One of the inevitable consequences of moving towards a mediterranena diet is the increase use of vegetables without actually becomming a vegetarian. Another reason for increasing the occurrence of vegetables is the fact that they are so damned easy to prepare and cook that they fit in with a midday main meal eating pattern and accommodate the inevitable conflicts of time on a working day. Whilst the range of vegetables on offer in Dartmouth is not great, we have occasion enough to head towards Totnes or even back to Frome where we can pick up a fairly good variety. This latest recipe is the result of foraging in Frome at the Great Western store and a bus ride to Totnes early on a Saturday morning to shop at Annies. The meal is based on our go to staple of pearl barley and red lentils with a mix of vegetables, aromatics and spices. The only oil used is EVOO and only a tbsp at that for sweat the onions. Most of the other ingredients are dry fried with a little hot water being added toward the end. The result is a tasty filling meal that hits the spot and doesn't pile on the calories whilst doing its bit to minimise LDL cholesterol. Ingredients 1 medium sweet potato One large aubergine 1 plantain 1 red onion roughly cut 3 cloves garlic a small piece of fresh ginger finely chopped 1/2 cup pearl barley 1/2 cup split red lentils 8 heads of cloves 8 cardamom pods crushed 1 tsp turmeric powder 1 tsp cumin powder freshly ground black pepper 1 cinnamon stick (Ceylon variety) 1 tsp coriander powder 1 tsp smoked paprika 1 tbsp EVOO pinch salt hot water as required Method First, cook the pearl barley and lentils together in water. This can be done in advance or left to simmer whilst you get on with the other tasks. Roughly chop the onion and drop that in a large heated frying pan ( having brought the EVOO up to heat). Fry carefully stirring occasionally to prevent sticking or burning. turn the heat down low. Break the cinnamon stick into 3 or 4 pieces and add to the pan. crsh the cardamom pods with the flat of a knife and drop those itno the pan together with the heasd of the cloves. Str a few times to mix and prevent sticking. Chop the sweet potato into bit size chunks. No need to peel. Add to the large pan abd bring the heat back up a bit. Stir occasionally ( 5 minutes or so) Peel and slice the ginger into strips and add to the pan, stirring to mix in. Peel, crush and slice the garlic cloves and add those to the pan. Cut a quarter of the aubergine up into large chunks and put those straight into the pan, stir and leave. Slice the remaining aubergine into short strips about 1/2 cm thick and set those aside. Slice the plantain into 1/2 cm rounds and set aside. Once the sweet potatoes have been in the pan for 8 minutes, add the powdered spices, stir for 30 seconds and then add the remaining aubergine and the water (about 100ml). Lid and leave to steam for a few minutes ( say five). Finally fold in the cooked lentils and pearl barley and if necessary a little water to ensure a gravy. Lid again and leave for a further 3 minutes. Serve! Observations The pearl barley and lentils go on together and take about 40 minutes to cook. use about 3:1 water to dry mix otherwise there will be too much liquid at the end when you come to add to the curry. This should give you a moist, slightly creamy mixture, with the barley retaining some bite. We had added okra on occasions as it makes an interestingly tactlie variation. The trick is to cook htem so they dont release the mucilage into the dish ( unless you want to do that - like their use in gumbo). what we do is to dry fry them until they start to char and then set aaside whislt we prepare the rest of hte dish. Then at the end, either back in a dry pan for a couple of minutes or a minute in hte microwave, served on top of the plated dish. We have. substituted a number of different vegetables - beetroot, fennel, cauliflower, mooli even sprouts. The important point is to add the slower cooking vegetables in first and in the right portion size so that everything comes together at hte end as a cooked product. Vegetables are so convenient and usually fairly forgiving. With the aubergines, we added some of the cubed piec es early so that they could contribute to the sauce texture itself and then added the visually individual pieces later to retain theri shape.

