Popping in for a Coffee: Roasting your own beans at home

Another great guest post by Matt Gibson.

The other day, I woke up and realised I had no coffee in the house. The fact that this realisation terrified me might give you some idea of the relationship I have with caffeine. It's a geek thing.

Luckily, I remembered I *did* actually have some coffee. The only problem was that what I had, tucked away in the back of a cupboard, was a bag of unroasted green beans.

So. Out with the popcorn maker!

Yes, the popcorn maker. I've had one hanging around since I read a fellow geek's blog post about how you could convince a hot-air popcorn maker to roast coffee beans. A week after I read that post, I saw one going on Freecycle. They're just the kind of appliance that people buy on a whim, use twice, and then relegate to the back of a cupboard until the next clear-out, so Freecycle is a pretty good source for them.

The next bit is more easily shown than told, so, without further ado, here's me, on a Saturday morning, making a cup of coffee all the way from a handful of green beans to the mug:

The coffee tasted pretty damn good. It helps that green beans last for *ages* compared to roasted beans, which is excellent motivation for home roasting.

If you want to try this at home, (a) see if you can find a friend with a popcorn maker they've not used since 1988 and steal it, and (b) look to somewhere like Has Bean for supplies – all their beans are available to buy green.

Enjoy! But do bear these caveats in mind:

• The same hot air that's designed to lift the popped corn out of the machine also blows out the chaff (the papery "skin" of the beans.) The chaff starts floating off soon after you put the beans in the machine, and is much harder to catch in a bowl than popcorn. Be prepared to sweep up afterwards.
  
• You normally roast coffee to somewhere between first and second "crack". Each coffee bean makes a sharp little cracking sound once, near the beginning of the roasting, and then again, a few minutes later in the case of my popcorn maker. The longer you leave it, the darker the roast, which I like, but it's a fine line between "French roast" and "burned to a cinder". This guide may help.
  
• Coffee roasting takes longer than popping popcorn. Be careful your popcorn maker doesn't overheat! Watch for deforming plastic, etc. Don't leave it unattended. Basically, don't try this at home, kids, unless you're prepared for unexpected consequences.
  
• You can, of course, buy "proper" home coffee roasters, but they're more expensive. And less fun, in my opinion, than repurposing something orange and plastic from the 1980s and bending it to your will.
  
• If you're going to point an expensive camera lens into a hot-air popcorn maker's exhaust port, make sure you do it from a safe distance. I got away with it, luckily.
  
• You probably want your beans to "rest" a while after roasting to "de-gas" them. The typical advice is to wait around a day between roasting and using the beans. In practice, though, the coffee tasted fine to me straight away, but that might have been because I was caffeine-starved :)

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Gooey Delicious Banana Cake (Revisited)

Charles Campion's Banana Cake is a recipe I copied across to my blog from a post that originally appeared on a food chat board, or in my general online diary, or was sent via email… or in one of the many places I shared my food experiences before I finally realised I was "stealth-blogging" and set up Kavey Eats!

It's such a good recipe I always intended to go back and add photos the next time I made it… but, although I've enjoyed making and eating it so many times since, I never have.

My talented-photographer-friend Matt Gibson made it recently and showed me his gorgeous photos. My brain started to tick tock tick tock and I discarded the plan to simply slot his photos into that old post, and asked him to guest blog it afresh instead.

Sharing the same recipe on a blog twice might be odd but Matt's lack of food processor means he's brought some new advice to the recipe, not to mention his confirmation that it's a doddle even for novice or nervous bakers.

Over to Matt:

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One evening, a week before Christmas, I peered into my fruit bowl. My three remaining bananas stared forlornly back at me. Over-ripe and -- based on evidence from the two I'd already eaten -- also rather bruised underneath. What to do?

Twitter to the rescue. "Got a banana bread recipe" I asked. "Only this one I've found is American, and I have no idea how many bananas there are in two-and-one-third cups."

