Chilies, Cucumbers & Quinces

The Taylors (Biddy's folks) always have a warm and welcoming kitchen, usually with simple, high-quality food on the table. Most veg and fruit is homegrown, bread is freshly baked, and superb (but incredible value) cheese is from the market.

Last time I visited was after a night on the town with Biddy and Maija, so the wholesome food was medicinal as well as delicious. Then I had a long drive home. I arrived back feeling dehydrated and queezy, but had been sent on my way with these lovely vegetables from the Taylors' garden. An absolutely delicious cucumber, tomato, chili and mint salad refreshed and revived me.



A couple of days later, I baked apples with slivers of the Taylors' quinces, adding lemon zest, lemon juice, honey, butter and sloe gin into the mix. Deeelightful with clotted cream, and the quince makes a big difference, transforming sweet 'n sour apples, with its fragrant layers of muskiness.

Flavoured Coffee

I've just received some flavoured Colombian coffee samples from Cherizena (www.cherizena.co.uk). They've recently launched their blueberry cream coffee, and I was dying to try it - love anything blueberry! They also sent vanilla nut flavour and their chocolate and raspberries flavour. All smell gorgeous, although the blueberry and vanilla ones smell slightly sickly, if only because I associate those aromas with very sweet syrups. But here's the beauty of these coffees; I really enjoy having syprups, such as hazelnut, in coffee - especially iced coffee - but I can't bare sugar in white coffee. The syrups are always so sweet, which ruins the whole effect for me, but with these flavoured coffees, you get the taste but don't have to endure sweetness. Brilliant!



The chocolate and raspberries variety smells the most delicious to me, but so far I have only tried the blueberry cream. It was a lovely drink in its own right; you can still enjoy the coffee itself, but the blueberry is satisfyingly strong and leaves a very nice taste in your mouth. You need to be in an indulgent blueberry coffee mood rather than an ordinary coffee mood to enjoy it fully, but I'll definitely be drinking this delight again. Mmm the kitchen smells damn good now, too! I can't wait to try the other flavours, but I've had rather a lot of caffeine already today.

Cherizena make their flavoured coffees simply by soaking robust Arabica Colombian coffee beans in flavour-infused oil, then leaving them to dry naturally. They also sell speciality and rare coffees, without the flavourings.