long years of suffering and hardship of War.

Is VE Day being marked where you are? If so, in what way? I’ll be really interested to hear.

Here are Elbow, all the way from Manchester, with One Day Like This.

Categories
Blog Desserts

Road to Nowhere

After several weeks travelling through Cornwall in our motorhome, we have finally run out of road. Yes, we have reached Land’s End, England’s most westerly point.

Out there beyond Longships Lighthouse, seen in my photo above, there is nothing but the Atlantic Ocean, stretching all the way across to the Eastern Seaboard. I waved a cheery hello to all our good friends and allies over there in Canada and the US of A 🙂 .

However, Cornish legend would have you believe that it wasn’t always just a great expanse of nothingness here. Back in the days of King Arthur (yes, him again), there was a kingdom known as Lyonesse that extended off the coast. That was until one particularly stormy night, when the city became engulfed by the waves, never to be seen again.

Lyonesse was reputed to have 140 churches. The story goes that, if you stand here surrounded by ocean on all sides, and listen carefully, you can sometimes hear the church bells ringing from the shadowy depths.

Well, I can’t say I heard any phantom bell-ringing (maybe I should come back at Halloween), but that didn’t stop me enjoying another enchanting tale from Cornish mythology.

To get here, we camped for 3 nights about a mile down the coast, near Sennen Cove, shown below. We walked the South-West Coast Path along some rugged headland to reach this famous land point.

Sennen is very remote and peaceful, with a relaxed way of life.

Just the place to enjoy some ice cream made with Cornish clotted cream, see below. That’s Cornish Sea Salted Caramel flavour on the left, and Cornish Strawberry on the right.

Having reached our journey’s end, it is time to head back home, which we will do gradually over the next 3 – 4 days. It’s been great fun travelling around Cornwall, enjoying the beaches, the legends, and of course the Pasties and Cream Teas.

I hope, like me, you’ve enjoyed the trip, and maybe learned something about the terrific food and drink this region has to offer.

Here are Talking Heads with Road to Nowhere.

I’ll be back next week with a new recipe.

Categories
Blog Snacks

Cornish Cream Tea

A cream tea is a must when visiting Cornwall. There are plenty of cafes offering it, wherever you go. This one we enjoyed while visiting the town of St. Ives.

It’s a very simple and delicious meal: freshly baked scones, halved and spread with Cornish clotted cream and fruit jam. Served up, of course, with a pot of tea.

A debate rages about whether the jam or the clotted cream should be spread first – I’m a firm fan of the clotted cream providing the under layer, and then topping off with the jam, as my photo above shows.

For this meal, we actually bought a bag of scones that were fresh from the oven, in the St. Ives Bakery (the just baked aroma in the shop was heavenly). We also bought a tub of Rodda’s clotted cream, and took these back to our motorhome pitch, on a site perched up on the edge of St. Ives, with views over the bay.

We already had a jar of locally made mixed fruit jam that we’d bought earlier on our travels, in Boscastle.

St. Ives is a beautiful coastal town. At low tide you can walk into the main port across the expansive golden beaches.

At high tide also, there are many vantage points for enjoying the views.

As you can see, the sun was shining, so we sat al fresco and enjoyed this classic lunch. With Cornish Tea, naturally.

Talking about clotted cream gives me a natural link to this track by the original supergroup, for adding to the ADK Playlist. This is Cream with Badge. Take it away, Eric!

Categories
Blog Mains

Return to Eden

Cornwall’s Eden Project really is a modern day wonder. Not only is it a great day out – it really makes you think.

Walking around this vast green and floral park on a sunny September day, it is difficult to believe that, until just a few years ago, this was an abandoned mining quarry, grey and ugly, ravaged by decades of underground metal extraction.

The transformation began in the 1990s, with an ambitious vision to turn it into a vast green oasis, showcasing plant life from all around the world, over a 30 acre site. I visited it soon after it opened in 2001, and found it very impressive.

On my current travels around Cornwall I was keen to return, to see how it was progressing. I’m pleased to report it is thriving and continues to be a very popular destination for visitors to Cornwall.

The central attraction is the Biomes – the huge, golf ball-shaped structures nestled in the centre of the valley. The first maintains a warm temperate, Mediterranean climate all year round. The second contains a fully grown rainforest, no less. Both are big enough to lose oneself in, and host mature, fully grown trees.

I enjoyed climbing the steps to the Lookout high up in the Rainforest Biome. It was very humid up there, and the steps did swing around a bit, but the views were great looking down over the whole of the rainforest.

These are more than just large scale greenhouses. The Eden Project is on a mission to highlight the modern day challenges to the natural world through climate change and human behaviour. They do a great job of taking complex subjects and explaining them in terms that are easy to understand.

Amongst the cacao and coffee trees in the Rainforest Biome, I learned how deforestation simultaneously reduces carbon safely stored in trees and underground, and increases the carbon in our atmosphere, thereby contributing to global warming. Deforestation is largely driven by economic pressures on producers, and countries like Costa Rica come in for praise for their efforts to combat these through sustainable reforestation. I learned that we can all do our bit to support them by choosing to buy Fair Trade coffee and chocolate, which I will now try to do.

I like the art that is scattered around the landscape, such as the Rites of Dionysus, Greek god of wine, in the Mediterranean Biome.

We came across this mirrored tree goddess high up in the outdoor gardens, just inside what used to be the rim of the quarry, now known as the Wild Edge.

The art carries a loose theme that cultural diversity is important, and that resource management is better led by local communities than big corporations.