Auntie Kavey responded instantly, pointing me at her Charles Campion's Banana Cake page. Not only did it sound easy -- always a bonus for an inexperienced baker like me -- but it called for three medium-sized bananas, exactly what I needed to make use of.

So, I dived in, stymied briefly by the local Co-Operative supermarket having run out of both eggs *and* caster sugar (hint, Co-Op: more people than normal are probably baking stuff in the week before Christmas.)

Another minor speed-bump in my road was the first instruction in the recipe, "Measure all ingredients straight into your food processor and whizz into smooth batter," which rather assumes you own something as fancy as a food processor. Still, at least I've got an electric whisk. Instead of boshing it all together I cubed the butter, which I figured would be the difficult-to-mix bit, and rubbed it into the sifted flour and sugar until I had a breadcrumb-like consistency. Then I added everything else, roughly mixing as I went. Finally I took up my electric whisk and zizzed the mixture to a nice smooth batter.

And that was the hard work done, really. I poured the mix into my greased, floured loaf-tin. Pausing only briefly to check I was neither very young, very old, nor pregnant, I took my life in my hands and tasted a wooden spoon's scraping's-worth of the cake mix that had clung on in the bowl. Niiiice. So, all the signs were good.

I popped the loaf tin straight into my pre-heated oven, did the washing-up, and went to post some "before" photos on Twitter. This is the 21st century, after all; if you've not tweeted about it, it hasn't happened.

About forty-five minutes later I was walking past my kitchen door and had to stop and stick my head in and inhale the lovely banana-ey bready smell that was coming from the oven. Another fifteen minutes and I was pulling open the oven, crossing my fingers, and manhandling the loaf tin onto the kitchen worktop with two strategically-positioned tea towels (I know, I know. "Oven gloves" has been just above "food processor" on my kitchen equipment shopping list for about eight years now.)

It looked good. Dark-to-golden brown, with a nice light sponginess showing through the split that had formed on the top. After a few minutes, I gently tried to slide the loaf out, but it felt a bit too wobbly and was clinging to the sides, so I tried to practise some patience and left it to cool in its tin for a while. Once it wasn't so hot, it slid out more easily, and kept its nice loaf shape as I rolled it onto the cooling rack, though the gooey bottom did sink a millimetre or so into the rack as it settled densely down.

After my disaster with Nigella's Dense Chocolate Loaf Cake, which stayed entirely liquid in the middle when I made it, I was a little scared to finally start slicing into my banana cake, but my fears were unfounded. It was a little gooey at the bottom, but pleasantly so, and the rest was a lovely moist cake with a delicious light crust on top and at the edges (the end parts were my personal favourite.) The banana flavour was good, and I hadn't overdone the vanilla, despite my worries.

All in all, this was a fantastic recipe, easy for the baking beginner, even if you're only armed with a £4.99 electric whisk from Argos that smells a bit like a Scalextric car when it's running. You'll never let over-ripe bananas go to waste again.

My beginner's tips:

* "a few drops" of vanilla essence is just under a quarter of a teaspoonful.
* Wait until the loaf's cooled a bit before you try to de-tin it.
* Don't shop for cake ingredients in the Co-Op just before Christmas.

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Here's the recipe again with my original notes below. ~ Kavey

Gooey Delicious Banana Cake

Ingredients
175 grams caster sugar
225 grams white self-raising flour
100 grams unsalted butter (I always use lightly salted actually)
3 tablespoons fresh milk (I used fully skimmed as that's what we buy)
2 large fresh eggs
3 medium sized, very ripe bananas
A few drops vanilla essence

Method

• Preheat oven to 185 C (adjust down for fan ovens).
• Measure all ingredients straight into your food processor and whizz into smooth batter.
• Butter a large loaf tin well, then throw in some flour, tap and turn the tin to coat the flour over all surfaces and then tap out any excess into the bin/ sink.
• Pour the batter into the tin.
• Bake for an hour.

