A Vintage Christmas Afternoon Tea at the Manor

We’re very busy pottering away at the Manor in anticipation of our Nigellic Christmas event this weekend, however we’re also busy planning away for a private vintage Christmas afternoon tea we’re holding a week later! We’ve agreed on the menu so we thought you’d like to peruse the savoury and sweet treats we’ll be providing our guests to get them in the Christmas spirit!

There’s no particular theme for this one, rather a selection of traditional and modern flavours in a vintage Victorian setting!

If you’re interested in holding a private event at the Manor, do get in touch

A Very Nigellic Christmas – December Menu

We don’t hide the fact we have a massive love for all things Nigella – so much so we’ve decided to hold a second event in her honour and theme our Christmas event around her. Think glitz and glamour, coupled with relaxed entertaining!

We’ve picked through our favourite festive dishes from a selection of her books and created a menu which we hope will keep our guests excited!

Let us know what you think.

Two Fat Loiners!

This weekend we channelled our inner greediness as we opened up the Manor for an autumnal feast inspired by 90s gems the Two Fat Ladies. Susie and I have recently picked up this retro cookbook from charity shops and were keen to put it to good use. Full of game, hearty ingredients and no nonsense directions it’s a fun book to work with – or so we thought!…

We spent months picking the right dishes for our November menu and putting them to the test. It soon transpired that we were wise to do this as not all the recipes were foolproof, or even that tasty!

We kickstarted our meal with a welcome drink of sloe gin fizz that was spiced up with ginger syrup and lime juice. This was paired with Susie’s elegant canapes of scotch eggs made with quail eggs. These differed to Jennifer and Clarissa’s version, which suggested chopped ham and anchovy instead of the seasoned sausage meat that Susie used. Also on offer were crostini topped with poor man’s caviar (a smoked aubergine pate, baba ganouch) and deliciously sweet crab, coriander and corn fritters – both of which we’re afraid to say were also slightly adapted!