Masterchef pop up

Yesterday after weeks of waiting we got to dine in the Master Chef pop up restaurant located at Blue Fin in Southwark. Soph and I are both huge fans of the show and even watch the Australian, South African and Irish versions so as you can imagine we were super excited at the prospect of the 2013 winner (Natalie Coleman), 2014 winner (Ping Coombes) and 2014 Finalist (Jack Lucas) cooking for us. When we arrived we headed straight for the bar but unusually for us not to grab cocktails but to take in the breath taking panoramic views of London which after being in China we appreciate even more.

We had prepaid for the 3 course 'sharing' super prior to our arrival and we were advised to chose both options on the menu and switch plates with each other half way through. In practise this would have worked better had there of been 2 of everything like the pork bun but we worked with what we got and even Soph who HATES fish tried the mackerel and really liked it!


Left: Natalie's Blow torched mackerel
Right: Ping's pork sandwich

Both dishes were presented beautifully and seasoned really well. All the elements on the plate worked well together and the pork belly had just the right amount of fat to meat.
The mackerel worked wonderfully with the cucumber and buttermilk and even had Soph wanting more...thank you Natalie - might get Soph to a fish restaurant now!!



Left: Ping's Prawn laksa

Right: Jack's Lamb rump & croquette

Ping's dish was well put together and the broth was just delicious. You could really taste the love and care that had gone into making it and when we headed to the open kitchen we caught Ping checking the broth herself to ensure she was happy with it before it was sent out.

Jack's lamb was tasty however a little of the well done side for us. The croquette and garlic mash were the winning elements to the dish but we weren't sure what the burnt bits added.

Left: Natalie's chocolate ganache

Right: Ping's: Parcel of coconut & pandan pannacotta

 

Both deserts were wolfed down by us both as they were just incredible!

Natalie's chocolate and pears is not something we have tried before and really worked. The textures were very pleasing to the pallet and the hazelnuts added another dimension..we scrapped our plate to get every last crumb!

The first mouthful of Ping's desert was a WOW moment! The sharpness of the lime with the creamy coconut was a taste sensation! The granite (crushed up ice) was delicious and would love the recipe!!

Overall we really enjoyed our evening however would have liked a little more as the idea was to share and sometimes you needed more than 2 mouthfuls to really appreciate the dish! We would have also liked to have sampled more of Jack's cooking. The open kitchen was great as we got to see the talented chefs at work in their home environment - they all looked super relaxed! We ended our evening buying a signed copy of Natalie's book and cannot wait to try her recipes out.

NFL weekend & Flat Iron

 

Last weekend we had two big wins...first was the NFL fan forum with 3 NFL legends (@Andre_Reed83, @Terrell_Davis & @RodWoodson26) , cardinals manager, Dick Ebersol - Former head of NBC Sports and Neil. We always try and attend these forums as it gives us a greater knowledge of the sport which we are fast becoming huge fans. We then spent the rest of our afternoon checking out the fan rally that was taking place on regents street. The turn out to this event was huge and really exciting to see so many Brits in NFL shirts..fingers crossed the London franchise will make it over as we will be first in line for season tickets!

 

We had seen NFL UK were running a comp on twitter to win tickets to the Dolphins v Raiders so we made sure we stayed around Regent street which resulted in us 1) Finally trying Flat Iron 2) Winning and getting to go to the game with the best seats we've ever had!

 

Flat Iron has been on our list of cheap eats in London that we were really keen to try due to our love for steaks. Can a steak that costs a tenner with a side salad really be as good as everyone raves about?! Well...the answer is YES! The steak was cooked medium rare and arrived a little more on the rare side but this cut of meat tastes better cooked this way. The steak was well seasoned and accompanied with a little side salad. The sides were extremly well priced and we decided to give the chips and aubergine with tomato dish a go. Appears that since coming back from China we cannot get enough of aubergine and this side was delicious. As the sauces were only 1 pound we decided to get a peppercorn and Fred sauce to share. The Fred sauce was a spicy tomato concotion but the peppercorn sauce stole the show - stick to the classics we say!