I was looking for something sweet that wasn't going to run up the calories and was going to be at least a little bit heart healthy. That clearly meant reducing the fat content as well as the type of fat, removing the flour and reducing the amount of sugar in the recipe. Obviously it needed to be a cake - a cake that was moist and kept for a good while. A search of Chat Gpt came up with an orange cake substituting flour with ground almonds and using olive oil and not butter or margarine. Ingredients: 2 whole oranges 200 g ground almonds 4 large eggs 90 g caster sugar 60 ml extra-virgin olive oil 1 tsp baking powder ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda Pinch of salt Optional: vanilla essence and/or orange extract Method: Put the whole, unpeeled oranges in a saucepan, cover with water and gently simmer for 60–75 minutes, until very soft. Drain and allow them to cool. Cut them up, remove any pips, then purée the entire oranges, including the peel. The. heat removes the bitterness ,really it does! Heat the oven to 170°C fan / 190°C conventional. Grease and /or line a cake tin. Beat the eggs and sugar until well combined and slightly aerated. Beat in the 60 ml EVOO and vanilla / orange extract, if using. Stir in the orange purée. Fold in the ground almonds, baking powder, bicarbonate and salt. Pour into the tin and spread evenly. Bake for 40–50 minutes. A skewer should come out with moist crumbs rather than wet batter. Leave it to cool completely before cutting — the texture firms as it cools. Observations: The cake makes 12 even slices when set out in my 24cm square baking pan. These come in at around 220 kcal per slice. in fact the high level nutritional pitch is:- Calories per slice: approximately 220 kcal Protein: approximately 5 g Carbohydrates: approximately 17 g Fat: approximately 15 g Of which saturated 2 g Fibre: approximately 2.5 g This is a lot lower than 325 kcal a slice, 25g carbohydrate and saturated fat of 15 g. In fact ,the cake is a particularly good alternative from a cardiovascular perspective. Although almonds and olive oil are calorie-dense, their predominantly unsaturated fats are generally preferable to the saturated fats in butter.if. You are looking for cholesterol-reduction, the most significant advantage is the lower saturated fat content, rather than simply the reduction in calories. In terms of storage, the cake will last in a fridge really well for about a week wrapped in baking parchment and a slice with a cup of tea is quite satisfactory.

Vampires, mortgages and one thoroughly disagreeable dwarf In 2008, the world's financial system came perilously close to collapse. Banks failed, fortunes disappeared, governments panicked and regulators were left wondering quite how it had all happened. It was, depending on your point of view, a catastrophe, an embarrassment or an opportunity. But what if the whole business had taken place in a world populated by dwarfs, witches, vampires and werewolves? That is the rather improbable starting point for Seagrum the Dwarf, a darkly comic fantasy novel in which the financial excesses of the real world find their counterparts in an altogether less respectable imaginary one. Meet Seagrum Seagrum is a dwarf. He is also a mercenary, a thief, an opportunist and, by almost any reasonable measure, an unpleasant individual. He is not particularly interested in saving the world. He has little regard for authority, even less for conventional morality, and a healthy appreciation of anything that might make him richer. Unfortunately for everyone concerned, he has a habit of becoming involved in matters considerably larger than himself. Among those whose paths cross his are Persephone, a witch with good reason to dislike him; Vinegorod, a vampire with an eye for business; and the Magister of the Hue and Cry, an organisation responsible for maintaining a degree of order in a world where order is frequently in short supply. None is entirely what they seem, although Seagrum makes relatively little effort to seem anything other than what he is. The business of being a vampire Vampires have traditionally been associated with blood, immortality and an unfortunate tendency to avoid daylight. In Seagrum the Dwarf, they have discovered something potentially even more rewarding: finance. The Death Pledge, a financial arrangement bearing a passing resemblance to the modern mortgage, offers opportunities that are difficult for an enterprising vampire to resist. And where there are financial opportunities, there are inevitably people prepared to exploit them. As the business expands, the distinction between financial ingenuity and outright lunacy becomes increasingly difficult to identify. The authorities, naturally, have everything under control. Or at least that is what they would prefer everyone to believe. A fantasy with a familiar problem Although the novel draws inspiration