Spotlight: Oxford

The Spy snuck sneakily into Magdalene College, where he made friends with a wisteria and a clematis.

The Cambridge Spy is experiencing a profound crisis of the soul, otherwise known as an almighty work-avalanche of biblical proportions. This will continue for the next few months, during which time his brain will shrivel, his vital organs will wither and his personality will be slowly eroded by the crushing burden of his labours. Posts will be brief, if not non-existent. The Spy anticipates that almost all of them will be in note-form, punctuated by bouts of authorial madness (you may find yourself reading treaties on subjects such as 'The Spy: Man or Malt Loaf?' or 'The Spy is a Bald Greenlandic Walrus named Gerald. Discuss'). 

In the mean time, a brief account of the Spy's recent stint in Oxford. In close-to-note form. 

Contentious though this confession may be, the Spy would be happy to spend the rest of his days swinging from the dreaming spires of Oxford like a little monkey in a stone rainforest. However, the first thing to be established would be where to find scones to rival those of The Orchard in Grantchester. Preliminary results reveal this may not be as straightforward as he hoped: those at The Rose Cafe were warmed and fairly nice, but a little too small and buttery for the Spy's taste. Excellent tea, however. 

Rose. Scone. Butter. Jam. 'Nuff sed.

Those at the magnificent  Grand Cafe got top marks for presentation (on a tiered silver stand with sliced strawberries perched on the cream), but alas, bottom marks for taste (think soft, slightly sweet bread). However, the full English breakfast came with a choice of rye or granary toast (yum!) and a particularly excellent Oxfordshire sausage, while the elderflower cordial was quite simply the nicest drink the Spy had ever encountered (think a non-alcoholic Mojito, with crushed mint and a mix of sharp lemon and sweet elderflower that set his tastebuds singing). And the door-closing-weight is a brass kettle on a string. What more could you want?

All that glitters is not gold...

Fry-up with rye bread. Classy.

Elixir of the gods cosying up to beautiful milk jug. Kettle out of shot.

A strong contender to match the excellent Nanna Mexico here in Cambridge, top-notch burritos came courtesy of The Mission, with enough red onions to put an end to the Spy's attempts to woo the luscious ladies of this fair city. They swooned before him, eyes watering...

Joining the crowds for one of the delis on the High Street, the Spy bought many olives. Many, many olives. He then took them to the Botanic Gardens, where he ate them whilst watching a sparrow savaging a heron. Nature is a cruel mistress...

The queue was stretching out the door. The Spy joined it enthusiastically: that's the British way!

The Covered Market provided the Spy with soft, squidgily warm Ben's Cookies straight out of the oven. A toss-up between the spiced oatmeal and the white chocolate chip. 

In the heat of the day, ice cream proved a necessity. It was practically medicinal; the Spy would have died of heatstroke without it. Reminiscent of JP Licks in Boston (which still retains the edge, however), G&D's Ice Cream Parlour hit the spot, with the smallest blobbette (i.e. the size of his fist) of Daim nestled next to an even more modest (i.e. bloody huge) helping of cherry-and-white-chocolate. On top of a warm waffle. Open from 8am until midnight for all your ice cream cravings. 

 

The medicine cabinet...

In short, the Spy hearts Oxford. Muchly. And there was a Northlight Homestore shop that the Spy went mad in (the good kind of mad, i.e. 'bought a lot', not the bad kind of mad, i.e. 'put his underpants on his head and started singing a song about sexually adventurous elves')  to counteract his Scandinavia-sickness from the time his work takes him out there. Next time, he's got his eyes on the restaurant specialising in bangers and mash. He will be back!

The Spy is secure enough in his own manhood that he can indulge his Nordic candle fetish without censure. Let there be light!

Spied Out: The Best Scones

The Spy's most recent, summery attempt at scones (strawberry); recipe here.

Rejoice good people of the fens and beyond, for summer is a-coming in (although if you think The Spy is going to celebrate with a rousing chorus of ‘sing cuckoo’ or a quick burst of ‘folderiddle rahs’, quite frankly you’ve been in the sun too long). The days are long, the swifts and swallows are wheeling and squealing high above us, and the flat fields stretch out green and glowing under the sun, capped by the blue-bowl sky as it unrolls itself towards the horizon.

