IF you think Austrian cakes are just about Viennoiserie (which, frankly, can be pretty boring), you haven’t been to some of the country’s great old coffee houses, particularly in Salzburg or Innsbruck – Esterhazyschnitt, Cremeschnitte, Kaisertorte, Linzertorte, Nusstorte … the litany of names is as mellifluous as the cakes are delicious. We spent a few…
THE weather this week has been so grim – cold, wet, windy, November going out like a grumpy hippo – so we thought we could dig into our archives and find something bright and sunny to cheer us all up. What better than a late summer visit to Provence with our friend, chef Philippa Davis from…
MORE and more people are choosing to stay in Britain for their holidays – it’s partly the insecurity of the pound, something to do with the frustrations and delays of air travel and perhaps also an awareness that this is a very beautiful country and we all ought to know it better! Whatever the reasons, a…
MANY visitors to the southern Spanish region of Andalusia head straight for the coast, in search of the predictable trilogy of sun, sex and sangria. They may find what they are looking for, but they experience little of the history, architecture, landscape and food that make this one of the most exciting and fascinating parts…
by Simone Sekers ONLY a month ago we were exploring the Salt Coast of Essex, in Maldon. Now I’m exploring Malton, in deepest Yorkshire, if only from the comfort of my own home. Last week we were sent another book by our old friend Peter Brears. For longer than it is tactful to remember we…
FOR far too long, driving in France has for me been no more than a direct route to Italy. But if France has been somewhat under-appreciated, my week in Brittany changed all that and reminded me what a beautiful country it is. One of the benefits was that we were able to avoid the hassle…
Philippa Davis’s clients have a frustrating but very well-fed week in Scotland SKIING, when snowfall has been poor, gets rather tricky. Beach holidays without the sun are pretty miserable. Camping in torrential rain is not much fun (well actually camping in any weather is not my idea of fun) and fishing weeks without water are…
by Simone Sekers WHY it should be that this summer we have been trailing salt is just one of those coincidences. Salt is the one condiment I couldn’t do without and we eat far too much of it in this house. I don’t know if this is why we chose to go to two centres…
A SUNNY week in North Wales, staying on the seafront at Llandudno. Doesn’t sound much like hard work, does it? But when the Guild of Fine Food went to North Wales for three days of Great Taste judging it was a serious business for 20 food writers, chefs and food producers.. The Guild of Fine…
ITALIANS love to pin nicknames on their favourite cities like Rome, Venice and Naples – so it says much about Bologna, the pride of northern Italy’s Emilia-Romagna region, that it can boast at least three. There’s ‘La Dotta’, the learned one, a reference to its great university, founded in 1088, the oldest in the world,…