West Country Cheese Co.
- Taken out of the oven: September 05 2010
On a wet Saturday in August, my BFF (best food friend) and I decided we would head off on another of our bourgeois adventures, looking for great food to eat and chat about. We caught the train up to Barnstaple with few expectations, but in good spirits. After the very pleasant train trip we walked the short distance to Barnstaple town centre with umbrella overhead and made our way through the weekend shoppers towards the historic Pannier market. I hadn’t been to Barnstaple in a number of years,…
James Duckett at the Old Custom House
- Taken out of the oven: August 29 2010
My relationship with Barnstaple isn’t particularly strong, nor is it beautiful, but I’m the kind of open-minded person (I like to think I am anyway) that never says never. Having worked for a relatively large advertising agency with it’s head office in Barnstaple (strange, but true) I had only ever experienced the kind of practical eating that included nipping out for a sandwich to M&S or popping to the nearest pub chain offering in between meetings. On that basis, I definitely didn’t…
Riverford Organic Veg
- Taken out of the oven: August 22 2010
I’ve been shopping with Riverford for the last 3 ½ years, so I feel I am in a position to sing their praises with some level of authority. With so many veg box schemes out there nowadays, Riverford ironically seem to be the big, bad corporate boy of the day which I find puzzling. The Watson family have been farming for many years, but Guy Watson, founder of Riverford, picked up his piece of the family land in 1985, moving…
The Oddfellows Exeter
- Taken out of the oven: August 01 2010
Over the years, I have been lucky enough to eat in some wonderful restaurants for my job. Not as a result of food writing unfortunately, but in advertising & marketing people like to eat out. Maybe that’s why I gravitated towards that line of work. In Sydney, my first real job at 17 was as a Junior in a typesetting company, and my boss liked to take us all out to dinner as a sort of team building exercise. None of this paintballing or swinging from trees lark that companies seem to think…
Taverner’s Farm Shop
- Taken out of the oven: July 11 2010
Twas a sunny afternoon one Saturday in July – yesterday actually – and I thought a little country drive would be in order. Saturdays have always been a touch bitter sweet for me. It’s the day when I like to get the majority of housework done, so cleaning the bathroom, washing, vacuuming and dusting are the norm, but it’s also cause for celebration in that it’s not a regular working day and I can relax for some of it. At the very least I like to get out of the house for a walk at some…
The Holt, Honiton
- Taken out of the oven: June 20 2010
On a sunny Summer’s day, spending time with good friends, eating, and perusing boutique shops in small Devon villages, has surely got to be one of the most perfect ways to pass the time. My Best Food Friend (BFF herein) and I had planned to head for Topsham for the Food & Drink Festival, but unfortunately we were quite late in arriving and ended up sitting in a lovely coffee shop sipping our hot beverages and sharing a slice of gingerbread instead. Time passed and when we reached the quay…
Café at 36
- Taken out of the oven: June 13 2010
In need of a little respite on a sunny Friday afternoon in June, I decided to walk myself along the River Exe to Cowick Street to sit in the lovely Café at 36 and grab some sustenance. It is only around 20 minutes walk for me so it means I get exercise, rays, food and pleasure all within a convenient distance from my house.
As I switched off the computer, grabbed my bag and headed for the sunshine, I had no real intention of writing a review of the café, but having been there a few times…
Can I Get a Coffee?
- Taken out of the oven: June 06 2010
I’ve lived in and around Exeter for over 15 years now and it is a fantastic city. Not being a true, authentic, card-carrying city-dweller I fight with myself intermittently about whether I really belong in an urban environment, but if I am honest Exeter is a perfect compromise for me. I spent much of my childhood growing up in Australia, moving from place to place alongside my nomadic mother. Roughly every 2 years she would ‘announce’ casually that we were moving to a new area and my sister…
Brizzol Beckons
- Taken out of the oven: May 23 2010
Over the last 12 months I have been happily taking fairly regular trips to Bristol with my partner in crime JC, in order to visit his lovely Nan in Bedminster and a few of the local eateries. Bristol is a very cool city, with a large student population and the music and fashion scenes that can stem from this fertile culture. JC’s maternal family are Bristolians so he has solid connections with the city and I am more than happy to nip up there on the train every few months to soak up the funky…
Rick Stein’s Fish & Chip Shop
- Taken out of the oven: May 12 2010
We planned our trip down to Padstow well in advance. I was incredibly excited when friends of JC’s decided that they were getting married and that they would be doing it in the bride’s home county of Cornwall. To my absolute delight it turned out the lovely bride was originally from a small parish outside of Padstow called St Eval and that’s the direction we would be heading for the last weekend in April. A weekend in Padstow was exactly what I would need considering I would be experiencing…
Fun-Free Food Anyone?