Poppy-trail on the fields up at Barton, by Burwash Manor.

Cambridge summertime in the botanic gardens.

The Spy can only apologise for his recent lack of posts, for he has been sneaking out and about again, sniffing out dastardly enemies and edible delicacies further afield in Oxford and Berlin. Only one incident of note to report: a visit to the farm-shop P.E. Mead and Sons, located on the route between Cambridge and Oxford, and purveyor of the oak-smoked rapeseed oil first tasted by the Spy a few months ago at the Feast East food show. At that point, the oil was still in development (smoked on trays in the smokery), but the Spy was contacted once it reached the shelves and duly hared over to pick some up (as well as some black pudding slices for his Sunday barbecue, which turned out to be a cooking revelation: try it). 

Oils aplenty in the farm shop (oak-smoked third from left).

However, to the point of this post: scones. He will dispense with the preamble, and point you only to the excellent recent 'search for the perfect scone' in The Guardian, while there are a variety of other articles dealing with crucial issues such as jam-or-cream-first (the Spy considers himself a heathen; the natural order is cream-then-jam, as in butter-then-jam, but personally adheres to the jam-then-cream school of thought), buttery-versus-bready (bready every time, if the Spy wants buttery then let him eat cake), delicate-versus-substantial (need you ask? if it’s not the size of his fist, the Spy wants two). Yet for a fully paid-up fen monkey, it’s surprisingly difficult to get a good scone. Here are the top of the crop: if anyone has any additional favourites they are happy to share, the Spy loves you and wants your babies.

The Spy seduces a buxom beauty over scones in Cafe Coucou. Who could resist...

1. The Orchard. What can be said about this most perfect of places? A walk over the fields and by the river, a tree-filled orchard to sit in if the weather is fine, and scones the size of a baby’s head, baked throughout the day and often still warm, picked out of wicker baskets and with a choice of plain, fruit or cheese (the last is good with honey). Get there at 9.30am on a Sunday morning for warm breakfast scones and the papers. Except don’t, because the Spy will be there, and he doesn’t want some other greedy bastard eating all the scones.

Sunbathing scones tremulously awaiting scoffage in The Orchard.

2. Café Coucou. A little outside Cambridge (but readily accessible by train and car), Saffron Walden is stunning, with 16^th century wooden-beamed houses painted in reds, blues and yellows and pargeting patterns covering the walls. Café Coucou is the gem in its crown; an independent café filled with wooden tables and creaky old floorboards, where their enormous scones are piled in the window to entice passers by (their sweet ones are second to the Orchard’s only because they could do with a little more salt, but their cheese ones probably have the edge). If you don’t fancy scones, there are sandwiches with homemade bread, stacks of beautiful biscuits and cakes, and hot drinks with little nubbly shortbread buttons on the side. The only downside is they are closed on a Sunday: the Spy suggests a petition to rectify this grievous situation.

Scones galore piled up in the window.

The inside counter of Cafe Coucou and its other delicious products...

3. When you want a scone to buy and take-away, those made by Tom’s Cakes in the market (only on Sunday) are big, robust and delicious; it is probably a good thing they are only there one day a week or the Spy would no longer fit into his James-Bond- -tuxedo. Elsewhere, the Farmers’ Outlet sells both Bury Lane Farm scones and others made by a little old lady in all kinds of flavours (mixed spice, raisin and almond, sweet chestnut), but you have to be lucky as they are not always there. Get a thermos-flask of tea, a pot of jam, and take those bad boys down to the river for a-guzzling.

The Spy's scone about to be picked from the pile on Tom's Cakes market stall.

 

A crate full of Farmers' Outlet lil-ol-lady scones (chestnut variety bottom right corner).

4. Michaelhouse Café in the centre of town is a great place for grub of any kind, located in the old church with the middle still cordoned off for services and concerts. The scones are good, particularly the cheese ones which rise to great heights like little golden-flecked pillars, but in general the scones can be a little hard and buttery for the Spy’s taste. Best warmed up.

