Thursday Night Stew & Oyster

On Thursday night Joe and I attended the launch of Stew & Oyster.  I've been quite excited about the opening of this bar for a while - it's the new outpost of Calls Landing in Leeds city centre which for a few years was our favourite local bar.  Since moving to Roundhay the choice of cool local bars has definitely minimised and its about time a relaxed, friendly bar opened in this neck of the woods.

This is just a short post tonight to say that Stew & Oyster is definitely worth a visit - it's stripped back, laid back, with a great range of interesting beers and tasty wines.  There is a fixed menu of their favourite stews and honorary stews (think mushrooms on toast, croque monsieurs etc) and platters including a very tasty looking pork pie option from Wilsons Butchers, as well as changing specials.  On top of this, they do fresh oysters sold either individually, in threes, sixes or a dozen and with champagne or ale.  One of my bank holiday treats is definitely going to be an oyster or two.

So we will be back over the bank holiday weekend, but for anyone looking for somewhere fun to go in the meantime, try Stew & Oyster.

Oh, and as well as tasting some of the stew (very good) we also had a black pudding, new potato and poached egg salad when we got home!  The black pudding is hidden in the picture but it was a very tasty meal coming out of nowhere (I'll thank my two glasses of wine at S&O for that!)

Stew & Oyster's own beer

Our home time drinks...whisky and chambord.  Eek.

Black pudding, new potato and poached egg salad

Thursday - Veggie haggis with peas and an egg

I promise this isn't as weird as it sounds!  We have a selection of lovely Macsweens goods in the fridge, including haggis, black pudding and vegetarian haggis.  I've never eaten vegetarian haggis, and quite honestly always thought the concept was a little strange, so this seemed like an opportunity to give it a try.  I was pleasantly surprised - it's not as strong as real haggis and is a little reminiscent of a nut roast - but I really liked it!  It was served on a bed of pea and parsley puree and topped with a poached egg and tomatoes.  Sounds like a strange combination but it really worked.

Vegetarian haggis on pea puree with a poached egg and tomatoes

As an absolute shock horror, we have also run out of biscuits.  I'm sure, given our blog name, this should be illegal, but we appear to have had a shopping fail.  No fear though, we had some trusty pop corn kernels so our dinner was salvaged by some tasty home made popcorn!!

Tuesday Macsween's Black Pudding Stack

Anyone who caught the Burns night post will know I'm quite the fan of Macsween's haggis (its the best I've found).  Well, lo and behold they also make black pudding.  This one is rich and spicy without lots of fat, which makes it right up my street (and in keeping with healthy week!) We picked some up at the Oakwood Farmers Market last week and it seemed only right that I used it to do something fun.  If you can't find it in the shops, you can buy their produce on the website here.

Thus, Tuesday night's dinner was a black pudding stack, with spinach, mushrooms, bacon, a poached egg and a tomato vinaigrette.

James from Macsween requested that I gave him the recipe as well, so you can find it below the pictures.  

Black pudding stack - with spinach, mushrooms, a poached egg, crispy bacon and a tomato vinaigrette.

Our dessert - yogurt topped with strawberries macerated in Chambord and topped with grated chocolate.

BLACK PUDDING STACK (serves 2)


1 Macsweens black pudding, sliced into 4 slices just under 1cm thick - there will be some left over  (don't short change yourself with the cheap stuff - it won't hold together and you'll have a mush rather than a stack)
4 slices brown bread
large handful of baby spinach
2 large chestnut mushrooms, sliced thickly
2 fresh eggs
4 rashers of streaky bacon
2 smallish vine tomatoes (or 1 big one)
English mustard, extra virgin olive oil and lemon juice for the dressing.

1.  Start by prepping the tomato vinaigrette.  Cut a cross in the stalk area of the tomatoes and plunge them into boiling water for 30 seconds.  Remove, skin, and chop the tomato flesh into smallish chunks.  In a bowl, mix a large splash of olive oil, juice of half a lemon and half a teaspoon of mustard.  Blend to taste and add the tomatoes.
2.  Using a round cutter (I used a scone cutter), cut one round from each slice of bread.
3.  Heat the oven to 200 degrees.  Place the bread round directly onto the lower shelf to crisp up.  Cook the bacon and mushroom slices on a grill pan until the bacon is crispy.  This will take approx 10 minutes.
4.  In a small pan, sweat down the spinach with some black pepper.  I find you don't need any salt as there is enough in the black pudding and the bacon.  When sweated down to approx 2 tablespoons with no remaining liquid, set to the side.
5.  In a large bottomed pan heat a small amount of oil and fry the black pudding on each side for around 4 minutes until cooked.
6.  At this stage, when the stack is ready to be assembled, poach your eggs.  I do mine in quickly simmering water for 1 minute and 45 seconds and always get a runny yolk - but do it as you prefer.  Also place the vinaigrette in the residual heat in the oven to slightly warm through.
7.  Erect the stack, one slice of bread first, followed by black pudding, followed by spinach.  Place the second slice of bread on top, followed by black pudding, followed by mushrooms.  Try and keep it straight and arrange your mushrooms so the egg can rest on top. 
8.  Drain your poached egg, rest it on top of the mushrooms, and delicately balance the crispy streaky bacon on the side.  Drizzle some of the vinaigrette over the egg and the rest around the stack. 

Voila!