Some meals are simply perfect. Of course it is all a matter of preference but last night's offering to the gods of cooking has to be listed as being on a par with the best that I have experienced. It's not arrogance. After all I merely cooked it, ate it and tasted it and it was indeed for my own pleasure. It's reportage. So I am not up there in the presentation of the food but to me that's not what I'm all about. Ingredients: 2 x 250g pieces of hake loin. 4 slices from a lemon 4 thin slices from a block of unsalted butter freshly ground pepper 150g fresh samphire (rinsed) 150g fresh cherry tomatoes 50g capers Oil for frying the tomatoes Balsamic vinegar Method: Set the oven at 180C and bring up to temperature . Place each hake loin onto its own piece of baking parchment, skin side down. Place the two slices of lemon on the fish and top each piece with a thin slice of butter. Season with freshly ground pepper. Form the papillote pouches and place them on a baking tray. I used two enamel dishes that I was going to serve the fish on. Place in the oven and cook for about 15 minutes. Meanwhile halve the cherry tomatoes and season with pepper and set aside. (The capers will provide the salt) Bring a pan of water to the boil and blanch the samphire. Drain and set aside. In a frying pan add a few drops of olive oil and heat. Add the cherry tomatoes and trin them cut side down. fry for a while and then flip over and add the capers. Stir together and continue to fry for a couple of minutes. Add a little liquid ( water of white wine) and continue to heat for a while, if the pan is a little dry. Turn off the heat and set aside. Bring out the fish and remove it from the pouch before placing it back in the centre of the cooking pan. Dress with a little balsamic vinegar Add the samphire and the tomato mix and serve immediately . Observations: You can of course use any fish. Cod and haddock would be good substitutes but they all have different texture. I refrained from using garlic much as I love it because I didn't want to overpower the fish.

It's the weekend of 25th October and the 2025 Dartmouth Food Festival is in full swing. The wind and the rainy weather has given over to crisp cool sunshine with occasional light showers that you can usually see coming down the river valley. The Pelican of London, a splendid, three mast vessel moored up on the town quay, normally in pride of place as a focus of attention, is having to take second place to a whole swathe of marquees that are set up along the South Embankment. Currently there are hordes of people queing patiently to get into the first of the marquees adjacent to the passenger ferry gang way. Its a one-way pedestrian system and so it can be a little frustrating at times. However, it would be chaos if people were free to roam in any direction. The place is a little different to a scene from the day before of an empty marquee and a view of the estuary beyond its rear walls. Every inch of space is now filled with the awnings themselves butting up against the edge of the quay and tied securely to the bollards. On the other side, there are various dead weight devices to help anchor down the awnings if the wind picks up. There isn't even space to sit in the riverside of the covered seating on the embankment. There was a kind of trial run on the Friday and we ventured out after a frustrating morning's work. I think I took my own personal cloud with me because I couldn't get into the spirit of it. I nearly fell out with one vendor who tried to get me to smell his black pepper. "I don't need to smell it, I kown what it smells like!" Churlish and unfriendly I know but at least it stopped him moving in to get me to part with £27 for a small bag of the long Kampot pepper corns that were the same price as a hunk of venison on a stall further on. (I bought the venison on Saturday though!) My mood didn't improve as I went to look around the street food stalls in Royal Avenue Gardens and reached a nadir after I had bought a lamb and harissa wrap for the princely sum of £15. Really, £30 for teo fancy sandwiches at lunch time. Without wanting to go on - the price of a piece of venison! Strangely, my ill humour seemed to dissipate as I sat in the gardens and ate my lunch. Perhaps I was just hungry! Saturday started a whole lot better. For a start, the sun really was out despite occasional showers and we had decided on fish for dinner today and so I had an excuse to head for the stall in the market. Here, one of my favourite places to shop for provisions, I acquired a kilo of hake loin, some samphire and a few slices of smoked salmon. The hake here cost more than the venison ( which seems to be my benchmark for this occasion) but it offered four