One Week in Puglia

The view at night from our roof terrace

Purple-headed raw red prawns

Prawn vs. Langoustine

Our daily tomato salad - they actually tasted of TOMATO!

Barbeque - we had many

Monopoli, on the coast

Raw squid antipasti at Osteria Perrucci, Monopoli - this was one of the highlights of an epic, gorgeous meal. No chewiness or sliminess, instead teeth snapped through soft, slightly crunchy lemon-spiked squid.

One of two shared pasta dishes, this was a favourite. Silky spaghetti with octopus, bathed in a rich tomato sauce.

The view from the passenger seat of our Fiat 500 as we tried to get our 9 mammoth takeaway pizzas home on the last night. Every so often a pizza-scented guff of steam would hit me in the face. It was an uncomfortable journey but it culminated in deliciousness.

It rained and thunderstormed for an hour or two. We got right stuck into the shots playing card games. We were all asleep by 10pm.

When 9 of us descended on our villa in Ceglie Messapica in Italy's heel, Puglia, we only really had one agenda. Eating well, partying well, and slouching around by the pool. We did this with (some) grace and fervour. Shopping at local markets for our fruit and vegetables, we gorged on flat peaches, soft apricots and heady-scented strawberries. Lunches and dinners would consist of a simple pasta, or barbequed meat / fish / shellfish with salads.

We ventured out one day, to Monopoli and feasted like kings at Osteria Perrucci, a tip I got from Greedy Diva. We left it as that, since navigating 9 people can be hard, and when it's a good 27 degrees sometimes all you want to do is flop by the pool, frosted beer in hand. Aside from a weekend trip to Venice, I hadn't been to Italy before; I fell in love with Puglia.

Food Stories has left some excellent tips on the region here. There's one thing I can add; don't trust Google maps to direct you down roads wider than your car if you're in anything bigger than a Fiat 500...

More photos, including the rest of the Monopoli meal, are here.

Steaks & Burgers

It would have been madness to turn down a box full of beef, sent to me by Donald Russell, especially when I was promised a load of 100% pure steak mince burgers. The bank holiday weekend was coming up and there were barbeques to be had. Being the generous people they are, they chucked in a load of steak for good measure.

The sirloin, rump and rib eye were slung on for a good flaming. After being rested for as long as we could bear it, we carved them up for a steaky starter. We all had our favourites, but surprisingly mine was the sirloin (I'm usually a rib eye kind of girl). The creamy fat that lined the meat provided just the right amount of richness.

So onto the main course. Since the meat was already prepared for us, I couldn't help but cause myself more hassle and decided to try making my own brioche buns. This, of course was fraught with difficulty after I firstly had to do a mad dash for bread flour, and then while the dough was proving, realised the yeast was 6 months out of date. It didn't seem to affect it though, and they turned into little beauties. It was well worth the hassle, as their buttery sweetness was the perfect vehicle.

Some preferred their burgers simple, with just a slice of slappy cheese (the only cheese that I offered because I love it and I'm stubborn).

I like a bit of greenery in my burger, a little red onion and a slice of tomato. A touch of mustard to smear on the bun and a little ketchup is also required. I was sad I forgot the pickle.

The burgers from Donald Russell were appropriately beefy; at first I was a bit dubious about them, what with being 100% steak mince. Other burgers I've tried usually have a bit of fat in them, and these could have done with some to be extra juicy. We ate our first burger and I thought something was missing. When we slapped the others on (yes, we ate two burgers each...) I realised it was salt, and a liberal hand while they were cooking rectified that.

The brioche recipe was from Smitten Kitchen - I made a couple of adjustments and converted it to UK measurements (I'm not going to go into how much cup measurements annoy me), so here it is:

Brioche Burger Buns

Makes 8

450gr strong bread flour
150gr plain flour
2 eggs
2.5 tbsp sugar
3 tbsp milk, warmed
230ml water
1.5 tsp salt
30gr butter
1 sachet of active dry yeast
Sesame seeds

In a bowl, add the warm milk, water, sugar and yeast to it and give it a good mix. Meanwhile, in a mixing bowl, add the two flours, the salt, and rub the butter in to create a crumbly texture. Beat an egg and add it in, then mix in the yeast mixture. Combine well. Turn out onto a floured surface and knead for 10 minutes, until it's nice and smooth. Put it back into the bowl and cover it with clingfilm, leaving it for two hours to rise to double the size. It might not take that long if your kitchen is warm enough.

