I'd heard of Nucoco Chocolate before when popping into the Good Spirits company but hadn't tried any of their products. When I heard via Facebook that they were going to be running chocolate making classes at the store, I figured I would go along & see what it's all about.
Dark Chocolate & pistachio / Dark Chocolate & rum soaked cranberries (my fav!)
For those who haven't heard of Nucoco, they are a Scottish company who pride themselves on making good quality chocolate. They have a few products including bars, smash bars(larger slabs, smashed up into bitesized pieces) and drinking chocolate. The mix of flavours are also quite different, including Rum soaked cranberry & tablet.
Walking into the room, each desk had a bowl, spatula, apron & printed book per person on it. At the front, there were a couple of machines along with a LOT of chocolate. Before we got our hands dirty (and they got very dirty!), Jackie told us a bit of background about Nucoco & the chocolate that they make. It was really informative & always a good to get a background into a company. Then the time came for us to get stuck in!
Jackie prepping the chocolate
One of the larger machines on the table, we were told, was a chocolate tempering machine. What that roughly translates as is, you can melt chocolate in it without burning it or ruining the colour. We were given the choice of making a slab of chocolate or individual bars - I opted for the bars. After receiving our freshly melted chocolate, it then had to be transferred to the moulds. This was a lot messier than it seemed. After putting the chocolate into the moulds, you then have to scrape the excess chocolate off and bang the mould to get all of the air bubbles out.
There was an array of toppings for the chocolate bars. The good thing about making the bars was that you could use pretty much all of the toppings on them. However, as the room was a bit cold, one of my sets of bars had started to set so we weren't sure if the toppings would stick. Jackie gave me a slab to make as well just in case the bars didn't turn out ok. More chocolate is never a bad thing!
Whilst the bars were cooling in the fridge, Jackie gave us some background into the world of chocolate. We were told about the origins, the different types of cocoa & the different forms it takes before you see it in the bar form you're probably more used to.
Cocoa beans, cocoa plants, cocoa nibs & cocoa butter
The bars were taken out of the fridge once set & as you can see, they turned out not too bad!
The class overall was a good experience, learning about what you're making as well as being very hands on. At a bargain of £20 for the introductory class, it was very good value for money! The next class will be on the 9th of February, costing £30 per person or £50 for 2. Even if it doesn't sound like your cup of tea, the class would make a good present for any chocoholic!
I had walked past The Drake a few times but never ventured in. Feeling the January pinch, we opted to go there on a 20% off A La Carte deal courtesy of 5pm.co.uk.
Walking in, we went straight upstairs only to be told that there was a function on & we had to go back downstairs. There were no signs signalling this which would've been helpful. When we got downstairs, we were told to take our pic of seats in the back bar area. We chose a big booth next to the fire, which unfortunately wasn't on despite it being chilly outside. The back bar area had a pretty laid back feel to it, with quilted booth style seats taking up most of the area & dimmed lighting throughout.
I'm a big fan of sharing starters because you get much more variety than your bog-standard starter. We went for the "Taste of the Sea" platter. As the name suggests, an array of seafood including smoked salmon, mussels, trout, pickled herring, squid & samphire salad accompanied by bread. For mains we went for the red snapper & king prawn Goan curry & the chorizo & chicken linguine. Unfortunately, the pasta had sold out so the Pollock with chorizo & squid broth was chosen instead.
The platter arrived & the first thing we noticed was that there was one king prawn - bit strange considering it was a sharing platter. I have to say overall, the platter was a disappointment. The best part of it was the squid & samphire salad, which mixed well together although the samphire wasn't as salty as I was expecting. The trout was melt in the mouth which made up for the strange smoked salmon. I can't even describe what it tasted like but it had some oil drizzled over it which detracted from the smokey flavour you would normally associate. Even Al who is a fish fanatic couldn't handle more than a couple of bites. The rest of the platter was equally unimpressive - plain mussels in hot water & stale bits of bread. We had to ask for butter to go with the bread as there was no sauce in the mussels to soak it up.