indulgent portions and the salmon was an excellent lunch for the two of us when served on cranberry and squash sourdough from the only artisan bread baker at the festival. The crowds were beginning to swell by the time that we sallied forth in the afternoon. In fact it was manic. I soon decided that any thought of getting some pictures of the place was a bad idea. Fortunately we were only really looking for the venison and perhaps some interesting teas. The latter search was a failure as there was no such offering amongst all the coffees. However the venison was acquired for £17.00 as it was a slow cook joint rather than a straight roasting cut. After a brief exchange with my better half about who was going to pay ( and I lost naturally enough), we headed out of the crowds. It was a little better further along the South Embankment and that gave me a moment for reflection on the origins of the foods. After all I had no idea where the venison came from nor who had actually sold it to me. Indeed, a twisted corner of my mind suggested that I had no idea what meat I had just bought. It could be an opportunistic way to dispose of a mother-in -law after all. I think I have probably delved a little too far into my psyche here and perhaps I should leave such meanderings to the contents of my novels. The Head Gardener for example. A macabre little tale if there ever was one but ,as one might say, "A cracking good read!" Still for the avoidance of doubt, I am pretty sure that it is venison and, whilst she lived, I was quite fond of my mother-in-law ... Whilst I feel that the festival was a little short on primary provisions such as herbs and spices, teas , pulses, interesting vegetables - that sort of thing - I did manage to find the stall for the Isle of Wight garlic farm ( or some such name). Here I bought three smoked garlic cloves and three others of a name I cannot remember. They all smelled good and the smoked was going to be. paired with the venison when it came to cooking it. The image of the partially plundered bulb does not do justice to the smell of the thing (naturally). Getting into the swing of spending at l;ast we also managed to finish off the day with the purchase of two terracotta glazed bowls which we needed for hte micro-wave. To the question, "Are they microwaveable ?" we received an enigmatic answer that involved terracotta naturally absorbing water (and not to let that happen) but I think it all wrapped up to a "Yes" . Only time will tell. That was Saturday pretty much wrapped up. All I needed was a few images at night of the festival in rest which , as you can see below, were picked up when I took our dog, Gandalf, for his late evening walk before bed. Sunday was a quiet start, probably something to do with the clocks changing. Pity no one told Gandalf. He had me up at 04.50 new time for his morning walk. Still not too bad really, I could hear a large dog barking in one of the buildings on the Quay, possibly the Royal Castle. At a more manageable time, we ventured forth into the crowds again. The purpose was to see if we had missed anything ( we hadn’t) and to buy some more breach from Vickys Bread and to find out where they deliver to in Dartmouth. (Sadly they don’t , the nearest is probably Kingsbridge.) We nearly bought some pies - they looked really good but to be honest I am on a dietary purge at the moment - so that was a bust. Slipping down Nelson Street for the first time for a few days, I found that Joe’s Bar was setting up an alfresco dining area complete with paintings on the walls and full service on the long table. Really like the paintings but was too embarrassed to take pictures there and then. Got three of them later and they are set out below. Not food as such but certainly food for thought. Online it seems that they were painted by the late Bas Kennedy of Dartmouth but I can’t find anything else about him ( or her ). So what was the take on the weekend? Well for a start the street food was pretty pricey by local standards. Were there any intersteing ideas or suggestions to be gathered? Perhaps there might have. been in hte tents where the demonstartions were held but I had neither the time nor the patience for those. The place was heaving with visitors and it seems that for every human family there was at least 1.3 dogs. Poor old Gandalf really struggled with the crowds and we had to keep to the back streets like lepers to avoid all the cockerpoos and other look alike dogs. It was with a kind of relief that Gandalf and I walked the Quay on Monday morning. The whole scene with no cars in sight reminderd me of the city scenes in I am Legend ( or for those of an older persuasion - The Omega Man). So all I needed now was the zombie apocalypse!

