Scientific advances in the rather unglamorous field of neurogastroenterology (the study of the alimentary canal) seem to support the old adage that we are what we eat. We effectively have an additional brain formed from the sheaths of neurons embedded in the walls of the long 9m length of our gut.  As Michael Gershon has written in his book, The Second Brain” the amount of neural firepower is far in excess of what is required simply to manage the daily grind of digestion.  The fact that 95% of the bodies serotonin comes from the bowel points to the health of our gut being hugely influential on our mood and sense of wellbeing.

Eat your way to Olympic performance

Looking after our second brain by choosing to eat a variety of wholesome and nutritionally balanced foods rather would seem to be sensible, but does this mean taking the joy out of eating?  Quite the reverse I would argue.  By finding a way to break away from the monotony of shopping exclusively at the large multiple retailers with their emphasis on more processed foods and discovering local food it’s easy to boost nutrition and eating pleasure simultaneously.  So in this piece I will show how you can balance your energy for peak performance throughout the day – Olympic performance without the training!

I have unashamedly use some examples from our product range at PJ taste, the fact that our customers buy these healthy and nutritious dishes because they look and taste good rather than consciously thinking they are good for them proves these principles work!

Local Sheffield nutritionist, Claire Gillis, advocates balancing blood sugar levels through the day as a key to promoting good gut health.

“Often energy slumps throughout the day can be attributed to keeping blood sugar levels balanced. In terms of general health, this is essential as over time, imbalanced blood sugar levels can be attributed to complaints such as sleep problems, difficulty loosing weight and even affects stress levels due to hormonal imbalance”

So how do we prevent “spiking” our sugar levels?  Let’s start with breakfast.  There is an expression, perhaps originating in Mongolia “Keep breakfast for yourself, share lunch with your friend and give dinner to your enemy”.  It’s certainly excellent advice not to miss breakfast but better to ensure you eat dinner too (hopefully in good company) as eating moderately but regularly helps the desired steady release of sugar into the bloodstream.  Research shows that people who skip breakfast tend to be heavier than people who eat this meal, probably because skippers end up eating more during the day as a result of hunger cravings.

Steel City Power Food Number One.  Porridge with Our Cow Molly Milk

PJ taste Porridge Pots

An excellent breakfast choice would consist of natural porridge oats customised into your favourite porridge with local milk, some nuts and seeds and perhaps some fresh fruit and local bioactive yoghurt.  Oats have been shown to slow the release of sugar into the blood and actually reduce the effects of harmful cholesterol.  Combining the carbohydrates from the oats with protein in the nuts and dairy is a method of further slowing the absorption of glucose which is released as the oats are digested .  Variety through the seasons makes this a dish which can be varied each day with good quality dark chocolate grated over the top or little local Sheffield Honey added for treats.  If you’re up for a bit of foraging, autumn’s a great time to find berries and local apples. In spring, Yorkshire rhubarb starts to appear. It’s delicious cooked down to a lovely pink puree and the forced variety of this vegetable from the famous Yorkshire triangle within Leeds, Bradford and Wakefield won EU protected status in 2010.

There’s also a surprising ‘taste imposter’ for rhubarb in the unlikely form of Japanese Knotweeed.  The young shoots look a little like asparagus when they sprout up and when up to a foot tall taste amazingly like rhubarb when cooked.  Be careful though as this is extreme foraging!  As well as potential dangers from pesticide treatments that have been unleashed on these unwelcome invaders, it’s an offence under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 to plant or otherwise cause the species to grow in the wild.

Given busy lifestyles many of us rush out of the house in the morning without a chance to get breakfast on.  The PJ taste ready to grab and go Porridge Pots offer a solution.  Made with organic Yorkshire oats with some dried fruit, nuts and a little organic Yorkshire hemp and are packed with nutrients.  We use Our Cow Molly milk delivered fresh from a few miles away at Dungworth when ready to eat.  The freshness ensures top nutritional quality (supermarket milk is often at least 5 days old before reaching the shelves) as does the individual attention to the animals possible through farming a small herd.

Sour Dough Loaves from Seven Hills Bakery

A common alternative breakfast is toast and jam.  The choice of bread is important.  White bread made from refined flours in an industrial process is a much less favourable choice than breads made from wholegrain flours using more natural leavening processes. These types of bread are available in Sheffield from the excellent Cat Lane Bakery and the newer Seven Hills Bakery.  You can find these and others in your area on the easy to use Real Bread Finder on the real bread Campaign’s site.

And it’s worth having a thought about the jam, real Seville orange marmalade with the bitter sweet oranges from Southern Spain being in season now.  Nothing wrong with jam once in a while (especially if you use some PJ taste preserves!) but using the principle of combining protein with carbohydrate why not have a fresh poached egg instead?

PJ taste Seville orange marmalade

Steel City Power Food Number Two.  Lunch – Roast Squash and Buckwheat salad with Pomegranite, Olives, Fresh Herbs and Pumpkin Oil Dressing

In many ways the traditional sandwich is not the best choice for lunch, particularly if the bread is of the white variety and the filling a mayonnaise rich affair which is tempting to grab when in a hurry but which will reduce our afternoon performance.  With a little planning we can instead ingest more beneficial fats and again apply the slow release energy principle.