Sweet scones with their sugary topping.

Towering cheese scones...

5. Wimpole Hall. The food is fabulous with roast dinners and sausage rolls straight from the farm’s own piggies and a changing selection of baked goods (on the Spy’s last trip there was a honey cakes to celebrate ‘The Year of Honey’). The scones are good and of a decent size, although better to go for the ones on the table by the baked goods rather than the ones kept in the chiller (the sight of which nearly gave the Spy a heart attack before he had even got his chops around a mouthful). For more on the best scones to be found in National Trust properties, see here.

The Spy's Wimpole Hall scone picture was pretty bad even by his standards (shaking from the excitement perhaps?) so instead, another scone picture from Cafe Coucou, and a close-up of the Spy's strawberry scones for the finale...

Spied Out: Pizza (L’Authentique)

Pizza doesn't get much better than this...

In a homage to Toad, Mole and Ratty in their canary-coloured cart, this week found The Cambridge Spy traversing the hedgerow-lined lanes and leafy byways of his fenland home, hot on the scent of a hidden culinary treasure in the most unorthodox of locations. No stranger to good pizza (he cut his baby teeth on pizza crusts in his uncle’s pizzeria down in southern Italy) he has long bemoaned the lack of good pizza in Cambridge and the surrounding area. So, bombing along past rolling fields of shining golden rapeseed, on roads transformed into mysterious emerald tunnels by trees bowed and bending to touch each other from either side of the verge, little did he expect to came upon his prey so suddenly. And yet, before him lay Pizza L'Authentique: a pizza van with a wood-burning oven in the back, incongruously perched at the side of the busy road leaving Harwick. (On Thursdays, the van can be found in an equally unexpected side-street in Caldecote; both are about 8 miles outside Cambridge. The rest of the week, there is no sign of it, and the Spy suspects that this mysterious travelling purveyor of pizzas enters some strange parallel universe or fairy realm where it sells pizza to the Fenland goblins, elves and other ghoulish beasties…)

The glory of Pizza L'Authentique at dusk, complete with field backdrop.

Based on the mobile pizzerias from the owner’s home city of Marseilles, France, the scent of the wood-fired brick oven hit the Spy like a smoky wall of deliciousness as he approached the van, and he was suddenly, devastatingly in love. With tremulous step he approached the glorious Frenchman who stood, elevated above him like a Gallic pizza god, an elfin, apple-cheeked goddess at his side with floury hands clutching a sturdy rolling pin. The deity spake thusly unto the Spy: “No Emmental today, my supplier screwed up.”

A sneak-preview of the menu as the next order is taken: word is spreading fast.

How can perfection be described in mere words? The pizza was rolled out before the Spy’s greedy little eyes, sprinkled in bacon and a confit of onions and shunted onto a pizza paddle, as the French God waxed lyrical about the crucial addition of Emmental and the difficulty incorporating his home-cooked gammon into a cooked pizza. As it sizzled in the oven, the God mused on how he planned to introduce a sourdough pizza base with his own ‘mother’ starter from Jack Lang of Midsummer House (who also owns a wood-burning oven of this kind). And as it was folded into the pizza box, so big that its crusts had to be folded over so they rose up the side, he talked of his French supplier down in Kent, whom he trundles down to every week to pick up goodies purloined from the other side of the channel. 

Rolling out the dough...

What more is there to be said? Reader, I gobbled him. Wordlessly. In a grassy airfield up the road. A groan or two may have issued forth from the Spy’s pizza-stained lips. He cannot be sure. A blissful calm had entered his heart, and all was well with the world.

The folded crust of gluttony...

In Cambridge itself, your best pizza bets would be The Cow near the market/Corn Exchange and The Red Bull on Barton Road (the Spy senses a bovine theme developing). For the best of the chains, Italians reliably inform the Spy that La Strada is where it's at. However, quite honestly, nothing even comes close to Pizza L’Authentique. For the sake of keeping this wonderful enterprise in business, the Spy suggests a car-share system for those without vehicles who live outside Caldecote/Hardwick: he is personally willing to ferry out crowds of pizza tourists in his own, rather growth-stunted automobile. At a conservative estimate he could fit seven hungry people in the back if they are all happy to lie stacked on top of each other, but on the return journey their pizza-filled, distended bellies must be factored into the equation, so one member of every party must be nominated to be the sacrificial lamb, left at the side of the road and forced to adopt a feral existence, scraping cheese out of empty pizza boxes and howling wildly at the moon. However, the hungry wolf hunts best, and when the magical pizza van returns, he will be first in the queue for smoky, wood-fired manna from heaven... 

