I visited the BBC. good Food winter show last Saturday with 2 wonderful friends, Carmela Hayes & Julie Elliott. We are an awesome trio when we get together and last week was no exception!
Starting on the train to Birmingham with Pain aux Raisin for breakfast, we visited stands laden with cheese, crackers, olives, British oils (Duncan Farrington from Farrington’s Mellow Yellow fame), spices, chocolate, coffee, gin (from the lovely guys at Warner Edwards), wine, pickles, chutneys and a myriad of other amazing ingredients.
We had 4th row tickets for the Super Theatre to see Paul Hollywood & Mary Berry demonstrate their recipes and were treated to a rather fabulous looking ‘kitchen hand’ who not only swept the floor, but also brushed Mary Berry down and tried to wipe the grey from Paul Hollywood’s beard.
The kitchen hand was only Gino Di’Campo!!!!!!
At the end of a fabulous day we bumped into the lovely Urvashi Roe who recommended we visit the Barbers cheese stand (how did we miss this?!) I’m so glad we did as I entered a competition to win a hamper of cheese.
Well, blow me down with a feather because look what I won…..!
A HUGE, quality made wooden box.
Which when opened revealed a gorgeous quality apron.
And underneath the insulation and packaging a MASSIVE treasure trove of amazing cheese. In fact over 3kg of their 24 month matured Vintage Cheddar Cheese. Now I know this cheese is good stuff as I tasted some at the show, we had ‘train snacks’ of cheese on the way home and I bought 2 packs of it to bring home for the family to enjoy too.
How lucky am I? Thank you to the Barber family for my generous prize. The wooden box will be kept for storage to remind me of your generosity.