Divide the dough into 8 and then roll into a burger bun shape and place on greaseproof paper on an oven tray. Leave enough room between them (I had to do mine in 2 batches) for them to expand while cooking. Leave for an hour. Preheat your oven to 200 degrees C. Glaze with beaten egg and sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Place a tray of water on the bottom shelf of the oven, then bake the buns for 15 minutes on a middle shelf. Remove and leave to cool on a wire rack.

A Mexican-Style Brunch

Lately I've been somewhat addicted to eggy brunches. Fried potatoes topped with a poached egg, flecks of chorizo littering the plate and staining the potatoes often feature. Other times it will be a mildly spiced kedgeree with a fried egg, it's yolk spilling itself, coating rice grains.

A favourite is a spicy Mexican-style brunch. Spicy tomato sauce (which, I'll confess is more often than not a leftover pasta sauce tarted up with a bit of hot smoked paprika) softens toasted corn tortillas, while creamy smoky black beans tempered the palate. A zingy guacamole was, in hindsight, an element too far. Surprisingly, it was the black beans that stole the show so here they are.

Refried Beans

Serves 2

390gr cooked black beans with the water (I used Sainsburys Organic tetrapak)
1 tsp chopped thyme
2 rashers of smoked streaky bacon
1 tsp chopped stalks of coriander
1 small white onion
3 cloves of garlic
1 chipotle chilli, or chipotle chilli flakes
1/2 tsp salt
Coriander and a wedge of lime, to garnish

In a saucepan with a little oil, add the bacon rashers, chopped finely. Fry until the fat is released and the meat takes on some colour. Dice the onion and mince the garlic and fry slowly until softened. Add the thyme and coriander stalks. Meanwhile, add the chipotle chilli flakes, or soften the chipotle chilli in hot water - if the latter, whizz in a processor and add to the pan. Add the beans with the water in the pack and then add the salt. Simmer for 40 minutes, adding more water if they're a little dry. Stir it often - it has the tendency to stick to the bottom of the pan very easily. Take off the heat and garnish with a little chopped coriander and a wedge of lime.

It freezes well in individual portions to whip out of the freezer for a quick brunch.

Pineapple, Lime & Chilli Sorbet

My ice cream maker hasn't been dusted off and busted out in a while. One might say I lost the love after the salted caramel butter ice cream. How could I top those heady heights? With a shadow of resignation, I got to work. For a while now I'd had the idea of pineapple and lime sorbet. Or mint? Pineapple and mint? Or lime? With gin? Tequila?

In the end, I settled on pineapple and lime with a hint of chilli and served with a few chunks of sweet strawberry, it worked a treat. Smooth, fluffy sorbet was heavily scented with pineapple, spiked through with lime and with a slow, confusing burn. Out of 8 of us who ate it a bewildered murmur went through the group. "Is there ginger in this?" "there's a strange hot-cold thing going on..." I smiled smugly at my secret, eventually revealing the truth.

Pineapple, Lime & Chilli Sorbet

Serves 8

1 ripe pineapple (give the inner most central green leaves a tug. If it comes out easily it's ripe.)
1 large lime
1 red birds eye chilli
100gr sugar
120mls water

In a saucepan, add the sugar and the water. Make a small slit in the chilli but do not slice through completely. Bring to the boil and simmer for a minute, take off the heat, remove the chilli and leave to cool.

Peel and core the pineapple, and chop into chunks. Place in a blender with the juice of the lime and the sugar solution. Blend vigorously until smooth - I left it blending away for about 3 minutes. Chill well, and then place in your ice cream maker. Alternatively, place in a container in the freezer, blending well every couple of hours a few times so that large ice crystals don't form.

The Pure Package

When The Pure Package approached me and asked if I wanted a 3 day trial of their food package plan, I said yes. The idea is that from £40 a day, between the hours of midnight and 6am, a courier delivers your 3 gourmet meals a day plus snacks in a temperature controlled bag, ready for you to wake up to in the morning. Sounds simple enough, so I selected their weight loss programme, since their website proclaims "weight loss is our speciality".

Except it's not that simple. How would the driver get through a magnetic gate? I had to send my key fob off with them, and subsequently haul myself over the 10ft gate every day.

But what about the food? For £40 a day, I was expecting something fancy. Bircher muesli for breakfast one day looked like sludge but tasted ok - as ok as soggy oats go, I suppose. Far better was the rye bread with hazelnut butter and orange segments (opening photo).

To keep you going, a mid morning and mid afternoon snack is provided. Fruit with seeds or nuts featured heavily; of the three days, the kiwi segments with pistachios were the best. An unripe, dry apple with raw, chewy cashew nuts depressed me.

