Wedding catering at Brockworth Court Tithe Barn, Gloucestershire

There are lots of houses in the Cotswolds called Dove Cottage or Dove House - a few hundred years ago they were kept for their meat. In a lot of houses and barns you see dove holes in the stone walls - but here at Brockworth Court Tythe Barn was a real dovecote. Makes a great talking point as this is where the guests were congregating for their reception drinks. 

Edible flower pots on the table! When I was clearing up the next morning all these had gone - they must have had a serious sugar rush!

Roast butternut squash soup with beetroot pesto served in a bread bowl - do you ever get so hungry you can eat the bowl? 

See how to make the bowls here.

Gill and Anton put together the other starter: ham hock, broad bean, mint and basil pearl barley risotto with beetroot pesto

Matador pie for the main course - similar to this one from a wedding a few years ago. This time we served it with dauphinoise potato, french beans and red wine braised red cabbage. At the tasting they said it was the matador pie that first switched them on to us - they had had the pieminister version at another wedding they had been to but much preferred ours. Not one to argue!
There was also a haddock, tiger prawn and mussell pie with sweet potato mash topping and a meditteranean vegetable pie with crispy filo topping.
When we were clearing up the next day there were compliments from the parents of the bride and groom The pies were the talk of the wedding apparently!

Trio of desserts - strawberry and gooseberry crumble tart, lychee and pommegranate panna cotta and chocolate & blackcurrant brownie

Related posts 

Other weddings we have done

Matador pie 2011

Lychee and pomegranate panna cotta 

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Canapés, roast loin of pork and trio of desserts for a wedding in Tewkesbury

The nearest wedding venue to Tewkesbury Abbey? Quite possibly. Certainly the closest we have catered at.   Another couple we are catering for in September are getting married at Tewkesbury Abbey too - can there be a better venue around the Cotswolds?

Hardwick House

When we commit to an event we go into it wholeheartedly - we get there whether through floods, digging ourselves out of snow drifts, or days when the road melts and the kitchen is 35 degrees and you get sunburnt cooking  serving a barbecue wedding (we've done all 3 and so much more!). Sadly the same can't be said for the original caterer for this wedding - we had been called in when the chef they had originally booked had decided to go away on holiday for his 30th birthday - how could anyone do that? I remember cooking for a dinner party on mine. You have to have 1001% commitment in this business - we play a big part in our clients' celebrations - never more so than their wedding day! And with that comes great responsibility to getting it right.

Smoked salmon blinis, air dried ham with Tewkesbury mustard,  croustade of Oxford blue and pear, croustade of brie and caramelised red onion

As we were coming in to this event at a late stage all the menus had been set up already so we took them on and prepared them in our own way - which had gone down well at the pre-wedding tasting with the bride and groom.

Picked up this pear shaped board a few days before - went with the  country  feel of the wedding

Scotch quail eggs

Quail eggs for the scotch quail eggs the night before - I've started so I'll finish!

Choral group performing on the lawn - real music! Amazingly  large & varied repertoire. Made the afternoon so much better!

Roast loin of Old Spot pork with apricot stuffing, crispy crackling  with Tewkesbury mustard mash, baby vegetables and Herefordshire cider jus

Summer vegetable risotto with poached Burford Brown egg and Double Gloucester cheese crisp - we were going to add marrow to the risotto until I saw it just about to be cut - then thought the marrow could make a great bowl for the risotto instead. So we hollowed out the middle and roasted them and the risotto could go in the middle. The poached egg swung quite a few meat eaters too - so we ended up with 12% risotto vs 88% pork.

Then for dessert........

Trio of desserts - Black Forest of Dean cheesecake, hedgrow pavlova  and pink champagne jelly

Originally the idea had been to serve these just on platters at the table for guests to help themselves. At the tasting I had suggested serving all on one plate like this. It does look rather impressive when it goes out!

Black Forest of Dean cheesecake using this recipe  - the griottine cherries might be terribly expensive, but they're so worth it - this was a revelation!  

Hedgerow pavlova

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Birthday meal cooked near Burford, Oxfordshire

Chocolate and almond torte with white chocolate ganache and berries - birthday cake aka torte becomes dessert to serve at the table family style

Served this up last night at Field House near Burford - love doing parties at this house. They only have an aga and the kitchen is more of kitchen-sitting room with 180 degree views of the countryside - great relaxed feel. Seriously chocolatey! I'd had quite an audience watching me prepare - five of them aged between 4 and 7 - most put out that I was cooking for their parents & grandparents rather than them. Next time guys!