Trilobites became extinct on our planet about 250 million years ago at the time of the Permian mass extinction. This was the greatest mass extinction recorded with something like 90% of all species being wiped out. It made the Dinosaur (KT) extinction look tame. These were marine creatures and so it is unlikely that on our planet they would have ever scuttled about around the feet of humans. But I guess it could have been! In any case, I chose to bring these marvellous creatures back from extinction in The Collector of Tales. It is after all a different world and Se Molde, the world of my stories, is not quite the Same Old same old that is our much abused planet Earth. Tiny pygidium from trilobite at Wren's Nest , Dudley For my own part I have sought out fossils of these beasts in Haverfordwest unsuccessfully, Wrens Nest in Dudley with variable success and along the banks of streams along the borders on Wenlock Edge with a certain amount of dampness. But for my arthropod fix I have had to resort to spiders and by spiders in this case I mean tarantulas. Pygidium from trilobite at Wenlock Edge You can see why they didn’t appear in The Collector of Tales. After all, spiders get a very bad press. Tolkien places them in the darkest foulest places of his Middle Earth to name but one. Yet they don’t deserve this treatment. Yes tarantulas have ‘hairs’ and eight legs , they are large and they scuttle around occasionally. Of course they’re venomous but for the most part true tarantulas are not lethal unless you have an llergic reaction to their bite. Admittedly you don’t want to get bitten by them because they can hurt and make your tissues swell up. In fact from my experience they seem pretty tolerant creatures all in all if left alone and not handled excessively (or even at all) Actually I don’t think the issue is tolerance. I suspect it is economy. Looking at it from a tarantulas point of view all the energy required to deliver a bite has to come from somewhere and then has to be replaced. Replacement is only in the form of food and that requires more energy to acquire. Then of course if venom is delivered all those proteins have to be re synthesised . More energy still and how is that going to square with the massive energy fest that is its moult. It can’t afford to screw that up because that is kind of fatal if that goes wrong. No I suspect that tarantulas don’t normally bite people because they can’t afford the energy loss. Unlike flicking their hairs on the other hand. If you want to check how skittish a spider is just have a look at the hairs on its abdomen. If there’s a bald patch then it’s probably a skittish one. If there’s a lot of hair then its probably more laid back (or it’s just gone through a moult). And you have to be careful of the hairs because they are tiny and barbed , travel a long way and can get in your eyes. Really they are the main risk because if the fire them off when your up close they are going to cause you some irritation. Then, generally, there is no need to get too close to the creatures. I had one, a large Chilean Rose that I would handle occasionally. Those occasions usually when I had had a glass or two of wine in my bloodstream. On the other hand I had a South African tarantula that after installing it in the vivarium, I caught sight of it about every six months when I assume it sallied forth from a deep burrow to find a supply of food (crickets). All tarantula images from my own collection around 2016.

Our sortie to the fish stall in the marketplace on Saturday produced a couple of large mackerel amongst other things. The fish as always looked really good and when I asked for two mackerel, I received the obligatory response "Two - each". He looked at the fish for a moment and said "I've got more out in the van," before heading off and then returning with a large box of the beauties. Look at those he offered - this man loves his fish. He picked a couple of them out and put them on the scales. He gutted them and then wrapped them up before coming back with, "what else?" Sardines and anchovies were the others today: an oily fish overkill probably. The mackerel were to be simply baked en papillote to eaten flaked on some bruschetta with horseradish and freshly roasted beetroot. The only problem was the beetroot. On this feted Saturday, Dartmouth could only offer pickled beets and so it was a trip to Kingsbridge on the bus on Sunday to see if the town could offer some. We had already booked a meal at the Crab Shell for Sunday Lunch and there is a good bus service from Dartmouth even on a Sunday. We had an hour to spare when we arrived and almost immediately, opposite the little bus station, we spotted an organic grocers. Yes, they had some beetroot and they also had horseradish root as a bonus. Not to mention the fresh turmeric root which we picked up for another day. Back to the mackerel meal, this was intended to be a light supper after feasting at lunch time. The beetroot was simply roasted in the oven at 180C for about 40 minutes to an hour then peeled ( when cool enough) and set aside. I chopped up 4 tomatoes into a small dice and added olive oil , 3 minced garlic cloves, some dried thyme and a splash of balsamic vinegar. These were mixed will and left to stand for when needed on the bruschetta. The fish had already been gutted so the cavity was loaded with butter and fresh dill and then placed in greaseproof paper and folded over for the oven. I made a fatal mistake in that I used the weight of the fish to keep the packet together by turning the fish over onto the paper seam. Obviously this allowed the butter to escape into the pan and the result was a buttery mess in the bottom of the oven. However, the fish went into the oven also at 180C for about 30 to 40 minutes. For the beasts that we had it took a full 40 minutes. It wasn't technically bruschetta but rather thin slices of sour dough with grains which was lightly toasted first during the latter stages of the fish cooking. Then the tomato mix was spread liberally on top and then returned to the oven for a further while. The fish cooked to a treat and was flakey and well mackerelly. It went beautifully with the beetroot (which I had cut into batons) and was complimented by some horseradish. I confess that this came from a jar and was not made up to order from the fresh root that we purchased in Kingsbridge. The tomato covered bruschetta added a little substance and an acidic hint to offset the fish. As mackerel are seasonal visitors to our seas I will have to start making plans to freeze a few for the winter.