Unfortunately, depression sank further on the first day, when eagerly anticipating my lunch the salad I whipped out consisted of a few canned tuna flakes, a handful of Cos lettuce leaves, a few beans, sweetcorn and cucumber. I wondered if it would have killed them to sling in a tomato or two, maybe a few slices of red onion. For £40 a day I expected more.

At least portion size improved on lunch on the following days. The box of rice noodles with Asian slaw an coconut chicken claimed "also yummy hot!". Without a microwave or oven at work, I suffered through the claggy mess cold.

Another lunch was a tangle of rocket leaves with roasted aubergines, peppers and courgettes, with a shred of buffalo mozzerella. A watery pot of vinegar was provided to dress it. The highlight was the mozzerella.

Some afternoon snacks were savoury. Sugarsnap peas with cannellini bean and roasted tomato dip would have been far better if the peas had been lightly steamed. The dip didn't taste of much.

On the first night, having suffered through almost a day of eating almost nothing and rendering me hangry, dinner turned out to be chicken breast with an orange and date sauce and steamed carrots and broccoli. After two bites it was abandoned. Sickly sweet sauce smothered dry meat, and an orange and date sauce should never be allowed near broccoli. I ate an enormous pie instead.

Day two's dinner fared better, with this cottage pie, though I questioned the addition of goat's cheese in the topping. That plate is normal sized, by the way.

Finally, on the last day, red snapper with an almond crust, courgette salad and steamed beans and carrots. All the hot dinner dishes were cooked in the oven for 10 - 15 minutes; this rendered the fish a bit dry, but at least the vegetables retained bite.

So, as you can probably guess by now, I wasn't a fan. My 3 days had a couple of difficulties; the key fob situation also wasn't helped by being mugged for my entire handbag on the evening of the first day. Their PR suggested that I wouldn't be able to give it a fair run, but my issues aren't to do with this; I couldn't believe that people would pay £40 A DAY for it. So you have your meals all ready and prepared, but I barely spend more than that on the weekly shop. For 90 days, you would spend a massive £2965.50 for the full programme. That's pretty bonkers to me.

There's also the crucial point that the food just didn't taste that good. They don't add preservatives, salt, sugar, refined carbohydrates, wheat or additives, which might go some way to explaining it. Surely we all need salt in our lives? I'm fairly certain that after a while, yes I would get used to a salt-free life, but salt (in moderation) isn't bad for me so why leave it out at all?

I have no doubt that this weight loss package is effective; if anything, it just put me off food completely.



EDIT: In response, the PR of The Pure Package have stated: "The 40 pound a day cost includes three freshly prepared gourmet meals and snacks made by award-winning chefs delivered direct to your door, including delivery charge, ongoing consulting service...it may seem expensive to the majority of people, however I think the figure seems more understandable when you break down exactly what that money includes."

So there you are.

Pitt Cue Co. - Southbank

London can be pretty stunning sometimes, and one of my favourite views is from the Hungerford Bridge. What makes it even more of a favourite is that for the next four months, Pitt Cue Co. is a food truck parked up underneath said bridge.

Styled on barbeques that the Americans are so famous for, we hot-footed it down there the first day they were open (well, it IS on the way home after all). Cardboard boxes (at £7 each) full of porky delights made their way to us. Tender, pulled pork came with what initially was some chewy bread. A good soaking in the sauces made us realise what it was for; a big flavour sponge. Sweet smoky beans nestled in the box along with some crunchy, fresh coleslaw.

Gloucester Old Spot ribs were tender and juicy, with hardly any bone. Again with beans, the sweetness of the beans was off-set perfectly with some tangy fennel-scented pickles. Barbeque sauce on the side was enriched with tiny cubes of pork lardons and was sweet, smoky, and had a hint of spice.

A ridiculously decadent box of potatoes turned up. Wedges of Jersey royals lay under rotisserie chickens, slowly roasting in their fat and juices. Sticky and caramelised, these were outrageously good.

All washed down with a medium dry Burrow Hill cider, dusk turned to dark and we waddled our way home. An worthy addition to the chain-laden Southbank, I'll be returning; I am very excited about smoked corn on the cob. And they do Negronis.

Pitt Cue Co.

Under Hungerford Bridge, 7 days a week, around lunchtime till 10pm-ish.

Public Service Announcement - 16 Days at The Rye

We've already missed Creperie Nicolas, dammit, so get your asses down to The Rye, Peckham, SE15 3NX this week for other street food stalls.

I, for one, plan on stuffing my face with at least a few tacos, a load of chocolate, more than 3 hot dogs and the rest of it. You should too. (Unless you're a vegan. I suspect there's not much there for you.)