The mains had actually arrived during our starter but we asked for them to be taken away. When we were ready for them, I was impressed with the presentation. My curry came in a dinky pot with a lid, served on a heavy slate board. The pollock was positioned nicely on a bed on samphire (much to Al's dismay at more of it) with scatterings of chorizo. One big down point to the curry was the single shell-on king prawn balanced on top. Not wanting to waste it, I de-shelled it but without having a single bite, my hands were covered in curry, not exactly what I was expecting!
My first taste of the curry & all I could immediately think of was the type of curry you get from the chinese. It had the same texture, colour & tasted extremely similar. Having never tasted a Goan curry before, I'm still not sure if this is what it is meant to taste like but I assume not. The prawns were cooked well but the red snapper was relatively tough. Al had a taste & asked me if it was chicken I had in the curry!! Apart from that I did enjoy it with the nicely fragrant rice, not overpowered with cloves & a nice chapati to soak it up. The pollock went down very weel & the chorizo accompanied it well. There was far too much samphire in the dish, with most of it being left to the side.
I was glad we had the 20% discount because I would not have been happy paying £40 for 2 very average courses & only 1 drink each. The Drake is trying to be a bit more upmarket than the skill of their current kitchen staff. If they toned down the menu more, going back to basics & served food more suited to the feel of the place, rather than trying to be too sophisticated. Will definitely be back for a drink!
For our last meal out of 2012, we decided to go somewhere we hadn't been before. As I had the choice, I opted for Central Market, a recently opened restaurant in the Merchant City of Glasgow.
We went along & were seated upstairs in the balcony area which I was quite happy with as you could see everything that was going on. It isn't the largest of restaurants but they can easily accommodate large parties as a table of around 12 with children were next to us. A couple of nice touches Central Market has is to have their oysters on display at the front of the bar, proving that they are fresh & also having a relatively open plan kitchen, allowing you to see exactly where your food is coming from. The toilets are unisex which is quite unusual! Another mention is that a pint of Bierra Moretti is only £4, much cheaper than Italian restaurants in the city - this was a big tick for Al.
Central Market's menu can't really be describe as run of the mill. They offer a lot of brunch items, with a range of sandwiches for lunchtime. Their main menu has the usual items such as terrine, mussels, steak & burgers but they also offer more unusual items like sardines, steak tartare & pork shoulder steak. Part of the reason for choosing the Central Market was that they served oysters & I had been wanting them since The Grill On The Corner had run out the night we were in. For starters we opted for 6 Oysters & Sardines to share and for mains I went for the Spatchcock Poussain & Al went for the 6oz Burger.
We managed to get the last portion of sardines available & I have to say I wasn't too sure about them when they arrived as they came whole which meant fish bones!! I have to admit, my first thoughts were soon set aside after tucking into them. They were excellent! The meat fell off the bones & any bones that were left over were big enough for you to notice them. The sardines came with a lime & chorizo oil which really complimented the fish. The lime was a good contrast. We soon tucked into the oysters which came with 3 accompaniments - tabasco (yay!), soy sauce & a red onion viniagrette type sauce. I tried all 3 & they all went very well, with only the red onion one maybe being a bit too tart for my liking.
There wasn't a long wait between our starter & main. The spatchcock poussain was delicious! I don't know what seasoning they had put on the chicken skin but it was slightly crunchy with a salty taste to it, really nice. It was accompanied by roast anya potatoes & a sprout salad. It tasted a bit like coleslaw as it was quite creamy but it went really well with the spatchcock & I wish they had a deli section so I could go & get a tub of it to take home!! Neither myself or Al are big tomato fans so when I noticed him tucking into the burger without taking the tomato out I asked him if he'd forgotten. He pointed to the bottom of the burger where the tomato was mushed up & he said it actually didn't taste like a tomato, it was more of a smokey flavour. I had a taste of the burger & to me it tasted a bit like a hot dog! Not that it was unpleasant, just a bit different from the usual strong beef flavour you would expect. The french fries were also nice & crispy & not overly pre-salted.
Overall, we thoroughly enjoyed our first visit to Central Market. I've since recommended it to a few people & intend on going back to try Steak Tartare for the first time!