A cassoulet is a melange of rich meats, white beans, fat and aromatics, cooked slowly over many hours. The recipe here, although claiming the name, has really no more right to it than many pizza. However, it is warming and it is hearty and it is a favourite go to on a cold day. Reading recipes for cassoulet, the fat content looks a bit to heavy for my liking and so whilst I am using the name, I am never likely to have a go at a real cassoulet. Indeed, even reading Escoffier's take on this dish, it reads a bit like something from the Collector of Tales . This recipe really is a version of Alubias Estofadas (i.e. stewed beans) but I'll never get around to remembering that. So let's get stuck into the recipe straightaway and the sooner cooked the sooner enjoyed! Ingredients 3 tins of beans drained ( I used cannellini, borlotti and fava) two carrots 1 large onion 1 stick celery 4 cloves garlic 1 tbsp mustard 2 tbsp tomato puree 500 ml chicken stock 500g meaty sausages 150g chorizo 1 red chilli pepper 1 tbsp smoked paprika Olive oil for frying salt and pepper to taste Method Dice the onion, slice the carrots the chilli and the celery. Then roughly chop the garlic. Cook the sausages whole either in the oven or on the hob and set aside when cooked. Add some oil to a heavy based pan and then fry off the onions, celery, carrot and chilli for about 5 minutes before adding the garlic. Fry for a further few minutes keeping an eye so that the garlic doesn't burn. Add the paprika, mustard, puree and chicken stock to the vegetables and stir occasionally to prevent sticking. Drain the beans and add them to the pot and incorporate, turning down the heat to ensure a gentle simmer. Once the sausages have stood for a while, slice thickly along with the chorizo and add to the pot. Top up with a little water or extra stock if the mix is too thick. Keep over a low heat fopr about 20 minutes to allow the flavours to infuse. Serve with crusty bread. Observations This meal doesn't have to have meat in it. You can replace the chicken stock with vegetable and add a tin more of beans instead of the sausages and chorizo for a vegetarian alternative. The image at the top only shows beans and vegetables (but rest assured , the meat is below the surface). To make it more meaty, you could add some pork bell slices cut into large cubes. they just need to be fried off after the soffrito much like the sausages below. Make sure you ensure the meat is cooked before serving. The sausages can be cooked in the pot rather than separately. Slice them thickly and add to the pan once the soffrito has fried up a little so that they brown off a little. The same for the chorizo. Again, for the sausages and if using 'raw' chorizo , make sure that the meat is cooked before serving. Depending upon how spicy you make it (maybe add a little cayenne or pimenton picante) it could benefit by the addition of cream or sour cream to serve.

Well, we have lived at The Quay now for just over six months and last night I got my first close up of a grey seal whilst walking Gandalf, our dog. It was sleeping on a pontoon just off the jetty near the Yatch Club in full view of anyone who happened to be walking that path just after 21.00. It was kind of unfortunate for me that a very vocal American came up as I was taking photos and trying to get the dog in the shot as well. (I failed) I was then subjected to about 15 minutes of monologue from the new worlder about seals ( it was a female apparantly) and dolphins. We then gravitated towards the ills of the world via global warming, the Israeli conflict, ISIS, Russia and all that stuff until at the end we reached Donald Trump and his advisors. We headed there via what sounded like racism, anti-semitism, the gun laws (and how could you people walk around unarmed over here?). Please be assured that I support none of these things! Frankly it all went on too long and if I had not been cradling a sufficiency of wine in my system, I would have brought the thing to a close a lot sooner. Even Gandalf let me down by failing to undertake his habitual barking whenever his walk is interrupted. The next morning that ole seal was still there sleeping as seals do, I guess. Again I tried to get a shot with Gandalf in the frame ( and again I failed) but at least it was quite early and no garrulous males were wandering around. At that time of day. a "Good morning" is more than adequate. Well, imagine my surprise looking out of the window later that morning when there she is again (after all I had been informed that it was a female and who am I to query?) This time she was swimming in a very leisurely manner around the boat float. As we were going shopping anyway, we nipped out as quick as we could to see if we could have a closer sighting of her swimming around. We weren't disappointed as the video shows. It seems wholly weird to me to see a marine mammal of this size just chilling out in full view of everyone and with the town life and activity taking place all around. The pessimist in me says that perhaps it is sick and / or dying but hopefully that is not the case. It is even more exciting to be able to see this going on from my own home. That is something other worldly even if the captured image falls short of the idea as can be seen below and could just as easily be a shot of the Loch Ness monster. Still there were a few good shots that I haven't posted and I haven't yet had the nerve to get out my actual camera and lenses because I have watched others ( tourists mostly I think) walking about like that here and frankly it looks weird. So, there you have it. All the excitement of a grey seal and not a reference to The Xandrian Quarters , or did I just!

