February 'Create the Seasons'

We admit this time of year is pretty gloomy, so why not cook yourself into a good mood, as there are an abundance of seasonal fruit, vegetables and other British produce to perk you up.

Seville Oranges
Marmalade was invented in Scotland in the late 18th Century by a savvy shopkeeper who unknowingly bought a cargo of bitter oranges. In a desperate plea to get his money's worth his wife turned it into jam; it seems that behind every successful man there is a quick thinking woman! This weekend, venture to your local market and buy yourself some Seville or blood oranges and cook up a batch of marmalade. A pretty sticky affair but definitely worth the effort.

Yorkshire Rhubarb

Yorkshire rhubarb or forced rhubarb is at it's pinkest at this time of year. The rhubarb is grown in pitch black sheds in a 9 square mile triangle in West Yorkshire, deprived of natural light and picked by candle light to keep it sweet and pink. Rhubarb is technically a vegetable, however you decide to eat it, it is delicious especially with homemade custard!

create's humble pink rhubarb and elderflower custard tart

with ginger bread cream, poached rhubarb and rhubarb curd

Mussels

The general rule with shellfish is to only eat them in months that include the letter "R", but at this time of year they are at their best. Mussels are not the most beautiful shellfish, but are packed with the flavour of the sea, and the shells make the most perfect natural canapé spoon.

create's sustainably rope grown mussels 
with parsley and shallot salsa

Quintessentially Create

Last night create teamed up with one of our brand new venues,
29 Portland Place, Quintessentialy Events and Tom Parker-Bowles
for a Burns Night bonanza.

Tom kindly donated some of his delicious canapé recipes to go alongside create's tailor made menu, full of handpicked Scottish produce and some Scottish classics re-invented for the occasion.

The evening kicked off with some tasty canapés...

little cups of cullen skink

whisky cured salmon with a mustard sauce served on oatcakes

scotch rarebit

create's (now infamous) pint of scottish prawns

Followed swiftly by a traditional haggis with neeps and tatties

A magnificent main course of...

rare roasted fillet of buccleuch beef

with potato topped scotch pie filled with confit beef cheek, wilted spinach, scottish girolles mushrooms and mcewans ale reduction

Finished off with...

tipsy laird

free form vanilla sponge, scottish raspberry jelly, heather honey macaroons and a drambuie chantilly cream

Adam Byatt on Saturday Kitchen

There's not a single person at create food and party design who won't be attempting Adam Byatt's 'Coq au vin with parsley mash' as seen on Saturday Kitchen this weekend. Deliciously hearty, packed full of seasonal ingredients and a certain winter warmer in this cold weather spell. Give it a go too, with the recipe below...

 

Click here for Adam Byatt's recipe

Adam Byatt is exclusively available to create's clients at tastings and events. Click here for further details.

Raymond Blanc at Adam Byatt's Trinity Restaurant

A legend of the culinary world, Raymond Blanc, visited create's Consultant Chef's Trinity Restaurant recently, regarding his experience there as "exceptional" on his blog. Here at create, we have long been fans of Trinity and indeed Adam Byatt and are delighted to be in partnership with him, offering our corporate and private clients the opportunity to enjoy Adam Byatt's exclusively designed British menus and presence at tastings and events.

We agree with Raymond in his blog post below, if you haven't been to Trinity, you must go!

Raymond said, "Yesterday I was treated to lunch by my good friend James Steen. He took me to Trinity, a restaurant in Clapham, London, to which I hadn't been before. What an exceptional lunch, full of seasonal ingredients, beautifully cooked and beautifully presented in a lovely and comfortable environment.

Here is a young British chef, Adam Byatt, cooking with great verve and flair. It is wonderful to see young and talented chefs observing the guidelines of sustainability, the best ingredients and offering great value too. Trinity is a lovely restaurant with very much its own style. I loved the way the food was presented, at one with its surroundings: hare and partridge served on a beautiful amber-coloured piece of burnished wood. A truffle from Perigord - the very essence of the season - allowed to speak (I should say to sing!) for itself. 

