Eating in – Some Local Tips for Weary Cooks

No, we haven’t got an Indian takeaway in Parwich, and don’t suppose we ever shall. However, we have something far better – freshly cooked to order curries by Paul and Evie, whom many of our older (we don’t mean in age, but in the sense of having been Tom’s and Douglas’s Barns guests for some time) may remember from the Gate in ‘the old days’ when they were the landlords.

Paul and Evie retired from pub running to their cottage on the green in Parwich. But you can’t keep a good cook down and they have decided to offer a Thursday to Saturday  making-curry-to-order service . The idea is you telephone them on (01335) 390488 between 5-7.30 the night before, and fetch the curry yourself presumably between the same times the next day. You do have to cook the rice and any side dishes you fancy although I see that to start with (and they hint of more to c0me) they are offering a mango chutney and a tub of chilli chopped onion… And these days you can buy packs of ready cooked rice from the Ashbourne supermarkets (don’t ask me how i know).

This looks like a super extra facility for our guests (and us!). We know for a fact that lots of our guests love to cook, and half of the fun of coming away is cooking at leisure with a glass of nice wine to hand, in a well-equipped kitchen, using carefully chosen wonderful local ingredients they have had fun sourcing. But for even those keen cooks (and I count myself among them) there comes many an occasion when the supreme pleasure would be to sit down to a meal prepared by someone else. The slow-cooker takes you half way there – if you have been out all day the preparation in the morning becomes a distant memory. Then there is always the possibility of having ordered a pre-ordered meal to be brought to your barn from Val Kirkham next door, on 01335 390 458. And now you can order a curry for the weekend from Paul and Evie.

The final tip, unfortunately, is far from local. However, Cook is such a good tip that I happily and most unselfishly pass it on. They deliver here (quite frequently!) but you do have to order at least £35 worth for free delivery. Everything arrives beautifully packed and still completely frozen and many – if not most – of the dishes they recommend your cooking from frozen; most of the dishes are microwaveable. With a bit of careful forethought you could eat like kings but do not a jot of cooking beyond popping food into the over or microwave! This is ready-made food but a serious cut above what one can buy in the supermarkets. It really does taste homemade (and each one comes with a label naming the cook that has in fact made it).

Baking Hot – Catching up with all the news

What a wonderful spell of weather we have been enjoying!

As luck would have it I spent much of today in our kitchen churning out Bakewell tarts and also the coconut ‘Lincoln Tarts’ (guests may recognise!) for the Derwent Rural Counselling Service  (DRCS) Shopping Fair tomorrow. The apparently burnt offering at the back does not look so bad in real life, I promise!

2011 DRCS Shopping Fair, at  the Maynard, Grindleford, S32 2HE Tues 5th Oct 6pm-8pm; Thurs 6th Oct 10am-4pm

Then we had spent the previous two days indoors too, escaping outside to enjoy the balmy October sunshine whenever we had a break – we’ll be writing about snow next…! We had been attending the Premier Cottages AGM, which rather conveniently for all of us us in the Peak District is usually held just outside Stafford, so a much easier drive for us than those poor Premier Cottage owners who come from the far north or Cornwall.

It is always a very pleasant affair, with lots of stimulating discussions both formal and informal and interesting presentations. These included one by the CEO of VisitEngland, and another about  star gradings and inspections for holiday cottages by Pam Foden, the VisitEngland Quality Controller, who warned that inspections would become (even more) robust.  We all had a nervous turn about this when John and I reported back to Janet this evening:  we take the cleanliness so seriously anyway and already it often takes every single minute of the five hours we have between visits to tackle everything, however clean and tidy the previous guests have (almost invariably) left it.

In our experience the ‘robustness’ of inspectors has never been in question – it is more the puzzling   inconsistencies…

Finally, to end on a more positive note, here is  another happy photo, of umbrellas: the Peak District Premier Cottages (PDPC) group has commissioned an umbrella with PDPC Logo for a bit of cheerful and useful PR.

Some Dog-Friendly News from Tom’s Barn

Here is a photo taken this afternoon of a very handsome Smudge who did not want to be hosed down after a boggy walk in the High Peak today. And just for good measure one of Boots our much-loved 14-year old cat inherited from my father Douglas, taken yesterday.

We warmly  welcome dogs (and the occasional cat) and their owners to Tom’s Barn and it is evident from what our guests tell us  and all the forward bookings (and the  disappointed scores we have to turn away all the time) that this feeling is mutual..What does this mean to the dogless?