If you are looking for a quick, cheap, tasty meal then Flat Iron is your place! Granted the steaks aren't as big as the likes of Gaucho and Hawkesmoor but the price v quality is something we cannot falt. The sides were also in the same bracket as many restaurants would bump up the price of the sides to compensate for the cheap steak.


Some snaps from Miami Dolphins v Oakland Raiders - final score 38-14

 

Happy birthday Mash

On 7th July MASH Copenhagen celebrated their 5th birthday.  To celebrate the great success of the first 5 years they have been offering 50% off all steaks at their (younger) London branch.  As Sarah is a huge steak fan, it would be criminal not to try this place.  As we are both trying to not be triple fat fatties we made a conscious decision not to have starters or desert (this was a tough decision after looking at the menu).

Sarah chose the 400g American Rib Eye cooked Medium rare and I had the 300g N.Y Strip also cooked medium rare.  On a recommendation we ordered sides of cheese and bacon mash, some chili fries, broccoli and cauliflower, and a pepper sauce (in other words we went all out on mains).

As we finished devouring our complimentary bread (which was very tasty) our mains arrived.  The presentation really didn't disappoint and we couldn't wait to tuck in.  The steaks were cooked perfectly and melted in the mouth.  Both tasted good however I actually preferred the richness of Sarah's steak and spent most of the meal trying to steal it :)  The sides were all delicious.  The mash was creamy and full of flavour and the chips were seasoned with chilli powder not chilli con carne as we thought.

Having previously eaten at Gaucho, Goodmans & STK, MASH is certainly up there with them on quality and service.

Tacutacu

After conquering many of the London street food markets @tacutacu have taken up a six week residency in Casa Bleu just at the end of Brick Lane.  We went along to try this place last night as a pre china celebration meal. Here's our little review....

Firstly the bar casa Bleu is an interesting place.  I would call it more of a cocktail bar than a pub.  The decor could be describe as 'vintage'.  The drinks menu is expensive for my liking with a draught beer costing £5 but I suppose you are paying for the location really.  This kind of reflects in how busy the bar was (just the two of us to be precise).

Below is a picture of the menu.  We chose the white fish tacos, the duck tacos, 2 burgers, some fries and the haloumi sticks (fatty mcfat fats ).

 

As always we arrived early and this meant that there was a bit of a wait on the food as the kitchen got up and running but the wait was worth it! The food came out at a decent pace and kept flowing! The fish tacos were seasoned to perfection and coated in a lovely light batter oh and the slaw to accompany it...well that was delicious!

The duck and cheese tacos were also nice and a decent size however for us they needed some sauce to give it that vava boom but ulitmately we were waiting for our burgers to arrive!

Unfortunately the shrimp burger wasnt prepped so we both had the 'Hot Havana' - 28 day aged beef blended with spicy chorizo topped with all sorts of delights including chipotle garlic mayo. The burger was really tasty, cooked medium rare and you could really taste the chorizo smokey meatiness running through! It is safe to say we smashed through both our burgers! Our only criticism was the bun which we were advised was due to the bakery he was using and would soon be rectified!
We washed both our burgers down with a side of fries and some halloumi sticks which were both delicious and big portions for the price. We really liked the burger sauce which accompanied the chips and the paprika sprinkled on them was lovely.

 

 

Despite being stuffed we really wanted to try the mojito cheesecake as these are two of our fav things however it wasn't set in time so we will try that when we are back from China!

 

We really enjoyed our meal at TacuTacu and really recommend it....maybe if it was popping up at a different location it would have the publicity it truly deserves!

 

 

Specials a la Byron

We have both been fans of Byron since moving to London, and even bigger fans of their specials. So here is a quick run down of some of them (this is in no particular order.....to begin with).

I reckon a good place to start is the patties themselves. Each patty is made freshly from a good source of beef in Scotland. These are standardly cooked medium (however they will cook it how you like) and with love. Every Byron I have had (that's quite few) have been really juicy and flavoursome without being over seasoned.

Miami Slice – 6oz hamburger, crispy potatoes, spicy salami, American cheese, smoked paprika ketchup, sourdough bun. Served with chicharrones (pork scratchings) and Byron hot sauce on the side

This little thing of beauty was released end of April 2014, and was totally different to any other Byron we had ever had and boy did we enjoy it. The smoked paprika ketchup with the crispy potatoes (which we weren't sure would work) took this burger to another level.




















