Indeed, summer was the nearly man this year, a suspicion of sunshine, a promise of lazy, hazy days laying on the grass with groovy sounds, a hint of a glint of the tint on a shiny bikini top strap under a summer blouse and a sniff of barbecued grub.
Now September is looming we’ve no chance…….what a con.
I took a quick trip to Pescara for a bit of sun and I invited my pal and fellow cook Franca to come over to Leeds next year when we have our Regional dinners featuring the specialities of her area, Abbruzzo. She has introduced me to some lovely old recipes and ingredients from the area and hopefully we shall see her in Salvo’s next September, commitments permitting.
I took my first ever cruise this summer with my wife, son and my auntie - Zia Pina. I approached the holiday with a bit of trepidation as my taste in entertainment, food and people can be a little ‘particolare’ as they say ‘round our parts.
Well, much to my surprise we all had a ball with much fun and laughter. There were people from all walks of life who immediately became your neighbours so lots of salutations and how’s your fathers like we had all been living together on the same estate since the 60’s which gave off a real feelgood factor. Nearly everybody was polite to one another; I forgot how good manners, conviviality and consideration for others around you can raise your spirits and put you in that warm fuzzy place .
The food and service was of a surprisingly good standard, every night we would put on our gladrags then make our way to one of the more formal dining rooms to join other diners on large tables. After a week or so you tend to meet people you enjoy spending time with for a few cocktails before joining them for a long boozy languorous dinner.
The entertainment was very mainstream but strangely enjoyable even when naff! The Star Turn Comedian (I’m too embarrassed to mention his name
told a story that we had already heard twice before by two other ‘turns’!
We rediscovered the joy of arriving slowly on foreign shores, it was really great sailing towards the lovely sunny coastline of Ajaccio, Corsica, and waking up at 7a.m, drawing the curtains and seeing magnificent Napoli in its sprawling splendour was also a bit of a moment for me.
All in all a relaxing and enjoyable holiday was had by all, except for our arrival in Southampton when the company, Princess Cruises, made a real pig’s ear of handling the ship’s late arrival and managed to antagonise 100’s of customers in an easily avoidable episode. The family want to cruise again but whether it will be with Princess remains to be seen, I have written to them with my complaint and I’m looking forward to hearing their comments on the fiasco.
With the Big City Jazz event going on in Leeds over the Bank Holiday weekend along with the Chapletown Carnival and Leedsfest we held our own little music events at the restaurant which we presumptuously called ‘The Sound of the Suburbs’.
On Sunday afternoon we had tables running all down the shop parade and over by the grass verges with a little jazz combo ‘Destrio’ playing on the street through the afternoon. All the tables were taken, the sun shone for once and we all enjoyed lunch to the music of Chet Baker, Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and the like. Nice!
We also hosted our first micro gig in the Enoteca above the restaurant on Bank holiday Monday. With a capacity of 30 people, the bar provided an intimate and perfect venue for local band ‘the Devil’s Jukebox’ who wheezed through a set of creaky ancient blues, vaudevillian tango’s and 20’s jazz with broken legs and a venereal disease. You really had to be there. The line up of harmonium, ukulele/banjo, stringed bathtub bass, and clarinet provided the backing for singer Dr Ezekiel Bordello, blues shouter ordinaire and part time travelling snake oil salesman who shimmied, leered and stripped his way through the one hour set, finishing the evening in his socks n suspenders, nipple tassels and decorated codpiece. Now that’s Entertainment.
http://www.myspace.com/thedevilsjukeboxuk
Here’s one for all you people wanting a great dining experience in Marbella .
I had booked a table by email a week earlier at Skina, a small restaurant in the Old Town area of Marbella serving new wave Andalusian to a maximum of 14 customers every night.
The tiny dining room is elegant without the faux formality that is found in many restaurants promising ‘fine dining’ along this coastline.
We were warmly welcomed at the door by name, Marco, a young, smart professional offered us a complimentary glass of local Cava while we scanned the menu.
Dainty hand made breadsticks and some kind of large crispbreads with black onion seeds were presented in a very heavy oblong of marble with grooves for the crispbreads (similar to the Italian ‘Mother in Law’s tongues’) and a hole filled with a dip made from pork fat and smoked paprika.
The 4 of us went for the Tasting menu at 48.50 euro a head and we started with a recommended bottle of very nice dry white (Do Ferreiro, 25 euro).
I could go on about this excellent meal so I will.
The cooking was precise modern Spanish with tons of flavour; Marco, one of 2 staff in the room, asked where we were from and it turned out he had worked with 2 friends of mine, Tony and Olga of Anthony’s in Leeds at El Bulli in Roses, talk about small world!
We had a procession of dishes, all memorable and 3 bottles of wine including a red at 35 euros (Finca Valpiedra – ‘scuse me for the lack of wine info but alcohol, visual and taste overload made me miss things in my surreptitiously scribbled notes
We finished the meal with a digestif similar to grappa and the bill came to 350 euro.
This was the menu degustacion.
Gazpacho served in chilled test tubes and topped with some crystallised stuff (cucumber? Olive oil? not sure)
Fois gras with yoghurt 3 ways (mousse, crunchy niblets, cream) and honey.
Tuna with different raw and cooked textures, micro cucumber, avruga caviar, sweet cucumber salad.
A bronze shiny cube of oxtail with tomato, apricot and soft rocks of olive oil. (Gill has the first of her many er…hot flushes of pleasure.
Sea bass in high tech plastic bag (en papillotte) with samphire, cherry tomato, fine veg, crispy seaweed? – served in a china hat.
Smoked prawn fritters.
Iberian Pork with candied aubergine, vincotto, blood sausage? and crispy vegetable stuff. The pork looked like a piece of rare beef fillet- dark red and oozing a little blood/juice, however it was pork neck muscle, cooked at low temperature for a long time. The quality of the meat was absolutely exceptional and swoonfully delicious.
I warn Gill who is veering towards a ‘when Harry met Sally’ scene.
An illuminated glass cube that gently changed colour was a pedestal for a bowl of crumbly chocolate, ‘frogspawn’ of violet, apricot mousse in a round skin, crispy sweet bits (unidentified) and soft little cubes redolent of yoghurt.
Chocolate graffiti – 4 ways with chocolate included choc ice jigsaw, balsamic choc mousse and some eucalyptus granita.
We thought it was all over and were outside having a smoke and digestif when another dish/not dish arrived.
Egg custard cube, chocolate with a suspicion of curry and a pot of red fruit fool with raspberries .
Flippin ‘eck it’s just a raspberry.
Are you sure?
Is there something in it?
Nope, just a raspberry – how nice to finish the last mouthful with something unreconstructed..
So, that was dinner at Spina. We all thought it the best meal we have enjoyed on the Costa del Sol. It was a lot of fun and surprisingly unpretentious and casual.
It will be interesting to see how these young restaurateurs get on in the future.
