Food by Depree

I really haven’t had much opportunity to experiment with food over the last couple of weeks as we have been focusing on the sale of our house and finding somewhere to live.
Of course this is always difficult for us as the kitchen I have in my mind when viewing potential houses never quite transpires. When I was younger I always imagined a world of stainless steel with some serious commercial appliances , luckily my approach has softened somewhat. (with some gentle Coercion from Helen my wife)

Despite the many hours and miles viewing properties, I have been able to spend some time doing some hearty home cooking such as Sheppard’s pie and spicy pork goulash and also have been baking cakes for Halloween and Fireworks night.
Having been away for the weekend, last night we were faced with leftovers but I managed to make a sausage and mash with braised celery and a gorgeous onion gravy which was cooked out for an hour.

Incidentally when writing about food that I cook I will sometimes utter subjective reviews on flavour etc. This is drawn from whether I actually like the food and also the summary of reviews of any attending diners which in most cases amounts to Helen.
I’m never really fully happy with what I make, generally for two reason. The first is that when you spend a long time cooking you tend not to be hungry as you have tasted your way through the cooking process. The second is because I can always think of ways to do things better, which is hopefully a good thing.

I finally took the plunge over the weekend and ordered a Sousvide (forgive the pun)as there was a great offer for the bath and the vac pack which could not be ignored. The challenge when buying kit like is whether you are buying it for yourself or for any future popup events. On this occasion this came down to how you store food after you have cooked it in the Sousvide as of course you cannot cook 35 portions at once in a smaller appliance and the big appliances are massive and very expensive.
The good news is that providing you chill the cooked items very quickly after cooking they can be stored for some time at the correct temperature. I have therefore ordered a £5000 blast chiller as well, l can’t wait to see Helens face when it arrives. (I’m joking of course, but I have subscribed to massivebagsofice.com)

So next weekend will be hugely experiential as I’ll be Sousvid’ing everything !.

The other thing I purchased which is long overdue is a kitchenAid food mixer which will save masses of time for both home and popup cooking in the future. It will also stop me trashing the walls in the kitchen as I have been using a hand mixer and a bowl for quite some time.

Finally on the popup front it looks like I have finally managed to set up a Trip Adviser page for the Food By Depree but weirdly when you search for it doesn’t exist. I’m trying to resolve this so all of you who are desperate to feedback on the 6th of October ill let you know when it’s available. Alternatively I do have a face book site where you can leave feedback. http://www.Facebook.com/foodbydepree

So my next blog will hopefully be
much sooner than this one and will be full of news on how the Sousvide cooking is going and also progress on potential dishes for the next popup which is more than likely going to be in January

More soon

Mr Depree

I’m still buzzing from an awesome night at my first #popup last night.
Very tiring couple of days but had a great time and lots of positive feedback from all of my guests.
Time to reflect now and consider what went well and what didn’t.
I’ll consolidate all of the pictures taken and post them on WordPress over the the next couple of day
I’m also waiting for my trip adviser page to be set up in order for everyone to post feedback.

A massive thanks the Steve for allowing me to use his premises and also to my wife for never ending support and hard work yesterday and the weekend shopping for missing ingredients and equipment.
Finally a huge thanks to all those that came and had faith in my cooking.

Mr Depree

All loaded and about to set off.
My car smells amazing 🙂
#popup #tminus8hours

I’m getting very excited now as I only have 3 days to go for my first ever popup restaurant.
Everything has been ordered and all final equipment has been delivered and I can’t wait to start my mise en place tomorrow which kicks of with vegetable stock and two types of sorbet…

I’m nearly fully booked so whilst this first one is not about making money, it looks like I’ll have enough for a glass of wine at the end.
If I get a chance I’ll write updates over the weekend and on the day with as many pictures as possible.

I’m also chuffed that Helen gave me some new chef whites for my birthday yesterday so will be wearing them also. My old ones are a touch too small now 🙂

Wish me luck !