PJtaste Squash and Buckwheat Salad

The Roast Squash salad is a typical offering in the PJ taste range of nutritious salads.  The local box is ticked with the Sheffield grown squash and the buckwheat is a nutritious, tasty and filling base.  Buckwheat is not related to wheat but part of the sorrels, knotweeds, and rhubarb family.  In studies of breads made from buckwheat flour against refined white wheat flours there was significantly lowered blood glucose and insulin responses, as well as finding a lowered risk of developing high cholesterol and high blood pressure.  The use of olive oil against other vegetable oils gives beneficial boosts to blood cholesterol levels (unlike saturated oils or even other vegetable oils like sunflower which contain an imbalance of omega 6 oils over the required omega 3 oils).

Steel City Power Food Number Three.  Dinner – Moss Valley loin of Pork with a Cider and Apple Sauce, Sautéed Leeks and Brown Basmati Rice.

Povey Farm Pork Loin in PJ taste Cider Sauce

This is a dish inspired by the excellent pork produced at Povey Farm in Sheffield’s Moss Valley by Stephen and Karen Thompson.  Last autumn we used wild apples from trees around Sheffield which gave us much scrumping fun.  But it also turns out that pork loin is a high quality nutritious meat.  A 150g portion has just 180 calories with a low fat count—just 5 grams in this portion with no carbohydrates and 40g of protein along with high levels of  vitamins and minerals.  Prominent amongst these are iron which helps keep energy levels high while building red blood cells to stave off illness and boost immunity.

The Crook Barn at Povey Farm

The seasonal leeks provide an excellent source of vitamin C as well as iron and fibre. They provide many of the health-giving benefits associated with garlic and onions, such as promoting the functioning of the blood and the heart.  Brown basmati rice being less processed than white rice retains it whole-grain nutritional values.  The most beneficial nutrient found in basmati rice is manganese, essential for the metabolism of protein and carbohydrates and regulating your nervous system. Approximately 88% of an adult’s daily recommended dietary allowance for manganese is available from just one cup of cooked rice.
Recipe – serves 4

500g cooking or wild apples
30g butter
200ml cider – a dry local or even homemade one is good
seasoning and perhaps a slug of cream

Sheffield Wild Apples

Make the sauce by gentle stewing down the first 4 ingredients until they can be pureed.

600g Pork Tenderloin

Cut the pork into 8-12 round slices (2-3 per person) – they will be quite thin approximately 1.5cm-2.5cm thick each and will cook quite quickly, so be careful not to dry them out.  See the note on cooking temperatures below.

1.  Add a little olive oil to a frying pan.  Season the loin steaks with salt and pepper or for a variation some ground fennel seeds work well.  Seal the meat for 1 minute on each side in a hot pan then continue to cook on a lower heat for 5 more minutes.  Check the core temperature has reached 145F (62C) for 3 minutes and for the last 2 minutes pour in the cider and apple sauce and heat until bubbling and piping hot.

2.  Good accompaniments and in season too are sliced leeks sautéed in olive oil and garlic along with a brown basmati rice.

Note on Cooking Temperatures

From a food safety perspective meats such as poultry and pork should be carefully cooked to meet some minimum time/temperature values to kill harmful bacteria.  Pork in the past has often been infected by trichina, the parasite that can cause trichinosis and the advice was thorough cooking until no sign of pinkness remained.  In the UK pigs are currently clear of the disease and so buying your pork from reliable, local sources such as Povey Farm gives you reassurance that the meat will be disease free.  (Not so in parts of Europe where Trichina is still present).  Relying on cutting into the meat to check a subjective range of pinkness is not particularly scientific so although it sounds a little “geeky” buying a simple meat probe thermometer is a very useful investment.    The minimum temperature/times decreed by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) is 145F (62C) held for at least 3 minutes.  In the UK the government does not legislate as specifically for temperatures although generations of college trained chefs will have be trained to cook poultry and pork to 75C  (approx. 167F).  At these temperatures the meat will certainly be drying as above around 55C the collagen fibres break down and start to release their juiciness. Modern restaurant kitchens often use sous vide cooking techniques which allow precise temperature control in water baths, allowing lower temperature cooking over a longer period to achieve succulent meat which is still safe because of the longer cooking time.

See some general food safety guideline here.

Nutitional Notes and References

Benefits of Buckwheat.  Containing high levels of flavonoids buckwheat has been linked to lowered risk of developing high cholesterol and high blood pressure. The Yi people of China consume a diet high in buckwheat (100 grams per day, about 3.5 ounces). When researchers tested blood lipids of 805 Yi Chinese, they found that buckwheat intake was associated with lower total serum cholesterol, lower low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL, the form linked to cardiovascular disease), and a high ratio of HDL (health-promoting cholesterol) to total cholesterol.  See more from www.whfoods.com

Balancing the ratio of Omega 3 to Omega 6.  Omega 3 and 6 are both essential fatty acids which help produce essential biochemicals in our bodies.  It appears that a lot of modern diets supply too much omega 6 compared to 3 with the ratio being far higher than the desired 2:1.  Some of the problem is that oils which can be perceived as “healthy” such as soybean, safflower, sunflower, corn and cottonseed oil have unknown to many a very high omega-6 and low omega-3 fats profile.  The inbalance can be as much as 200:1.  The result disrupts the balance of pro- and anti-inflammatory agents in the body, promoting chronic inflammation and elevating the risk of health problem such as asthma, allergies, diabetes and arthritis.  See more at the conscious life web site.

