crab at manna
Holly Jones of Manna from Devon Cooking School meets up with old and new friends
A Food & Drink feature (March 2011)
After the excitement of Christmas and New Year, January and February can be gloomy and grey so it’s always a pleasure to meet up with old and new friends. One perfect reason for a get-together in February was the cooking day for the winners of the Dartmouth Food Festival 2010 auction who generously and successfully outbid all others for a cooking day at Manna from Devon with David and Holly Jones, Mitch Tonks of the Seahorse and food festival advocate, Serin Aubrey from Anzac St Bistro and the festival’s executive chef, and Tim McClaughlin-Green, sommelier to the Seahorse and huge supporter of the festival.
The group of friends (Val and David Bird, Liz and Paul Burry, Pat and Neill Irwin) came over to Kingswear-based Manna from Devon in time for lunch of Dartmouth crab, homemade mayo and fresh sourdough bread along with the first of many wines from Tim. Their first task was to make the lunch so under Mitch’s expert tutelage set about whisking up the mayo and cracking open the 2 fabulous local cock crabs from Mark Lobb.
We then embarked on preparing a leisurely supper on a Lebanese theme to bring in some winter sun and to challenge Tim with the wine selection. David Jones led the team in a bread making session and then they created a selection of mezze including roast aubergine dip, hummus, marinated bream parcels, a variety of salads and spiced chicken.
A leg of hogget from Sally Vincent in Dittisham was butterflied by Serin and roasted with spices, rightly taking centre stage and a homemade baklava of filo layers with pistachios and local honey finished the meal with dark coffee.
Tim had provided a selection of his favourite wines to enjoy with the different courses including a 10 year old Muscadet and some fabulous reds to go with the hogget – it was really interesting to experience wines we would probably not have chosen ourselves and to see how they reacted with the food.
All in all a great day – relaxed, chatty cooking with a group of friends, with memories of last year’s food festival and general foodie (and otherwise) gossip, and a great way of cheering up a grey Friday in February.
First Published March 2011 By The Dart