from the financial crisis of 2008, it isn't a textbook about banking, mortgages or economics. No knowledge of financial services is required, and readers who have never encountered a mortgage-backed security need not worry. The financial crisis provides the underlying absurdity. The story itself belongs to Seagrum and the extraordinary collection of individuals who have the misfortune to encounter him. There are plots, betrayals, magical complications, political manoeuvrings and a fair amount of violence. There are also dwarfs who behave like dwarfs, vampires who behave like bankers, and regulators who occasionally behave like neither. The result is a fantasy in which greed, ambition, self-interest and incompetence are hardly confined to the human race. Not quite your conventional fantasy hero Readers looking for a noble warrior destined to defeat evil and restore harmony to the world may find Seagrum something of a disappointment. He has no particular desire to restore harmony. Indeed, he is frequently responsible for disturbing it. Nevertheless, there is a certain consistency to his character. He understands what he wants, generally knows how to obtain it and is remarkably unconcerned about what others think of his methods. Whether these qualities make him a hero is a question best left to the reader. About the novel Seagrum the Dwarf is a standalone, darkly comic fantasy by David Payne, combining the conventions of fantasy adventure with a satirical look at the financial world. Its inspiration lies partly in the extraordinary events surrounding the financial crisis, but its characters inhabit a world entirely their own. And although the financial crisis may be familiar, the manner in which events unfold is rather less predictable. After all, when vampires become bankers and werewolves become regulators, what could possibly go wrong? Seagrum the Dwarf — by David Payne Available to download free from TheQuay. Visit TheQuay

As a part of our new outlook on food, we have identified the need for a bread with oat or barley flour. More specifically we are looking for nutrition that provides about 1g of beta-glucan for when we are likely to miss our daily target of 3g through porridge or pearl barley. Beta-glucan is a type of soluble fibre found mainly in oats and barley. In the gut it forms a gel that helps prevent some bile acids from being reabsorbed; the liver then uses cholesterol from the blood to make replacement bile acids, helping to lower LDL (“bad”) cholesterol. Good sources include porridge oats, pinhead/steel-cut oats, oat bran, oat flour, pearl barley and barley flour. The recognised effective daily intake is 3 g of oat or barley beta-glucan, ideally eaten regularly as part of a balanced diet. We went simple on this and sourced some organic oat flour from Doves Farm to pair it with an equal amount of strong white bread flour. The recipe was a basic bread mix as follows:- Ingredients 250g strong white bread flour 250g organic oat flour 7g sachet of fast acting yeast 5g salt 400ml blood warm water (80% hydration) 1/2 tsp EVOO for oiling the pan Method Mix all dry ingredients together in a bowl. Add the blood warm water and mix well with a wooden spoon. Flour your hands and then knead or stretch and turn as you prefer to get the gluten acting in the white flour. The oat flour has no gluten so the white flour has to do the work for both. Cover and leave for about an hour to rise. Then stretch and turn (easier than kneading given that there is 80% hydration in the mix). Repeat a couple more times after about 30 to 60 minutes. Prepare a shallow cake tin by lining it with baking parchment. We used a square one about 24 cms Stretch or roll out the dough to fit the tin and then leave it covered with a damp cloth for 30-60 minutes to rise. Prepare the oven at 220C fan and then bake in hte centre of the oven for around 30 minutes. It is cooked if the bread sounds hollow when tapped on the base. Turn out and allow to cool before cutting into 8 slices. Observations We avoided olive oil in the mix or the addition of any honey although there are recipes out there. We wanted to keep simple bread, simply made. The resulting bread cut into 8 slices was really quite good and delivered about 1.2g beta glucan per slice with 7.7g protein for 225 Kcal , 44g carbohydrate, 3.6g fibre and 2.3g fat (unsaturated). We were surprised in a good way by the extent to which the gluten in the white flour worked to structure the bread. It accepted a combination of kneading and stretch and turn techniques over about three hours of rising. We baked it focaccia style in a square shallow tin that was lined and oiled with the EVOO for about 20 minutes or at least until the loaf sounded hollow when tapped. We shaped and actually rolled the dough to fit the tin as it wasn’t as soft as focaccia dough despite the 80% hydration. The loaf will provide us with about a week's supply of additional beta-glucan where we fall short on pearl barley, pinhead oats and oat milk. We’ll probably put it the freezer but will keep the first batch in the fridge to see how long it keeps fresh having been sliced and wrapped in greaseproof paper. We also used a barley flour mix (250g) to strong white flour (250g) and treated it the same as the oat version. If anything the taste was superior with the barley mix. It was stickier at the same hydration level (80%) and so was a little more of a challenge to manoeuvre but we used bread paddles ( or whatever they are called). The result is shown below:

Mackerel is a fantastic and health giving fish. It is packed with Omega-3 and offer about 50g of protein for 500 calories on a decent sized fish. For a heart helthy diet is is arguably a must. Of course like most fish there are the bones but you can always get your fishmonger to fillet it for you if that is a worry. On the other hand, you could always cook it whole and remove the bones after it has cooked. Mackerel is a bit scarce in off of Dartmouth at hte moment and that is a shame because it wasn't so many years ago that you could see the shoals bubbling and boiling on the surface of the water on the way out to the castle. However I am not in Dartmouth at the moment, I am visiting Newcastle where it seems the beasts are in good supply. A trip to Grainger Market yielded a fine specimen for lunch today and I decided to pair it with plantain and beetroot bought from a well stocked greengrocers also in the market. The structure of the meal and style of cooking is very much in line with our new approach to eating in terms of carbohdyrate and fat content. Basically no 'gratuitous' carbs and olive oils prmarily the only oil in place. Lots of vegetables. Obviously using an oily fish we were going to major on omega 3 oils but that too was in the right direction. In a word the main objectives of our diet are :- weight loss ( by way of calorie deficit) protein intake for muscle preservation heart health (blood pressure and cholesterol) It is more or less a mediterranean style diet that we have adopted but anyway, down to hte business of cooking. Ingredients 1 mackerel (about 345g) 1/2 a plantain 1 baked beetroot 1/2 a florence fennel bulb 6 garlic cloves 50g cooked pearl barley 1 large ripe tomato sliced 50g washed baby spinach Juice of half a lemon 2 tsp EVOO Method Preheat the oven to 200C (180C fan). Line a baking tray with baking paper. For the mackerel either have it gutted by the fishmonger of gut it yourself and place it on baking paper . Add 1 tsp EVOO and a squeeze of lemon juice and the fold up en papillote. Place the parcel onto the lined baking tray. (The lining is for the beetroot) Wash and top and tail the beetroot and cut into segments or quarters depending upon size and lay these on the baking paper alongside the fish. When the oven is at heat, place the tray on the middle shelve and bake about 20 - 25 minutes depending upon size. Check after 20 minutes and return if not fully cooked. Peel and slice the half plantain and slice the half fennel bulb. Peel the 6 garlic cloves. Set all aside until the fish has been in the oven for 10 minutes. Meanwhile lay out the washed spinach on the serving plate and wash and slice the tomato and set aside. When the fish has been in the oven for 10 minutes heat a frying pan and add 2 tsp olive oil. get the oil hot and then turn down. Add the garlic cloves and fry for about 2-3 minutes, stiring all the time. Then add the fennel and stir (occasionally now). After a further 3 minutes and the plantain and turn the heat down lower and stop stirring for a while. Flip the plantain slices after about 3 minutes and cook o the other side . After they have had a further 3 minutes turn off the heat. Check the fish after it has been in ht oven 20 minutes and once cooked remove from oven. Microwave the pre-cooked pearl barley for about 1 minute until hot. Remove the head of the mackerel ( so that it fits the plate) and lay the fish on hte bed of spinach. Place the pearl barley, fennel , beetroot and plantain around the fish as you see appropriate and poor the juices from the papillote packet onto the fish and the pearl barley. Place the sliced tomato on the dish and add a good squeeze of fresh lemon juice. Ready to serve Observations The plantain was a little too underripe and so I did not get the banana flavour that I was looking for. Also the dish was served as a mix of hot and cold ingreients (hot fish, cooking liquor, beetroot and pearl barley - the rest cold.) It could all equally have been served cold. Notwithstanding the above, it was a really good plate of fish complemented by the aromatic vegetables, offering 50g protein and the whole meal taking about 925 Kcal. The vegetables in the main provided a pleasant crunch to the meal and left a very satisfied sense of wholeness after eating.