The Benefit of Brown Basmati Rice.

PJ taste Steak Sandwich

Our suppliers include Coppice House Farm in the Rivelin Vallery for beef, Moss Valley Fine Meats for pork and Mann’s of Hillsborough/Sharrowvale for fish.

Not that I am bitter but Tesco’s recent loss of £5 billion in their share price in one day gave me some cause for cheer.  But just a bit.

Why so?  Well it indicates that people are exploring alternatives to this one stop monolith and choice is good.  Choice keeps the retailers keen and ensures that competition exists in the market place.

We want to promote the choice of the best local food made with care and designed to excite and stimulate. 

But we can only take a fleeting moment of hope in Tesco’s woes as they will be back unless……Unless we can keep getting better at winning our customers support.  And as I have said before in “How can the independents fight back” we can only do this by getting better at marketing the benefits of our wares more effectively and enabling our customers to get hold of our goodies more easily.

So in this spirit here’s our fabulous Specials and Offers for next week do give us a try!  PJtasteWestStMenu 230112

PJ taste at 249 Glossop Road (West Street)

Its true there is a grass roots resurgence of interest in local food, growing your own and a desire for a closer connection to the source of our ingredients by uncovering the stories behind our food producers.  In some cases we are becoming proto hunter- gatherers ourselves typified by the keen foragers amongst us.  But in reality can most of us regularly eat local produced food, do we know the source of much of our food and even if we do how can we get hold of it?

We posed this question at our recent Taste of Christmas event.  Specifically can you eat local food for each meal on Christmas Day?  A keen bunch of Sheffield foodies gathered to watch demonstrations given by PJ taste’s Ian Martin and Mat Webster along with guest John Lord who has been making amazing free range Yorkshire Pork Pies for over 50 years.  I was able to put forward my theory that yes you can eat like a King from local food, and from a taste, nutrition, animal welfare and often cost point of view you can do so much better than from those pesky supermarkets.  But and this is a big but the convenience factor is a lot less.  The supermarkets have made themselves very easy to buy from and seduce us with a constant drip drip of their insidious marketing messages.  My challenge for the independent food producing and retailing businesses in Sheffield and elsewhere for 2012 is to work hard on improving the distribution and awareness of local food making it truly Sheffield Food for Sheffield People.   You can see our recipes and my recommendations for Sheffield suppliers and producers for a Christmas day feast here.

Back at our Taste of Christmas event we were able to introduce a range of fabulous local producers as well as some foraging enhancements.  There is a fine line between gardening/allotmenteering and foraging and when you cultivate or at least permit to grow weeds on your allotment you are straying into foraging territory.  Starring in our welcome nibbles were chickweed and interestingly fennel roots both from wildish pedigree on my allotment.  Chickweed has a lovely nutty flavour and usefully grows year round, thriving particularly well through this year’s warm autumn and early winter.

It forms a loose mat of many stems creeping between cracks in pavements, gardens, filed edges and allotments.  With small bright green leaves and star shaped white flowers it is quite distinctive.  However, there are a few basic features to distinguish it from mouse-ear chickweed (Ceratium vulgatum) which is not so pleasant to eat and another poisonous plant – Scarlet Pimpernel (Anagallis arvensis) which is obviously not so good to eat.  Briefly chickweed has one distinct line of fine hairs running up the stem into the leaves, whereas mouse-ear chickweed has random hairs all over the stem.  Scarlet pimpernel has no obvious hairs and a square stem with red blotches on the underside of its leaves.  A good book with more information on these and many other common weeds/excellent foraging fodder is “Edible Wild Plant by John Kallas 2010.

The chickweed was used as a nutty addition to our Squash Shots – intense glasses of butter nut squash soup with a pumpkin seed and oil garnish and the fennel roots on a simple brushetta.  The fennel root canapé became the mystery dish with no one in the room being able to guess its origin as the flavour is more celery/celeriac/parsnip like than the taste from actual fennel bulb or the upper herby fronds of the herb normally tasted.

To me this was a great example of how when you are close to the source of food production you can experiment and ensure that every part of the produce is used.  I would wager that you will not find fennel root in any supermarket near you soon.  The supermarkets would argue that if there was a demand for it they would stock it but in the way that they condition and narrow choice prevents us from exploring new possibilities.  They are working on the principle that most of us conform to the way Henry Ford saw things typified in his famous quote –  ‘If I’d have asked my customers what they wanted, they would have told me ‘A faster horse.’’’

The star of the show was a traditional Plum Pudding made with wild Sheffield plums and real beef suet from Coppice House Farm in the Rivelin Valley.  What has morphed into our better known and in my experience little loved Christmas Pudding started as a vehicle for preserving meat into the winter.  The spicing, encasing in fat and long cooking all helping to ensure there was food when the animals had been slaughtered in the Autumn to save feeding them through the winter.  I was pleased with the lovely sweet and sour flavour and the rich moistness we achieved.