A jollof is a Nigerian dish of rice cooked with tomatoes. It is another of those one-pot dishes that pop up in the culinary landscape when one looks for them. Typically of most one-pot dishes, it is not very photogenic. I discovered this by accident in a news article somewhere about a world record attempt on a huge jollof. I have no interest in the world record aspect but the idea of the meal appealed and so, naturally enough , I investigated it. Recently I have discovered a real pleasure in one-pot dishes (sad but true) and this seemed to add a few more ideas to my studies. The principal dish is vegetarian but it lends itself to adding meat if required. This version uses beef short ribs. Recipe 2 cups long grain rice 2 cups beef stock 2 cups water 4 fresh tomatoes ( chopped up small) 1 large red onion ( finely chopped) 1 large red pepper (diced) 4 garlic cloves (chopped) 20g grated fresh ginger 2 tbsp tomato puree 1 tbsp sun dried tomato puree / paste 2 bay leaves 1 tbsp medium curry powder 1 tsp smoked paprika (dulce) no 1 tsp hot chilli powder 1 tsp dried thyme Oil for frying. (I used about 1 tbsp of olive oil) The recipes I have seen also use goat or chicken. Goat isn't readily available in Dartmouth unfortunately and it is always good to have an alternative to chicken. on this occasion therefore, I used 3 beef short ribs for which were slow cooked in the sauce before adding the rice. There is nothing to say that this cant be a vegetarian dish as indeed it usually is i believe. I'll do one of those on another occasion with a mix of aubergine, long stemmed broccoli, lentils and potatoes and a vegatable stock. Method Pre heat the oven to 140C (fan). Rinse the rice until the water runs clear and then leave to soak in warm water for about an hour. Next add the oil to your cooking pot( which should be large enough to cook the whole dish in the oven with a close fitting lid) and heat. Add the chopped onions and fry for 5 minutes. Then add the diced peppers , the garlic and the minced ginger and fry for a further 2 minutes stirring to prevent anything sticking or burning. Add the dry spices and stir well then after about a minute , drop in the chopped tomatoes and continue to cook for another 5 minutes. When the tomatoes are beginning to soften add the bay leaves ; the puree and the puree paste and stir well. Add the beef stock and water and then the dried thyme. Season at this point before adding the beef short ribs ( about 3 or 500g). Leave on the job to heat for a further 5 minutes and then place in centre of preheated oven. Cook for about 4 hours. Remove pan from oven and check the meat. If it is falling off the bone then you are ready to add the rice. If not put back in oven for a further 30 minutes. Drain the rice and add it carefully to the pot. Stir carefully to distribute and the lid and return the pot to the oven. Turn the oven up to 160C ( fan) and cook for a further 40 minutes or until the rice is cooked. Remove from oven and serve. Observations Instead of the fresh tomatoes you can use a 440g tin of chopped. If using chicken, use boneless thigh and flavour or marinade it to your choice. (Maybe garlic yoghurt and hot paprika.) Instead of adding beef stock and water, add chicken stock and water and then add the marinaded chicken thighs before burying them with rice as per the method above. i.e. Replace the high-lighted text in the method with the following: Add two cups of chicken stock instead of beef and the water and then the dried thyme. Season at this point before adding the marinaded chicken thighs (500g). Careful the cooking liquor will still be quite hot. If using vegetables, prepare your vegetables approrpiately depending on cooking time and add them with 2 cups of veteable stock and 2 cups of water and the thyme before the rice is added.