B-Rex - 6oz hamburger, onion ring, crispy smoked bacon, American cheese, jalapeños, pickles, onions, BBQ sauce and mayonnaise.

The B-Rex was a tribute to the first burger Fred (the head chef) remembered having after watching Jurassic Park. If this had been the first burger I could remember eating, its safe to say I would be a good 30 stone by now. The barbecuey, spicy goodness of this burger is just divine. The jalapeños, pickles and onions add a nice crunch which works well with the smokey BBQ sauce and bacon.


 

















The Ronaldo: two 6oz hamburgers, crispy smoked bacon, American cheese, buttered onions, crispy fried onions, pickles, American mustard and ketchup
The Ronaldo is the big boy of specials and a tribute to the one and only Brazilian big boy of football.  Byron released this as a world cup special and it proved popular.  However, for us this burger was just too big.  This burger wasn't as juicy as burgers we have had in the past, and its sheer size made very hard work for the bun to actually hold it all together.  Overall it did taste good and we do love crispy fried onions but this was not our favourite.

      

Le Smoky: 6oz hamburger, smoked Cheddar, streaky bacon, crispy fried onions, shredded iceberg, pickles and smoked chili BBQ sauce. 

AHHHHH OUI OUI!!!!! This burger is c'est magnifique!!! (that's about as far as French goes for me)  Le smokey is the most popular special that Byron have done and was my very first try of Byron.  It is easy to see why this little guy has made it on to the menu full time.  Le Smoky is packed full of flavour provided by the smoked cheese and smoked chili BBQ sauce.  When you add the rest of the ingredients this burger becomes out of this world in both taste and texture.

Holy Cheesemas:two 6oz patties, double helpings of bacon & quadruple helpings of cheese.

Launch date Monday 3rd November

As you can probably tell by the name this is the special for the run up to the festive period.  This burger is basically a tribute to cheese.  The patties themselvees were the usual Byron standard, however we were slightly dissappointed with the cheese element.  Both of us like our cheese really quite strong, we found the cheese on the holy cheesemas alittle bland and it wasn't quite the cheese fest we were expecting.



 

Over all our favourites so far are:-

Soph:

1. Le Smoky

2. Miami Slice

3. B-Rex

4 The Ronaldo
5. Holy Cheesemas

Sarah:
1. Miami Slice
2. B-Rex
3. Le smoky
4. The Ronaldo
5. Holy Cheesemas

This is by no means a definitive list of the specials or the menu available at Byron.  However a special shout out goes out to Byrons' Courgette fries and Mac n Cheese which are both awesome!!!

We cannot wait for the next special!!

L'anima soft launch

Last Wednesday we visited Francesco Mazzei's newest venture - L'anima Cafe for their soft launch and were impressed from the second we walked in (if not feeling a little under-dressed). The decor was really fresh and spacious with a really large bar and some of the tables had a flame in the middle which was producing some serious heat (not needed with the current weather!) From start to end we were impressed and found the staff really friendly, smartly dressed and attentive and it was nice to see Francesco walking around - felt a bit sorry for the bread waitress though as she kept crashing the trolley as she wheeled it to peoples tables.

Check out the bread and dip selection - absolutely delicious!  We were able to select 3 breads to try accompanied with a fish, vegetarian and spicy dip.  Our favourite bread was probably the olive bread however they were all great.  Beware that you will have to pay for the bread.

Starters:

Carpaccio di manzo & tonno crudo

-Both starters were a decent size and very flavoursome. The carpaccio melted in the mouth and worked really well with the blue cheese. The tuna was beyond fresh but we felt it was slightly overpowered by the celery.  Despite this the dish not unpleasant and was great for a summer evening.



     

Mains:

Calabrese & Sybarita
- Both pizzas were on a great base with the right amount of crunch (around the edges)! The nduja one was by far our favourite with really fresh mozzarella and watercress helping cool the mouth down as nduja can be really spicy! The roast potato and italien sausage pizza were not what we were expecting at all.  And in all honesty we did not enjoy it, the base was very soggy and it was very bland.  We were left disappointed.

