I hate the word Gourmet, perhaps as it reeks of pretensive and elitist... anyone who can taste the difference of crap from good food and has the money and wisdom to choose the better stuff read on
I am no food expert but here I shall collect some of my findings of stuff I find particularly delicious
It doesn't inherently have to be expensive, I like simple foods, not everything has to be aged 100 years to pass my palate.. id rather eat at Pizzahut than a authentic Italian Restaurant, I'm not a big fan of nouvelle cuisine where they server you tiny ass amounts of food in some kind of sadist fashion of making you want it more... pseudo expensive I call it, where people try to make stuff seem expensive by either covering it in fake gold or just giving you hardly any of it in order to make you feel posh because you are that superficial.
Anyway I could rant on forever, to the food and drink!!
I will be paying special attention to things local to me in and around Birmingham
Restaurants
Nandos
Killer food, simple food, healthy (relatively) and spicy is always good in my book
PizzaHut
Good pizzas but always leaves me feeling like a fat bastard, a good treat now and then but for gods sake don't go regularly and go at a time when the kids are not around
La Tasca
Great great food, the Tapas are wonderful not as good as Mechu but pretty close
Red Peppers
Random Tapas Place by Canal
---
Mechu in Birmingham
Very nice classy place, good prices, amazing Tapas
Carrots, Swede, Peas, Onion, Chinese Cabbage, Lamb Kebabs, Tomatoe
Spicy Ham and Chinese Cabbage, Onions, Tomatoe, Spicyness! (Learning to use various Indian spices I have)
Chicken Pasta Bake, Oat Bran and Cheese Topping = Yum (Sauce was Tuna Napol...)
Tofu, Chinese Leaves/Cabbage, Onion/Peas/Pepper, Rice
Chicken cooked into Garlic Nandos
Tofu and Leaves cooked in Soy and Chinese Herbs and Vegetable Stock, they soak up the flavour very well.
Noodles
Tofu and Chinese Leaves/Cabbage
Cooked in Soy, Herbs and Sweet/Sour Sauce
Gloriousness is a Costco Tiramisu
Failed Cake, just tasted too damn sweet, though it is meant to look like that.. mostly
Inedible sausage of forever cooked, not my fault or doing!
Chinese Leaves simmered in soy sauce
Thick noodles + Chicken in garlic black bean thingy thing sauce :-p I forget
Trifle I decorated with a Cherry Brandy moat ;-P
Alexs new invention, the double wrap... tasty!
Enchiladas - Pain is Good BBQ Flavas - Peas - Cheese and Ham fried in tomato chutney stuffed inside the enchiladas - Sundried Tomatoes and Chilis - Diced Tomato - Onions - Peppers
Sweedish Meatballs - Pasta - SunDried Tomato - ChilliPepper - Peas - Grilled Cheese
Yes most if not all the food I eat looks pretty disturbing, messy, mushy... but I tell you what, It smells good and tastes great and is simple to make
:-)
Fried ham in spice, Juicy Green Jalepeno Peppers, Boiled Potato mixed with Pataks Rogan Josh sauce and Heinz Beans with melted cheese on top and grilled
Variation on the same:
Thicks Noodles + Meatballs
Meatballs and Pasta
Pasta Bake with Soup andCheese grilled
Thick Noodles + Sauce + ham + Rice
Thick Noodles and cooked ham+sauce
Thicks Noodles plus tomato sauce plus spicy meatballs
Chicken
Red Thai Curry with.. stuff!
Real Mince complete with far too much fatty oil, learned to drain it in future and dab with paper towels or just use fake/Quorn Mince to save arteries!
Chorizo Sausage or Lincolnshire Sausage cooked in Barbados Mustard Pepper Sauce, with Onion Gravy and bubble and squeak (Cabbage/Mash)
Some restaurants I have visited
Sticky Chicken - Thai - Red Orchid Canal side Mailbox Birmingham
Tapas at Mechu - Birminhgam, best Tapas ever
2nd Visit to Mechu:
La Tascas - Good Tapas! = Fat
Indian in Manchester by River - East East Restaurant
Thai Restaurant Mailbox Birmingham
Good very spicy indian food aimed at indian people - StarCity Birmingham
--
Favorite Ingredients and Meals
Tesco - Sundried Tomatoes (they look disgusting but dice them up and they taste delicious, add a lovely tart and rich flavour to almost anything)
Tesco - Merchant Gourmet Roquito Hot Sweet Chilli Peppers (amazing juicy sweet spicy nom!)
Star - Jalapeno Peppers - Juicy Spiceyness Lovely!!
Nandos - Hot Peri-Peri Sauce, lovely flavour, real taste, and good on spice/hotness too, comes in different strengths too along with a variety of flavours.
Chorizo Sausage, why buy normal sausages when you can have chorizo, spicy and rich flavored and no less healthy than normal sausages I believe.
I just recently bought some Chorizo & Pork sausages and the are fantastic. Too Strong to eat on there own you'll really want to put it with something else like Patas Bravas or what I had it with Bubble and Squeek
:-D
or just onion gravy and mashed potato or something. Such basic and simple food but it tastes really good. Slightly worrying how much fat /oil drips out of these things though, the Pork+Chorizo are not as bad as the full on chorizo and I think they taste better too.
or just onion gravy and mashed potato or something. Such basic and simple food but it tastes really good. Slightly worrying how much fat /oil drips out of these things though, the Pork+Chorizo are not as bad as the full on chorizo and I think they taste better too.Thick Chinese Noodles
These are fantastic if you can find them, I get them from a chinese super market Sing Fat
They cook reeealy quick and go well with so many things.
Morrisons - Quorn - Mince - 1.99
Quorn Mince, looks pretty weird but tastes great and is essential if you like mince/meatballs etc as the real beef stuff is horrendously unhealthy you can just see it dripping with oil and fat
Quorn Italian Style Meat Balls - Very very nice
Quorn Chicken Style Pieces - need a fair bit of oil to soften them, doesn't taste much like chicken at all
Quorn - Peppered Steaks
Frozen rice and Frozen Diced Onions are a must if you do a lot of stir fry. It makes cooking effortlessly fast and simple.
Morrisions Own - Frozen Vegetable Rice (Mushrooms Peas Rice) - £1.29 - BUY
Baps Buns
Sainsburys - Frozen Diced Onions - 500g - 69p - BUY
Sliced Water Chesnuts
Great with noodles, they add a lovely lil crunch to what might ordinarily be a rather mushy blend of noodles. And they don't have much flavor really, try them!
Chilli Bean Sauce, this stuff is epicaly good, goes nice with:
Laksa Paste
Red Thai Curry Paste, I like to stir fry meat in it such as ham, gives the meat a brilliant spicy tang.