I will post the whole menu later, but for now I must say thank you to James for a wonderful lunch and to Adam and his team! I can only urge you all to go yourselves."

If you would like a 'create with Adam Byatt' menu at your event, perhaps the celebrated Chef himself at your tasting or awards dinner, call our sales team on 020 8944 4900 to discuss create's exciting new partnership.

Read Raymond's full blog post here

New Year, New Food, New Trends

The create kitchen predicts what's hot 
and what's not for 2013 

(and a few trends we are going to push this year!)

Street Food
Back in October when we ate our way through the launch of KERB, the new street food market sensation at Kings Cross Boulevard, it got us thinking...so expect big things from the create 'streat' movement this Summer!

Recipe resurrections making the classics cool
History has given us some amazing recipes which have long been forgotten and we think it's about time people remembered them; our menus are going be crammed full of sippets, flummeries and heritage varieties of vegetables.

Making sweet savoury
Just like fashion, food follows trends. Some are good and some are terrible and some are just plain strange, but if you are clever and can combine the good and the strange we think, you have an excellent recipe for success. 

Our star dish of Autumn/Winter 2012 was a sirloin of beef with cashel blue and chard bread and butter pudding, and looking forward, we are thinking duck and hot cherry and beetroot summer pudding is a must. 

A few more to look out for:
Trash food - the gourmet junk food.
Gourmet grilling - spit roast cow and vertical bbqs both a spectacle in their own right and here at create, we are masters at both.
Sharing platters - the new tapas!
Eating your greens- foraged herbs and baby cress have made greens cool again.

On the last day of create christmas

Richard Groves made for me...Christmas Mince Pies

Orange pastry:
500g plain flour
175g icing or caster sugar (I use icing)
375g butter
Finely grated rind and juice of one large orange

Sift the flour and sugar into a mixing bowl. Cut the butter into small pieces, stir these into the flour and rub gently with your fingertips until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Stir in the grated rind. Then, using a knife, stir in the orange juice until the dough just begins to stick together, add more fresh orange juice if the orange was not juicy enough!

Gather up the dough, wrap in cling film and chill for at least 30 minutes.
This quantity will make about 24 mince pies.

Mincemeat:

If you use bought in mincemeat the addition of a little grated orange rind, chopped apple and brandy will improve its flavour.

Roll out the pastry and use a 7.5cm fluted pastry cutter, grease your pie moulds and pop the bottoms in. Fill with mincemeat and put a 5cm top on after moistening the edge of the bottom. Brush the top with milk and bake in a preheated oven (gas mark 7/220c/425f) for 15-20 minutes until golden brown.

Deluxe version: Cream 250g full fat cream cheese and 50g caster sugar until smooth. Put a teaspoon of the cheese mixture on top of the mincemeat in each pastry bottom and top with a smaller round top.

Serve warm if possible and dust with icing sugar.

If you are being a complete show off, put a pinch of cinnamon powder in the icing sugar before dusting the mincies and serve with soft brandy butter to complete the hedonistic mince pie ritual.

on the 11th day of create christmas

The kitchen reduced  for me... spiced Christmas gravy

Every morning in the create kitchen huge stock pots bubble away, with all of the trimmings from the onions, vegetables and herbs thrown in too. When it comes to Christmas we pop in some cinnamon sticks and star anise as well for some festive spice. We guess that you probably don't have 100 litre stock pots at home so use the biggest pan you can find.