Orzo risotto with grilled prawns and scallops & courgette carpaccio - lucky they were plain white plates or the pattern would have eaten too - went down rather well!

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Assiette of desserts with mini heart shaped scones - Wedding catering in Chepstow

Assiette of dessert with mini heart scones with clotted cream and jam,  lemon meringue pie,  ricotta and raspberry cheesecake, spoon of sticky toffee pudding and homemade Baileys ice cream

Heart shape scones - used in the dessert above. 

Italian meringue on lemon meringue pies gets glazed with blow torch

Looks like this will be one of the last events we will be doing at Wyelands in Chepstow - sadly the owners are taking it back into private ownership next month - they're downsizing to Wyelands, which makes you laugh slightly.

The kitchen there is infront of the dining table, so as the guests were eating the main course they could watch us putting the finishing touches to the dessert. Apparently we made it all look so easy. The secret is in the days of preparation beforehand.

Starter - pearl barley pea and mint risotto with grilled prawns, & mint pesto. No picture of the dessert -  as always so busy getting it out hot & on time forgot photo 

Related posts:

Previous assiette desserts we have served
What does 'assiette' mean? Assiette of desserts 12 July 

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Grilled scallops with nettle and chorizo risotto and nettle pesto

So in after a couple of days cooking at Camp Bestival with Ms Marmitelover it was back up the M5 from Dorset to cook for this wedding and set up 4 other events, before heading back down to Dorset at 5am on Sunday morning - busy.

The risotto is made with pearl barley rather than rice - adapted a recipe from here.

There's lots more photos from this event on the facebook album here: Wedding 30 July 2011. Forgot to take pics of the canapes though - so much going on.

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1001 Kitchen tips #60 - The secret ingredient in (vegetarian) mushroom risotto is.......

It was OK - just needed something a bit.... more. Using vegetable stock rather than chicken or fish you lack a certain depth of favour. Had a look in the cupboards, the fridge. Then on the sideboard spotted a jar of marmite. The best discoveries are made by accident.

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Pearl barley risotto with grilled tiger prawns, peas, basil and mint

There is pearl barley risotto under there - honest!This was for a hen party a few weeks ago. I normally do this with mint pesto, but as they had the summer style beef dish for the main course with watercress coulis I changed it to oyster sauce dressing with the risotto which I normally use for the asparagus and prawn dish (goes well with blackened cod and rice noodles too - that was our lunch today).
And for dessert? Just a little assiette:

Strawberry meringue roulade
Creme brulee
White chocolate and blueberry cheesecake
Chocolate and nut torte
Homemade Baileys ice cream

As there was one diabetic I made an alternative diabetic friendly assiette dessert as seen on a previous post.

Related posts

Link to pearl barley risotto recipe
Other assiette of desserts
Assiette of desserts facebook album
What does assiette mean?

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Meat Free Monday #4 - Sweet potato and leek pearl barley risotto with portobello and spinach

Another post-midnight meat free Monday into Tuesday feast chez nous.

The previous Saturday (now writing this 6 days later) we had been cooking for 31 in the midst of a powercut which lasted the whole night from before we got there. Burn out at the local substation. We couldn't even get in through the electric entrance gates when we arrived. One of the guests kindly reversed their car down the long drive and I transferred everything from the van, balancing on the cattlegrid in the van hadlights (don't look down) and into his car. Some 45 minutes later we were ready to cook..... without the electric oven or hob. Luckily there was an aga which I was already well acquainted with (another interesting saga with pigeons in feather and frozen pheasants for 26 guests which they had brought with them for me to cook around 11 months previously). The aga is on permenant go slow. The potatoes which normally cook in 10 - 15 minutes took 1 1/2 hours, and the water for coffee and washing up around 1 hour. If I had not pre-cooked the pheasant before we came out (even the electric oven there only goes up to 180 oC and is quite small for 30 people - and only useful when you have electicity) I am not really sure what time they would have eaten the main course. Front of house of course, everything was perfect - and everyone was really happy ("it was more than I could ever have hoped for - and that was in normal circumstances"). Chocolate fondue went down well too. With all the years of experience we had bewteen us, it was just another challenge - you have to have a sense of humour about these things. Great new trio of fish starters - but couldn't actually find the camera in the candlelight to take a photo - it really was hard to see anything - only found it by accident clearing up around midnight.