There is apparently a tuna season in the UK and it must be about now because the fish has started making appearances in the local fish stall in Dartmouth. We were intrigued by the weird cut that sat behind the head of the tuna and so naturally, we asked what it was. Collar, was the answer. Still none the wiser, we got into a discussion on the various cuts . At one point the fishmonger rummaged under some other fish and pulled out a triangular packet which he proceeded to be unwrap with a kind of reverence. “Tuna belly,” he offered, “ my favourite cut.” He added enthusiastically. Apparently it was the cut called Otoro , marbled with omega 3 fats and very rich in flavour. We couldn’t work out how we would cook the collar so we selected a couple of pieces of otoro for the days meal and headed off home. One the way back to the Apartment we thought about the tuna collar a bit more and by the time we had reached the Quay, we had determined that we ought to give it a go. We did an about face and headed back to the market, fully expecting the cut to have been sold but no, it was still there waiting for us. “We’d like the tuna collar,” says I. “Subject to price , “ I added as an after thought. Just as well, I think for he popped the cut on the scales and with a look of horror mouthed to his colleague, "I can't charge them that." "Well, we've got to look after the locals," he said before naming price. "Done," says I enthusiastically as I did a mental note on the state of my bank account at that time. The transaction being complete we both headed home with our packets of fish. The Otoro was the subject of that days main meal and will be dealt with elsewhere. The collar was the subject of Friday night's meal. Oddly enough the cooking of this fish caused me a substantial mass of anxiety. I put it down to age mostly and the general reduction in confidence that I had been feeling these days. It was after all a fairly straight forward cook. About 20 - 25 minutes on high heat in the oven and then 5 minutes under a hot grill. Served on a bed of salad vegatabels and with olive oil and lemon juice drizzled over. Well that was the executive summary. The issue was in the detail. Did we cook the fish skin side up or skin side down? How did we prepare it? How did we get it from hot oven to hot grill ( the cooker was new to us)? Some parts were thinner than others - would they burn? A fair bit of research went into the matter and Chat Gpt seemed to be the most helpful. In the end we decided to cook it at 250C (fan) for 20-25 minutes because it was about 6cm thick at its widest. We wrapped the thinner part with foil to prevent burning. It only needed patting dry and sprinkling with sea salt by way of preparation. After a fair debate - not quite an argument - we agreed to cook it skin side down and then to flip it over for the last 5 minutes grilling. Switching from oven to grill proved to be fairly straight forward. The image shows the collar prepared for the oven. After 20 minutes or so of cooking at 250C we opened the oven door and successfully set off our fire alarm and caused the fire suppression system to come alive and scan the kitchen with what seemed like murderous intent. Fortunately the water mister didn't fire off and we got windows and doors open to reduce the impact. We could then turn the collar over and get the grill switched over on high. Back in it went, smelling wonderful, for a further 5 minutes of blistering heat. Prior to the fire alarm excitement we had prepared a large Christmas sized platter with salad vegetables to bed the collar on. Tomatoes, beetroot, watercress, rocket and preserved artichokes were the vegetables of choice. We also had an olive oil & lemon mix todress the salad rather than the fish which we wanted as unadulterated as possible. After 5 minutes under the grill came the moment of truth. This time the alarms did not go off because I had temporarily turned it off. The fish came out looking like it had taken a fair mount of heat - which of course it had - and went with relative ease onto the platter skin side down and meat facing up. It looked and smelled wonderful and whilst we spent a bit of time tidying up our kitchen and making space at our diminutive bistro table, it sat there in all its glory. The images don't really do it justice and I never cease to be amazed at how much is missed from an image compared to the real life experience . Here are a few shots of the meal as presented. The fish itself was rich and well, meaty. The bones and the connective tissues provided the opportunity to make a fish stock the next day which had to go into the freezer until we found a use for it. All in all that was a culinery experience like no other and it is certainly one I owudl want to repeat. The cost of hte collar was quite hefty but no more than we paid out at Christmas last year for ltwo large pieces of halibut.

