Smy Chutney Goes Abroad: Colosseo, Roma

 

Check out these jars of Smy Chutney, lounging on a sunny terrace in Rome, marvelling at the Colosseum, having an aperitivo and thinking about the important things like - where has the best pizza in Rome? The best tiramisu? Is there a city in the world as beautiful as Rome?

(grazie Nina e Zappa per le foto! x)

Canapés: can I get a canapé-men?

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.

Six-pepper Sunday Roast Chicken

I love a Sunday roast.  I love six-pepper jelly.  So I massaged six-pepper jelly into a chicken and roasted it up.

 

I've tried this technique many times and the resulting chicken is crispy, spicy and super moist.

There's nothing like sharing a home-cooked roast dinner with friends and family but I knew that I had a hectic week and that by roasting a chicken I would be setting myself up for some easy but tasty meals to eat throughout the week. I made three tasty salads with some of the left over meat and ate those on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.  This one has the chicken, mixed greens, shredded carrot and beetroot, mixed seeds and a dollop of rhubarb chutney.

With the left over carcass, some onion, carrot, celery, bay leaf, parsley, salt and pepper I made a chicken stock.  I use stock cubes in emergencies but I always try to have an arsenal of homemade stocks in the freezer as they make such a difference in soups and gravies.

From which I then made red cabbage, chicken, parsnip and pinenut soup to have for lunch on Thursday and Friday and I was able to freeze two large portions as well.

I'll share some of my other leftovers meals as there are so many, I have a post nearly ready to go on rissoles and risottos. I'll also post the full recipe for the above soup.

Marie Curie Blooming Great Tea Party - Saturday 30th July 2011

Last weekend I was fortunate enough to be asked to be involved in the Marie Curie Blooming Great Tea Party at the Avo Hotel Dalston.  Lots of care and planning went into an amazing day which saw over £400 being raised for Marie Curie which will help this brilliant charity continue with its work.  Delicious food and drink were donated and prepared by generous businesses and lots of locals came out to enjoy cups of tea, sandwiches and the cakes and other goodies that were available.  The weather cooperated and everyone was in high spirits and feeling good.  Here are just a few photos from the day, apologies on the quality but I lost my handbag the previous weekend which had my camera in it:

 This is only some of all the donated food and drink.

 My lemon curd cupcakes (curdcakes somehow sounds wrong...) and my chocolate and six-pepper jelly cupcakes.  They were very well received!

Strawberry & pineapple jam standing at the ready to be teamed with homemade scones and cream!

Lots of amazing individuals and businesses were involved in this day including:

Avo Dalston Hotel

Boulevard Catering

Juno Says Hello

Rosy Lee Tea

NikoB Chocolates

Vegan Peasant

Borough Wines

Scipmylo

Beyond Thrilled

Mary's Tea Parties

and me,

Smy Chutney

(apologies for anyone that I have not included!)

You can see more photos by checking out the Avo Hotel Dalston's Facebook Marie Curie event photos.

Click on the link to find out more about Marie Curie Cancer Care or if would like to donate to the cause.

  and remember...

it's not your chutney...

it's Smy Chutney.

Chee Rabbits and Snaekdog: Smy Chutney Super Fans

Lately I've been meeting amazing people and sometimes becoming good friends with people on Twitter. It's often the case where I may start following someone whose blog I have found helpful or Tweetdeck highlights something of interest. Sometimes it feels like Twitter is tapping into the same cosmic stream that makes iTunes seem to predict what music you need to have "shuffle" into your life at exactly the right time. Several weeks ago I saw the following tweets pop up on my Tweetdeck:

does water really need a f*@!ing day? #worldchutneyday
22 March

I absolutely love chutney. Is there some kind of chutney lovers website or committee I can join? I wish to talk to like minded chutney lovers.
22 March

Both tweets were from Chee Rabbits, they made me smile and I started following him immediately. Entertaining discourse ensued and two people with similar interests and senses of humour forged a friendship. Together we have not succeeded in a #worldchutneyday, however we have gone on to recognise an entire Chutney Kingdom full of kings, queens, princes, folklore, creatures and music where every day is World Chutney Day. As you should know Chee Rabbits is himself a talented musician, writer and artist (www.snaek.org) as well as the Royal Sweetness of Confettiland, so it is a great partnership, friendship and alliance for all involved.

Chee Rabbits kindly placed an order on www.SmyChutney.com and since receiving his order he has been giving me lots of feedback and recipe ideas. I asked him for some pics and what I received today had me welling up as they are just SO fabulous. I am, as ever, so touched that someone would take such time and effort to celebrate Smy Chutney. I sometimes forget that jars of Smy Chutney have a whole other life that I don't often get to glimpse once they've been sold on. It's these glimpses that make me the happiest as does making new friends. So let me introduce you to Snaekdog:


I've added this to my website as I do all feedback and pictures sent in but I will be putting this up on my actual wall as well as my virtual ones. Chee Rabbits and Snaekdog will obviously be rewarded in free chutney samples for their contribution to the chutney arts and as a show of thanks. I can't say thank you enough to Chee Rabbits for his amazing artwork and support and to everyone who enjoys and supports Smy Chutney.

and remember...
it's not your chutney...
it's Smy Chutney.

Work Them Smy Chutney Batches

Here's a little video to give you an insight into a typical Sunday for Smy Chutney. This one is actually last Sunday but this will encapsulate the past week. You may not find bubbling chutney, or in this case six-pepper jelly, as fascinating as I do but as I was making this video this song happened to get thrown into the mix and it is my favourite song as the minute, Ramadanman's Work Them. Good tunes obviously makes for tastier chutney and this seemed to work perfectly as the potent six-pepper jelly was furiously rolling. The picture isn't brilliant as it was fogging up the camera...probably not the best idea...but I thought it looked like molten lava or a martian firework display.

and remember...
it's not your chutney...
it's smy chutney

Spitalfield's Show and Green Fair

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!

Kieran Tries Six-Pepper Jelly

Here is a simple vid of Kieran trying Smy Chutney Six-pepper jelly. If you send in a video or something creative of you enjoying Smy Chutney you will get free samples!!!!

And remember...
it's not your chutney
it's Smy Chutney.

Six-pepper jelly & sausage sarnie

Yummy and super simple:
1. Grill several good quality sausages
2. Toast and butter bread
3. Slather liberal amounts of cream cheese on one half of the bread
4. Spread lashings of Smy Chutney six-pepper jelly on the other half
5. Enjoy the warm and cool flavours of this delicious sandwich!

and remember....it's not your chutney
it's Smy Chutney