Mr Depree

I love travelling to places around the world and picking up hints and tips for cooking and food preparation.
We are in Amsterdam this weekend as a birthday trip and we have eaten some great food and also my faith in Farmers markets has been restored somewhat albeit away from home.

We started our day with a traditional ham cheese and eggs breakfast in a local cafe which whilst calorific was very good. I wasn’t too worried as we had already hired our bikes and intended to traverse the entire city amongst the other thousands of bikes to burn off the consumption.

Following this we visited the farmers market which was very good and truly showed that when all local growers come together with their wares in one place, it can have a big impact. One stall I found particularly good was the mushroom stall which had vast amounts of seasonal fungi which had I been cooking on this trip would have cost me a small fortune.
We have no excuse in England for not having stalls like this as our country has the perfect conditions for growing fungi and when I return home I shall investigate why they are not prevalent.

We did indeed ride another 17k yesterday, which helped with the preparation for our dinner where we had booked La Rive at the Intercontinental, a stunning Michelin star restaurant on the edge of Amsterdam.
I have to say, this was probably one of the best meals I’ve had with many highlights, including the deep fried cherry tomato and soy sauce sorbet and also the Wagu beef with bay leaf jus. I can’t mention all of the highlights as there were many and also of course I want to borrow some of the ideas for my cooking in the future.
One thing I did find very good which I’ve not seen before was sliced confit roast potatoes which I discussed at great length with the head waiter about how they were prepared. Mainly around whether hey were sliced before or after cooking. I’m going to try them when I get home.

My mind is still fully on next weekend as I will spend most of it in the kitchen preparing for the popup on Monday night.

I’m reasonably well prepared but have a lot to do in the evenings next week to ensure all of the food is ordered and my timelines are competed.
I also have to buy a couple of pieces of equipment to help cook some of the dishes as I’ve been practicing with inferior tools. (The excuse is in 🙂

There is still space, so if you know anyone that wants to break the Monday night rule and come and enjoy some good food and good company please let me know ASAP.

Hope you are all having a great weekend.

Mr Depree

Sent from my iPad

Up until a couple of months ago I generally only ever tweeted or updated my status on Facebook when I had something to rant about or to express my natural sarcasm to others.

It never occurred to me that I should be sharing my thoughts about the things I am passionate about, i.e. food and music.

It’s been quite interesting how that change has moved my social media experience to seldom interesting to now actively participating in discussion and feeds, with quite a few responses from key people who are also on the Popup journey.

On the music side I did get a response from the artist ‘Example’ once but it was in response to me being sarcastic to him and was met with andequate balanced reply.

So my ‘Personal Cloud’ increases in size which can only help when I do events such as this in the future.

I also now follow lots and lots of feeds in various places updating on events and suppliers throughout London and Surrey which is great reference material.

This week I have been trying to nail down my suppliers and am struggling somewhat with Fruit and Veg as my continual emailing, calling and even tweeting to my preferred choices does not appear to be working. It’s a real shame that local suppliers can’t see the benefit of being involved in smaller businesses such as mine. It seems perseverance is the key with things like this.

I have decided to keep the menu a secret until the last minute as it seems that’s what most popups do. I can tell you however that it will contain Duck, Beetroot, British goat’s cheese and hopefully some autumn fruit. There is lots of variety so no need to worry too much about not liking something.

There are still spaces so please get in touch with your details as soon as possible.

I’m looking forward to the weekend as I’ll be purchasing any final equipment needed for cooking and serving on the day, even perhaps a new food processor as mine has almost died with so much use recently. (It was 13 years old)

Have a great weekend

Mr Depree

 

 

We again had a very busy weekend as we visited friends for dinner (which was lovely as always, great Seabass Mr Pimm) and also went to see the Invictus games at the Olympic park which was awesome.

This left little time to practice any of the dishes im intending to cook at the Popup on the 6th but I forced msyelf to spend most of Sunday evening in the kitchen working out the final elements to the menu and messing with the flavours a little.

Im pleased to say im very close to finalising it all, with only the desert to agree.