Desert: Caprese - we were super full  after our first courses but just had to try the flour free chocolate cake! This reminded us of a cherry bake well due to the use of almond flour and the second it arrived we managed to make room and the cake was soon demolished!

We had a pretty good meal here despite some slight disappointments and encourage everyone to take a trip East to this eatery. After watching masterchef we would also love to go to L'anima restaurant and sample some more of Francesco's Italian classics!

An innings too far...

On Friday we headed to the Oval after work to watch Surrey v Glamorgan in a T20 game which was especially important to us as Soph is Welsh from Cardiff and Sarah from Surrey.

Tickets were only 22 pounds and beers under a fiver (which we were suprised at). The atmosphere was electric with a really close match, Mexican waves a plenty and empty beer towers being built all around the stands. There was a great mix of people there from families to work parties and much to our suprise; a fair few Welsh haters.  Even if you are not interested in the cricket at all then it is worth going for the banter, oh, and beers of course. Also if you catch the ball off a six you could win £1000 - we were willing the ball over to us but alas it didn't and Sophs team beat mine by 4 runs.

We left the Oval and headed home via a fave of ours, the Peckham Pelican. This place has a great vibe and does seriously good £6 cocktails although annoyingly last orders are 10:30. Not wanting our Friday night to end we headed along Bellenden road and sunk a few in The Victoria Inn opposite The Beggin Bowl. This is a really nice pub with a big outdoor area and lots of seats inside.  A double and mixer in here will however set you back about £8. Upon closing we literally staggered into Peckham's newest bar - Four Quarters. It is safe to say this is one of the coolest bars we have been to with the unique mix of retro arcade games and craft beers. It took us both quite a long time to realise that the games were free as our beer brains had well and truly kicked in! This place has a really nice laid back atmosphere with everyone really enjoying the arcade games. The bar staff and door staff were extremely friendly and we will 100% be returning.

NB rooster spot ain't bad for a late night chicken burger either :P, and as always for a hangover cure the guys at alibaba juice are the best!

STAX DINER (Soft launch)

Having a week off work in London during the summer is one of our favorite things - You get to walk around in the blazing sunshine and do all the touristy things that seem so much effort at other times of the year.  It was on one of our little day trips out when we saw on twitter that Stax Diner were having their soft launch (50% off all food).... we were not going to miss out on this.After a couple more hours strolling round and visiting The Museum of London (which is very good and free) we had worked up quite an appetite.

We arrived at Stax ready for food, although yet again we were a little early as it did not open until 6pm, even so there was quite a queue building up.  We were seated quickly and drinks orders were taken pretty instantly, 1 Dalmatian (Oreo cookies and baileys) and 1 Drunken Brown Cow (coca cola, rum, chocolate and vanilla ice cream float).  As we waited for our drinks our food order was taken.  For possibly the first time ever I did not have a beef burger instead plumping for "The Chickadee"  (Buttermilk marinated fried chicken breast on Balthazar brioche with lettuce, tomato, pickles and mayo) while Sarah chose (much to my annoyance as I couldn't try it) " The Stax Po' Boy" (Cajun spiced popcorn shrimp on brioche with spicy comeback sauce, tomato and lettuce).  We decided to share a side off Battered pickles.  Once we ordered we then sat and waited and waited and waited for our drinks.... which in the end came after our food despite a number of enquiries as to where they were.

When the food arrived we weren't disappointed overall, however the chips did not look like they were homemade and actually didn't taste like it either - for us they were underdone.  As for the rest of the food, I really enjoyed my chicken burger; the batter was well seasoned and had a nice crunch to it.  Sarah was a little underwhelmed with her Po' Boy due to its lack of flavour and soggy coating.  We both really enjoyed the battered pickles.... it would seem that (for us at least) battering and frying vegetables is the way forward.

Overall the service was mediocre as was the food aside from a few hidden gems.  Having said this, it was their soft launch and throughout the week it was clear that they had had some teething problems.  We would like to go back in the future to sample some of their other dishes once they are settled as we have heard on the grapevine that their chicken and waffles is excellent.

Have you been? How did you rate it?