Proper Pub Grub at the Manor

Last weekend saw us host our penultimate events before we take the Manor on the road! This time our theme was pub grub, using Tom Kerridge’s book as inspiration. Donning our best West Country accents and big grins, we were very exciting about producing the big flavours this chef is known for. However, pub grub isn’t pub grub without beer, so we paired each of the courses with some lovely beers by Ilkley Brewery.

Mind you – we had a bit of a trauma getting the beers! Aside from the bottles we also had a couple of kegs for the weekend….but no taps!! Luckily one of our lovely guests Dan, who happens to run a pub, came to our rescue. There WOULD be beer for our guests!

Trinity Kitchen – New Street Eats

A couple of weeks ago we were invited along to Trinity Kitchen to try out the new influx of street food vendors for the next few weeks. I was very excited to see another diverse range of food pit stops touting their wares. On offer for this session were MEATwagon, one of the UK’s foremost street food pioneers and are set to open up shop (MEATLiquor) in Leeds later this year. Two Asian inspired vendors, Dorshi who create fusion dishes from British Ingredients, Harajuku Kitchen from Edinburgh, who’ve travelled down to share their gyoza and okonomiyaki (Japanese pancake) with the residents of Leeds. Representing the northern contingent were Cafe Moor – beautiful Middle Eastern food from one of our beloved Leeds Market residents and favourite places to go for food on the go. For something sweet there was Headingley’s Love Rouge Bakery with all their sugary, cupcakey, baked goodness.

Having been to these blogger tastings previously, I was expecting the usual casual affair of being able to mill around the vendors and chat about all things food with them. However, this time around it was more of a formal affair, with the event being a self styled “Blogger Secret Supperclub”. Something that piqued my interest given we might know a thing or two about supperclubs! 🙂

Huddersfield’s got Tallent!

It was in Huddersfield that I had my first ever supperclub experience nearly three whole years ago. So it was good to be back in Kirklees to sample the wares of Huddersfield’s latest and most welcome addition to the supperclub circuit – Tallents’ Ten. Run by young chef Nat Tallents, people may recognise her from a short stint on Masterchef the Professionals or as lead chef at Mushroom Mina’s foraging supperclub. Nat is a self taught chef who started life as a waitress. Frustrated with just giving out food, she made the move to commis chef and within less than a year was head chef, having never cooked before!

Tallents Ten is an interesting and brave set up. Situated about 3 miles outside of Huddersfield centre it’s within easy access of the glorious Pennine countryside. Diners are all seated at a table that looks on to Nat’s cooking/prep and plating station. Nat is also a one woman show, doing all the cooking, cleaning and hosting herself. And all without a drop of sweat on her brow! I loved just being able to sit there and watch her meticulously plate up. We were encouraged to ask questions and you could tell that this in turn gave Nat some pleasure and confidence, which was great.

March Menu – Proper Pub Food with Ilkley Brewery Ales

We’re very excited about our next event, its been almost two years since our last beer and food event and we”re looking forward to it. Only one week to go!

We’ve been rifling through man of the moment Tom Kerridge’s Proper Pub Food to create a menu of traditional pub grub but with a twist. All the while pairing them with some very delicious ales from Ilkley Brewery.

Hearty grub. Great Beer. What’s not to like? Let us know what you think.

The Afternoon Tea Diaries

Wow, its March already, where does the time go!? This past Saturday we held our fifth event of 2014 but our first afternoon tea. It was time for Dan and I to get our bake on! Our tome for the afternoon was Nigel Slater’s Kitchen Diaries, which we used as inspiration for some of the treats on offer. An eclectic mix of savouries and sweets were offered to our guests, but kept at the heart of it was Slater’s ethos of simple food that tastes great. That’s not to say we didn’t add the usual Dinner at the Manor twists!

Our guests included a lovely couple of returning guests, but the majority were new diners, which was great to see. The welcome cocktail this time round was a Breakfast Martini. Gin, triple sec, lemon juice and our own homemade marmalade made for a zingy pick me up before the savouries.