Feast your eyes on a range of canapés that I made for a recent gathering. They were the prelude to an Italian-made porcini risotto starter, roast beef and caramelised onion main and lemon curd ice cream that I made for dessert. The canapés were a hit and starting from the right of the photo and moving left they were:
Brie topped with banana & date chutney
Cream cheese topped with six-pepper jelly
Goat's cheese topped with jamón Serrano and black cherry and black pepper conserve
Rocket topped with pan-seared duck breast and plum gumbo
Grilled mackerel topped with greengage chutney
Stilton topped with black cherry and clack pepper conserve.
The top three favourites were the mackeral and greengage chutney, duck with plum gumbo and rocket and the classic banana & date with brie. The stilton was meant to be paired with a red onion marmalade but we ended up serving it as another accompaniment to the beef with the carmelised onions. I used Nairn's mini oatcakes for the canapés but I prefer to make my own and add different seeds and spices to complement the canapé or they are nice to eat on their own as an alternative to crisps.
Close up of (from bottom to top) duck, rocket & plum gumbo; jamón, goat's cheese and black cherry; cream cheese and six-pepper jelly.
Close up of (from bottom to top) stilton and clack cherry and black pepper compote; mackerel and greengage chutney.
Behold the twin bananas that I discovered today whilst making a batch of banana and date chutney! I've photographed them next to a standard banana but they were totally smooth on each side. They were hiding underneath a small bunch of individual bananas and I gasped as I saw them and turned them over and around, looking at them from all their angles. The twin hemispheres of my brain were working rather fast but they were slightly confused until they determined, yes - it was a banana but as my hands prodded them I could feel two distinct bananas, twin bananas under one peel. If they were a hardier fruit I might have thought about keeping them around a bit longer but I'm funny about my bananas, twins or no twins, and these two were already teetering on the wrong edge of how I like to eat and/or use them for my banana & date chutney. I was obviously wondering if they are a rare or common phenomenon and was planning to take to Twitter to find out but thought I would need photographic evidence. Had I not lost my camera last month I would have made a video...but please do not get me started on that or the fact that I also lost my Smy Chutney notebook in the same evening, alas, it could have been worse. But back to the twins, I felt like little Phoebe here and eerily had an almost identical conversation to the one that she has below:
There are lots of images of other twin bananas and even a query on yahoo asking, "Will a pregnant mother give birth to twins if she eats twin bananas? If she splits them behind her back, will she still have twins? Please include research. :)" I do not think this blog constitutes research for or against twin bananas having the power to banana split an embryo into twins, I would think that research is not actually necessary so moving on.
Here are my twin bananas sans peel, just before they were chopped up and sacrificed to a batch of banana and date chutney and as @EllieBry stated, "it was a sacrifice any decent banana would make."
I salute you twin bananas, thank you for the memories and I look forward to spreading you on ham and cheese sandwiches.
Yesterday, Saturday 12 September, Smy Chutney went to Spitalfield's City Farm for the Spitalfield's Show and Green Fair. It was a lovely combo of your classic village fete contests and a great opportunity to celebrate green issues. We brought along some jars of banana and date chutney, rhubarb chutney, mango chutney, six-pepper jelly, ella bella (damson) jelly and strawberry and pineapple jam. Although we weren't awarded a first prize we did get second place for banana and date chutney and a third for rhubarb chutney and a second place for the ella bella (damson) jelly. We were super-chuffed as this was the first time we've entered Smy Chutney into any sort of contest. Congratulations to all the participants and organisers for a brilliant day.Massive thanks to Mr Waghorn for letting Smy Chutney know about this opportunity. If anyone knows of any other upcoming coming chutney contests, please let us know! It was so much fun we might be hooked!
And remember....it's not your chutney...it's Smy Chutney!
Watch Mohammed sample Smy Chutney: banana & date for the first time in the form of a delightful canape. I say canape, it's really just a Tuc biscuit, bit of cheese and a dollop of Smy Chutney. The results speak for themselves. Big thanks to Mohammed and Smy Chutney Uber-fan, Emma and her mad presenting skills.