Note: Campion says "Because we are looking for a soggy end product, the old-faithful test of sticking in a skewer and withdrawing it clean is not appropriate. With practice you'll simply need to glance at it to tell. In the meantime, because of the style of cake we're trying to achieve, there's a wide margin of error to make things easier."

Note: If it helps, I find the cake rises delightfully and the top turns a lovely rich chocolatey brown (darker than golden brown) and also usually splits, like a lemon drizzle cake.

All images by Matt Gibson.

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Simply Relish' Wild Apple Jelly With Chillies & Lemongrass

I have known Ann Busby for some years now, as a fellow member of the BBC Food chat board and more recently, the Wildfood forums.

Just over three years ago, Ann's husband complained about the quality of piccalilli on sale in supermarkets. His comments prompted Ann to make her own, using her mum's recipe. A box scheme starting locally at the same time and Ann asked them to sell some of the jars she'd made.

That was the start of her Simply Relish business through which she now sells home made chutneys, relishes and jams to an appreciative audience.

Her products have been recognised in the Guild of Fine Food's Great Taste Awards for three years in a row!

Ann is keen to be as green as possible and now grows a lot of her own ingredients, composts all her peelings and sources the rest of her ingredients locally and seasonally as much as she can.

I was so pleased when she agreed to write a guest post sharing one of her fantastic recipes with Kavey Eats readers.

Scroll to the bottom to win some of Ann's goodies for yourself!

Over to Ann:

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I am an award-winning artisan chutney and relish creator and sell my produce at local farmers’ markets and farm shops. This gives me the flexibility to use seasonal and local produce to its full potential. Luckily I’m well known in the village and it’s not unusual to return home to find bags sitting on the doorstep bursting with apples, plums and pears, all of which are turned into chutneys and jellies.

I just love using our native wild apples! From sunshiny crab apples to the tiny green ones, they are all rich in pectin at this time of year and set readily into sparkling clear jellies. This one is made in the traditional way, using some contemporary ingredients.

It’s getting a little late in the season for Crab apples, so I’ve mixed the few I managed to pick (asking the land owner’s permission first) with other native apples. The colour of the jelly may not be a vibrant pink, but the taste will be sublime!

Before you start, ensure you have got enough jars, (I filled 12 x 110ml jars, using the quantity of apples below) lids and a large pan. Other useful, but not essential, equipment includes a jam thermometer, a funnel and a jelly straining bag, all available from good cook shops.

This is not a quick jelly to make – you’ll also need time and patience!

Simply Relish' Wild Apple Jelly with Chillies and Lemongrass

Ingredients:
1.5 kilos mixed apples
White granulated sugar (more about that later!)
2 deseeded fat red chillies, minced – or more if you like it hot!
2 stalks of finely diced lemongrass; remove the outer leaves and discard. Use only the bottom third of the remaining stalk.

Method:

• The pectin is richest in the skin and pips, so all you need to do is wash and roughly chop the apples, discarding any that are bruised or rotten. Pop them in a pan and cover them with about 1.2 litres of cold water; bring to the boil and let them simmer until they’re soft and pulpy. You can help them to break down by stirring with a wooden spoon. This stage takes up to 45 minutes.
  
• Now comes the most traditional part – straining them. Great Grandma would probably have done this every autumn to maximise nature’s bounty. She would have used muslin, but you can use a straining bag or even a clean stocking! The liquid needs to drip slowly into a clean receptacle; don’t be tempted to help it along by squeezing, as you’ll get a cloudy jelly. Leave it overnight, if possible, or at least 6 hours.
  
• Discard the dried out apple solids – you can compost these. You’ll be left with a rather dull, cloudy juice, but nature is an alchemist and, as long as you haven’t squeezed, prodded or poked the dripping apples, you can look forward to seeing the amazing change that will (trust me!) occur.

• There are a few things to do before you start the next stage. If you don’t have a jam thermometer, pop a saucer or small dish in your freezer – this will help you determine when your jelly has reached setting point. You’ll also need to wash, drain and sterilise your jars; leave them in a warm oven (approx 130 Celsius) for 20 minutes. Boil the lids in a small pan and drain thoroughly. You don’t want any water in the jars, once sealed.
  