Tom’s Barn welcomes dogs but Douglas is Dogless

Please  be reassured,  you don’t have to have a dog to stay in Tom’s Barn! All our guests  are just as warmly welcome, with or without a dog. We have never done a count up to see what the percentage of dog-owner visitors is but I would guess at more than half, possibly more like three quarters. The dogless have the advantage that they can make the choice between Tom’s Barn or Douglas’s Barn.

Douglas’s Barn, which also has its own loyal band of followers, is always dog-free. Many choose it for its peaceful colour scheme and quirky design, the spacious bedroom and the power shower (not to forget the slightly bigger-longer bed…). However it is particularly attractive to those who fear (we trust totally unnecessarily) that where there have been dogs there will be evidence of doggy smell or hair.

“A lot of dog friendly accommodation really isn’t of a good standard, and having spent time at Tom’s Barn it really is a hard act to follow!” wrote a happy dog-owner who stayed here in july for her second visit.

Another guest comments on Tripadvisor that dog-owners can often find themselves being given a  raw deal,  “If you’re worried about staying at Tom’s Barn don’t (worry), this as a dog owner is the best place I have ever stayed in, clean and really comfortable.”

Finally, here is a link to a local website, Dog Friendly Peak District, (you may find you have to register first) which has some useful information including a list of dog-friendly pubs, which however doesn’t include our two favourites, the George at Alstonefield and the Gate at Brassington. By the way, with all of them we do recommend always that you ring beforehand to check; pub owners can change their policy after one too many tricky canine incidents (not all dogs or owners are so well-mannered as ours invariably are!).

Prize-Winning Biscuit Recipe

My cake may not have been rated by the Parwich Horticultural Show judge (apparently a genuine Home Economics teacher) nor my jam, but I take heart from the fact my biscuits were given FIRST PRIZE! I must admit it is a very good recipe so I can’t take all that much credit; they do always taste pretty special although you must be careful not to burn them…

Before I begin, you must forgive a cook ‘d’un certain age’ who still uses imperial measurements. I will leave any translation into metrics to you. The recipe – possibly South African – was given to my sister and me when we were still at school (in what is now Zimbabwe) and we have both made them pretty consistently ever since so the recipe (imperial measurements and all) has withstood the passage of time and in my case continents.

Ingredients

6 oz butter              2oz icing sugar              5oz flour            2 level teaspoons baking powder             3oz custard powder

Method

Cream the butter and icing sugar until well mixed and soft. Sift in the dry ingredients and knead (by hand or in a processor) until everything is completely mixed in and smooth.

Roll small pieces of the dough into walnut sized balls. Place them – not too close together – on a baking sheet lined with non-stick paper. Flatten them with a fork.

Bake in a moderate oven, or on the grid shelf of the floor of the roasting oven in an Aga, with the cold plain shelf slid along the second set of rungs from the top.

They will probably take about 20-25 minutes to cook, depending on how big you make them, but start looking after about 15, because they burn quite easily.  When ready they are yellowish and firm.

Thumbs Up for the Druid

Good Food not too far from Tom's and Douglas's Barns

Enticed by a post in the Parwich Blog and encouraged by the fact that we had had a busy day and there didn’t seem much prospect of a decent home-cooked meal tonight from the chefs at Orchard Farm  we eagerly set off for the Druid this evening to undertake some vital research.

And how glad we are that we did! We were greeted pleasantly but not pushily when we arrived at the bar, where several people were sitting at tables eating, drinking and chatting quietly. We ordered a glass of wine, asked to look at the dinner menu and quickly decided to stay while we chatted to the new(ish) young owners and staff trying to find out a bit more about the current Druid situation.

The new owners took over in January, have a new chef who has scaled down and refined the menu,  which they descibe as ‘modern Derbyshire’ (with not a hint of the previous owners favoured black pudding as far as we could see)  and is making most of what they serve in house, from tomato ketchup up. Apparently it was his night off tonight but we both had an excellent meal. John had ‘Sheffield’ fish cake and chips which was a new one on us (and possibly not totally ‘Derbyshire’ either…). It was layers of white fish and potato, in a crisp batter and quite delicious; it came with mushy peas and the statutary  criss coss arrangement of fat chips. I had herby pancakes with ‘mushrooms in a creamy sauce, spinach and feta’, plus a salad and hot green beans and red onion. I loved every mouthful!

Just coffee and no puds for me but John had some ice cream described as vanilla but rather more interesting than that but neither of us could identify what the flavour was. It tasted home made, but we didn’t check. The whole came to £41 I think including tip and two large glasses of wine, so good value whilst certainly not not cheap.