All the recipes from the evening are available at www.peterpjtaste.wordpress.com and a review by the ubiquitous Sheffield food Missie Cindz, who launched her Sheffield Favourites Hamper at the event, is at www.cindycheung.co.uk/missie/ .

However, in the spirit of Christmas here is my Christmas Pudding recipe loosely adapted from a Mrs Beetons traditional recipe with some local foraging thrown in.

Finally a Happy Christmas to one and all and I do hope you are able to get out into your local patch for some Christmas foraging during the festive season.  There is still free food to be had including the mentioned chickweed as well as rosehips, hawthorns, rowan berries and even some wild apples still clinging on (I once picked some on new years Day!).

PJ taste Christmas Pudding

8 oz moist sugar (use soft brown )
8 oz chopped suet – we used Rivelin Valley beef suet
8 oz sultanas cleaned
8 oz raisins halved and stoned – we used Sheffield wild plums which had been frozen and increased the quantity to 16oz
4 oz currants washed and dried
4 oz shredded mixed candied peel – Cut your own or use ready cut
4 oz of plain flour – Carr house Farm Spelt Flour

4 oz breadcrumbs

2 oz almonds blanched and shredded
the grated rind of a 1 lemon
3 eggs
a salt spoonful of  nutmeg grated
half a teaspoon of salt
quarter pint of milk
1 small wineglassful of brandy (optional)

Mix all the dry ingredients together, stir in the well beaten eggs, milk and brandy.

Turn the mixture into 2 well greased basins, and steam for 5 to 6 hours.

We demonstrated a number of dishes, shared some lovely food and everyone participated in our beef taste test.  In an effort to publish the recipes quickly I produce them here but we are keen to post a further blog in a few days with more juicy details from the evening.  However, I can’t resist revealing the results of our beef tasting so look below!

The key message was that you can easily, nutritiously and cheaply eat amazing local food for each meal on Christmas Day (and beyond).  However, we all need to find better ways of distributing and supplying this produce if we are to survive the curse of the supermarkets with their insidious ways – and survival for us independents is by no means certain.  I am sure that this subject alone will give us lots to think about, share and explore into 2012.  Importantly to work with the menu and recipes I have also included a link to the suppliers I used.  Please let us know if you need help in obtaining any of their produce.

A taste of Christmas with PJ taste – the recipes

Squash Shots with a Pumpkin Oil Garnish (V),

Serves 6

2 Large ish Butternut Squash
1 Large Onion
3 Cloves garlic
Olive oil/Butter
½ lt vegetable stock
½ lt milk
Freshly grated nutmeg
Salt and Pepper

Chop the butternut squash into large chucks removing seeds and roast with olive oil and garlic in the oven at a high heat.  Soften the onion in more butter/olive oil and then add the stock and milk and bring to a simmer.  Scoop the squash from the skins and add to the stock along with the seasonings.  Simmer for 15 minutes.  Then liquidise and serve.

Pumpkin Sprinkle Garnish

½ cup pumpkin seeds
2 cloves garlic
¼ cup parsley
¼ teaspoon sea salt
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon Pumpkin Oil

Heat a dry frying pan to a medium heat.  Add pumpkin seeds and keep them moving with a wooden spoon.  After a few minutes they will begin to give off a nutty aroma.  Remove from heat.

Place toasted pumpkin seeds with all other ingredients in a food processor and pulse and few times until you have a coarse mixture.

Cinnamon & star anise cured salmon

150.0g brown sugar
300.0g rock salt 3 oranges, zested
2 star anise
1 cinnamon stick
500.0g salmon, centre piece of fillet, skinned and pin boned
2 slices sourdough bread, toasted, each cut into 6
crème fraîche to serve
3 slices of raw beetroot, peeled and shredded
12 coriander leaves

Whizz the sugar, salt, zest, star anise and cinnamon in a food processor. Spread a small amount onto a tray and lay the fish on top, tip over the rest of the mix over the top of the salmon and spread.  Cover with clingfilm and leave in the fridge or a cool place for 24 hours.

Wash any remaining mixture off the salmon and leave to dry for 1 hour. Slice when needed then use for your recipe.  Brushettas can be made with a generous amount of salmon, a dollop of crème fraîche, some beetroot and a coriander leaf.

Chestnut and Mushroom Stuffing

200g pound fresh chestnuts
200g unsalted butter
½ lt breadcrumbs, such as rye or sourdough, crust removed and cut into 1-inch cubes
Punnet of wild mushrooms or 50g dried mushrooms
1 medium onion, diced
4 stalks celery, diced
Small bunch fresh parsley, coarsely chopped
3 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves
1 1/2 to 2 cups chicken or vegetable stock
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 tablespoon fine sea salt
2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper

Preparation

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Using chestnut knife or sharp paring knife, make large X on flat side of each chestnut through shell but not meat. Soak chestnuts in bowl of warm water to cover by 2 inches for 15 minutes, and then drain well. Arrange chestnuts in 1 layer in shallow baking pan, then roast in middle of oven until shells curl away at X mark, about 15 minutes. Wearing protective gloves peel away shells from chestnuts while still hot. In large pot boiling water, blanch chestnuts 2 minutes, then drain. Using kitchen towel, rub chestnuts to remove skins. Coarsely chop and reserve. Leave oven on.

