An intelligent mix of culture, style, travel, food and property, as well as where to go and what to see.
There are all sorts of things we’re prepared to do once December rears its head, that we’d absolutely turn our noses up at in a less festive month: back to back parties, kitsch decorations, adding spices to anything that stands still long enough, engaging with relatives we normally avoid. And there are certain foods and
28 min listen
Theo Fennell is a jewellery maker. He has been designing and making jewellery in Fulham, London for over forty years and in 2008 founded The Original Design Partnership. On the podcast, he talks to Lara and Liv about his childhood growing up in the colonies during the last days of the British Empire. He gives
Everyone should have a catering trick to easily host a large party. As Jeffrey Archer once told me, while pointing out Oxford landmarks as if it were his university rather than mine, he was famous for his legendary Shepherd’s pie and Krug champagne Christmas soirées. I have my own party formula: ‘Bagels and Booze’. I
If you’re a lover of Pinot Noir and fine red burgundy you’re doubtless in a bit of a stew. You’re worried that although the about-to-be-launched 2020 vintage is an absolute cracker, the amount of Pinot produced was down by around 40 per cent and there ain’t going to be enough to go round. You’re also
Nine months ago, after a decade spent in London, I moved to Lancashire. Although I’m a northerner born and bred, I’m from the northeast, between Newcastle and Sunderland, so this was new territory for me. Keen to assimilate, I was ready to get stuck into some of the dishes the area is famous for: Eccles
What gift is good enough for the Queen? A crop of French Perigord black truffles (worth £150-£200 per 100g) is no bad choice – as Prince Philip discovered after 12 years of fruitless attempts to coax the mushroom into growing on the Queen’s Sandringham estate. Aside from making the Duke of Edinburgh reportedly the first person to
There’s an air of familiarity about the former head chef of Claridge’s penchant for plant-based food. It was reported this weekend that he has left his role after the hotel passed on his plans for an entirely plant-based menu. All credit to Claridge’s who are one of the few institutions not to have swallowed this particular culinary cool
There are some dishes on which I am well aware I hold strong opinions: toast (well done but not burnt, real butter, generously spread; must be eaten hot), crumble (crunchy, not soggy, lots of it; simply must be served with custard, ideally cold), roast chicken (cooked hot and fast, with more butter than is sensible,
The bittersweet conclusion the Daniel Craig era in No Time to Die has led many of us to revisit the 007 canon – from the cars, to the suits, to the cocktails. One particular item on James’ longstanding bar tab continues to fascinate more than any other, his signature drink, the Vesper. ‘A dry martini,’
21 min listen
Dee Rettali is an artisan baker. She founded Patisserie Organic in 1998, and afterwards the Fortitude Bakehouse in London. She is the author of Baking with Fortitude: sourdough cakes and bakes. On the podcast, she tells Lara and Liv about enjoying tinned fish, relying on the custom of cyclists in lockdown, and learning from 1970s
At this time of year, nothing beats a cosy tavern with steamed up windows, a roaring fire and hearty food. ‘Gastropubs’ have come under some justified criticism over the years: trying too hard to be restaurants and with prices to match, pricing out their former loyal clientele. Too many regular pubs meanwhile are happy to serve
Marble cakes are a simple concept, but such a satisfying bake, with that delightful reveal when you cut into the cake and expose the hidden pattern. They are made by dividing the base cake batter, and adding colouring or flavouring to one part of it, and then mottled by dolloping light and dark batter alternately
We have finally arrived in the roaring 20s and the urge to drink – after the year and a half we’ve been through – is strong. Lockdown provided ample opportunity to neck wine in the monotonous comfort of one’s own home, so the mood now is firmly for tipples in luxurious, and crucially, public indoor
There’s never been a better year to celebrate Bonfire Night. Late night, outdoor, responsible fun to enjoy now that there’s precious little else to do after 10 p.m. Plus it’s surely therapeutic to remind ourselves that while things are currently a little tough going and hosting a dinner party in your home is an act
