Special offer on my 500th blogpost.

To celebrate my 500th blogpost I am offering an instant pdf file of my popular book Tales From The Block at only £4.99!!! This offer is open until 27th February (my birthday!)

This beautiful book is available through this link on the Blurb book publishers website. For those who haven't had a chance to read it, browse it or just lovingly adore it here is your opportunity to help me celebrate my 500th blog post and I look forward to your responses. The Blurb Book link above will take you to my publisher page and guide you through the simple purchasing procedure.

Many thanks to all my readers for reading and enjoying my foodie blog all these years.

Phil Lowe.



Tales From The Block

Bit of human blood with your lamb?

Well I was going to write a piece about a butcher's shop I walked into in the southernmost town of Ettlingen in Germany (Early December 2014) as my next post but I had an accident at work on Friday evening and I'm choosing to put the German butcher's story on hold until next time.

Friday evening is my only late shift at Tesco (12pm - 9pm) but it can be rather boring if the store is quiet. Having done all my cleaning jobs and sorted out my reductions I was actually rather delighted when a middle aged couple came over and asked my advice on lamb for a tagine. Long story short - they agreed on my boning out a full leg of lamb for them. This is a job I could do with my eyes shut. Perhaps in hindsight it would have been beneficial if I had kept them shut.

boning knife in action

Instead, I took the very sharp boning knife and began to snick away at the meat around the bone at the very end of the leg. 'Snick snick snick' went the knife. Such a balletic sound. I was a meat craftsman at the height of his prowess. Now for the knee joint on the leg. Found it in one. They were going to be so pleased with my work. I found the gap for my knife's end quicker than you can say "cut above the others" then I freed the section from the main thigh bone. The knife suddenly slipped sideways and sliced deeply into my first finger on the left hand. The hand, incidentally, that was NOT sporting a chain mail glove. For a fraction of a second I hoped I had just nicked the fleshy top of my knuckle. I looked down and saw something gaping wide and bleeding profusely that possibly required stitches. Suddenly it hurt. Lots. I swore. I almost said a very bad word which would have meant instant dismissal, yes that word - "Sainsburys!!!"

I actually said the accusatory expletive "Bastard!!!!" and then ran to the hand sink to wash the wound under the stinging cold water tap. Elevating my injured finger I quickly wrapped it in an apron and sped towards the first aid box. Eliott on the deli helped me dress the wound with two blue plasters. The customers had gone white. I kept apologising for swearing and continued to finish off boning their leg off lamb - very cautiously. With each gingerly practised slice of the meat I checked for blood seepage. Some was leaking out of the bottom of the plasters. I got one of the lads to wrap the meat up in two plastic bags sans human blood. I hope they enjoyed their tagine.

Perhaps I should have gone to the hospital to see if it needed stitches but by this time it was almost time to take the ice of the fish counter, clean up and go home at nine o'clock. No way was I going to hang around the accident and emergency ward at the QMC for hours and then go home.

On the Saturday morning (before going to work)  I cautiously took off the plasters to reveal the injury. It was still a bit bloody and sore but didn't feel infected ie: warm and puffy. I took the photo above - as you do.  As I write this today (Tuesday 20th January) I will have changed the plasters three times and worn one of those blue condom finger jobbies with strings on to protect my finger and keep it clean at work. As my finger sticks out like a sore finger I have felt perfectly placed to point at things around the Tesco store. Eggs you want? Follow the blue finger. Anchovies? Aisle 8 in the direction of the blue finger. Now where's that chain mail glove?

"Sauerkraut anyone?"

"Fermented cabbage for dinner, anyone? Come on eat up!" Sauerkraut is exactly that - fermented cabbage and it is one of those 'love it or hate it or sorry never even tried it' kind of foods. However it has fans worldwide and although often associated with German cuisine the roots and action of fermentation of finely shredded cabbage actually goes back to ancient China.

Sauerkraut means 'sour cabbage' and it is made using a very simple procedure involving wild fermentation. In effect it requires no live starter to begin the process. Salt is added to the finely shredded cabbage and this draws out water from the vegetable. Naturally occurring bacteria present in the cabbage react with the resulting brine and this causes the cabbage to ferment and take on its sour flavour. Although it can be purchased in jars and cans, fresh sauerkraut has a superior flavour.

On our recent trip to Karlsruhe my friend Emma and I were keen to experience as much of the ordinary life of an average German as possible and we enjoyed browsing in some of the shops off the beaten track. Just off the main shopping thoroughfare we encountered a small independent supermarket with boxes of vegetables and fruits placed outside. It was the first time we had ever seen sauerkraut sold in bags before and amused ourselves with a daft photo opportunity. My grumpy face is supposed to be illustrated a 'sour' mood. We half expected the veg police to come to arrest us for messing with the sauerkraut.  For some interesting and simple sauerkraut recipes check this site.

'Sauerkraut has a clean but pleasantly sour/tart flavour that is good for cutting through the fattiness of some meats. It can make a refreshing side dish to sausages, ham and bacon and can be eaten cold in salads and sandwiches.' 1001 Foods you must try before you die.

The Karlsruhe Christmas Market or Christkindlmarkt.

I've been so busy since I came back from Germany in early December and then after Christmas I came down with this virus everyone seemed to be getting and so all my chronological plans of writing about the food in Germany, the butchers shop in Ettlingen and a variety of other cooking or food related blog posts up to this day seemed to have got all mixed up. I still have to tell you all about the open market in Leiden in Holland too!

Well, at least I am no longer coughing like a bad tempered walrus and on this rainy Tuesday in early January 2015 (Happy New Year readers!) I have been going through a few photographs of my relatively recent visit to Karlsruhe with my friend Emma Brown. We went to perform my play called Greetings From The Trenches. A lot of our time was spent doing last minute technical checks and rehearsing with our German sound and lighting guy - Lennart Strenztsch but we were also able to get out and about to the Christmas Market and enjoy some mulled wine and sweet and savoury pfannkuchen.

Whilst eating and drinking our way round the festive Christkindlmarkt  we spotted some smoked salmon in the whole side being smoked in front of a fire as well as plenty of  pretty stalls selling a variety of confectionary items and enough nougat to rot your teeth in seconds. The Germans certainly seemed to be a nation with a sweet tooth. As you might expect from such a market there were many stalls selling Lebkuchen and Magenbrot (both forms of soft gingerbread) and Gebrannte Mandeln (candied toasted almonds) as well as candles in all shapes and sizes and wooden toys. Although I kept saying that I was going to try a German sausage I never did get round to it.

During my time in Karlsruhe I came back to the Christkindlmarkt two more times. Those were on the Saturday to meet up with my friend Lena and her partner Sascha and on the Sunday to see my friend Thorsten (of whose Christmas dinner you can read about in the blog post before this.) On both occasions we had to try out the gluhwein just to make sure it was still ok. Thorsten took me to a tiny little kiosk where he claimed it was the best mulled wine made with good wine from his homeland - the Rheinland Pfalz.

A lot of the time in Germany seemed to be involving drinking German lager beer (weird that) and sitting in steamy cafes with a cup of strong coffee and an appetizing portion of delicious fruit based tart. A couple of times the too strong coffee upset  my stomach and caused me to make a swift visit to the loo! But that is another story. Happy days! Even as I am writing this I am recalling lots of stories and incidents/observations from my time in Karlsruhe regarding food and certain favourite cafes. I certainly won't be short of things to write about this year!

On the tram to Heide.