Nestling in the heart of Lancashire just off the A59 in the delightful village of Mellor, this 2 AA star hotel is a real delight. The Millstone is known as the ‘baby’ of the Shire hotels family, but its food is certainly ‘grown up’.
The home cooked menu featured the finest that the Red Rose County has to offer, serving Lancashire’s most popular dishes at 2 AA Rosette quality. Sunday lunch in the traditional oak, panelled restaurant dining next to a cosy fire was definitely appreciated on a winter’s day by my wife and I.
Continue reading "Magnificent Millstone" »
Richard Bampfield, one of only 280 Masters of Wine in the world, is an experienced wine professional with over 30 years of experience in the international wine industry. For the last 11 years, he and his wife Jackie have been running their own business, specialising in wine public relations, corporate wine events and trade consultancy. Richard tells us about his most recent visit to Stanley House Hotel in Mellor for its second annual Tasting of England event.
Continue reading "Tasting of England at Stanley House Hotel" »
Yesterday saw three of our four team entrants head off to the Hastings in Lytham for a cookery masterclass by head chef Warwick Dodds in preparation for the first round of the Great Northern Cook Off Competition. For the amateur cooking competition, attracting teams from all business sectors, our intrepid team of Tim, Justina, Sally and Katie donned their aprons and headed into their first professional kitchen.
What followed was a fascinating display of chopping, frying, stirring and culinary genius – well, in our opinion! Guiding the team through the basics of knife skills as they chopped and sliced onions and vegetables I was ecstatic that no-one lost a finger! Whilst covering the basics of good sauce making – butter/flour/milk or stock/seasoning – Justina audibly gasped at the amount of salt used but conceded the dish tasted perfect.
Continue reading "A masterclass in Risotto making from Lancashire chef Warwick Dodds" »
When I turned up at Ewood Park, home of Blackburn Rovers, last Sunday in my bright green polo shirt, it wasn’t to support some rival premiership team but to work at Nigel Haworth’s first Fantastic Food Show. And, to quote one of the visitors to the show, it was “absolutely fantastic!”
Continue reading "Food Show – Fantastic!" »
Twenty-four year old Martin Hargreaves, senior chef de partie at Stanley House Hotel’s fine dining restaurant Cassis, was crowned Lancashire Young Chef of the Year in at the LETS Awards (Lancashire Excellence in Tourism Skills) in November 2009 before going on to compete in the finals of North West Chef of the Year 2010.
Martin, from Hoghton near Preston, trained at Blackburn College and has worked at Stanley House since it opened nearly six years ago. He started as a trainee in the Cassis kitchens and then moved to the pastry kitchen as a commis chef for two years. He was promoted to senior chef de partie last year. This is his blog:
Continue reading "Guest Blog: Martin Hargreaves, senior chef de partie at Stanley House" »
Having been in the kitchen from 8 in the morning, I think Andrew Fairlie, the chef from Gleneagles Hotel in Perthshire, was glad of the short break our interview gave him! Andrew has been on Nigel’s hitlist for nine years and only now has he been able to work a trip to Obsession into his own busy schedule, due to the extension of the Festival dates into February.
Continue reading "A Fairlie French Obsession" »
Last night it was the turn of Jacob Jan Boerma to take centre stage at Northcote’s Obsession 10 event. Another international guest chef, Jacob comes from the Restaurant De Leest in the Netherlands which has 2 Michelin stars.
Jacob says he is very honoured to be invited to this event. “This is a good opportunity to show the people the style of our kitchen and the way of cooking in The Netherlands. I think it is also important to learn from this event and maybe some day we can hold an event like this in The Netherlands.”
Continue reading "Something fishy’s going on at Obsession..." »