If you’re bracing for a bleak winter by lining up a box-set binge, then at least there’s a glut of options on the gogglebox right now. And as you settle on the sofa, the moment will be capped if you find the most appropriate drink to sip as you get square eyes. Here then, are
I must have written thousands of words about my love of stews, braises, and slow-cooked dishes, but osso bucco must be one of my longtime, unchanging favourites. Osso bucco comes from the Northern Italian region of Lombardy, and is made from braised veal shanks. It’s a cut that not only benefits from, but really needs,
Well done, Joanna Lumley. The 75-year-old actress has solved the climate crisis. She proposes a return to wartime rationing when shoppers had to surrender government coupons whenever they bought meat, sugar, petrol, bread and even soap. ‘You’re given a certain amount of points,’ she told the Radio Times, ‘and it’s up to you how to
There was a nifty about-turn last week when the so-called Nudge Unit, the government’s behavioural policy advisory body, abandoned its proposals to get us to shift towards a plant-based diet and away from eating meat. Among other exciting intiatives it suggested ‘building support for a bold policy’ such as a tax on producers of mutton and
30 min listen
Rachel Roddy is an author and food writer based in Rome. She has written for several publications, including the Financial Times, the Telegraph, Food and Wine, The Spectator, and has a weekly column in the Guardian. On the podcast, Rachel talks to Lara and Liv about growing up in Hertfordshire, coping with an eating disorder,
Diwali is synonymous with fireworks and candles (diwas) – it is after all the ‘festival of lights’ – but sweet morsels of sugar and spice are almost as important a part of the festivities. Just as Christmas is a time when restraint rightly crumbles in the face of mince pies and lashings of brandy butter,
Chocolate cake comes in many different guises: from the dark and rich, to the sweet and simple. For me, it’s not like the ultimate cookie, or the perfect brownie: I don’t believe that there is one, definitive chocolate cake. I do not spend my days searching for the platonic version; trying to rank a chocolate
If the brimming hedgerows were not enough to sate your taste buds this autumn, then it’s time to turn your attention to game season. As I’ve written, game is not only delicious but sustainable and healthy too. Indeed, venison is higher in protein and lower in fat than any other meat. It’s not for nothing that the
Once a staple of clubs and bars, the whisky and soda spent the latter-half of the 20th century on the wrong side of fashion. The popularity of clear spirits coupled with a curious belief that mixing whisky is a near-criminal act saw the serve relegated to the back bench. At least that was the case
There are few things as good as soup for comfort and warmth. Though, with the very notable exception of Heinz tomato, I find ready-made soups invariably dull. The fresh counter ones are even worse than the tinned: bland, gloopy, surprisingly calorific and expensive for what is, after all, liquid food. When it comes to soup, I
What is it about retro food? I don’t mean nostalgic food, from school dinner favourites to your grandmother’s signature dishes. I mean food you’ve probably never even tried. Thoroughly old-fashioned dishes that nevertheless light up your culinary imagination — or at least mine. I’m talking devilled eggs. Prawn cocktail. Beef stroganoff. Perhaps it’s because many
29 min listen
Laurie Woolever is a writer and editor, and for nearly a decade worked as the assistant to the late author, TV host and producer Anthony Bourdain. On the podcast, she talks to Lara and Liv about tending to garden peas from the age of four, finishing co-writing a book with Bourdain after he passed away,
Getting a takeaway doesn’t quite mean what it used to. The choice used to be between a pizza, ‘an Indian’ or ‘a Chinese’, and was reserved as a Friday night treat, to be eaten out the box while flopped on the sofa watching Cilla Black’s Blind Date. Nowadays one is as likely to order a
According to recent reports, we might be looking down the sharp end of a turkey-less Christmas. Kate Martin of the Traditional Farm Fresh Turkey Association has warned that a lack of European farmhands means that Britain could be facing a turkey shortage this December. Turkeys have been synonymous with British Christmas dinners since the Victorian
It’s not terribly surprising that the apple Charlotte is often mistakenly attributed to French chef Marie Antoine Carême; the so-called first celebrity chef is credited with inventing everything from the chef’s tall toque hat to the taxonomic arrangement of sauces, via creating an entirely new system of dining and service. Some of these have more
