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2018 was an incredibly difficult year for me on a personal level.  I don’t want to go into all the doom and gloom here, but I think it’s fair to say that it’s the worst year I’ve ever experienced and there have been some other contenders for that in recent years.   The tail end of the year was the worst part of it and I haven’t really felt in the mood to share some great news with you all until now.

Photo by kazuend on Unsplash

So it’s lovely to have some really good news to celebrate.  I’ve only gone and won an award: Food Blogger of the Year 2018 – UK.  It’s one of the awards given by LUXlife magazine and it’s great to see the name of my blog up there with so many great blogs and websites.  It’s a real honour.  Sometimes in this job you can feel you are working away alone and no one really appreciates your work, so awards like this do provide a very welcome boost. You can read about the other winners in my category : The Food & Drinks Awards here.  Looking through there are so many great hotels and restaurants I now want to visit and so many wonderful food and drink producers that I now want to sample.  There’s plenty there to keep me occupied for a long time to come.

Here’s a link to the announcement of my win. Many many thanks once again to LUXlife magazine.  I’m so thrilled to be included in your list of award winners.

After the indulgences of the Christmas and New Year season, it can feel good to cut back on a rich foods and take a step away from heavy dishes with lots of meat in and take on a lighter diet.  That doesn’t need to be boring though.  Lots of people have been doing Veganuary this year and even though we haven’t gone that far, we have been trying to incorporate more vegetarian and vegan food into our diets and cut back on meat, fish and dairy a little. So when Comptoir Libanais got in touch and asked me to try out their Veganuary menu, I was really interested to try it out their vegan feast at the Birmingham branch in Grand Central.

Comptoir Libanais are celebrating have launched a special Lebanese Vegan Feast menu offering a variety of colourful and tasty vegan dishes.  The menu will be available throughout January at all Comptoir Libanais restaurants for a very reasonable £12.95.  We started off by nibbling away at some tasty Marinated Damascus Olives and a Selection of Pickles whilst we took in the colourful, atmospheric decor which certainly makes you feel like you are somewhere exotic.  There are fez hats on the walls and some wonderful tiles, you can even buy a range of goods which have that Middle-Eastern vibe.

We moved onto the mezze selection of Red Pepper Hommos, a smooth chickpea puree with tahina and red peppers, virgin olive oil, served with pita bread and a Quinoa Tabbouleh, which is made from chopped parsley, quinoa, tomatoes, mint and onions with a lemon and olive oil dressing. The red pepper hummus was delicious and moreish, plus the flatbreads were perfect to mop it up. The quinoa tabbouleh was the perfect foil to it with its fresh, citrusy zing.

I really enjoyed the delicious Couscous Salad with grilled peppers, roasted squash and mixed nuts.  It was very tasty.  The other choice of main was the Aubergine Tagine which sadly wasn’t available on our visit due to supply problems.

For dessert there is a Coconut Mouhalabia and Mixed Dried Fruit.  It’s a traditional Lebanese milk pudding made using coconut milk and topped with toasted pistachios.  The coconut mouhalbia which was like a panacotta with a smooth texture and a lightly sweet flavour. We loved the sweet fruits on the top and the sweet honey syrup that was poured on top.

For liquid refreshment between us we tried a couple of beers: Almaza and Casablanca (Casablanca was the better of the two) and Leymona, which was a really tasty and thirst-quenching lemonade with flavours of lemon and lime.

The service was excellent: attentive and friendly.  The staff were knowledgeable about the food on the menu and we were very well looked after.

Wild and Game, the not for profit business that aims to turn the UK into a nation of game eaters, has launched a new range of high quality ready meals. The idea behind the new range is to take familiar favourites and make them into ready meals using game as the meat ingredient.  The hope is that people will realise how easy it is to enjoy game in the place of more widely used meats, such as beef and chicken. The ready meals include grouse with mushroom and peppercorn sauce; pheasant breasts with pancetta, mushroom and cider sauce; pheasant breasts Florentine; and pheasant tikka masala.  I always like to have some easy meals available at home for those nights where you want something without having to put a lot of effort in.

“These are dishes people would probably love to cook at home, but many people are not confident cooking with game, so we came up with this range of high quality ready meals to make life easier,” says Wild and Game’s co-founder Steven Frampton.

I tried out the Pheasant Tikka Masala.  It was a nice generous portion size, although it is advertised as for two people, and it actually provided a very hearty meal for one and if I’d been less hungry there might have been some leftovers.  Whilst the dish is made for you, this isn’t the sort of meal you can put in the microwave for a few minutes and then sit down to eat.  It needs 80-90 minutes and that needs to be in the oven. So that requires a bit of planning and forethought.  Also, you’ll need to provide rice or naan bread or whatever you fancy as an accompaniment yourself. That said, you will get a meal that is full of flavour and does taste like you have lovingly cooked it for several hours.  I think you could get away with serving this up at a dinner party as your own dish as long as you served up some rice with it. In fact, I’m tempted to do that as it would certainly cut down on the stress and my guests would be getting a very decent meal.

Now I’m a bit of a game fan, but I was surprised how well pheasant suited the subtle, yet distinctive flavours of tikka masala.  The pheasant added a richness and depth of flavour that you certainly don’t get with a blander meat like chicken.  I’d go as far as saying that pheasant is a much better bird to use with the dish and I’d certainly be happy to eat this dish again.

The other week we (me, my parents and my son H) went to the Park Regis, Broad Street, Birmingham (near Five Ways roundabout) to try out their Sunday Carvery offering.  The decor is very plush and you certainly feel like this is a special occasion venue when you step inside.  The 1565 Restaurant is upstairs near the bar and there is a balcony with views out over the city.

The carvery starts at 1pm and last seating is at 2.30pm and there are three courses available.  I love that three courses are included because that seems like much more of a treat than a one course offering and at £14.95 each it seems like a good value option. Most of the starters and desserts are included within the £14.95 price, but a few special items do attract a supplement, but this is clearly stated on the menu.

There were a number of freshly prepared and appetizing salads available from a self-service buffet and a soup was also on offer if preferred.  I really enjoyed my selection of salads and you can help yourself to what you want.

On the day we visited there were three meats to choose from: roast beef, gammon and turkey.  Now I like my beef a little pink, but my Dad’s not so keen, so we did differ in our opinion of the beef.  I also had some turkey and that was nicely cooked, without being too dry.

There was a good selection of vegetables and the restaurant has taken quite a few measures to keep them warm.  They are in lidded containers to keep the heat in. The vegetables were nicely cooked and seemed to please the whole party on that score.  I think though that the Yorkshire puddings and the stuffing had been a bit overdone though and they were a bit on the dry side.  There’s plenty of gravy available though to help with that and you can serve yourself to that.

Whilst we were pretty full after our first two courses, we did venture to try some desserts.

I had the profiteroles and they were lovely.  The portion size was quite small, but I think it needed to be after two courses where you were able to help yourself to as much salad or vegetables as you wanted.  My parents had the chocolate mousse and they really enjoyed that.

Throughout the meal the staff were really attentive and were ready to help.  Looking around the restaurant, there were quite a few families eating there and they were quickly provided with high chairs and the like, so it’s a truly family friendly restaurant.  I certainly recommend the carvery if you are looking for a good Sunday carvery which feels like a bit of a treat.