Another menu for Team GB.

Not long ago, supper clubbers joined us to cheer Mo Farah to glory and to celebrate the success of Team GB at London 2012.  Having sobbed and cheered my way through lots of Paralympic coverage, we're ready to do it again. Our menu has a slightly international feel, journeying to France with the starter,  the Middle East with the main and uniting the best of British berries and indulgent USA for the pudding.

To start
Pork rillettes, pear chutney, homemade honey and walnut soda bread or
pear, walnut and blue cheese salad (v).

To follow
Lamb or mint and feta cakes (v) with chilli, pistachio and rose petal sauce, cous cous.

To finish
Celebration brownies, strawberry shots and strawberry and black pepper ice cream.

Let them eat cake

After seeing and eating such an epic amount of cake with my lovely cake buddy (we managed amazing cheesecake, lemon layer, tower of sin and apple and cinnamon) and meeting so many passionate bakers, it seems right that this blog post should be written while munching leftovers for breakfast.

Lynn, the bakelady welcomes us all.

Staring, drooling, waiting patiently...

Last night's Clandestine Cake Club was delicious and delightful. Brought together by Lynn and hosted by the lovely Alana at Fredericks. The real stars of the show however were the cakes, all baked to the theme of Homespun Harmony which ignited imaginations and resulted in classic and new creations. Be prepared, these photos will make you want cake, now. My memory is a haze of sugar so the titles are largely guessed, apologies if I get it wrong.

Lemon and raspberry roulade made by Edinburgh Foody.

Lemon Polenta cake with Limoncello syrup by Edinburgh Eats. See her post on the event here, and get the recipes too.

Classic Victoria Sponge by Stephanie of Sunday Brunch Club fame, following a Delia recipe.

I snapped this beauty and when I went back to check what it was, it was gone... can anyone identify?

Tower of sin by Great British Bake Off contestant, Bakers Bunny, lurking in calorific glory in the shadows!

A pink treat, white chocolate and raspberry by Ideas Spotting.

The cake line up.

Apple and olive oil cake (not sure who made it) in the background and unidentifed in the fore...

Tucking in at last.

Apple and Cinnamon Cake made by Lynn, the recipe is here, happy baking!

What it says on the tub.

The final piece of my rough and ready raspberry and white chocolate cake.

A pimped up, grand version of the raspberry and white chocolate cake with raspberry buttercream.

The end. Well, not quite.

Here is the take away plate which I duly shared with C and still had some for breakfast. Rather than simply stuffing my face, I tried to take a bit more time over the flavours back home. Next time, I'll take notes at the event too!

Clockwise from white sponge - Angel cake with rhubarb and strawberry compote, Apple and olive oil cake, cinnamon and apple cake with cinnamon cream frosting, sour cream and blueberry cake, Dundee marmalade cake, lemon polenta cake with limoncello syrup and candied orange.

Here are our tasting notes:

Angel cake - as light as angel's wings, delicious texture (not unlike milk roll), easy to eat in vast quantities, intensely fruity compote. In all, rather like a deconstructed summer pudding. Great alternative to more traditional cake.

Apple and olive oil cake - a hybrid cake - somewhere between a sponge and a fruit cake, bold juicy flavours, perfect with tea.

Cinnamon and apple cake - made to an original recipe by Lynn (above). This is a dense cake as you might expect from an adopted muffin recipe, apparently easy to vary by replacing the apple with choc chips, finished with a super smooth frosting so tasty you could devour by the spoonful.

Sour cream and blueberry - a delicious, moist cake, with a zingy blueberry filling which contrasted well with the sugary icing.

Dundee marmalade - a real classic, looked inviting and tasted moreish. Job well done.

Lemon polenta - the polenta gives an intriguing texture to this sticky, sweet sensation. One of the most inventive flavour combinations and Katey even made her own limoncello - now that's homespun harmony if ever we saw it.

Desperate to get my hands on some more recipes so please share with Lynn, with me, with all! And please leave your comments, how many slices of cake did you manage? Did you have a favourite? Which one did you make? I'm curious.

Waitrose Kitchen

I have often sneaked a copy of Waitrose Food Illustrated onto the conveyor belt at the end of a shop and happily thumbed its pages, so I was definitely intrigued and excited when I saw a billboard featuring Delia and Heston and the new Waitrose Kitchen launch edition shortly afterwards in stores. The magazine has a new look but the content is mainly a refreshed version of the Waitrose Food Illustrated formula; that works for me.

As for the Smith/Blumenthal partnership, I love the idea but feel it got off to a shaky start with Delia's admission that the two have "only just met" (at a recent photo shoot). Could they not have made the effort before? I get the feeling that they'd probably rather not work together but they were offered a deal which neither could refuse and valued at £10m, who wouldn't work with anyone and break their "policy against advertising commercial brands"? If only the egos and value didn't make it all too contrived...

Then again, who am I kidding? It has the makings of a great campaign, TV ads are taking over entire commercial breaks at a time and even if it's not a credible pairing, I won't resist the weekly recipe cards or ingredient pimping. Well done Waitrose.

Beetroot daydreams

I was oh so excited to see bunches of early beetroot on supermarket shelves this week and cannot wait to experiment with some new recipes. Last year, despite creating what looked like a murder scene in the kitchen, I made batches of hearty beetroot soup (based on a trusty Delia recipe in her Soup Collection). This year, I’m going to attempt to create a lighter dish with the wonderful, succulent texture and delightful, intense colour.

My early memories of beetroot are tied to Tuesday Family Teas at my Gran’s House before swimming lessons. Alongside trays and trays and even ironing boards full of delicious home baking, we sat down to corned beef pie or a very English type of pizza (my Gran’s invention) with homemade crinkle cut chips and beetroot (sometimes pickled, sometimes boiled) on the side. There was something incredibly comforting about those gatherings and it’s probably because of this association that I believe in beetroot as a wholesome, good food. It also intrigued me as a bit of a rebel vegetable with its deceptive skin, vibrant colour and brilliant ability to stain, far removed from the humble pea or other boring, green alternatives.

So, I was looking for some inspiration and found the flavour combinations here. They really captured my imagination and if I can bring just an ounce of this style to Charlie and Evelyn’s Table, my beetroot daydreams will be fulfilled and I’ll have a dish that tastes every bit as good as it looks. And, if that is not enough to convince even the non beetroot fans, I didn’t just dream it, beetroot is also very good for you.