• Prepare your chillies and lemongrass now. I’m used to handling chillies, but you may want to wear gloves; remember to wash your hands well afterwards! If you prefer a hot jelly, add a bird’s eye chilli or two.
  
• Remove the outer leaves from two stalks of lemon grass and finely dice the lower part. Put to one side.

• On with the exciting bit! You need to measure the juice and calculate how much sugar you need to add.
  
• I use this simple formula: to each 100ml of juice, add 80g of sugar if you want a tart jelly or 90g if you want a sweeter one. This batch yielded 965ml, so I added 870 grams of sugar.
  
• Put the sugar and juice into a large pan – you can use the bottom part of a pressure cooker, if you have one. Bring it to the boil - the jelly will rise and, if the pan isn’t big enough, it will boil over, so you will need to keep an eye on it.
  
• Using a slotted spoon, skim any scum from the mixture.
  
• You’ll see the juice turn from cloudy to clear and its transformation is almost complete! Water now needs to be driven from the jelly; you’ll need that patience again! While it’s still on a ‘good rolling boil’, add the chillies and lemongrass, so they cook well. Keep checking it if you have a thermometer – it should reach 105 Celsius for a good set.
  
• If you don’t have a jam thermometer, drop a small amount on the saucer you popped in the freezer earlier and leave it to cool a little. If it wrinkles when pushed, it’s reached its setting point. If not, keep boiling and repeat the procedure until it does.
  
• When you’re satisfied that it’s set, leave it for a few minutes. This cooling should ensure an even distribution of ‘solids’. Using a funnel, ladle the jelly into jars, lid and place where it won’t be disturbed until it’s cooled and set. I love to put it on the windowsill, where the light can shine through.

• Once cold, label and put in a cool place.

It goes particularly well with poultry and pork, but I also love it in a Cheshire or Wensleydale cheese sandwich. It’ll keep quite happily, unopened, for a few months. Of course, I should tell you to keep it in the fridge, once opened, but this is a traditionally made jelly – and Great Grandma didn’t have a fridge!

The jars make lovely presents, too – if you can bear to part with them! This little lot are off to market!

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Doesn't that look absolutely delicious? Thank you, Ann, for sharing your recipe and tips!

To win a jar of Ann's Simply Relish Sizzling Sweet Chilli Sauce and one of her Simply Relish Hot Sweet and Sour Sauce, please leave a comment about what you might serve with either one, before 15th November midnight GMT. Open to UK residents only. Please leave your email contact in your comment. A winner will be drawn using a random number generator.

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Creamy, Dreamy Paneer Malai

This post was first published as a guest post on Maunika Gowardhan's Cookinacurry blog back in June.

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You know how people sometimes talk about second generation immigrants as slightly lost souls - neither entirely comfortable in the land from whence their parents came nor completely integrated into the land of their birth?

Well, that's not me.

I was born in London in the early seventies to two doctors who emigrated from India a few years before I was born. My sister came along 3 years (and five minutes) later. Throughout our childhood, we were brought up to have a strong connection to our relatives in India – indeed we visited them every few years, which we loved. But we were also brought up as British kids, free to take onboard our local culture, without the stricter cultural and behavioural strictures that many other second generation children were, in my admittedly subjective opinion, shackled with.

That applied to food too – mum regularly cooked Indian food but she also taught herself Italian, French, Chinese and, of course, British dishes from cookery books and by trial and error. We probably had Indian food once or twice a week, if that. And we travelled a lot too, in our holidays, to wonderfully exotic places and mum would often bring home a recipe or two such as peanut soup from South America, something she still makes today.

What all this boils down to is that, whilst we'd often help mum in the kitchen, we never really learned to cook Indian food in any meaningful way – we didn't pick up the techniques, the instinctive use of spices and wide repertoire of dishes that we might have resulted from a more traditional upbringing.

