Monday 13 June 2016

Celia organic premium Czech lager. It's gluten free and flavourful

Celia organic premium Czech lager is an organic lager that is guaranteed gluten free and also guaranteed to be 100% organic.

It's also suitable for vegans as no animal by-products are used in its production.

Some lagers can leave you feeling bloated, this is because carbon dioxide gas is relentlessly pumped into the beer, making it more like fizzy pop than genuine beer.

This is not the case with Celia. Because the only carbonation within Celia is that of the natural brewing process so it does not leave you with that horrible bloated, gassy feeling that comes with some other lagers.

Celia is brewed with Moravian Malt and 100% Organic Saaz Hops. The water used in the brewing process is locally sourced from the neighbouring Zatec foothills, where it is naturally filtered through sand.

Incidentally, the hops are chosen from a specially selected crop in Zatec, where hops have been farmed since 1004, well over 1,000 years of farming history served in a bottle of Celia!

The Saaz hops are the world's only protected hop, which is why Celia Organic Lager is allowed to use the Protected Designation of Origin symbol on their bottles.

It's also carefully brewed to make sure it is an able and very willing accompaniment for almost every type of food, savoury or sweet. (EDITOR: We found it especially good with a chicken dish.)

So, it's organic, it's gluten free and it's safe for vegans to drink.

So what does it taste like?

It's a real premium Czech lager beer. It's lighter than many you might have tried, the bubbles are refreshing, but they do not get in your way of enjoying the flavour of the beer.

There's a refreshing bitter edge and depth to the flavour and there's also more of a fruity background to it, I was thinking berries, my wife was more convinced it was a hint of several citrus fruits, combined.

My wife is, or rather was, not a lager fan, though she has been converted to Celia.

We will be seeking this out again, as it is the only lager so far that my wife (who needs to be gluten free) can both enjoy and tolerate.

It costs £2.50 a bottle and can be found at Waitrose, Ocado, some Oddbins, Booths and Whole Food Market.

Coronation Chicken flavour crisps. From Tyrell's, of course!

Tyrell's are, as the saying goes, never backwards in coming forwards, and this latest addition to their range is no exception to that maxim.

Coronation Chicken flavour.

Now, first, a little background about what is, after all, a quintessentially British dish.

It is generally held that the dish was specially created for the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953, by Constance Spry, an English cookery expert and food writer and Rosemary Hume, both of the  London-based Cordon Bleu Cookery School.

It basically consists of cold cooked chicken meat, herbs and curry spices all blended in mayonnaise and often served with a salad, as a filling for jacket potatoes and the like.

It is an extremely popular dish in the UK. So, how would the Tyrrell's version stand up to the taste test?

The answer, if there had been any room for doubt, was that it stood up to the taste test very well indeed!

The crisps taste exactly like a good Coronation Chicken.

There's a nice mixture of flavours, roast chicken comes through, very nicely, there's a hint of a nice and creamy mayonnaise dressing, plus a rather nice  tang of curry that comes through very well.

It is important to point out that no one flavour predominates or over-powers. The chefs at Tyrell's have worked really to come up with this creation.

In fact I think Tyrell's -if they haven't done so already- should send a crate of these Coronation Chicken Crisps 150g bags to Buckingham Palace!

By the way, these are seasonal so do not miss out!

Tyrell's Poshcorn. Best popcorn I ever tasted!

This summer those clever folk over a Tyyrell's have introduced a special summer flavour for their Poshcorn popcorn range.

Summer strawberries and cream.

When we opened the packet there was a delightful scent of strawberries and cream.

As we sat out on the back patio of That's Food and Drink House, my assistant (well, manager really, AKA my wife!)  we dipped in and our reactions were immediate.

Mine: "Oh, wow! Just like strawberries and cream!"

Hers: "Good heavens! It is just like strawberries and cream!"

It is British grown popping corn combined with real strawberry juice (and some raspberry juice, too) and real, honest to goodness Dorset cream.

At the rate they were being consumed a 75g bag lasted far longer than we thought it would.

Or you can even find a massive 270g party bag!

For a really decadent idea, why not serve them with a bowl of fresh strawberries and real cream?

That was my plan, but sadly we accidentally ate them all before we could put my plan into action.

Next time? Yes. Definitely next time. Unless, of course, we eat them all again before we can get around to doing it!

My advice? Buy several bags and lay them in ready for Wimbledon.

Other flavours available are: Coconut and caramel, sweet, sweet and salty, sea salted, salted with a twist of black pepper and lemon cupcake.





Monday 2 May 2016

Primrose's Kitchen

Primrose extends a warm welcome to everyone who is interested in eating well and eating properly.

It's the proud claim of Primrose that everything she and her company creates, every recipe, are made from 100% natural raw vegetable ingredients deep in the heart of Dorset.

Primrose crafts some very delicious breakfast muselis and she has taken the decision to grow their range so there are now even more tasty recipes for you to enjoy.

The purpose is to ensure that their range will be able to help you feel nourished throughout the day as simply as possible.

All of their recipes are gluten free and are suitable for everyone to eat and enjoy, including vegans.