We asked for some sample menus but they didn’t have any and suggested we looked on the website; the website however appears still to be under construction so we didn’t get very far there! However, we shall certainly recommend it to our guests and any friends that ask, and let’s hope the current owners make a go of it (there were only six of us in the dining room…). We are only too aware that owners come and go and repuations go up and down, so we’d be very grateful to be kept up to date and would welcome all comments (please!).

How to Make a Prizewinning Cake

I have been baking cakes, pretty successfully, for many many years. I have never ever entered into  competition but for the Parwich Horticultural Show yesterday I was persuaded to do so, and some plum jam and some biscuits…

Pride comes before the proverbial fall, not that I expected to win but I fondly imagined I might at least come in with a Third. No such luck: my poor Victoria sponge  was not commended in any way at all. Nor was my jam (that was possibly less of a surprise, although I must admit it tastes pretty good but maybe it isn’t quite up to the perfectionist’s standard. The biscuits actually won First Prize, which I must try to remember but cakes do take more skill.

Later last night Ben’s wife let us into the secret. The secret, she advises, is not to wear too many clothes! No wonder I didn’t get a prize.

Anyway, the out and out winner of the cake section was our good friend Ben who to the best of my knowledge isn’t baking cakes every day of the week. It had risen beautifully (he did use five eggs as against my three…) it was light and airy and tasted divine (I know because I begged a mouthful off Kevin who successfully bid for it at auction at the end of the show).

FInally, to become a lot less personal, the Parwich Strongman Competition was held on Saturday afternoon, on the football ground at the bottom of the village – a lovely green and spacious setting with plenty of space for the children to run around in, and for the Parwich A52s ‘Folk-tinged rock from the land of the peaks’ to play.

Sad for Parwich’s reputation for manliness the competition was won for the second year running by a man from Belper, but – it must be pointed out – he was put under serious pressure until the last moment by young Tom Slater, Parwich born and bred. Plenty of photos on the Parwich blog: they certainly have to do some pretty amazing and alarming things

Gluts in the Veg Patch: Chocolate Courgette Cake

The ‘season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’ creeps upon us. Blackberries are ripening, courgettes are turning into marrows while one’s back is momentarily turned, the plums on our old tree are turning a beauiful golden red and are already as sweet as honey, the apple tree can hardly cope with all the apples and the damsons are darkening by the hour. We’re all going to have a busy time and it doesn’t stop with the picking. After the jam and chutneys, the apple puree and damson gin, what to do with all the courgettes?

Soup (lovely), chutneys and pickle (also lovely) chocolate and courgette cake – also sounds very lovely. Riverford Farm have the recipe which you will find the link to  here  but also in their recipe book, page. I tried it yesterday. It smelt delicious but it certainly was a tad on the heavy, somewhat squadgy side. Perhaps 1lb of grated courgete is askig a bit much, and rather more likely, I perhaps should have left it in the oven a little longer. It was compulsive eating though, I kept trying yet another bit, just to reassure myslef that it was really deliciousl. I wonder what our guests’ reaction is… – I hope they will let us know. Meanwhile, here is the link to the recipe, courtesy of Riverford. Do let me know what you think if you make it. i shall certainly try agai as my first attempt was not an unqualified success (and I usually have quite agood success rate with cakes although i say it myself).

Jubilee Chicken Recipe

Well over a month ago now, the Friends of DRCS Fundraising committee hosted a charity lunch for 120, and the dish we prepared was this. Fairly labour intensive for 120, as you can imagine, it should be a doddle for 4 or 8 or even 12. It really is delicious and we received so many compliments at the time and later that I thought I’d share it with you all here. We recently had some friends over for a joint summer  birthday celebration, in theory for a barbecue but because the weather outlook was  dismal we changed plans and had a cosy meal indoors, enjoying a summery Jubilee Chicken and salad. It is going to prove a good standby!

Jubilee Chicken Quantity to serve 4
4 chicken breasts
Salt and pepper
2tbsp olive oil
1 lime quartered, bunch of flat leaf parsley and grated nutmeg

Marinade
Half lime juiced and zest grated
3cm fresh root ginger peeled and grated
1 clove crushed garlic
1 shallot chopped
2 tbsp olive oil

Dressing
3 floz/ 100ml crème fraiche
6 tbsp mayonnaise
Half lime, juice, zest grated
5cms piece fresh root ginger

Method

Mix marinade in shallow dish. Add chicken and coat thoroughly. Refrigerate, covered for 2-3 hrs
Mix dressing. Place crème fraiche, mayo, lime juice and zest in a bowl. Peel and grate the ginger then twist in a piece of muslin or press through a sieve to extract juice. Add 2 tsp of juice to dressing.  Stir and cover and chill.
Scrape marinade from chicken, season, drizzle with olive oil and roast in preheated oven 190 c/375f for 25 mins, basting occasionally. Leave to cool completely then cut into bite size pieces and cover with dressing.