Ingredients
25g butter
Turkey giblets (neck, heart and liver) 
3 celery sticks, roughly chopped
2 carrots, roughly chopped
1 onion, roughly chopped
3 fresh bay leaves
8 star anise
2 cinnamon sticks
8 black peppercorns
3 tbsp plain flour
150ml red wine
a dash of Worcestershire sauce

1) melt the butter in a large pan over a medium heat, add the giblets and vegetables and fry for 8 minutes, until golden.
2) add the bay leaves and spices and 1.5 litres water, gently bring to the boil and simmer for 1 hour.
3) strain the stock into a jug – you should have around 600ml. Set aside to cool slightly, then discard the fat from the surface.
4) once your turkey has roasted remove it from the pan and place the turkey’s roasting tin on the hob over a medium-high heat, add the flour and stir for 1 minute. Gradually stir in the wine, bring to the boil and reduce by half, then add the stock and any of the turkey’s cooking juices and bring back to the boil, allow to simmer for 15 minutes, to thicken. Discard any film from the surface, then season with the Worcestershire sauce.

on the 10th day of create christmas

Turkey Finder found for me... the best free range turkey

I have become a little obsessed recently with the concept of PYOT (or pick your own turkey in case you didn't already know). What could nicer than going to the farm and choosing your own bird and then getting it delivered to your door. Agreed it might not be up everyone's pear tree but if you want to know you are eating a turkey which is truly free range then give it a go, just enter your postcode into the search box and call up the friendly if not slight stressed farmer to arrange a viewing!

Click here for UK Turkeys

There have been many theories over the last few years on how to avoid dry tasteless turkey, from Nigella and her rather strange soaking your turkey overnight in a spice bath to wrapping and roasting your turkey in a buttered muslin cloak. If you start with the best quality free range turkey you can find then you are already half way there.

We find that wrapping the turkey breast in lots and lots of bacon and putting a herbed or spiced butter under the skin always works well. Breast side down may deform your turkey a little but you will have deliciously moist and flavoursome meat!

on the 9th day of create christmas

the pastry kitchen made for me... boozy brandy butter

Possibly the simplest Christmas recipe but definitely the most un-healthy! 3 ingredients never tasted so good especially when eaten with a warm mince pie or Christmas pudd...

Ingredients:

125g unsalted softened butter
125g icing sugar
2 tbsp boiling water
3 tbsp brandy

1) whip the butter and icing sugar until light and fluffy
2) gently beat in the boiling water and brandy
3) refrigerate and repeat the process as brandy butter never lasts long if left un-attended.

on the 8th day of create christmas

the kitchen sauteed for me... brussel sprouts with chestnuts and bacon

Sprouts get a lot of bad press and we are not sure why, we love sprouts at create, possibly because we don't believe in crossing their sprout bottoms. Whoever the clever chap was who decided to sauteed them with bacon and chestnuts in lots of butter, was, in my opinion a bit of genius, who doesn't like bacon and butter?

Ingredients:
6 thick rashers of English pancetta from the Wild Pig Charcuterie, Worcs
2kg of brussel sprouts
1kg of fresh chestnuts (you can buy these pre roasted and vac packed or alternatively roast them your selves)
150g unsalted butter
1 nutmeg

1) cut your pancetta into little pieces and in a hot pan saute until crispy and golden
2) meanwhile boil a large pan of salted water and cook your sprouts for 5-7 mins, the common mistake is to over cook sprouts so keep an eye of them, they want to have a little bit of bite.
3) once cooked drain the sprouts and put them in a bowl of ice water, this will stop them cooking.
4) roughly chop your chestnuts and add these to the pan of bacon and toss around, add you butter to the pan, once melted grate in a few good grates of fresh nutmeg
5) remove your sprouts from the iced water and pat dry add these to the pan of bacon and chestnuts and toss around over a medium heat until all the sprouts are coated and hot.

on the 7th day of create christmas

The kitchen made for me... pear and celeriac stuffing

However you like you like your stuffing, in rustic round balls, baked through the oven or stuffed into your Christmas bird, this delicious recipe gives you something slightly different...