Migas, in Spain and Portugal at least is a popular meal that uses up left over bread. The name comes from the Spanish word for crumbs. Originally it was eaten as a breakfast dish. Indeed, Cervantes makes reference to it through Sancho Panza in Don Quixote Part II Chapter LIX. Sancho Panza “I’ll be hanged, gentlemen, if the author of this book you have in your hands wants us to make good migas together! I’d wish that, since he calls me a glutton—as you say—he wouldn’t also call me a drunkard.” Here it is an idiom of the time for "getting on together" or being "good friends" reflecting the fact that migas would have been eaten from a communal dish. Cervantes is voicing Sancho's vocal disapproval of his creator in a way that is typical of the genius that he is. One of the subliminal influences on The Collector of Tales . Migas is now included as lunch , as tapas or as an evening meal. The following recipe is very much my take on the migas manchegas and includes bacon ( in this case actually it is jamon serrano and chorizo). This is not a New World migas. Ingredients 300g stale bread 300g chorizo 50g jamon serrano thinly sliced and diced 1 large red onion 1 large red pepper Some green olives Olive oil 1 large salt-preserved lemon 4 cloves garlic Some dried oregano Greek yoghurt Smoked paprika Method Break up the stale bread in to bite-size chunks and set aside. Chop up the salted lemon into small pieces, keeping some of the juice. NOTE: These are salty beasts so only add the juice if you think the dish is not salty enough for your tastes. DO NOT ADD ANY ADDITIONAL SALT TO THIS DISH as it will make it unpalatable. Chop the red onion roughly (i.e not fine diced but chopped with attitude). In a large pan ( we use the base of a metal tagine), add a good portion of oil and heat until , well. hot I suppose. Add the onion and stir to prevent sticking or burning. Turn down the heat (or move it to the cooler plate on the Aga) and allow to cook for about 5 minutes. Peel, crush and chop the garlic and also slice the chorizo into rounds. Add both meats and garlic to the pan and stir in with the onions and cook for a further 5 minutes or so. Add the chunks of stale bread and olives and a good pinch of dried oregano and mix in well, adding more olive oil as you see fit - this is a dish rich in olive oil! Keep over a low heat for a further 10 minutes, checking occasionally to make sure that it is not sticking. Meanwhile chop up the pepper into whatever size pieces you prefer and then add to the pan with the olives and salted lemon. Cover and put in oven for a further 10 to 20 minutes. Serve with some Greek yoghurt and a sprinkling of smoked paprika. Perhaps a little lollo rosso. Observations There is a real risk of over salting this dish. Jamon and salted lemons and olives all hold a lot of salt so don't even think about adding any extra and go carefully with the quantities of preserved lemons. The other main variables are the amount of chorizo you want to include; the degree of staleness of the bread which can vary cooking time; and, the amount of olive oil you are happy to add to the meal.

This is a simple recipe adapted slightly from the BBC Good Food website and a couple of other recipes that I have read cookery books. It feels distinctly Xandrian in style in which world I would have flame roasted the vegetables over an open fire before pounding them into a rough soup. If the Collector of Tales has a copy of a recipe scribbled down somewhere in one of his journals, then he hasn’t shared it with me. However I’m not in that other world and so I have settled for an electric fan oven at 160C! Simple fare for a light lunch to assist me in my quest to reduce weight without the aid of chemicals or special diets. Overnight I have managed to reduce my BMI to 29.7 and so I can now with satisfaction declare that I am no longer obese according to the NHS web site. Now there’s a comfort and I can look forward to the slog all the way to a 79kg upper limit acceptable weight, somewhere out there on the distant horizon a little under 15kg away. Ingredients 1 kg butternut squash 2 large red pepper 2 large onions 1 whole garlic bulb 3 tbsps (approximately) olive oil 2 tsp ground cumin 3 tbsp ground coriander 2 tbsp rose harissa paste 100 ml double cream 500 ml Chicken stock This makes for a very thick soup. You could double the stock or add water to thin it a little and you can of course use vegetable stock instead. Method Peel and cube the squash and place on a large oven tray on greaseproof paper. Peel and roughly chop the onions and red peppers and arrange on greaseproof paper on another oven tray. Slice the base off the garlic and add to the tray with onions. Drizzle both sets of vegetables with olive oil and sprinkle over the spices. Place in oven that has been heated to 160C . Roast for about 45 minutes. When done carefully squeeze out the garlic cloves from the bulb into a large saucepan. Add the roasted vegetables and the stock and the harissa paste. Blitz with a stick blender until smooth and then add the cream and heat until boiling. Serve with freshly toasted croutons. The soup sgould be sweet, spicy and rich with a thick texture. Serves four at about 300 calories per portion ( excluding croutons). Cost about £8.20 at current prices.