This is proving to be quite challenging as my aim to make it all very British seasonal makes it hard as fruit at this time of year can be a little boring, and im trying to avoid heavy cakey (is that a word?) chocolate dishes (sorry ladies).

I believe the search may have ended though as I cooked something new and interesting last night which ill finish tomorrow so fingers crossed.

I have also had a couple of bookings come in over the weekend so now im pleased to say it will be a worthwhile number and ill be cooking for people ive never met before. All very scary !

Still some spaces left though so get in touch quickly if you want to come.

I hope your week got off to a good start.

Mr Depree

 

There are still spaces available for my popup in Hampton Village on 6th October. Get in touch if you would like to come.
Mr Depree

I’m very conscious that my first Popup is only a couple of weeks away and I have stacks to do before the event.
I am however reasonably relaxed about most things which is vastly different to a lot of things I do I my work life. I always stand by my ethos that food is very reliable whereas IT is not, especially when you add people into the mix.
Most people like food but only 50% of people like IT (that’s a guess and I don’t have time to check Wikipedia).

Over the weekend I registered for grub club which as you probably know is a central site for all popup and dining clubs to advertise their events.
The set up process isn’t too lengthy however it does challenge your thought process somewhat when asked your background and your reasons for hosting an event. It wasn’t too troublesome for me though as those that know me are aware that I can wax lyrical about food and my love for cooking all day.
The only part I struggled with was uploading the picture as the website continually crashed. ( I told you, people and IT, not a good mix).

So I completed the submission and awaited acceptance, hoping it would introduce people to not only my popup but also my blog and twitter feed for future events (hopeful)
Disappointingly I got an email on Tuesday advising they cannot market the event as it is not in London and they only have a small team.
I was very tempted to run through my ‘technically Middlesex does exist, it’s now London’ story but truly felt it would be wasted.
It looks like a good site and service and I’m not sure how much extra effort it would take for one small event, hopefully they will extend in the future.
Perhaps I should start a site for surrey ….

The last couple of weeks have been very busy at work and also every spare moment gets taken up trying to find a house as we sold ours 6 months ago and after 2 failed purchases we are getting desperate and a touch weary.
The knock on effect is that I haven’t been able to practice my menu as much as I would like and also decide on a dessert. Focus is required I feel to progress and perhaps some very early mornings. Although I’m not sure it would be appreciated if the smell of cooking surrounded the house at 5am..
So all in all, still work to be done.

There are still spaces for the event if you are interested, please get In touch via any of my SM streams

Thanks

Mr Depree

For quite a long time now I have thought that farmers markets that appear once a month in towns around the country are not really what they claim to be.

This weekend I had planned to continue my search for quality local suppliers of fruit, veg and meat which I can use for my Popup on the 6^th October. My wife Helen persuaded me to get up a little earlier than usual on a Saturday and go to the local farmers market in Walton on Thames despite my reluctance due to previous experiences.

We stopped at the market on our way to the gym (I thought I’d add that to demonstrate our healthy lifestyle) and walked through the stalls which looked to be very few in number with only one or two stalls selling anything related to a farm or local produce.

Stalls packed with oils, chutneys and craft knickknacks were abundant including the obligatory cupcake stand which I still feel that we have inherited from the US, as when I was a child they were called fairy cakes and only had half the amount of icing on them.

After completing a full circuit I decided to ask one of the only game suppliers whether they could provide a number of duck legs and deliver them to the local area. This seemed to confuse the owner somewhat as the response was a touch vague and not convincing so I politely gave up.

There was a good fruit and veg stall however which looked to have good quality food, so I remembered the name for later Googling as the chap serving seemed a little too busy playing on his phone.

So all in all the trip was worth a visit at it confirmed to me that markets such as these are not a good source of local providers. Perhaps something will come out of the fruit and veg stall and help to change my mind slightly.

Until then, the search continues.

Bookings for the event are coming in nicely with only 25 places left so if you are interested drop me a line on one of my social media feeds. You are guaranteed to get locally sourced produce as this is something I am very passionate about.