Birthday dinner at The Wild Garlic – returning to my Dorset roots

As a Dorset girl, I was rooting for Mat Follas throughout the 2009 season of Masterchef and was in awe of his natural talent for producing rustic dishes that appeared both hearty and elegant in equal measure. My parents and I had been eager to visit Mat’s restaurant The Wild Garlic ever since this former tollhouse was transformed by the Masterchef champion, especially as Beaminster is only an hour away from our home beside the seaside in Poole.

The perfect excuse for us to take a little drive into the countryside and check out Mat’s culinary skills for ourselves finally arrived last weekend, in the guise of my twenty-seventh birthday. Whilst we perused the menu in the intimate dining room I decided to kickstart the celebrations by relaxing my normal alcohol ban and treating myself to a glass of sparkling wine with a sweet note of delicate elderflower known as Mat’s Fizz.

#Project366 – week 17

With polling day for the local elections approaching imminently, the final week in April represented a crunch period in my working life. This meant that most of my meals (including breakfast!) were consumed either on the road or waiting at a train station as I travelled across the country coordinating political media visits. I was so desperate to get back to our little flat’s kitchen and start cooking again that I stayed up until midnight baking cookies during the only evening I was home!

Day #113 – I’m incredibly proud of my boyfriend for completing the London Marathon in just over 4 hours and raising over £2,000 for the British Heart Foundation. His brother and I followed our own little route to cheer him on, and stopped for a quick brunch of smoked salmon and scrambled egg (with bonus chips) in Canary Wharf’s shopping arcade just before high-fiving my man at mile 19

#Project366 – week 16

Sadly a chaotic few weeks at work has meant that I’ve fallen at the first hurdle in my grand plan to report back on the latest progress in my #Project366 challenge at the end of each week. It’s still my intention to get my act in gear to the point where I can upload the latest update every Sunday, so please bear with me whilst I whizz through the past few weeks of food photos in order to get back on track. For now, cast your minds back to mid-April and feast your eyes on the tasty treats that made my week bearable… 

Day #106 – As part of my parents’ long weekend in London we took a trip over to Bluewater for BBC’s Spring Good Food Show. The food market itself was much smaller than I’d expected, but this did give us a great opportunity to spend time talking to stallholders like Gower Cottage’s Kate Jenkins about their top-quality produce. We were also lucky enough to meet charmingly modest Masterchef winner Thomasina Miers and gush to her about our love of Wahaca before watching her teach jolly Olly Smith how to prepare spicy and refreshing crab tacos in the Cooks’ Theatre