- Taken out of the oven: May 03 2010
After a lot of deliberation, I decided to visit the Exeter Food & Drink Festival on Sunday 11th April which is Family Day. After all, how can anybody with a food blog miss one of the most important culinary events of the year? The deliberation came about as a result of the diet I am currently on. After a month of feasting in Australia and in celebration of my birthday back in the UK, I decided that I would benefit from a sugar, wheat, dairy, alcohol & caffeine-free month or two to help…
Dining Down Under (Part 3)
- Taken out of the oven: April 13 2010
Once back in NSW, having left behind the lush scenery and produce of QLD, I did what any self-respecting food lover would do and headed straight for my next culinary experience at Pilu at Freshwater. This was a big event for me as I had been planning it for some time – my friends will back me up on this as I bored them senseless with emails in the lead up. I researched for weeks trying to find the best venue…
Dining Down Under (Part 2)
- Taken out of the oven: April 05 2010
After having been in Australia for over a week and taken in some of the great food in the Hunter Valley I was looking forward to seeing my mum in Caloundra and visiting some of my favourite haunts on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland. We’d already spoken on the phone about where we would be having most of our lunches and dinners during my 3 night stay. My mum has always been a great cook and a keen food fan so within a few hours of my plane landing we had visited our first supermarket and made…
Dining Down Under (Part 1)
- Taken out of the oven: April 04 2010
What’s the difference between Australia and a pot of yogurt? The answer to this 'hilarious' joke is to do with one having a lack of culture and you can probably guess it isn’t the yoghurt. I’ve heard this joke a lot over the years but like most cultural generalisations – the Irish are daft, the British don’t wash, the French wear garlic necklaces – there isn’t a lot of truth in it. I’ve recently returned from a fantastic trip to Australia to visit my family & friends and it…
Hello … Good Pie!!
- Taken out of the oven: February 19 2010
Firstly, I need to say a massive thank you to Jon Simon and Tristan Hogg who hooked up in 2002 to create some of the most gorgeous pies I have ever tasted when they formed Pie Minister pies. They are a well travelled pair with plenty of catering experience between them. Starting with a small shop in Bristol, they quickly progressed to holding a pie stall at London’s borough market and now, in 2010, you can pick up a…
Devon Delights meet French Fancies
- Taken out of the oven: February 07 2010
Situated on the edge of Kilmington, Millers Farm Shop has been operating since 1985 and is just off the A35 about 8 miles from Honiton. Combining a broad range of West Country gastronomic delights with an extensive selection of French goodies, the Millers have created a treasure trove of edible bounty. A good friend of mine told me about it a few months back and I couldn’t quite believe I hadn’t heard of it…
Dart’s Farm, Topsham
- Taken out of the oven: January 24 2010
Darts Farm is a bit of a foodie institution in and around Exeter. Based in the ancient port of Topsham on the edge of Exeter, the Dart family have been selling their produce to the locals for the last 40 years so their credentials are sound. Not your average farm shop, they have lost most of their rusticity and are now more akin to a ‘Selfridge’s food hall’ as the Guardian put it, but quite a distance from London. In the last 5 years the Dart brothers, Paul, Michael and James, have received…
Love Local Food
- Taken out of the oven: January 10 2010
Back in February 2009, I spotted an article on www.wmnthinklocal.co.uk that peaked my interest and I clicked through to the Love Local Food (LLF) website eager to find out more. LLF consists of founding members Emma Parkin, Martyn Bragg, Jo Cotter & Christine Duff and was built around a vision to highlight Exeter’s position as both an urban conurbation and a rural idyll. The idea being to remind the inhabitants…