That was Saturday (and 3 1/2 hours of Sunday). Then it was a rapid turn-around on Sunday into Monday gearing up for the next party on the Monday night. So by midnight on Monday the only thing I could think of was fast food (above) - sweet potato and leek pearl barley and spelt risotto as I had served on Saturday night (the best one yet - so annoyed I didn't find the camera), and portobello mushrooms and spinach left from Gill's Saturday party. The spelt was accidental - I had picked up the wrong packet from the shelf in haste, but decided to try it anyway, and it worked really well. I used cider instead of white wine in the risotto base, and there was a bit of rosemary mixed in too from the garden - the only herb I could see out there in the dark.

Might get round to the sweet and sour jerualem artichokes later for this week's MFM.

More info on Meat Free Monday here.

Related posts

Other Meat Free Monday dishes

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Meat free Monday #1 - Roasted butternut squash with pearl barley risotto, baby beets and coriander puree

Made any new years resolutions? I'm realistisic and only make one or two. That way you're more likely to stick to them and move forwards. Like meat free Monday. Saw the concept in a few blogs last year. After a little reminder here just before new year, I thought why not try it. For a whole year.

After 35 days of busyness from the end of November up to last Saturday night, this morning I was hitting the carbs again gearing up for the next round. Having a personal breakfast chef is something I would reccommend to anyone. Mine (my dad, who's been helping over new year) cooked up mushroom omlette and fondant potato this morning. Definitely a good start to the new week.

Lunch was tomato soup (left from children's meal on NY eve) with sweetcorn fritter (left from Saturday night).

Tonight having a (raw) butternut squash left from NYE also I thought I'd try this. I like the idea of an edible bowl - like the fennel and apple bread bowls I made for the mussells a few weeks ago. Some people may tire of peeling squash - there are some great tips here if that is the case. When it comes to cooking for myself, it has to be said that I too like it to be as quick as possible as there's always so much else to do. So why not cook the squash in it's skin without peeling it? I cut the top part off and kept it to use for something else, and just scooped out the middle with an ice cream scoop. I'm pretty sure I remember a Jamie Oliver version like this, where it was halved, filled and tied back together with string to roast.... but maybe I'm wrong. This is an even quicker version at least.

I sat it on a few bay leaves (frosty ones picked outside my kitchen door) and drizzled on a little olive oil & scaterring of thyme, s & p, and roasted it (the oven heat helping to defrost the inside of my house).

When it was semi soft I took out the sprig of thyme in the middle and added the risotto (pearl barley risotto base, mixed with roasted vegetables, coriander, parmesan, white wine, wild rice, toasted pinenuts, chickpeas, clotted cream [marscapone had run out] and lemon juice). As I had all these ingredients around in the fridge I mixed them cold. As the squash roasts a bit longer the risotto in the middle heats through and blends together - a rather rustic version which is fine if you're just cooking at home for yourselves. If I was serving this to guests I would add the risotto in warm after the squash was completely cooked.

Don't throw the seeds away either. I keep meaning to save some to try germinating them and growing my own butternut squash (easy to do this with chillis too), but I like roasting them too. Nice to add when you're making granola, or to sprinkle over roasted butternut squash, or just to nibble on while you're busy in the kitchen....

The advantage of using pearl barley rather than risotto rice for this is it holds it shape where as risotto rice reaches a critical point and once past can become a puree - not so good. It also has a much higher fibre content ( 2 1/2 times the amount to white rice) which has obvious health benefits.

Eat with a spoon and fork so you can scoop out the roasted squash from the skin - it's comfort food after all.....

Roasted squash like this makes a good soup bowl too.

P.S. There's other posts to come from Christmas & new year, but they'll have to wait a while - so much else to do.

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Holiday chef

'We take the catering out of self catering, leaving you time to spend on your self'.

A personal chef for your holiday - all or some of your meals taken care of: breakfast, lunch, childrens meals and evening meals are all possible - you decide how much you want us to do. It's like being in a hotel but with the flexibility of your own home. No taxis to restaurants to organise and no baby sitter needed for the children - and it doesn't cost as much as you think!

We have menu ideas using the links below, but are happy to make whatever you would like - after all it's your special holiday!