Ingredients:

2-3 tbsp goose fat

1 large onion, peeled and chopped

½ small celeriac, peeled and cut into 1cm cubes

Juice and zest of 1 orange

3 pears peeled and cored and cut into 1cm cubes

500g of coarsely minced sausage meat

80g finely chopped chicken livers

100g finely chopped almonds

1 handful fresh white breadcrumbs

1 tbsp finely chopped sage

1 tsp finely chopped thyme leaves

Pinch ground mace

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Heat the goose fat in a large, heavy-bottomed frying pan over a low heat, add the onion and cook gently until soft and translucent, throw in the celeriac and cook until soft.
Squeeze the orange juice into a large mixing bowl and add the pears into the juice and toss to stop discolouring.

Remove the onions and celeriac from the heat and mix thoroughly with the pears, sausage meat, chicken livers, breadcrumbs, herbs and spices and season well with salt and pepper.
Shape into small balls and roast in the oven for about 20-30mins until golden brown and slightly crisp.

on the 6th day of create christmas

The Butchers delivered to me... pigs in blankets 

We scoured the country's butchers for the finest sausages and the best cured bacon for what we think makes up the ultimate pigs in blankets and little did we know that the winner would be our very own butcher! With their meat reared on The Buccleuch Estates spread across Scotland these master butchers know more about meat than most, and when it comes to pigs in blankets only the best will do.

We are hoping that you don't need a recipe for how to make pigs in blankets but just in case here is a quick reminder

1) wrap your little chipolatas in rashers of streaky bacon (you can cut the rashers in half and they will roll better) and roast through the oven until golden and delicious.

Pretty simple really!

Create's Exciting Partnership with Adam Byatt

As Chef Patron of Trinity and Bistro Union restaurants in Clapham, Adam Byatt has won over the likes of London's most ruthless critics. Giles Coren of The Times regarded his experience at Trinity as, 'As close to an absolutely perfect experience of eating out as it is possible to have.' Trinity was named 'London Restaurant of the Year' at the AA Hospitality Awards in 2008.

Adam has joined forces with create in an exciting new relationship. Adam is exclusively available to create, designing a range of seasonal menus whilst offering his culinary expertise and presence at a selection of tastings and events. Caroline Gardiner, Managing Director of create said "This exciting partnership adds a new dimension to create, with a celebrated consultant chef on board whose love of food design and sourcing of great British suppliers has a close synergy with create's food ethos. We are delighted to be working with Adam". 
 
Adam's first book How to Eat In was published by Random House in April 2010 and is full of enduring recipes that take classic heritage cooking techniques into the modern era. As one of Britain's leading chefs and culinary experts, Adam's skills can also be seen on top-rated BBC 1 programme Saturday Kitchen, on which he regularly features as a guest presenter.

"As someone who is passionate about locally sourced food & using the best in British produce, I look forward to working with create, whose approach to delicious food is based on sound traditional kitchen practices & is totally in line with my way of thinking. The way create offer apprenticeships to local people really appeals to me too, they are a fantastic company to be associated with & I look forward to getting started!"
Adam Byatt

on the 5th day of create christmas

I made for myself... lots of bread sauce (sung like 5 gold rings!)

In my humble opinion, bread sauce is the king of all sauces.

Ingredients:

110g stale crustless white bread - chop in a processor
1 large onion
1 pint of whole milk
50g butter
2 tbsp double cream
1 nutmeg
2 bay leaves
1 sprig of thyme
15 cloves
5 black peppercorns
2 peeled garlic cloves
salt to taste


Stud your peeled onion with cloves and peppercorns & place in a pan with the bay leaves, thyme, smashed garlic and the milk. slowly bring to the boil with a lid on to let all the flavours infuse.
Add the bread & stir gently, switch off & leave to cool.
Once cool remove the bay, thyme, garlic & studded onion, if you like you can grate some of the cooked onion into your sauce.
When ready to use heat gently & add the double cream, some salt and pepper and a little grated fresh nutmeg.

Enjoy!