This is a much under valued fish in the UK but is fairly popular in the mediterranean where apparently it is overfished. In the UK it can be seen as a more sustainable source than cod or haddock and with a flakier and milder taste, lends itself to more varied types of cooking. Hake Loin I have only really gotten in touch with this fish since moving down to Dartmouth because there are so many varieties of fish availble. So far I have only tried en papillote with a nice thick piece of loin and shallow fried with olive oil. I have also used the head to make an excellent fish stock. Whilst I have put up a picture of hake loin, the recipe that I am going to focus on here is an adaption of a Venetian dish by Rick Stein, hake alla Carlina. I used fillets that were not particularly thick as can be seen from the images but they worked a treat and were well worth it. hake isn't a particularly cheap fish and the pieces in the images cost me just shy of £20. The fish is served with fresh samphire and new potatoes with garlic and butter and there is a side of home made tartare sauce. Ingredients: 4 hake fillets skin on (about 150g each) 2 tbsp olive oil 50 g plain flour salt and freshly ground pepper for the sauce: 2 tbsp olive oil 1/2 lemon 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce 2 small gherkins finely chopped 2 tbsps capers (1 finely chopped) 2 ripe tomatoes finely chopped 3 tbps tomato sauce or pasata 250 ml fish stock ( I used water) For the tartare sauce: 200ml mayonaise 1 tsp Dijon mustard 2 tbsp capers ( whole) 6 small dill gherkins (half roughly chopped the other finely chopped) splash of Worcestershire sauce splash of chilli sauce 50g of washed and finely chopped samphire squeeze of lemon juice tsp of onion granules Method For the tartare sauce Mix together all the ingredients and leave to stand in the fridge preferably for a couple of hours or more. For the potatoes Pre cook the potatoes in water and then cool to prevent over cooking. For the hake Season the fillets with salt and pepper and then coat them with flour. Heat the olive oil in a pan and then add the fillets skin side down to fry for 2 to 3 minutes ( until lightly browned) then season with a squeeze of lemon juice. Turn the fish over an fry for a further minute or two. Remove from pan and keep warm. For the sauce and assembly When you are about to serve the fish, put some butter in a pan and add some finely chopped garlic to warm up but be careful so as not to burn. Hake alla Carlina Blanch the samphire in boiling water and drain. Add the Worcestershire sauce, gherkins, capers, tomatoes and tomato sauce to the fish stock or water. Bring to the boil and then reduce to a bout three quarters to create the sauce. When cooked and reduced add the fish back to the pan carefully to warm through in the sauce . Plate up and serve immediately with a good spoonful of tartar sauce. NOTE: If you don't make the tartare sauce yourself, don't buy a jar. Leave it out.

This year was the 180th year of this annual celebration where, for a few days, the town descends into a madness of noise and stalls and food and competitions and what not. Traffic gets re-arranged and flows in all sorts of unusual directions; car parks become fair grounds; and, dog walking spaces become car parks. You can see from my description that I am not a nautical person as I would have written it differently. Rowing and sailing and kon-tiki raft races, competitions and such like, team work and so on. There was a slight change this year apparently due to the bank holiday falling on the penultimate weekend of August. This meant that the festivities and the madness started with a family fun weekend on Saturday 29th August and ran until the firework finale on Saturday 30th with an opening ceremony (for the Regatta itself) on the evening of Wednesday 27th. The first stalls to go up were the food and drink for the family weekend and this Greek Souvlaki stall was possibly the best presented. What's more, the display stayed as clean and fresh on each day as it did on the first. It was a shame to see the souvlaki bulked up with chips but I guess that we live in a supersized world these days and if it's what the consumer wants (which they clearly did as it was very popular)... Of course it would be wrong to write about the regatta without making reference to the background. The first recorded regatta was held in 1822. In historical context, that was just over a year after Napoleon Bonaparte died on St Helena. The event recorded included a rowing race for six-oared gigs. There was also a ball held in the evening for one hunderd and twenty persons. It wasn't until 1856 that it became the Royal Regatta when Queen Victoria made an emergency stop over in the port due to bad weather and bestowed the title before she departed. There was a lot of activity on an already busy river this past week which commenced I believe with the six-oared gigs pictured here and ended with the tug of war between whalers in the boat float in what was probably the wettest day of the festival. Night time provided an interesting mix of noise and serenity depending