The wood-burning stove, pre-pizza.

Scandinavian London and an Ancient Chocolate Cake

Cinnamon buns in the Nordic Bakery (see below).

Huzzah, the Spy has made it back to Blighty! The bluebirds are cartwheeling over the white cliffs of Dover, Winston Churchill and Sherlock Holmes are dancing the conga down the street, and Queen Elizabeth I is doing a victory streak across the rugby pitch with nothing to preserve her modesty but a St. George's Cross flag. And to celebrate? A Saturday breakfast scone The Orchard in Grantchester (fear not, a long-overdue 'best scone' post is clattering about in the Spy's brain), followed the next day by a tramp along the river to Fen Ditton and a plate of fish and chips from The Sea Tree down on Mill Road. 

On the road to Fen Ditton.

A few days later, he found himself in London for a working-lunch with fellow Spy and volcano-strandee Agent Gherkin. With some serious Norwegian food withdrawal symptoms, they were prompted to scurry over to the Scandinavian Kitchen on Great Titchfield Street and stock up on proper Scandinavian hot dogs, Smash chocolate (salty tortillas covered in chocolate: pure unadulterated heaven) and salted liquorice, before heading over to the Nordic Bakery on Golden Square for some serious cinnamon buns (the best in London, dear reader) and a strong cup of Finnish coffee. 

Clockwise from top right: a mighty collection of smash, salted liquorice, rye bread and pølse (hot dog).

Cinnamon bun (forward), orange-and-poppy-seed cake (back).

However, most importantly, he had made it back onto this beloved and daft little island in time for a particularly important family birthday, and thus he comes to the real purpose for this post. Back in the mists of time, a great-great-great Spy ancestor held the key to birthday cake heaven, with a dense, heavy chocolate beast that would be baked for any such celebration. She continued to churn out these wonderful creations despite the fact that in every other respect she had become knicker-boilingly doddery; testament to the enduring importance of culinary family traditions that are beaten into children as soon as they can hold a wooden spoon. The Spy was hardly a twinkle in a milkman's eye at the time of this venerable lady's demise, and yet he vividly remembers her cakes perched upon her kitchen table on top of a red-and-white checked tablecloth, although said tablecloth, table and cake towered above him on account of his diminutive stature. 

Confused, dear reader? Revolted, perhaps? Titillated, no doubt? Read on...

This is daddy in the Holy Trinity of Spy family birthday cakes , and in order to preserve the recipe for posterity, it must be shared with the world. On this particular occasion, the decoration took the form of a portrait of the Birthday Boy himself, with chunks of the aforementioned tortilla Smash for his noble and sagacious beard (note the cunning blending of culinary cultures: the Spy will not be caught napping) and chocolate sprinkles for his unruly (but no less noble) mop of hair. A generation or two ahead of the Spy, this esteemed gentleman also remembers this cake being made for him when he was a (marginally) less hairy, wee slip of a boy. Finally, the best tip for this recipe: make it badly. The less-risen, the denser and stodgier, the better. No fluffiness, no delicacy, no skill. Hell, this is a shoddy, occasionally bearded monstrosity very close to the Spy's heart, straight from the hills and moors of northern England. 