Previous dishes made to request can be seen here: Special request .

You can also find dishes we have served in the past by clicking on starters, main course, dessert etc on the right sidebar or by using the search engine on the top left.

For weekends we also have weekend catering packages here: Benson of Broadway weekend catering pacakges and special offers

If you are interested in just one night - ideal for a celebration because you can spend your evening with your guests rather than toiling in the kitchen - we have menus here: Benson of Broadway menus.

We can either cook you meal in your home with chef and waiting staff or deliver it chilled with simple instructions for you to heat and serve.

You can see our previous clients' feedback here: Benson of Broadway recommendation letters.

See a previous holiday chef menu post - click here

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11 - 16 August 2009

Last week we cooked for a lady celebrating her 70th birthday at Wellacres. Adam cooked for them on Saturday when her family were there while I was barbecuing in Stroud. Then the family left on the Sunday and Monday, and her friends arrived on Tuesday and I cooked for them on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.

It was a week of bistro menus. They chose the Saturday menu but left the rest of the days to me so I tried out a few new bistro dishes.



As always there were different chocolates to go with the coffee & tea each day and different flavour bread rolls, but this time even different shapes for the rolls.


Tuesday

Homemade sundried tomato, olive and basil bakers knot rolls

Asparagus and gruyère tart
You can see more about this on a previous post.

Slow cooked shoulder of pork with lentils, spinach and chorizo......

Pot roasted for 6 hours - like the pork belly. The foil is taken off the top for the last hour so the crackling can crisp up. There is some spinach hiding underneath the pork.
..... and turnip and carrot salad

Cut on the mandolin. Bound with mayonnaise and vinaigrette a bit like coleslaw, but with turnips. Salted over night and then drained the turnips take on a new character - you could just mix them with olive oil and lemon and use them like celariac.

New York vanilla cheesecake with cherries in cherry brandy
I took the cherries raw and whole, and pitted them when I got there. Dropped in a little thickened sugar syrup with a good amount of cherry brandy and cooked for just a couple of minutes till soft (but you don't want them to puree!). I left them to cool naturally while we served the rest of them meal so they could remain at room temperature.

Coffee, tea and handmade white chocolate and blueberry fudge
Wednesday

Homemade onion bread rolls
Smoked chicken and orange salad with orange dressing
Donnington trout fillets in cider and apple sauce with baked cannellini beans, runner beans, broad beans and mangetout

When I was updating a few pages on the website recently I came accross this long forgotten dish, something I did in the months before I started. I thought it was time for a revamp. This is after all a sustainable fish - and in the Cotswolds about the only local fish, although I saw they had eel there as well.
The trout were still alive the morning before we served this. I had picked them up at Donnington on the way the previous evening - you have to let them rest overnight so the bones relax enough to pin bone them. I still can't forget the night I tried to pinbone them a few hours after they had been caught. The fillets are cooked skin side up (you need to scale them for this) so you can eat the crispy skin with a ladle of cider on the tray as well which poaches them from underneath.

Banana tarte tatin with homemade rum and raisin ice cream
After the success of the barbecued bananas recently I thought it would be good to try a banana tarte tatin. I still had some caramel left from cooking apples for tarte tatin and pineapples for the barbecue. All the flavour from cooking those was imparted to the bananas. The combination of this and the rum and raisin ice cream was just pure decadence.

Coffee, tea and handmade chocolate and coconut fudge


Thursday

I had saved the lamb and lemon tart till the last day - everyone's favourite. Always good to finish on a high note.

Homemade pesto bread rolls
Pearl barley risotto with wild nettles, roasted purple sprouting broccoli, artichokes and nettle pesto

After so many days in the kitchen it was nice to get out in the morning to pick nettles along the river. I found the first blackberries too - just a single bush that was directly in the sunlight, while the rest were still bitter green or still in flower. I sautéed the nettles and used some in the risotto itself and some to make pesto to go with it.





Shoulder of lamb with tabbouleh and grilled vegetables

Exactly the same as this one pictured a couple of months ago.

Glazed lemon tart with raspberries and raspberry sorbet

Coffee, tea and handmade elderflower Turkish delight
There is more on the turkish delight here.




"We have to go home tomorrow" said one guest at the end "and cook our own meals again - it just won't be the same". "Well you'll just have to come back again" I said. One of the other guests was already noting down our details and those of the house to do just that......

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