This is a message to my older self who at some point will forget what goes into things to assemble certain kitchen basics. This is a Bechamel-like sauce but without butter, fat or oil. I use it for lasagna and where a Bechamel is called for. It reminds me of a sauce that was served over cannelloni when I used to holiday as a child in Spain. (It was the year of the moon landing - I remember watching clips with my dad in a shop window at the time.) I think the restaurant or bistro was in some backstreet in Sitges before it grew to the creature it is today. It was just a family run restaurant - no doubt long gone but the taste remains! Ingredients 1500 ml milk 150 g strong plain flour 1 carrot 1 stick celery 1 onion 2 cloves garlic 6 -10 whole cloves 1 stick cinnamon (2 inches ish) 6 black peppercorns Method Pour the milk into a large pan. Chop the carrot and celery into thirds. Press the cloves into the peeled whole onion. Peel and crush the garlic. Add all the vegetables and the spices to the milk. Place the pan on a gentle heat for about 20 minutes then set aside for a further 20 minutes. Meanwhile, mix the flour to a smooth paste with cold water. Remove the vegetables and cinnamon from the milk and place the milk back on a low heat. Add the flour paste and stir whilst heating to near boiling .. When the sauce thickens remove from the heat as it is done. Observations This is about 99kcal per 100ml using whole milk. Don’t heat the milk on too fierce a heat and stir constantly or the pan will stick. Use it in place of bechamel sauce for a lower fat option.

There has been a radical change in the sale of fish at the Dartmouth Market stall. The previous fish man (who has been selling fish for about 50 years) has finally retired and handed the batton on to a new set of faces. The style of presentation has changed from eclectic and quirky to organised and, if I'm honest, a little too clinical but the fish looks good. I think I am going to miss the availability of fish species that Mark had on offer but on a trial run for squid yesterday, the new guys came up trumps with some excellent and tasty molluscs. So we went for squid pad thai because it was a quick preparation and cook even allowing for cleaning and preparing the squid. It also fits in with our revised eating habits of having our main meal in the middle of the day. Purists will challenge the pad thai bit as we used samphire instead of beansprouts but we make no apologies. Ingredients: 300g fresh whole squid ( roughly 3 squid) a good handful of samphire 90g dried rice noodles 2 cloves garlic grated 20g piece fresh ginger grated 3 spring onions 2 tbsp tamarind paste 1 tsp nam pla 1 tbsp ketjap manis 30g crushed plain peanuts 1 tbsp olive oil This provides two portions of about 430 kcal each (≈30 g protein). Method: Soak the rice noodles in hot not boiling water for about 30 minutes. Clean and prepare the quid and slice into rings. Then fry the squid in the olive oil until opaque and set aside. Mix tamarind paste, fish sauce, and kechap manis together in a small bowl. Stir-fry the garlic, chilies, and drained noodles with the sauce until the noodles absorb the liquid. Fold in the cooked squid and fresh samphire right at the end so the samphire stays crisp and salty, then top with crushed peanuts Observations: I didn’t clean the squid fully and so had sand still in the end of the squid tubes. Also I didn’t check the samphire for woody parts and so had some tough pieces that were not consumable. Not had that before so will take more care in selection in the future. Otherwise an excellent meal in line with our new dietary objectives .