(Of course, I think my parents got it absolutely right – I feel a pride in my extra cultural heritage, I am very happy in my brown skin, I will always cherish my links with India. But I am first and foremost British).

When I went to university, I soon realised I could more readily cook a roast beef dinner than a keema curry and turned to mum for help when I needed an Indian fix, phoning for recipes and snatches of advice during term time or bending her ear during trips home. A few years later, my sister and I both implored mum to write down all our best-loved of her Indian recipes in a more organised manner, so that we might stand a chance of perfecting our family favourites.

Mum started laboriously writing recipes onto index cards, two copies of each, of course. It was slow work. Not long afterwards, an Indian cousin of ours who'd moved from India to Europe asked if he might have a copy, so he too could recreate the tastes of home. At which point, the idea of a website came up. Mum's brother pointed out that a website would allow all the family in India (plus some in America too) to contribute to the recipe collection, not to mention benefit from it too.

That was how Mamta's Kitchen came to be born, back in 2001. Since then, it's become so much more than its original intention – a family cookbook on the web. It's become a resource visited and valued by cooks from all around the world and mum, my husband Pete and I (who run it together) love the positive vibe of the whole thing.

Just like many of our non-Indian visitors, the first place I turn to when I need an Indian recipe is the website!

Recently, I was invited to attend a fantastically fun event – FoodUrchin's imu for which he buried an entire lamb in what looked like a grave in his back garden, along with lots of very hot rocks and things on fire. It's a Hawaiian tradition the idea for which he found in a book.

All the guests were tasked with bringing something for the table. With all that meat cooking away slowly in the earth, I decided to bring something vegetarian, opting for this simple paneer malai recipe.

I'd never made it before and, even when it came out of the oven, at FoodUrchin's house, I worried that it would be too bland to stand up against the robust flavours of the wonderful baba ghanoush, parmesan biscuits, salads, sauces, freshly made breads and dips that others had created. But, to my delight and relief, it went down very well indeed – I had many requests for the recipe.

Here it is as my mum makes it:

Mamta's Kitchen Paneer Malai

Ingredients
350 grams paneer
-first marinade
2 tablespoons vinegar
1 heaped tablespoon ginger root, freshly ground or finely grated
1 tablespoon garlic, freshly ground or finely grated or crushed
1.5 teaspoons salt
-second marinade
2 tablespoons full fat cream cheese
3 tablespoons full fat sour cream or thick yoghurt
2 teaspoons corn flour (not maze flour)
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 teaspoon sweet paprika powder for colour
3 red or green fresh chillies, finely chopped (red chillies look nicer)
1 tablespoon. coriander leaves, finely chopped
A few strands of saffron, soaked in 1 tablespoon of warm water
1 teaspoon garam masala

Notes: I used shop-bought paneer. You can make your own, which will be a little more crumbly, following this recipe. I used full fat sour cream. I didn't have any fresh chillies or paprika so I used some very hot red chilli powder instead. I omitted the saffron completely.

Method

• Cut Paneer into roughly 2 inch/5cm pieces.

• Place vinegar in a bowl and add salt, ginger and garlic. Mix.

• Add Paneer cubes, mix and marinate for 1 hour.
  
• Preheat the oven to 200˚C.
  
• Make a paste of the cream cheese, sour cream, egg, chillies, coriander, saffron, paprika and corn flour. (Mix this by hand rather than using a food processor, as a processor will reduce it to a thin runny liquid).

• Lift Paneer cubes pieces from the first marinade, leaving the liquid behind (but taking some of the ginger and garlic solids, if you like). Add them to 2nd marinade and gently turn to coat well. Allow to stand for an hour (or longer).

• Line a tray with aluminium foil and cook for 10-20 minute, turning once or twice, to ensure even cooking.

• They are ready when the marinade has formed a firm crust on the paneer cubes and they have started to take on a little colour at the edges.

• If you do not have a grill or oven, you can stir-fry them in a heated wok in 2 tablespoons oil.