Butter 9- by 13-inch casserole dish with 1 tablespoon butter.

On foil-lined baking sheet, toast bread in 350°F oven, tossing occasionally, until lightly browned, about 15 minutes. Place in large mixing bowl and set aside. Leave oven on.

In heavy frying pan melt 4 tablespoons butter. Add mushrooms and sauté, stirring, until golden brown, 7 to 8 minutes. Add another 2 tablespoons butter and heat until melted. Add onion and celery, and sauté until translucent, 6 to 7 minutes.

Add mushroom mixture plus parsley and thyme to bread and gently stir to combine.

In heavy, small pot over moderate heat bring the stock to a gentle boil. Pour into bread mixture and gently toss to combine. Stir in egg, salt, and pepper. The stuffing is now ready to be used to stuff meat or cooked as it is in a casserole dish. The stuffing can be prepared up to this point and kept, covered and refrigerated, up to four hours. Bake until golden brown and heated through, about 30 minutes. Serve hot.

Golden Beets and Brussels Sprouts

Preparation

2 medium sized golden beets
10 brussels sprouts
1 shallot, peeled and sliced
Olive oil
1 Tbsp fresh thyme, chopped (can substitute a 1 teaspoon of dried thyme)
2 Tbsp almond slivers, toasted
Salt and freshly ground pepper

METHOD

1 Boil or roast beets if using, until cooked. Cool, peel and chop.
2 Prep and blanch veg until nearly cooked, plunge in cold water to stop cooking process.
3 Mix ingredients, splash with olive oil and seasoning and hot roast for 20 mins until hot and slightly coloured.

Provencal New Potatoes

2 lb small new potatoes (look for the smallest you can find, the potatoes should be no bigger than 1 1/2 inches, if they are bigger, cut them into 1 to 1 1/2 inch pieces)

1 medium onion, sliced in the direction of root to top
6 cloves of garlic, crushed with peel on (do not remove peel)
2-3 small to medium vine-ripened tomatoes, or plum tomatoes, cut into 1 1/2-inch chunks
1 Tbsp mixed herbs
Olive oil
2 teaspoons salt
Freshly ground black pepper

Preparation

1 Wedge toms and roast in oven for several hours with salt pepper and herbs. Can be done a few days in advance
2 Blanch potatoes until almost cooked be careful not to overcook. Can be done up to two days in advance.
3 put ingredients in oven dish/foil dish and roast in hot oven for 30 mins until coloured and hot.

Rivelin Valley Beef casserole with Pride of Sheffield beer – a great Boxing Day dish which could be cooked in a slow cooker or in a moderate oven for a number of hours.

Ingredients

500g Rivelin Valley chuck steak
1 small onion, quartered
1 small carrot, quartered
1 garlic bulb, halved horizontally
2 fresh thyme sprigs
1 fresh bay leaf
black peppercorns250ml  Kelham Island Pride of Sheffield Beer
2 tbsp vegetable oil1 litre/1¾ pints chicken stock

Preparation
Place the beef in a large bowl add the vegetables, herbs and peppercorns; pour over the beer and mix until well combined, then chill in the fridge for 24 hours.

1.    Preheat the oven to 140C/275F/Gas 1.
2.    Strain the beer from the beef mixture and set aside.
3.    Season the beef with salt and freshly ground black pepper.
4.    Heat a flameproof casserole dish, add the vegetable oil and brown the beef all over, then remove from the dish and set aside.
5.    Reduce the heat, add the onions, carrots and garlic and cook for 4-6 minutes, or until pale golden-brown.
6.    Add the herbs and peppercorns, then add the reserved beer and continue to cook until the volume has reduced by half.
7.    Return the beef to the dish, add the chicken stock and bring up to the boil, then cook in the oven for three hours or until the beef is very tender.

Mrs Beetons Christmas Pudding – adapted a bit incorporating some PJ taste foraging!

8 oz moist sugar (use soft brown )
8 oz chopped suet – we used Rivelin Valley beef suet
8 oz sultanas cleaned
8 oz raisins halved and stoned – we used Sheffield wild plums which had been frozen
4 oz currants washed and dried
4 oz shredded mixed candied peel – Cut your own or use ready cut
4 oz of plain flour – Carr house Farm Spelt Flour
4 oz breadcrumbs
2 oz almonds blanched and shredded
the grated rind of a 1 lemon
3 eggs
a salt spoonful of  nutmeg grated
half a teaspoon of salt
quarter pint of milk
1 small wineglassful of brandy (optional)

Mix all the dry ingredients together, stir in the well beaten eggs, milk and brandy.

Turn the mixture into 2 well greased basins, and steam for 5 to 6 hours.

And finally the beef test

For this we took a leading supermarket brand of British beef and compared it to Rivelin Valley beef from Coppice House Farm in our slow cooked beef casserole made with Pride of Sheffield beer.