The flooded valley that the River Dart runs through does some interesting things with clouds, rain, mist and fog. None of them more strange than recently when on a walk around the boat float, we noticed wafts of grey smoke floating up through the town behind where we live. We assumed it was a fire of some sort or a barbecue that had gotten out of control but it was weird that there were no emergency services hanging around. Naturally curious (or just plain nosey) we wandered along the South Embankment to locate the source of the fire. There clearly wasn't a source on this side of the river and looking out towards the estuary we were confronted with the site of a narrow blanket of smoke originating on the Kingswear bank and hugging the river as it crossed over to our side. It didn't smell like smoke and it didn't behave like smoke. That was probably because in fact it wasn't smoke at all. A search of the internet showed no clear signs of localised fires although there was a boat or caravan fire about 7 miles away. This event was not it. It took a while to find but eventually we discovered that the thing was a sea fog or Haar. Thinking about it, it would have taken quite a fire to produce the amount of 'smoke' that this fog clearly was. That is especially so if you take a look at the lack of visibility that occured at its best or worst . The estuary mouth was completely obscured and Dartmouth castle was nowhere to be seen as you can see from the following images. So what is a haar? A sea haar (sometimes called a sea fret) is a dense coastal fog that forms when warm, moist air passes over colder seawater. The air cools rapidly, causing the moisture within it to condense into a blanket of mist or fog that can drift ashore and dramatically reduce visibility. Although the term is most commonly associated with the east coast of Scotland, the same phenomenon can occur anywhere around the UK coast where the sea is significantly colder than the air above it. In Dartmouth, the recent event that many people noticed was likely caused by warm, humid air moving in from the south-west over the still-cool waters of the English Channel. As the air cooled over the sea, fog developed and was then carried into the Dart Estuary by light onshore winds. Once established, the haar can be remarkably localised, with thick fog covering the waterfront while higher ground a short distance away remains clear. A sea haar often appears suddenly, giving the impression that it is "rolling in" from the sea. Temperatures can fall by several degrees within minutes, and visibility may drop to only a few hundred metres. Around Dartmouth, this can create dramatic scenes where Kingswear, the estuary and vessels on the river seem to disappear into a grey-white curtain, before re-emerging as the fog slowly lifts later in the day. In short, a sea haar is not smoke or pollution but a natural weather phenomenon caused by the meeting of warm moist air and colder sea water.

fancied some scones with clotted cream and jam recently and so researched a suitable recipe based on Mrs Beeton. Since our downsizing move a year ago we haven't had access to all the equipment we used to have and so didn't have any means to cut out the scones. We therefore went for a simple round to be divided into 8 segments. We tried a number of recipes and ended up with the following Ingredients 250 g self-raising flour Pinch of salt 60 g cold butter, diced 25–40 g caster sugar (we used 28g) 140–150 ml milk 1 tsp vanilla extract A little milk or beaten egg for glazing ( we skipped this) Method Heat the oven to 220°C / 200°C fan. Line a baking tray with baking paper. Rub the butter into the flour and salt until it resembles fine breadcrumbs. Stir in the sugar, if using. Add the vanilla essence to the milk and then add most of the milk and mix with a knife until a soft dough forms. Add the remaining milk only if needed. Tin the bowl gently bring together. Do not knead. Pat into a round about 20 cm (8 inches) across and 2–3 cm thick. Place on the tray and score 8 segments on the top, cutting down about half way through the mix. Use a wet knife if it sticks. Brush with milk or egg if using. Bake for 18–22 minutes or a little over until well risen and golden. remove from oven . Will sound slightly hollow if done. Place on a wire rack to cool. Serve warm with butter, jam (blueberry) , and clotted cream. The round should be cut into wedges.