on what was playing in the Royal Avenue Gardens and on what hour of the day or night that it was. And who was it that parked their VW Beetle on the pavement when all other cars had gone? Early mornings were quiet except for the seagulls who it has to be said, kept a pretty low profile during the day time. One can only assume that it was the sheer number of humans wandering about the gardens and the waterfront that pushed them out of their preferred foraging sites until the early hours of the morning. That was of course dog walking time, always a quiet period of the day (well usually) and one where it is actually to find a little peace and tranquility. Of course there is the canine omnipresent expectation of a free lunch and so walking Gandalf this week has been its own tug of war between the two of us over whether he could forage. It was a battle that was in his interest to lose, having rescued him a week or so before from a couple of large fishing hooks where he had managed to sniff out and half eat an old bit of bait that was lying about fully armed. He must have been worried himself as he whimpered and allowed me to remove food and fish hooks from between his teeth without even a growl. Dog walking was a particular problem duing the week culminating in the regatta proper where the press of people (some with two or three dogs apiece) on Thursday and Friday in particular was quite excessive. On these days, preferred dog walks tended to be through the backstreets to Ford and then back again the other side (South Ford) where, as is evidenced in the image, there are bananas growing. Can you beleive it, bananas growing outside in the UK. Well, in Dartmouth in particular. All in all, the regatta experience was a positive one. There were some interesting spots. Like when a spice merchant tried to sell me chutney and sauces at £9.50 a pot and where I am convinced that the shreds of turmeric in the "concoction" ( his word) were actually carrot. Or missing the point that when the sign says "Car Park Closed" that it really does include those individuals who have an electric moped parked there. We only spotted our error a couple of days later by which time the solitry vehicle had been incorporated into the fairground equipment. And it was still there when the council sweepers were cleaning up a magically empty car park (other than a bike!) that up until late the night before had been a heaving fairground. Of course the big finale is the firework display held on the Saturday. It rained for most of the day and that proved a bit of a washout for the various traders. But on a positive side, the weather had otherwise been good all week. Whether the display was in any risk of cancellation was anyone's guess but the rain stopped when predicted and the sun came out in time to go down, when predicted. We took oursleves to a vantage point up Crowthers Hill to get a view of them rather than staying in the centre of town. It was an impressive view and the image doesn't do justice to the display. Nor, it has to be said, did the formulaic "oohs" and "aahs" that were being muttered in the general vicinity and giving the whole experience a kind of pantomine quality. Which, in point of fact, it was. Now, uncharacterisically, I have failed include a link to one of my novels and so I am forced to be more blatant than usual. Here is a link to The Head Gardener which I am making available to download for free in Ebook form during September.

The most striking feature of Dartmouth is the waterfront. This is especially so at night when the yellow lights of the Quayside compete with the deep blues of the estuary. Indeed, walking along it is oddly reminiscent of a similar waterfront in the novel The Xandrian Quarters , although I didn't think that Dartmouth was in mind at the time it was written. It is the town centre and its proximity to the water that is so striking. Notwithstanding its history, what there is today is a waterfront embankment of about a mile in length running from the higher ferry near Sandquay to the lower ferry just before Bayards Cove. Much of this promenade is railed to protect the unwary from falling in the river but it is also a commercial jetty where crabbing vessels pull up alongside to unload in the early hours when the tide is right. Indeed the waterfront at night has a wonderful look and feel to it. Although it can prove to be a crowded space, especially during Regatta, both at the start of the day and at the end it can be an area of pleasant solitude. In the early morning there is the sound of the gulls (not as irritating as it might seem); the quiet hum of boats heading into and from the sea and the occasional "Morning" called out by other early risers (or dog walkers). At night there is the sound of gulls (straining slightly on the irritation levels); the occasional cries of herons as they are disturbed from their fishing vigils on the pontoons; and, the slightly over friendly greetings for those late night walkers who are trying to walk off the effects of an evenings alcohol consumption. There is just such a wonderful mix of natural and human generated light.