I could say a lot about the amazing differences in these two ingredients which apart from the name shared very little.  The colour was different, the way they cooked and the material which came out (of one of them) as they cooked was different.  We treated them identically and cooked/chilled/re-heated simultaneously with exactly the same times and temperature and ingredients through-out.  Then you tasted them!  The result was every single adult in the room on the night voted for the Rivelin Valley beef.  A resounding success for local food, great animal husbandry and common sense.

Sheffield grown Crown Prince Squash

Welcome nibbles will include Squash Shots with a Pumpkin Oil Infusion, Cured Salmon on Beanies Sour Dough, and PJ taste Rilletts with Moss Valley Pork.

Squash Shot with Glazed Bacon

Salmon Cured with Star Anise and Beetroot

There's still time to collect Rowan Berries to make Jelly to go with Xmas Turkey

Demonstrations will include a fascinating insight into making traditional hand raised pork pies by John Lord.  With over 50 years experience starting as an apprentice in Pudsey John also has some stories to tell!  Peter from PJ taste will feature ingredients from local producers as well as some seasonally foraged goodies to make some stress free Christmas inspired dishes.  With Missie Cindz unveiling her Sheffield Favourites Hamper and an opportunity to taste the demonstrated dishes and buy foodies Christmas gifts it is shaping up to be a great night.

To join us e-mail ask@pjtaste.co.uk to check availability and we will send ticket details.

The PJ taste bicycle

To make sure it gets found we are offering a free lunch to the first person who tweets or e-mails its location to us everyday until the end of October 2011.  Happy hunting.

Please see detailed t’s and c’s at www.pjtaste.co.uk

Apple juice pouring off the press

By the time we arrived it was clear that the 15 or so family, friends and willing volunteers had perfected a slick system which was resulting in an impressively continuous stream of apple juice flowing off the press.  Richard Shepley, (Dick) later explained that this was the result of 40 years of continuous improvement in the process.

Dick Shepley

The apple juice pressed at Woodthorpe is used to make their legendary Woodthorpe Hall cider.  Plenty was being quaffed to assist the work involved and on tasting it was wonderfully fruity.  This full flavour was exceptionally well balanced by the powerful level of alcohol recorded at 10.2% by volume – at this strength worryingly refreshing.  Dick was a great host and insisted we keep drinking, offering next their special apple and pear blend.  This was also very moreish, slightly sweeter with almost a “candyfloss” caramelised flavour.

But back to the job in hand.  The well practised system goes like this.  First the apples are washed.  One of the volunteers told me that this years innovation was heated water so no more freezing fingers during this stage.

Innovation for 2011

Like a lot of Dick’s equipment it may not look particularly pretty but its the practical result that matters.  In this case keeping the people at this station happy is vital for it is they who not only wash the fruit but carry out quality control by cutting off any bad bits and discarding stray stalk and leaves.

From here the apples go into a two stage chopping and shredding process.  Another great old piece of agricultural machinery carries out the initial chopping using a powerful grater at the bottom of its hopper.

Apples chopped in the first stage

This is juicing on an industrial scale so spades are used to shovel the chopped apple into buckets ready for transfer to the shredder.  This machine makes short work of bucket after bucket of apple chips, reducing them to a fine mulch which oozes with juice and is clearly ready for the press.

Apple chips are shovelled into the shredder

Once out of the shredder the mulch is again shovelled into buckets and can be finally carried through to the cider press.  Its heavy work with what I would estimate to be in excess of 20 kilos of apple in each bucket.  The apple mulch is tipped into a large hessian sheet which is held in shape by the wooden ‘cheese mould’ which is a square frame or former.

The apple is distributed to an even depth by hand and even at this stage the juice is starting to pour off the press.  There is a full-time job for at least another two people to man the washing-up bowls in rotation to catch the juice and transfer via a simple sieve into the 20 litre plastic bottles in which Dick initially collects the juice.  With the first frame full the cloth is carefully folded over the top and the wooden frame lifted off (I was very impressed with the skill shown by the men at this as if they have been making beds all their life).  Two wooden slats are then placed on top of this first “cheese” and a second one built on top.  As the buckets of apple mulch are added to the frame for a second time the weight immediately causes the juice production to accelerate and at times a torrent of juice seems to be flowing.  After folding the cloth on the second cheese and removing the frame the full weight of the press can start to be employed.  Another two men, taking one side each, gradually wind down the press applying huge pressure which requires long lever extensions to the screws handles.  And all the time the juice flows on appearing for much longer than you would imagine.  We guessed that at least 80 litres came from

Carefully folding the cloth to form the "cheese"

each pressing of these two cheeses.  This would correspond roughly to one litre from every two kilo of apples based on the estimate of 80 kilo of apples going into each “cheese”, 160 kilo in the press at any one time.

Later in the afternoon a couple of pressings of the very special pear and apple mix were done, the resulting juice tasting different but indistinguishable in appearance.  This necessitated an ingenious storage system as the containers were filled – pure apple to the right the blend with pear to the left as you exit the cider press.

Containers filled with juice

Sampling the juice neat off the press

And so another year and another harvest is dispatched.  Now the natural alchemy will begin as the natural yeasts start their work of fermentation to produce another vintage to be enjoyed in 2012.  Great thanks to Dick and Sue at Woodthorpe Hall for allowing us to join in and experience this occasion.

