Thursday - Mario at Homage2Fromage (and some other stuff)

On Thursday I attended Homage2Fromage at the Adephi in Leeds, and it was great! Our host for the evening was Mario (Gusto Italiano) who is a passionate Italian food maker with roots in Sardinia and a love for all things Yorkshire. Over the past few months we have become friendly with Mario (at Christmas we won a load of Italian goodies in a competition that Mario ran) and he a lovely guy. I have misplaced the list of cheeses that we had on Thursday but 99% were winners - the only one I didn't like was a smoked mozzarella but I seemed to be in the minority on that score. The highlight was Mario's live cheese making demonstration that everyone loved and I am sure will inspire a few to try it themselves. He makes his own cheese (and other delights) that he sells at Farmers Markets so go pay him a visit. He also runs a monthly supper club that is really picking up - we are going next month and can't wait!  - all in another great cheese event from Vickie and Nick.

Mario's artisan cheese

Joe and Mario

Hunter Pig

Live cheese making

As we no longer blog daily I thought I would mention how Mum is doing - and the answer is really well so far with the chemo not stopping her from being her usual brilliant self! See you next weekend Mum x

Sunday is the Leeds Half Marathon for me - it's a training run I suppose before the marathon at the end of the Month but I am still hoping for a PB which would be sub 1hr 40! Fingers crossed. My pre long run routine is pizza (any excuse) and Jo is making one from scratch this evening - can't wait. I have been told that beetroot juice will increase my endurance so I will be drinking a shot of Beet-It one hour before the run and I have been getting through the big bottle this week - it's really quite nice! - you can get it from Millies (cheaper that the chains - fact!)

Beet-It!

We have decided not to blog daily, but here are some of the things we had for dinner this week;

Have a lovely weekend - Joe and Jo.

German Friendship Cake

Last weekend whilst in Edinburgh my mum bestowed on me some German friendship cake batter.  She had already given it some TLC, having received it from Else, a dear family friend who had in turn brought it from Holland!  In case you haven't had one, essentially it is a living batter mix.  You stir it every day for ten days, feeding it on days 4 and 9, before dividing it into four, turning one into a cake and passing the other three onto friends.  And so it goes on...!  Mine have gone to James Smartie, Sue and Sue's friend Pauline, who have all promised they will take good care of it.  Hopefully I might even get it back at some point!

And here is my effort - baked with apples, sultanas and almonds, and it is (not to blow my own trumpet or anything) awesome.  I left half with Sue so she can treat her friends and brought the other half home so Joe and I can get fat and happy on cake!

The finished product - German friendship cake

My latest serving suggestion - cake with stewed rhubarb and yoghurt

Nawaab Khan, Oakwood

After driving back from the Wirral and a few drinks in Stew & Oyster, the last thing we wanted to do on Sunday night was cook.  Luckily for us, next door to Stew & Oyster is Nawaab Khan, self proclaimed "probably the best curry in Yorkshire".  Now, I'm not really in a position to judge whether that statement is accurate - I've eaten a lot of good (and some rubbish) curries whilst living in Leeds.  However, I will say that I did like this one. 

We opted for takeaway treats (Joe finally getting his way after what feels like months of asking), although on Sundays they do a "mega Asian buffet" for £10.95 per person.

Nawaab Khan is a family run restaurant serving Pakistani and Indian dishes.  We were relatively restrained in our ordering and could have gone for a lot more.  What I did note is that the menu doesn't give much of a spice indication - its fairly clear what is mild from the ingredients list, but what is spicy is less clear. 

We went for poppadoms and a pickle tray as a little starter and the pickles were great.  There was a lovely little coriander pickle which I haven't tried before, and was really tasty.  The others, although more standard, were also very good.

Poppadoms and pickles

For mains we went for Punjabi chicken, which is a Rajastani dish made with green chillies, cloves, cumin, black pepper and coriander, and was full of flavour and not too hot despite all the chillies. We also had lamb madras, which had sweet lamb in a lovely warming sauce full of flavour.  Both served up with pilau rice and a plain naan, it was a lovely dinner.  I was stuffed to the rafters but it was well worth it!  They are definitely giving the other Indian restaurants in the area a run for their money.

Punjabi chicken (left) and Lamb Madras (right)