Flavours (all are gluten free and nut free, unless stated otherwise) that were trialled were as follows:

Courgette and Cacao Granola.
This was an example of a chunky type of breakfast cereal. It is made up of sunflower seeds, coconut pieces, sultanas, sprouted buckwheat, dates, courgettes, shelled hemp, cacao, lucuma, cacao butter, ground flaxseed, vanilla, turmeric and kelp powder.

The predominant taste that came through was that of the chocolate flavour from the cacao. (Raw cacao is made by cold-pressing unroasted cocoa beans)

Orange and Cashew Granola
Made from sunflower seeds, orange, sultanas, cashew nuts and coconut pieces
Unsurprisingly the predominant flavour with this particular granola recipe is orange, though as you would expect, it is the flavour of real oranges.

Porridge Oats
This is made with Gluten free oats and nothing else.
It is great made up as a traditional porridge (with only salt, not sugar as my grandfather insisted!) but it is also perfect with cold milk. (Cow, rice, soya, or almond milk, whatever your preference.)

Raw Beetroot and Ginger Muesli
I have to confess that this was my personal favourite. It is made with Gluten free oats, raw beetroot, raw blue agave nectar, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, raw virgin coconut oil, almonds, linseeds, coconut pieces, ground ginger, psyllium husk seeds and hemp seeds.

The ginger makes this breakfast cereal a real tongue tingler and the raw beetroot makes the milk turn a delightful shade of pink. You can taste the ginger and also detect the good, honest earthy taste of the raw beetroot working in the background.

Oatmeal and Chia
The same delicious gluten free oatmeal as used in the porridge oats, but with the addition of chia seeds.

The chia seeds add an interesting and subtle taste to the oats. It's almost the same as poppy seeds in flavour, but not quite.

To learn more about the range of breakfast foods and other items that Primrose makes -and to keep your eye open for fresh, new recipes- please drop in to see them at www.primroseskitchen.com 

400 grammes will cost £5.95.

You can purchase Primrose's Kitchen products at the following link http://goo.gl/GjK2SB. Just enter the shop and click on the Grocery section once you are there.

Sunday 1 May 2016

Jimmy's Iced Coffee. Iced coffee like it should be.

Jimmy's Iced Coffee is like iced coffee should be.

There are many types of iced coffee that you can buy in convenience stores, grocers, sandwich shops, supermarkets and the like. But please do mark my words, there is only one Jimmy's Iced Coffee.

Some iced coffees (even those made by some so-called leading brands)  just don't taste right. They are either too weak, or sometimes taste a little bit burnt.

But that's definitely not the case with Jimmy's Iced coffee.

There's no cream in Jimmy's Iced Coffee (well, that is to say unless you choose to add some!) but it does have a deliciously creamy taste and texture to it.

Is it the fact that when you buy Jimmy's Iced coffee you actually get real British milk? Could be!

Let's take a look -and a taste- of Jimmy's Iced Coffee Skinny.

It's deliciously refreshing. You can definitely taste the Arabica coffee (well, with 36% of this making up the coffee part of the taste, that's a certainty!) and the fact that this blend uses British skimmed milk, which makes up 61% of the total content, plus there's the great taste of demerara sugar to add just the right amount of the subtle brown sugar taste that's so often sadly lacking with other types of iced coffee.

The carton tells us that there is 24.9mg of caffeine in every 100ml of coffee.

There's Original, Skinny and Mocha.

It's a family owned business and is made in Britain. In Dorset to be more precise.

It costs £1.59 and bears the legend: "Keep Your Chin Up!" (KYCU)

To learn more visit http://jimmysicedcoffee.com/

Great Uncle Cornelius' range of real non-alcoholic drinks

From the James White company, the Cornelius range is described by the company as: "The 'Great Uncle' to all their brands."

Take a stroll back through time. Not to yesterday, when soft drinks had become chemical concoctions that gave children garishly coloured lips and tongues and hyper-active mad-ups due to the propensity of soft drink makers to shove dubious chemicals into their soft drinks.

We would rather you step back a good deal further, back to a time when soft drinks were made using real fruits, real sugar, some water and nothing else.

Take that step back and you will find yourself in the time of The Great Uncle Cornelius range of James White.

You'll be able to try their Lemon Refresher, which is cloudy because of the fruit juices contained therein, not due to any nasty E number nonsense!

Or try the new Rhubarb Refresher!

Rhubarb is known for its exceptionally tart taste, but combined with just the right amount of apple juice, it makes for a lovely and utterly refreshing drink.

But for those of you who like their drinks a little hotter, why not try Uncle Cornelius' Famous Spiced Ginger?

Enjoy it cold over ice (if you want to add ice, that is?) or why not try it warm?

It makes a perfect Whisky Mac, so add the Scotch (or Irish Whiskey or Welsh whisky) of your choice and you'll soon be in a Celtic heaven!

Or if you are feeling under the weather, add honey to it to make a perfect hot toddy.

Or why not try the James White Organic Ginger Zinger Shot?

It will give you a really good boost, just when you need it and it's free from any horrible additives!

You can buy the James White range of drinks at https://goo.gl/ipT2id