Nana's Chocolate Cake:

Cake:

7 oz self-raising flour

1-2 oz cocoa powder

8 oz caster sugar

1/2 tsp salt

4 oz margarine (Nana used 'Stork')

2 eggs, beaten

5 tablespoons evaporated milk

5 tablespoons water

1 tsp vanilla essence

Icing:

2 1/2 oz margarine, melted

2 oz cocoa

9 oz icing sugar

3 tablespoons milk, heated

1 tsp vanilla essence

Pre-heat oven 180 C, grease and flour two 8 inch cake tins

Sieve flour, sugar, salt and cocoa into bowl

Rub in margarine

Stir in eggs, vanilla essence and liquids

Beat well

Divide between tins and bake for 30-35 mins until skewer/knife comes out clean

Leave for 5 mins in tin, then cool on wire rack

To make the icing, sieve sugar and cocoa, add liquids, beat until smooth 

Sandwich cake together with half the icing, and spread the other half on top

Decorate, with beard if necessary

Hairy cake contemplating his hairy doom...

Spotlight: Brown Cheese (Oslo II)

Brunost sandwiches from Baker Hansen.

As ash rains down upon Oslo and the Spy tries not to panic as he contemplates a stranded eternity, he finds himself in tuneful voice. Consequently, he has penned an ode to one of the strangest and most beautiful delicacies of the Nordic cuisine (greatest expressions of art flourishing in the face of adversity etc etc). What dish might this be, he hears you ask? The ungodly Icelandic rotten shark, predominantly forcefed to unsuspecting tourists? Seared sheep's head, or indeed any of the dishes consumed during Thorramatur? The grisly hanging dried fish that brought such prosperity to Norway's medieval shores? The traditional Thursday delicacy of raspeballer, which sit in the stomach like cannonballs and would no doubt be every bit as lethal in battle? Rotten herring, as celebrated with great joy (and copious quantities of raw onion) at the Annual Fermented Herring Festival in Sweden? Indeed no. The Spy is talking of Brunost, otherwise known as brown cheese or gjetost (goat's cheese).

Individually wrapped slices of brunost, for that life-or-death toffee cheese emergency...

Made from milk, whey and cream, brunost is boiled for hours until the water evaporates and a sweet, caramelised gloop remains. It is a tricky ingredient to use in combination with others, and in comparison to more standard cheeses, there are few recipes that incorporate brunost apart from sauces to be eaten with game. One particularly fine trick is to toast a slice of bread, preferably muesli or seeded, spread with a layer of jam, preferably strawberry, and then top with a thin slice of brunost. (Incidentally, always slice, dont cut. The cheese slicer or ostehøvelen was invented (or at least patented) by the Norwegians for such a case as this, for a lumpy great chunk of brunost is a Monstrosity unto the Lord.) Otherwise, just stick to having it plain in sandwiches. However, the Spy, being a terrible foreign type, has a sacrilegious habit of asking for 'choose your own fillings' sandwiches in bakeries that consist of both salad ingredients and slices of brunost on top. The idea is that he then takes the two halves apart, thus creating two smørbrød (open faced) sandwiches for the price of one (salad for main course, brunost for afters). Yet however many times he tries to explain this to the people working in the bakeries, he is simply met with a pitying expression, and, on several occasions, a flat refusal to commit such a dastardly culinary crime. Alas...

The freakish monstrosity of a brunost-and-salad sandwich, pre-deconstruction.

Anyway, in homage to this fine and distinguished son of Norway, the Spy feels An Ode rushing to his lips, ready to gush forth like a flowing river of Viking mead (*cue lugubrious throat-clearing cough*): 

Oh Mighty, Noble, Sweet Brown Cheese,

You make me tingle to my knees,

You dont melt well, you're bad for cooking,

An orange brick, not too good-looking.

Yet of all cheeses, you're the king
Your goaty goodness makes me sing, 

On toasted muesli-bread you go

With strawb'rry jam, it's odd, I know,

But yummy, and one's gotta find

A way to make those flavours bind.   

The bakers in the sandwich shop

Refuse to place you on the top

Of salad, though I beg and plead,

They quake, assuming I've been freed

From some nut-house, 'til I assert

One half's main course, one half's dessert.
(A word of caution, please note well,
When paired with chutney, brunost's hell.)

All glory be to you, geitost,

Without you, I'd be wholly lost.

Huzzah, hip hip, and give me more,

'Til I explode upon the floor!

A final note: the Spy has not forgotten that this blog is in fact called 'Feasting in the Fens'. Consequently, he is delighted to inform you all that the Cambridge Cheese Company in All Saints Passage sells brunost, so strap on your skis and get down there right now.