It really is delicious. I am sure one could think of all sorts of variations including adding apricots or mango or even grapes and perhaps a hint of curry, using a good quality paste. I’d welcome any suggestions!

Another Food Update from Tom’s & Douglas’s Barns

You must excuse the present stress on food but we do have a good tip to pass on after a doubly positive experience re the Peak District Pemier Cottages Privileges project, and Rowley’s Restaurant, in Baslow, which is one of the founder members of the scheme.

We have had Angela, a friend from Yorkshire staying, who is an excellent cook, and extemely interested in food generally. By lucky good fortune we were able to go together to Max Fischer (of Fischer’s which is related to Rowley’s) Taste of the Peak’s cookery demonstration at the Dome on Tuesday as part of Buxton Festival programme. Max was inspirational – apparently completely unfazed by the total gas and electricity failure at the start he began demonstrating a salad… When power was restored he made a risotto and a plum crumble which we tasted afterwards and marvelled over and decided then and there to go to Rowley’s the next day to see if it lived up to our expectations. John and I had been before, but a couple of years ago. We justified our rather self-indulgent proposal by deciding It was pretty crucial that we should test out, there and then, how our new Peak District Premier Cottages Privileges scheme was working.

So we were pretty gratified therefore when the Rowley’s manager instantly recognised the scheme, and made us very welcome; the girl that served us was also charming (we didn’t ask her name unfortunately). Even more importantly, the food was quite delicious and certainly lived up to our expectations. Eager to pick up more tips we sat at the table by the kitchen and watched the chef and his mate like hawks and I am sure we must have made them feel quite uneasy although they seemed quite affable and relaxed when we thanked them at the end.

For those that are interested John wanted a very light lunch so had roasted cherry tomato soup and a selection of ice-creams. No such restraint for Angela and me: Angela had a pea risotto and a creme brulee, complete with a dollop of banana compote, a banana ice-cream and toasted popcorn on top! My photo hardly does it justice. I also had the creme brule and a spiced beef and naan bread ‘sandwich’ which came with chips which I shared with the others, and a very delicious sauce. John’s soup was officially a starter, Angela and I had a ‘light bite’ portion but a heavy bite would be more than either of us could have managed and as it was we all felt obliged to have a brisk 4 mile walk afterwards.

We found the whole a most enjoyable experience; it was also we felt surprisingly reasonable – we had two courses each and a glass of wine (and of course our free PDPC Privileges coffee and fudge) and it came to under £50 – I think £43, but John paid so I am not quite sure. We will most certainly return and are very happy to continue to recommend Rowley’s to our guests – but with even more conviction now. (By the way, just in case you are wondering, nobody at Rowley’ has any idea I am writing this entirely unsolicited report.) And finally, we are even more convinced what a good thing our PDPC Privileges card is going to prove to be, for everyone involved.

More Recipes & Recommendations from Tom’s & Douglas’s Barns

I am almost too embarrassed to show my head again, having written nothing for about a week apart from last night’s poppy seed cake post. The ‘busy’ excuse is wearing a bit thin, although it remains true – more about what we’ve been doing later but meanwhile, down to some food tips.

Two lots of recent guests have been to and thoroughly enjoyed The Packhorse, at Crowdecote. This is one of many pubs that has gone up and down like a yoyo, starting from a good high; apparently it is very pleasing again. The setting is certainly superb and worth the trip alone.Do let us know if you do visit, meanwhiloe john and I intend to as soon as is decentl;y possible. (Note they are shut Monday and Tuesday.) A restaurant that one or two have written highly of recently is Rowley’s, in Baslow. Rowley’s is now part of our Peak District Premier Cottages Privileges scheme so all the more reason to visit!

Ages ago I promised the Poppyseed Cake recipe, which I posted last night. Now I am about to reveal a delicious French recipe for a crispy almond biscuit, ‘croquant‘. Last weekend we met amongst other people a very charming French couple who produced these croquants to everybody’s delighted enjoyment! Vincent, the Frenchman, gave me the address of his (French) blog site where I found his recipe, also in French but which even to my rusty French brain was very easy to translate, so here goes:

Les Croquants
3 egg whites
125g flour
320g sugar
120 g almonds (either ground, or finely chopped)

Mix together all the ingredients. Put tiny, very well-spaced spoonfuls (they spread a lot) onto a lined baking tray. Bake at 200′ for about 20 minutes (check!). Leave the biscuits on the tray for at least 15 minutes after you have taken them out of the oven.