Mum would usually serve these cubes on a bed of lettuce with some lemon wedges, but in this case, they were eaten straight from the oven dish, in very short order!

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Guest Post: Mango, Date & Chilli Chutney by Gareth Groves

Gareth Groves is an ex-Chef turned wine merchant who is now Communications Manager at Bibendum. His best man once described him as a man who uses breakfast as an opportunity to think about lunch. Part of his job is to manage social media for Bibendum, so he spends a bit of time on twitter, where it's clear to all that he feels a real passion for food and drink.

Given my recent condiment craze, nay obsession, I was more than a little intrigued when he tweeted that he was cooking up his annual batch of mango, date and chilli chutney. Sounds quite a tasty treat doesn't it? Especially given that Gareth stipulates proper tasty mangoes!

Rather liking the sound of that, I invited Gareth to share the recipe (and it's history) with readers of my blog and, to my delight, he agreed.

Over to Gareth:

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I've been making this chutney for something approaching ten years. I first came across the recipe in a cookbook celebrating the chefs of the town of Noosa on Australia's Gold Coast, when I was cooking in a Edinburgh fusion restaurant (God bless the 1990s).

We used to serve it with anything and everything: goats’ cheese tarts, grilled tiger prawns, Isle of Mull cheddar - you name it, it probably came with a small red dish of this chutney. It was our staple condiment: it is easy to make, reads well on a menu and, most importantly, is absolutely delicious.

Since giving up the professional cooking lark for the wine trade and moving to London, I've made this chutney every summer when the Indian and Pakistani mangoes have been in season on Tooting High Street.

Mango, Date & Chilli Chutney

Ingredients (makes 6-8 jars):
3 boxes of golden Pakistani mangoes (about 15-18 mangoes)
500ml cider vinegar
500ml demerara sugar
6-8 hot chillies
250g root ginger peeled or scraped
325g pitted dates

Method:

• Chop the mango flesh into a big pan.
• Boil the vinegar and sugar to make a light syrup.
• Blitz the chillies (seeds and all), ginger and dates up to make a thick paste. Add a bit of water to the blender if necessary – it will boil off in the final cooking.
• Add the vinegar syrup and chilli mixture to the mango.
• Heat and simmer gently until thick and a dark burnished gold. This can take a few hours. Sunday's batch took about 3 and half hours. Take care the chutney doesn't catch and burn on the bottom of the pan.

• When ready, jar up in sterilised jars.

• Wait.

How long do you have to wait? In truth, not that long. You can eat this chutney almost immediately and it will be hot, sweet and fruity. With time, it mellows and becomes more rounded with a deeper flavour. We've just finished our last jar of the 2009 vintage one year on and it was delicious.

And what should you serve it with? Almost anything you like. Cheese and cold meats are obvious choices but it also shines in fish fingers sandwiches. A favourite at our house is to make quite a plain dhal and serve it with rice and this chutney: perfect comfort food.

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Guest Post: Alex English Visits Morston Hall

Once a fellow food blogger, now in the ranks of professional food writers, stylists and cooks, my friend Alex English has kindly written a guest post for Kavey Eats. Enjoy!

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After an exhausting five weeks training at Ashburton Cookery School, the husband (who I'd hardly seen for over a month) and I decided that a break in the country would be perfect for a bit of rest & relaxation. There's something special about country house hotels. Secluded, discreet, and utterly, utterly relaxing, they're the perfect place to unwind if you're short on time (and, er, fairly long on cash). Morston Hall is no exception. I've been a fan of Galton Blackiston for a while, and his North Norfolk bolthole with Michelin starred restaurant has been on my most-wanted list for some time.

After making the three hour journey up to Morston, we had a few hours to relax in our spacious garden suite before getting dressed for dinner. There's no dress code at Morston Hall, but as we discovered when we headed to the conservatory for apertifs, the clientele is generally of an older persuasion and jackets and ties are pretty much the norm for men.