The Participants

Starting from the Calver Crossaroads we walked towards Stoney Middleton on the main road but soon struck off to the left along a lane leading into Coomb Dale.  It always amazes me that when you are looking and your eyes are tuned in how soon you start to make finds.  In this instance it was immediately on entering the wood that we found our first fungus of the day being Stag’s Horn or Candlesnuff Fungus – Xylaria hypoxylon.  Both names are very descriptive as the picture shows:

A few feet away Jim discovered this inkcap.  It was identified as Glistening Inkcap, Coprinus micaceus.

Glistening Inkcap

Up to this point I had only been aware of Shaggy Inkcaps as these are an edible species.  Edible though only to a point as they contain coprine which when mixed with alcohol causes severe symptoms of nausea and palpitations.  It is the same chemical that is present in disulfiram (Antabuse), an anti-drinking drug used in the treatment of alcohol dependence.

The next find demonstrated how hard it can be to positively identify an individual species within a group or genus.  The best that could be said of this fungus was that it was a member of the Mycena genus – a closer study with a microscope to look at details of its spore shape for example would apparently be needed.  This was getting technical!

One of the Mycena genus?

Moving along, but only a few feet we came across a Cramp Ball – Daldinia concentrica,  otherwise known as King Alfred’s cakes given their resemblance to a very overdone day of baking.

Cramp Balls

These have been used as a means of carrying fire once they are completely dry.  They are very common although appearing mostly exclusively on dead ash.

Fairy bonnet inkcap Coprinus disseminatus or trooping crumble cap was a great sight on this log, their ranks of neat lines really living up to their trooping name.

Trooping Crumble Cap

Stinking Dapperling – Lepiota aspera, (below) was found among a series of Bitter Poisonpie – Hebeloma sinapizans.  These had the distinctive radish smell.  I noticed that the group did a lot of smelling – obviously a mycologists trait.

Stinking Dapperling

The lovely little tuft of fungus below was identified by the group on the walk as honey fungus, a species which can be eaten after first boiling in milk and discarding the liqour.  I duly added it to my basket to examine further later.  At home I was not convinced it resembled fully the pictures in my books so sent the picture  to John Harris at the mushroom diary.  Here is his response:

So not sure on this one, illustrating the need for further experience and perhaps seeing these fungus developing over different stages.

Moving further up the dale we came out of the trees and onto steep meadows on limestone scree.  We climbed up and Jim pointed our Rock Rose – Helianthemum nummularium, growing prolifically.

Rock Rose

The presence of this plant is good news for mycologists as their woody roots provide habitat for fungi to associate with.  However, it was not until towards the top of the ridge that we found a web cap.  We were not able to identify this specifically suffice to say that web caps – the Cortinarius genus – are generally dangerous and best avoided altogether.

Spot the distinctive web of fibres - cortina on this specimin

On the way back across the meadows we found a lovely Parasol Mushroom – Macrolepiota procera.  These are an edible species but as it was a solitary soul I left it in situ to shed its spores.

Parasol Mushroom

Just before we dipped back into the woods I spotted this lovely bracket fungus a group know as Polypores.  Jim thought it may have been Hen of the Woods but as the rain was coming down we did not linger long to make further investigation.

Hen of the Woods?

We dropped back towards the main road and added Field Mushrooms Agaricus campestris “Dog Sick” fungus and Jelly Fungus – Dacrymyces chrysospermus to the day’s tally.  In all in this short excursion I counted that we had found around 24 species and the opportunity to look at them with others of greater knowledge was brilliant.  Heres to an Autumn of fruitful mellowness and many more foraging trips.  Thanks to Jim Horsfall and The Sorby Natural History Society who hold a wide range of indoor meetings and outdoor field trips.  Find out more here.

If of interest here are some recommended fungi guides:

The PJ taste Team

First it is important to understand what are we fighting against.  In our case supermarkets and large groups of coffee shops and chains of sandwich shops have developed the power to dominate the market.  It’s important that we don’t simply gripe about this but understand how it has happened.  They have got into this position by providing a customer experience that works.  Making themselves easy to buy from, concentrating on their core offer and creating a clear and defined vision of what we can expect from them.  The problems I believe start as they reach a high level of market saturation.  At this point do we the customer really still have a choice or are we now too far from the point of production to understand or influence the quality of ingredients.  Importantly I also believe that all the focus becomes on short-term profit which does not factor in possible longer term costs to our health and the environment.  The experience can also become rather sterile and does nothing to help families derive the joy from eating and drinking.  The insidious effects of the supermarkets march to domination are now being more fully understood and explained.  Leading the way have been figures like Joanna Blythman who’s 2007 book “Shopped: The Shocking Power of British Supermarkets” outline the corrosive effect of supermarkets on our farming and our food culture.  More recently the mantle is being taken up by people like the Anslow sisters with their social enterprise hiSbe – standing for how it Should be – people before profit.

So what can we do to encourage new customers to buy from us?  I say new because thankfully our existing customers are very loyal and have already “bought” the benefits of the interestingly seasonal, Sheffield Food that we make.  The following ideas are work in progress but at least should provide a starting point and your input would be most welcome.

