life locally... Chriskitch, Muswell Hill

Rare is the day when both Marto and I both separately decide that we want to visit the same cafe on the same day. Independently we had both discovered Chriskitch last week and waited until the weekend so that we could go together. I was keen to try the coffee and cake and admire the vintage furniture; Marto told me that he came across the cafe on the wine forum he frequents and was excited that a chef who had worked with Gordon Ramsey and Alain Ducasse was serving food just down the road from us.

We were not disappointed. We started with cake. Lemon pound cake, to be exact. It was beautiful. I had a nice latte, Marto a mint tea. We were sat at a huge butchers block with vintage school chairs, in the enormous front window, full of light. Under foot, vintage floorboards from a factory in Islington. There were newspapers. (although we had the baby with us, so reading was impossible. but it would have been a lovely place to read, sans bebe). Sugar cubes in vintage tins.

The salads tempted us. A perfectly roasted chicken leg, drizzled with a teeny bit of oil and sprinkled with salt, to serve. A plate of a gorgeous selection of salads, as pretty on the plate as in the mouth. My favourite was leeks, peas, broccoli and samphire but they were all delicious. The chicken leg served with roasted vegetables. Mouthful after mouthful of sweet roasted garlic, pulled out of it's skin, crunchy slightly bitter almost charred lemon and chili falling apart and off the stalk. Roasted red onion. Better even than Marto cooks at home, and that is saying something. It has to be a good restaurant these days for the food to be better than we eat at home.

And then a pudding. How could you not when the owner comes over to discuss the food and recommends the treacle tart to finish. A macchiato and a little bit of chocolate torte with it for Marto (courtesy of Chris, the owner, because as he put it, "you've got to have a little bit chocolate with a macchiato").
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Chriskitch
7a Tetherdown, Muswell Hill

Melancholy

PMT makes me feel like I want to stab someone. Not that I ever would, of course, but it makes me angry. {what a good job Husband is away}. Beyond grumpy. And melancholy. Which, by some coincidence, was the subject of The Delicious Miss Dahl this evening. Whilst Sophie made a variety of soups and chocolate dishes I grumped my way through a bowl of potato and leek soup and another one of salad. Our computer must have PMT too as it kept stopping and thinking and it took every ounce of self restraint not to thump it hard and throw it out of the window. And then, yet again, Sophie quoted from another of my favourite poems. Either I am extremely predicatable in my tastes or Sophie is...

Razors pain you
Rivers are damp
Acids stain you
And drugs cause cramp
Guns aren't lawful
Nooses give
Gas smells awful
You might as well live.

-Dorothy Parker

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photo of Sophie Dahl via the BBC website

Fudge By Post

Last week I received a very tasty parcel through my letterbox. A beautiful box of homemade Scilly fudge complete with stunning artwork by Cornish artist Tom Holland.

Veronica Farm Fudge is made by Issy's mother at their home in Bryher which is one of the islands which make up the Isles of Scilly. Issy is the author of the blog Cupcakes & Cornwall where she chronicles a mixture of recipes, food and cornish related things. And it was through a giveaway that she hosted that I received a pick me up parcel last week.

Veronica Farm Fudge is everything that you could hope for in fudge: rich, creamy, sweet but not sickly. In my head the Isles of Scilly are bathed in sunshine and I swore I could taste it as I ate my fudge on a cold rainy November morning in London.

And best still, the fudge is available by post, payable online. A few simple clicks and it can be winging it's sunny way to you or someone of your choosing.

As usual, The The Times reports on trends when they are almost over pt 1

Today they report the trend for cupcakes, just as other bloggers are proclaiming them over (or at least, the trend has been around for a. long. time)*.

I for one still enjoy an occasional cupcake as a treat for afternoon tea (and my sporadic posting about Primrose Bakery certainly bears testament to that). Yet recently a vanilla cupcake with vanilla icing just hasn't been doing anything for me. At home, for birthdays and parties, I have moved onto mocha cupcakes with coffee icing which, in my opinion, have a nicer texture and more interesting taste. And, as afternoon tea treats I am currently more interested in biscuits or a slice of cake, or, if at home, a hot buttered crumpet or two.


*I didn't say they were over, btw, just that other bloggers were starting to. They certainly have become ubiquitous. But, as my lovely friend Cara says, "bad cupcakes are over. The real thing? A classic. I feel it's like saying 'Audrey Hepburn is so over' just because her pic is everywhere. A classic is never over, you just have to wait for the fickle to give up on it again". Agreed.

Plus a customer just bought me a cupcake to say thank you for helping him pick a vintage dress for his actress girlfriend. And who can say to a gesture like that, thanks, but cupcakes are over?!