Glasses of champagne started at £6 and helped the amuse bouche of crab soup with sweetcorn puree slip down nicely.

We then started on the menu proper. Morston Hall has one sitting and a set menu of four courses plus coffee and petit fours. Personally, I like this way of dining - I will eat anything and it's kind of fun to have a surprise menu that takes away the decision making hassles. If you have allergies or a fussiness problem then the kitchen will swap in alternatives.

Our starter of Madeira stewed wild mushrooms with poached hen's yolk, cauliflower puree and jellied mushroom tea was umami rich and delicious, although the jelly ended up melting everywhere and we wished we had more bread to mop it up with.

Next up was a grilled fillet of wild sea bass with pork belly on wilted water cress, bitter lemon dresssing and confit zest. The bitter lemon dressing was the perfect foil to the moist fish. Pork belly turned out to be more of a bacon crisp rather than the thick chunks I had imagined, but it was great to have a fish dish with bold, punchy flavours.

The main course of roasted rib of Blickling Hall Aberdeen Angus with braised skirt, oak smoked mashed potato, sauteed spinach, shallot confit, fine beans, Norfolk asparagus and rich beef jus (what a mouthful!) really was the star of the show. The oak smoked mash was a genius combination with the beef, and I grilled Galton about it when he did the rounds later in the evening. Apparently baked potatoes are infused with oaky flavours in the on-site smokehouse (used for the breakfast kippers). Keen smokers can try it at home by making the mash first and smoking it in a double boiler. One for the weekend maybe?

We were now faced with the choice between dessert or cheese. I went for the sweet option - a dreamy raspberry, vanilla and coconut soup with mango sorbet and a floating island (poached meringue, in case you were wondering). Hubby chose the cheese plate, with particular highlights being the parmesan-esque Old Winchester, Perl Las and Binham Blue (made just up the road at Wells-Next-The-Sea).

After coffees, teas and delicious petit fours - passionfruit truffles, a white chocolate and apricot thingy and honey madeleines, we were off to bed, not forgetting to order our smoked-to-order kippers for breakfast the next morning. Morston Hall isn't cheap at around £300 a night for two (including breakfast and dinner), but it's a great place to get away from it all and with food this good and surroundings this pretty you end up feeling refreshed and ready to head back to the big city.

Morston Hall, Morston, Holt, Norfolk, NR25 7AA

A selection of Alex' photos of the food at Morston Hall:

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Guest Post: Cookinacurry’s Green Coconut Prawn Curry

I'm very pleased to introduce the first ever guest post on Kavey Eats – a delicious curry from Cookinacurry's Maunika Gowardhan. Enjoy!

And please do visit Maunika's blog today to read my guest post where I share a recipe for paneer malai.

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My trip to a fish monger today fills me with excitement, joy, anticipation and this unusual burst of energy which stems back with memories from my childhood that always come flooding back in an instant. My family lived in the coastal region of Maharashtra where seafood was always in abundance, with even a fishmonger visiting our doorstep frequently. Maharashtrians do eat Chicken and mutton but based on the way the region is laid out, a fully fledged meat based diet is consumed within the inner regions where supply of seafood can be scarce.

Welcome to my guest post on Kavey’s blog. I’m Maunika Gowardhan, a private chef and columnist for Food Quarter Magazine in the North East of England. My food is a reflection of everything I have absorbed, learnt and seen my mother cook for my family growing up as a young girl. But beyond that, it also encompasses regional fare from a sub continent that is vibrant, diverse in culture with over 25 different states and home to millions of people making hearty homely food.

I champion Indian food all the way not just to show case that it’s easy but more importantly versatile. That’s the kind of food I cook for my family, clients and also whilst doing food demos. To share my experience join me on my blog www.cookinacurry.co.uk Make sure to leave a comment but more importantly cook the dishes and make them part of your repertoire.