There's only so many pictures of brunost a Spy can take. Behold some mighty Viking axes instead.

And behold a mighty Norwegian flag. Note the angle of the horizon: the Spy was rather green around the gills at this point.

Spotlight: Oslo Bakeries

Baker Hansen: fine loaves and finer women

Life can be tough, and sometimes the Spy feels that its burden lies heavy upon his shoulders. For instance, he is currently surrounded by a veritable bevvy of blonde, buxom beauties, with legs up to their ears (not literally of course, as this would be disturbing rather than titilating, rather like the dog-headed men and one-legged monsters on a medieval map). He is also surrounded by delicious baked products, and if he fancies a change of scene, in the course of a two minute walk down the road, he will pass at least five other top-notch bakeries, all boasting stunning interior design and free coffee refills.

Is the Spy in heaven, I hear you ask? Did he finally meet his match, perishing in a cliff-top tussle to the death with his arch-enemy Moriaty, a fluffy yet rabidly bloodthirsty white cat called Tiddles and a deadly umbrella stand full of ricin-tipped waterproof devices? Indeed no, for faced with such a situation, the Spy would merely grab an umbrella and vault over the aforementioned arch-enemy, stuffing a Petrou Brothers' large haddock into his dastardly underpants on the way, thereby causing Tiddles to attack said dastardly nether-regions with furious and fundamentally fatal feline feroicity. No, the Spy is simply abroad once again, this time working in Oslo, the city to which his heart will always belong.

Noble soldiers marching outside the Slott. The Spy was disappointed to discover they were rather weedy in the flesh, a Bluebottle boy-scout division perhaps? (L). Piles of noble snow still melting despite the sun (R).

Fear not gentle reader, he will be back in the fens soon, and will not visit you with a million non-bog-related posts from this fjord-ridden and mountainous terrain of rapey, pillagey Vikings past and flaxen-haired, socially forward-looking giants present. However, a couple of points must be addressed. Most importantly, the bakeries. By Odin, the bakeries. As the Spy takes his morning constitutional up Bogstadveien from the Royal Park (see pictures above) up towards Viglelandsparken (home to more stone sculptures than the White Witch's winter palace, only more Nordically liberal nakedness; see pictures below), he passes no less than 6 bakeries, all with their own unique style and clientèle. A short summary is called for...

Behold the phallic might of the Vigeland sculptures. The gentle, innocent Spy nearly fainted clean away.

1. Åpent Bakeri: classy, beautiful, posh, delicious muesli bread. 

Bread bread bread...

2. Godt Brød: ecological, delicious, best for making up sandwiches.

Godt brød and its spring flowers.

3. Baker Brun: yummy, but probably the weak link in the chain. Not to beconfused with Baker Brun in Bergen, home to the seeded bread of the Spy's dreams.)

 

Said dreamy seeded Bergen bread #1 and #2. Yes, the Spy really does take pictures of his bread at every available opportunity. What of it?

4. Baker Hansen (x2, the one further up the hill on the left is best): Scandinavian chic, lovely lamps, best scones. 

Baker Hansen: classy chic and the best scones on the block.

5. United Bakeries: very classy, amazing decor in all their branches (see here for a short and delicious film on the subject).

United Bakeries on Valkyriegata, with its walls covered in coffee grinders.

 

The branch on Slemdalsveien, with a tiled floor much coveted by the Spy.

And the same bakery from the outside: where else would you find Viking snakes over the door?

Dont ask the Spy to choose between them (ok you twisted his arm, Baker Hansen for scones and brunost sandwiches, United Bakeries for decor and bread, Godt Brød for lunchtime sandwiches and Åpent Bakeri for muesli-bread). There's a time and a place for each, which is why they all seem to be doing a roaring trade, despite their proximity to each other. Anyway, the Spy must brush off the bread crumbs and return to work before his enemies discover him, covered in flour and locked in a passionate embrace with a magnificently breast-plated Valkyrie...

What better place to consume your bakery-pillaged spoils than on the top of Ekeberg park, looking out onto Oslo (just to the right) and its collection of islands?