The following is a base for chip shop and katsu curry. In other words when you want a quick fix artificial curry. Ingredients 2 tbsp chicken fat 1 tbsp flour 1 to 2 tbsp medium roasted curry powder 1 tsp turmeric ( for katsu curry option see Method) 3 tbsps of stock from a roasted chicken carcass - the stuff you normally make the gravy with Water to dilute as appropriate Method Make a roux and then stir in the curry powder and turmeric if you’re making katsu. If you can get authentic Japanese curry stick use this and not the recipe curry powder and turmeric. Add the chicken stock and stir on a medium heat. Dilute as necessary with water depending on how thick you want the sauce Cook and stir on low heat for further 5 minutes keeping consistency as you want with added water . Job done! Observations I would use authentic curry stick like S&B to make katsu but the above is a reasonable substitute if it is not available. This recipe is for chip shop or Chinese style curry and not for mixing into your favourite real curry! The chicken stick should be a solid jelly when cold . I used the chicken fat that had coated the stock in the fridge as it was available. If that doesn’t appeal then any oil or ghee or even butter if you wish.

Rightly or wrongly this was one of tastiest and most colourful pad thais that I have made in recent times. Technically it is not a pad thai, it is more like a warm salad but I don't actually care about that. I couldn't get beansprouts separately so had to buy a pepper and peashoot salad pack from M & S. The original recipe source some iterations back is from Rick Stein's Far Eastern Odyssey. The origins of the dish are not very ancient, arising as it did in the 1940s driven by government and nationalism -not to mention a shortage of rice (hence noodles). Ingredients 1 Pack Flat rice noodles 1 tbsp oil (see method) large piece of fresh ginger peeled and sliced 3 cloves garlic sliced 3 spring onions chopped into rounds good hand full of cashew nuts chopped small 1 red chilli pepper de-seeded and sliced 2 large duck breasts skin on 1 pack pea shoot and pepper salad (M&S) 2 tbsp tamarind sauce 2 tbps fish sauce (nam Pla) 2 tsps kecap manis Method Prepare the noodles Bring a pot of water to the boil and add 3 of the noodle sticks to cook for about 5 minutes or until soft. Remove from the heat and drain. Then rinse with cold water to prevent them cooking further. Drain and set aside. Prepare the aromatics If not already done, peel and slice the garlic and the ginger and de-seed and slice the red chilli. Trim and slice the spring onions. Chop the nuts. Set all aside. Prepare the sauce Mix the nam pla, tamarind sauce and kecap manis together in a small bowl and set aside. Pan fry the duck breasts Heat a large pan without oil and then place both duck breasts skin side down. Sear for about 5 minutes before flipping over and repeating. The time allocated is dependent upon how well cooked you want the meat and how thick the breasts are. We prefer the centre to be pink and so we keep the cooking time short. When cooked remove from the pan and set aside to rest for 5 minutes. Assemble and final cook Either remove the duck fat from the pan and use 1 tbsp sunflower oil or, better, keep the duck fat and use that to fry. Add the garlic, ginger and chilli and fry for a couple of minutes on a high heat stirring to prevent burning. Turn down the heat a little and add the sauce and stir well before adding the drained noodles ( which at this stage should be cool / cold). Heat and stir for awhile and then add the pea shoot and pepper salad and mix in quickly, allowing to heat for no more than a couple of minutes. Add the chopped nuts and give a final mix. Slice the duck breasts thinly. Serve the pad thai on warmed plates and top with the sliced duck breast. Observations Peanuts are more traditional than cashew nuts. Beansprouts instead of mixed stir fry vegetables. Duck breast is a lovely meat to have with this dish but alternatives are steak, chicken, prawn or tofu. A squeeze of lime juice would have aded a little extra flavour. Don't have too much sauce, it detracts from the overall flavour of the ingredients.