As a young girl accompanying my mother to the meat and fish market was something I would look forward to, keen to see what fresh produce was be up for grabs. This really might not be something everyone enjoys but for me it was unique and special. The market had the distinct ‘fishy’ smell to it as you walked up to the entrance. The rustic colonial style doors leading the way to massive halls (almost the size of billingsgate market!) with old fashioned bronzed fans dotted about which just about made the place cool. My mother made sure to carry our own retro shopping baskets to the stalls as most of the fish bought was usually just wrapped in newspaper.

The first port of call was ALWAYS to surf the market and see who had freshest fish. Also to check pricing on every stall was key. With rows of women sat in a line with variety of fish and shell fish to sell, all vying to make that next sale shouting out the price of the fish trying to get the customers attention. As with most indian fish markets, the men usually went out to shore and caught the fish in the early hours of the morning whilst the women collected the days quota and bought it across to the markets to sell.

Like every regular punter, my mother knew exactly who had the best quality. The stock included Pomfret (also known in the market as Paaplet derived from the Portuguese dialect), Mackerel, and Bombay duck which taste amazing when batter fried. A variety of king prawns; gleaming clams and my favourite live blue swimmer crabs.

Our shopping would be for pomfret which to be honest back in the 80’s and 90’s was a luxury to eat. A flat fish which my mother usually sliced and pan fried in spices. Prawns were always something we stocked up on too. Some of it was cooked on the day whilst the rest was frozen.

Even today going to the fishmongers for me is special, though the shops are much more organised and cleaner now. Nevertheless I revel in joy seeing the abundance of the sea out there with a choice of the best seafood. Shopping for this post you could say was no different. A sunny Sunday morning I was up early, making my way to South Shields in the North East to visit Latimers. A must visit if your ever in the North East. There is a lovely cafe in one half of the shop so once I’m done with my shop I sit in the cafe overlooking the sea sampling fresh oysters that they serve up. On that particular day, I was hoping to find something for a curry based dish but was delighted as ever when I got there to discover some of the freshest prawns. I picked out 5 pieces. Based on the size of the prawns the quantity was more than enough to form the main part of my curry. A green coconut prawns curry which is something commonly eaten in the west coast of India spanning from Maharashtra, Goa and down to southern India.

Cooking something coastal with flavours of coriander, coconut milk, curry leaves to form a paste coating the succulent prawns was perfect. The base of the dish was a paste I ground down and fried in oil. I include the prawn heads to the curry while cooking as it adds to the flavour. But that’s a personal preference so feel free to discard them. The dish had a light sauce; served with some steamed rice. Not stodgy or heavy but a tangy, creamy and distinct flavour of coriander running through. It’s my favourite ways of cooking seafood. You can even swap the prawns for any variety of fish. Garnished with coriander and lemon juice it’s a treat anytime of the year.

Cookinacurry’s Green Coconut Prawn Curry

Ingredients
5-7 jumbo raw prawns (if you’re using smaller prawns increase the quantity)
½ tsp turmeric powder
Pinch of salt
2 tbsp vegetable oil
8-10 curry leaves
350mls coconut water
100mls water
Salt to taste
1 tbsp chopped coriander for garnish

For the green paste;
100gms coriander leaves
6 cloves of garlic
1 inch piece of ginger
Juice of one lime

Method

1. Peel and devein the prawns leaving the tails on. Sprinkle a pinch of salt and turmeric powder on the prawns. Mix well and set aside whilst you make the paste.

2. Mix all the ingredients for the paste in a mini processor and whiz to a fine paste. Add a couple of tablespoons of water if required to get a paste consistency.

3. Spread a couple of teaspoons of the paste over the prawns and set aside.

4. Heat oil in a sauce pan add the curry leaves and sauté until they crackle

5. Add the remaining paste and sauté on medium heat for 2-3minutes. Add the prawns and sauté for 1 minute

6. Pour in the coconut milk and simmer for 5minutes and add the water

7. Simmer for a further 4-5 minutes until the prawns are just cooked

8. Season to taste and garnish with chopped coriander. Serve immediately with chapattis or steamed rice

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