We had lunch in the Biome Kitchen. All the ingredients used are seasonal and locally grown. Suppliers are all Cornwall-based businesses, like soft drinks from Jolly’s, and ice cream from Roskilly’s. Even the catering promotes a sustainable local economy.

My choice for lunch was this griddled flatbread, topped with white bean pate, leaves, marinated roasted vegetables, tomatoes, balsamic drizzle, herbs and toasted seeds.

The overall message from the Eden Project is one of hope. If a team of people can successfully transform a disused quarry into a beautiful, green paragon of sustainability, then most things are possible. We learn that every one of us can do our bit – small changes made locally can contribute to wider scale positive change. It is never too late.

Time to add Coldplay to the ADK Playlist, with Paradise.

Categories
Blog

Leicestershire and Rutland

I am off on my travels again – this time a motorhome journey north with my wife to explore Scotland. First stop along the way is the East Midlands which, at the time of our visit, was basking in temperatures in the upper 20s Celsius. Or maybe it is just always this warm up here?

We’ve based ourselves on the south shore of Rutland Water, the largest man-made lake in England, and one of the largest in Europe. It’s a great environment for wildlife, sailing, walking and cycling. We carry our bikes on the back of the van, so enjoyed the off-road, waterside cycle track to the beautiful Normanton Church, captured in my main photo above.

The local markets, delis and farmer’s shops have been great. Farndon Fields is an excellent farm shop in Market Harborough, well-stocked with lots of local fresh produce. We combined our visit with brunch in their on-site restaurant, the Farmer’s Kitchen. My Eggs Benedict had perfectly soft-poached eggs over slices of baked ham on a toasted muffin – chopped chillis topping off the Hollandaise Sauce with a spicy kick.

Saturday morning brings a foodie market to the village of Thrapston. I picked up these pork and chorizo sausages from a local butcher’s stall, to cook up later on the Cadac. The Cadac is my gas bbq that plugs directly into the motorhome’s gas tank via a socket on the outside wall. They tasted as great as they look here, glowing on the griddle in the evening sunshine.

The people like their cheese an orangey shade of yellow here. Red Leicester is nationally famous, of course, but Rutland Red less so. It is a more mature, hard cheese, an even deeper shade of orange, but still mild tasting. Here it is adorning my evening cheeseboard with customary glass of red alongside. The blue cheese is from neighbouring Derbyshire.

Speaking of Red Leicester, how about incorporating it when baking Welsh cakes? I bought these when I saw them at Thrapston Market. They were delicious.

I understand that a pork pie is not necessarily everyone’s cup of tea, but I felt I had to try one of these famous Melton Mowbray delicacies when I found them in a butcher’s shop in Oakham. I found it had a good short pastry base, golden flaky top and soft salty filling – a very enjoyable lunchtime stop.

There you are – just some of the fine local produce I’ve been gorging on while visiting the scenic delights of Leicestershire and Rutland. It’s been a really enjoyable first stop on the journey north.

For the next track on the ADK Playlist I have turned to this band who were formed in Leicester in the 1990s. This track became a massive hit when it was remixed by Fatboy Slim – here’s Cornershop with Brimful of Asha.

Categories
Bakes Recipes

Coronation Scones

Today I’m featuring a recipe that is, quite literally, fit for a King!

Across the UK this weekend, people will be watching history in the making, as our new King and Queen are crowned at Westminster Abbey, in London.

On Saturday, the procession route will be lined with Union Jack waving wellwishers, and those that can’t be there are able to watch the whole proceedings live on free to air TV. With all the pageantry on show, events are guaranteed to be quite some spectacle.

Sunday is the day for street parties in local communities, finishing with a major concert at Windsor Castle, also live on TV.

On Monday, we are being given a day’s national holiday so that we can recover from all this partying and excitement. Hey, we haven’t had one of these for 70 years, when most of us (me included) weren’t even alive. Coronations only come around once every few generations, so there’s no surprise it’s getting this much special attention.

Here’s what I’m making for our own local street party – a Coronation take on a Brit classic – the scone with jam and clotted cream. Served with a pot of tea, of course.

Happy and Glorious!

Servings

Makes 8 scones.

Timings

15 mins to prepare, 15 – 20 mins to bake at 180C.

You Will Need

  • 450g self-raising flour
  • 115g soft margarine or spread
  • 85g caster sugar
  • 85g sultanas
  • 1 egg, beaten
  • 200ml milk
  • strawberry jam and clotted cream to serve
  • Union Jack flag to wave (optional)

Method

  1. Put the flour and margarine into a bowl and mix with an electric mixer until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.
  2. Stir in the sugar and sultanas.
  3. Mix in the egg, and gradually add in 150ml of the milk to make a soft dough.
  4. Turn it on to a floured surface and knead slightly. Roll out to a 2cm thickness.
  5. Stamp out circles with a 7cm diameter fluted biscuit cutter, and transfer to a baking sheet covered in a layer of baking paper. Reroll the dough as necessary till you have 8 shapes cut.
  6. Brush the tops with the remaining milk and bake for 15 – 20 mins at 180C.
  7. Serve warm or cold, split and topped with the jam and clotted cream.
  8. Wave a little Union Jack flag as you eat!

Customise It!

If you’re watching your cholesterol, you can replace the clotted cream with low fat spread. Other fruit jams, like raspberry or cherry, will work just as well if you prefer.

What better time than the Coronation to add some joyous Britpop to the ADK Playlist. I am sure Charles and Camilla would approve. Here’s Blur with Parklife.