Our weekly food diary shares right-now ingredients, fun foodie events, Instagrammable restaurant dishes and trendy street eats.
This week we tried...
Pumpkin & yuzu sour
Dust off your hats and scarves and zip up those jackets because autumn is officially upon us. And that means…pumpkins! Here at Good Food HQ, October is another chance to get creative with the squash, whether it’s making pumpkin pies, soups, or even pumpkin hummus. But here’s a new idea that we can really get behind: pumpkin cocktails. Yep, it was only a matter of time before someone put pumpkin in a cocktail, especially since the world is already obsessed with other pumpkin-based drinks (pumpkin spice latte, we mean you…). We tried this pumpkin & yuzu sour at Salon, Brixton, and it was truly delicious. Made using a pumpkin syrup, yuzu and gin, the cocktail is shaken together with aquafaba (the water from a can of chickpeas) to create the foam. The result is a drink with the sweetness of pumpkin, sharp zingy flavours of yuzu and a foam that’s lighter than the standard egg-white version (not to mention vegan-friendly). Salon, we salute you!Cookie dough
If your favourite part of home baking is licking the spoon, then this one’s for you... Eating raw cookie dough has long been a norm in the US and the trend took hold here some time ago in products like cookie dough ice cream. But, years on, we’ve finally gone full throttle on cookie dough. Not only can you now buy pots of the stuff online, there are also cafés selling it in cones or pots, just like gelato. We had this peanut butter & chocolate chip delight at Naked Dough on Old Street in east London. The verdict? Just as you’d imagine – soft, sweet (if not slightly sickly) and moreish. Plus, it’s safe to eat, unlike the raw mixture you get when baking at home, which normally contains eggs. Fancy trying it yourself? Buy Cookie Doe online, find Naked Dough on London’s Old Street, Blondie’s Kitchenin Selfridges on Oxford Street, or have a go at making it yourself with our safe-to-eat cookie dough recipefrom Emma Freud.Blue tea
You’ve all heard of green tea, but what about blue? Yes, it’s a thing. Now taking Instagram by storm, this tea turns a vibrant cobalt blue after just a couple of minutes' brewing. Why? Well, it’s made using blue pea flowers, a plant native to South East Asia, also sometimes known as butterfly pea flowers. Not technically a tea in itself (as the blue flowers aren’t from a tea plant), this particular blend from Yumchaa, named ‘Blue Voodoo’, also contains green tea, goji berries, lemongrass and pomegranate. Aside from its impressive hue (here’s the science bit...), the drink boasts plenty of health benefits from antioxidants to anti-inflammatory agents and is also reputed to have an anti-glycation effect. That means it fights the signs of ageing in the skin, apparently. The important question, though, is: how does it taste? The answer is sweet, very sweet. Thanks to the addition of pomegranate and goji berries, this tea has the taste and aroma of jelly sweets. It’s fruity, sweet and slightly floral, so a great tea for those who want the health benefits of a green tea with a sweeter taste. Last week we tried...
Barrel aged negronis
We love a recipe that goes above and beyond for flavour’s sake, and these barrel-aged negronis from The Kitty Hawk do just that. We’re familiar with barrel-aged whiskies, but these aged orange-flavoured beauties are our new favourite tipple. A cross between the classic recipe and the American-born boulevardier, these negronis add a splash of bourbon along with the bitters. All the ingredients are then aged in a virgin American white oak barrel from anywhere between 1 week and 1 month until the flavours have intensified. The white oak gives the drink a deep, smooth flavour with just a hint of smokiness from the charring on the inside of the barrel. Letting the ingredients mingle for a while before serving gives the cocktail an intensity of flavour that can’t be achieved without a little time. It’s true that the best things come to those who wait, and that includes amazing cocktails.Curried octopus
You might not normally associate octopus with Indian cooking, but grill king Neil Rankin has taken the eight-legged cephalopod to an ingenious spicy level at his new restaurant, Temper. Served on a bed of dahl that’s been cooked in chicken stock, the octopus is poached in water, lemon, garlic and white wine for an hour, then dressed in black vinegar, chipotle, soy, and green and red chilies. The result is mouth-tingling and tender: as soft as butter with a punch of fiery heat. For us, it was the stand out dish when we visited @frontlinechef’s follow-up restaurant to his hugely popular Soho Temper. We munched (more like, drooled!) our way through crab beignets, mutton rolls, Korean haggis and kimchi lamb skewers. Order one of the curry thali plates and you’ll find a delightful side: Monster Munch. Drinks-wise, gin is in at Temper – a choice of 20 from around the world.Pastitsio
‘tis the season of proper comfort food, so we’re getting stuck into the beautiful pasta hybrid that is, the pastitsio. This bubbling, beautiful, cheesy thing is an Italian-Greek hybrid, originating from southern Italy, although there are delicious variants to be found throughout the Mediterranean. The best way we can describe it is the ultimate meeting of lasagna, moussaka and macaroni cheese. Treat yourself to layers of tubular pasta, topped with beef mince, a seriously creamy béchamel sauce and grated cheese. In Malta, hard-boiled eggs are sometimes added, in Egypt, it’s made with penne and a Mornay sauce, in Cyprus this essential celebration dish is made with pork and grated halloumi cheese. This versatile dish is pasta perfection and ideal for seeing us through those cold winter nights.
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