Scallops with a warm tomato & olive salsa

Sirloin Steak with homemade chips & a rocket salad

The rocket dressing was simply 1 part white wine vinegar to 3 parts extra virgin olive oil but it was really, really lovely

And finally Chocolate Mousse

Mmmmmmm. Thanks Gordon.

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and Santa brought you some nice gifts. He certainly stopped here as I am now overwhelmed by lots of glorious & mostly foodie presents. To mention, but a few, I am now the proud owner of Simon Rimmers the accidental vegetarian which I cant wait to use. I also have (having arrived today!) the Best-kept Secrets of the Women’s Institute Jams, Pickles & Chutneys. I have a spoon rest, a new super-dooper set of scales, a years subscription to Delicous magazine, the very large & new Gordon Ramsay book and a beautiful Nigella cake stand in cream.

I also got my very own website which I will be moving to soon (I very much hope you’ll join me there). All I can say for now is Hubby is a lovely and very talented man – I have a new logo already – we just need to work on the website layout & content. So keep your eyes peeled for that!

Food-wise, we enjoyed a fantastic (as usual) Christmas day dinner at my mum & dads. We had smoked salmon blini with avocado, mango & chilli salsa. It was really really nice. Hubby had a sausage (its a long term joke in our family) as he doesn’t really like smoked salmon.

The main meal was Turkey with sausages, the-bestest-ever-stuffing (this is my favouritest part), roasted potatoes & roasted parsnips (in goose fat) so they were really crispy, carrots, sprouts (or for me, just one for tradition, I’m really not keen), bread sauce & cranberry sauce (i forgot to take mine, duh!).

Pudding was either Christmas pudding & brandy sauce or my mums triffle – loaded with sherry.

I will be making a smaller version of our feast, hopefully, at the weekend just for Hubby & I.

Oh, and our main present between ourselves was our lovely new digital SLR camera. My Gran was amused as I just took photos of anything that didn’t move all day long! So here are some of our snaps…

We were quite lucky with our seats – very central & not too far back considering the number of seats they cram in! Anyway, the show was great. Jamie was very funny & there was lots of crowd interaction. He made three dishes. The first was hot smoked salmon in the biscuit tin – the smell of the salmon cooking was really fabulous. He then went on to make a warm chicken Cesar salad which looked divine. To top this off he made a beef stroganoff with mushrooms with a little help from his mushroom hero Gennaro Contaldo.

We also came across Gordon Ramsay, Rachel Allen, the Hairy Bikers, Angela Hartnett, Matt Skinner and Brian Turner.
We went on a wine masterclass - by mistake we booked one held by the Ian Harvey of the Birmingham Post Wine Club when we had wanted to go to the Matt Skinner one – but it turned out well & we tasted six South American wines. Hubby enjoyed this bit the most. I think he see’s himself becoming a wine connoisseur.

Tasting highlights
These included a pork pattie care of Jimmy’s Farm. Coming from a not-really-a-meat-eater I have to hold my hands up and say it was delicious. And thanks to Jules we may just have to order some from the online shop.

I also tasted a veggie pie & mash from Blenheim House – this was nice but the gravy was delicious. And we both had a ‘Duo of rich Belgian truffle’ which didn’t last more than 60 seconds – hence the half eaten one in the photograph!
We sampled some of Walkers warm, freshly cooked crisps. You added you own toppings – salt, pepper, chilli & rosemary etc.

I’ve also found a soft spot for Sloe Gin. We will hopefully be purchasing some of this soon to make cranberry sauce.

It was also very nice to see Gordon & Macphail of Elgin at the show. The shop in Elgin is really lovely with a room dedicated to whisky and then a room full of wines and spirits and a third room with delicatessen type goods.

Overall it was a really lovely day out & we may have to go back another year.