1.  Being “Dramatically and Demonstrably Different”

We are dramatically different but demonstrating it is another matter!  It’s about getting the facts out in the open and developing a clear and coherent way of communicating with our target audience.  By being small and flexible enough to source local ingredients that are suited to being grown/produced in our region in a sensible seasonal fashion we can produce the best in terms of flavour, freshness and nutrition.  It’s of course only a “can” because a close working relationship between us and the grower/producer is required to ensure these potential benefits are realised.  It’s about building up trust, understanding the product and each others needs and importantly working together to tackle issues such as efficient distribution.  That is why for example we like to pay our local suppliers cash on delivery, why we consider together how to minimise delivery journeys and how we may discuss for instance utilising all the cuts from the animal with the butcher.

By being close to the growers we have some great stories to tell.  Add in the range of products we make ourselves and the stories get even closer to the source.  Here are some facts to get into the open:

The benefits of local super fresh milk.  We use milk from Mosleys in the Rivelin Valley and from a little further away from our base Our Cow Molly at Dungworth (Eddie from Our Cow Molly is a cousin of the Mosley family).  We also use Our Cow Molly’s ice cream – its great in our milk shakes.  A visitor to our shop would probably not know this at the moment.

Our Cow Molly Branded Milk

The thing about this Sheffield milk is that the milk delivered on Monday comes out of the cows on Monday – the same Monday not the week before!.  This is in stark contrast to most supermarket bought milk which by their own admission is a minimum of five days old before we get the opportunity to purchase it.  This matters nutritionally as the vitamin content is depleted with each day’s age, and the process of protein degradation which sours milk is well on the way.  In addition with the milk coming for a defined, small high quality herd where the farmer knows and respects each animal as an individual the husbandry is as natural as possible, with winter feed being produced on the farm from silage and hay.  This builds trust and a direct connection between us and the producer.  As you can see from the picture above  Our Cow Molly are being proactively innovative by branding their milk as the genuine Sheffield article and providing the facts on freshness and quality.  Our aim is to pass this on with passion to our customers.   For further interest here is some information about the Nutritional Aspects of Milk.

PJ taste Citrus Hits™  our very own soft drinks are made from infusions of Yorkshire herbs and fruits and bottled in a re-used J2O bottle (supplied by the Old Bear Brewery in Keighley.  Made in small batches it allows us to use seasonal produce, and the lack of any preservatives or pasteurisation maintains the natural flavours.  My favourite is the amazing Blackberry and Orange which is now very much in season.

Another delivery of re-used J2O bottles

The picture above was taken by Cindy Cheung as part of her Eat Sheffield for a Week challenge during the Sheffield Food Festival.  It features a Lemon and Lavender Citrus Hit and a PJ taste Ultimate Cheese toastie.  We make these toasties from the Spelt sourdough that we make from organic Yorkshire wheat sourced from Carr House Farm in Driffield.

So the stories are there the job is to communicate them in a systematic and planned way keeping them fresh, interesting and topical.  We are sharpening the tools we have to do this by way of a quarterly newsletter, regular PR features in the local press, a refurbishment of the shop to project a clear external image and concise descriptions/links to the stories inside.  Perhaps boringly but crucially we are systemising these activities and agreeing targets, sharing responsibility for them within our team and investing in a regular focused meeting structure to report back and monitor progress against these goals.  And all this needs to feel spontaneous to our audience – who said running your own business was easy!

2.  Being Easy to Buy From.

Could do better would be the verdict at the moment!  How can we improve?  Heres the ideas:

a)  Research shows that the time people are prepared to queue has reduced to a mere 2 minutes.  As our peak business is over the lunch time period its important to maximise the capacity to serve and reduce queuing to the minimum.  We are re-organising the customer flow accordingly, to also ensure that everyone needs to pass our retail items, and that all the main food offers can be referred to at an external menu.

b)  The ongoing involvement of our staff to share the objectives and benefit from their experience is vital but something we have failed to make the most of on occasions.  Hopefully we will do our group training in a more planned way than Starbucks famously did in 2008.  Being easy to buy from starts with that front line experience, and developing it relies on the eyes and ears of the staff on the ground.

c)  Would an on-line order system work for the delivery of lunch to your desk.  Order by 11 and we deliver by 1pm?  Is this too big an extension of our business model?

d) Our business is currently Monday to Friday mainly catering for that early morning cappuccino, a grab and go lunch and some interesting hot dishes to eat in.  Is there an opportunity to open for an early evening Bistro Night?  Or to offer a high quality simple meal for people to buy on the way home and enjoy in the evening.  We could feature a key ingredient each month and produce a meal for 2 for £10 (£10 + VAT to eat in) which would be convenient and a direct alternative to a leading supermarkets headline offer.  Too copy cat, too much brand extension or another idea worth exploring?

e)  What do we do about opening on quieter times in our case Saturdays.  With a decline in sales its easy to see savings in staff time by reducing opening hours.  Is this the answer or would it be better to find a new market.

These ideas are part of a journey but the pressure is on to ensure we make the right turns in the near future.  The opportunity to work in partnership with external groups who share our desire to ensure that we all have a variety of food choices on the high street in the future is vital.  We welcome these opinions and support and look forward to shaping and telling the stories for many years to come.