The winds blow and winter slowly edges its season on to our menu. But fear not, time to get rid of those namby courgettes and have some real vegetables, all proper local Cornish ingredients grown in the fields around us.

Jerusalem artichokes are just starting their winter tenure in our kitchen, raw or roasted, alongside the versatile leek, try cooking them “confit” for several hours over a low temperature, unctuous! Not to mention a battalion of various kales and cabbages are pouring into the kitchen, it is not just greens anymore, these are the modern winter salad, curly wilted with balsamic vinegar, Savoy braised with saffron butter and red cabbage stir-fried with hazelnuts and Allet goat’s cheese.

 Fish play a big part on our menu at this time of year; the delicious monkfish cheeks from Kernowsashimi served up with a vegetable tagine, or seared scallops with cauliflower fritters. Now is the time to trawl deep through the by-catches and find some long lost friends like pouting, dabs and ling on our Express Lunch. The kitchen favourite is pouting, deep-fried; it’s the best staff meal around.

 Carnivores, you are not forgotten, this is your time, game from the Cornish Moors and Estates, grilled bavette of beef “rare” with fries on the Early Supper menu or slow cooked joints like breast of Bocaddon veal or Nancarrow mutton from Truro Farmers Market.

I have to mention the dreaded twitter. We have been tweeting for a while now and we think that we are getting better at it? You can be kept up to date with various menu changes, new dishes, car foraging exploits and the latest Cornish drinks. Otherwise you can just read about our rants and random tweets. If you’re very unlucky or catch our imagination we might follow you!

Spring is back!

Signs of life are all around us, in the lanes the green weeds are sprouting into exotic foragable ingredients, down on the farm, longer days and greater sunshine are helping shoots poke up and even in the sea, warmer waters brings tasty morsels.

 Seasonally this time of year can be a bit of a challenge for us chefs and cooks. Do we put away the winter comfort foods and tear into summer ingredients and pretend that we are all on the Mediterranean balconies or do we just pinch ourselves and urge caution. Personally I favour a bit of caution, with an unpredictable climate down ere, you’re never sure what the wind will blow in.

  One ingredient that is for sure on the radar is asparagus; we have a bit of madness around this time of year when we feature these splendid green spears from just up the road at Tregassow Farm. Here’s the deal, just come in as often as possible and try as many of the dishes as you can from soups, salads, mezzes and even savoury desserts until the end of June, then you won’t have to eat another spear until springtime next year! Beware of imported imposters!..........

Now I could mention Farmers Markets in Truro on Wednesdays and Saturdays, or talk about all the wonderful wines from Wadebridge Wines or even plug a visit to Menallack Farm Shop, Treverva, near Penryn where the cheeses are handmade. But alas no, with the page running out I have to mention the dreaded twitter.

 We have been tweeting for a while now and we think that we are getting better at it? If you’re lucky you can be kept up to date with various menu changes, new dishes, latest car foraging exploits and new local ingredients and drinks. Otherwise you can just read about our latest rants and random tweets. If you’re very unlucky or catch our imagination we might follow you.

Welcome back to Saffron and I trust that you are all well; the weather is a bit iffy at the moment, but hopefully with a small rise in the temperature, we should see some early signs of spring.

 Out in the wilds, shoots are beginning to appear, we have started our forays along the coast and hedgerow to bring to our menu a little something different and seasonal. First pickings down at the beach have given us from the rock pools some young shoots of Sargossam, which is a tasty little seaweed with tiny little seeds, we like to put into our cheese-crackers and the branches add a bit of edible curiosity to our fish dishes. Next up is Sea Beet, there are scuds of it around, again small leaves, but plenty to pick, tastes a bit like spinach with attitude. Finally we have the Alexanders, think of angelica, yep that old school cake garnish and you’re in the right area, stems will appear on our rhubarb plate dreckly, the leaves can be deep-fried and the flower buds take to a light escabêche pickle.

 Talking of the sea, probably a lot of you have now seen various bits of Channel 4 Fish Fight. These programmes will spark a healthy debate and hopefully question our motives in purchasing fish. Here at Saffron our range of fish has evolved over the last twelve years, as I have tried to educate myself through my policy of only purchasing fish caught locally, most recently with Wing of St Mawes.

 We work very closely with Dylan and Chris at Kernowsashimi and in the run up to Christmas we participated in a Red Mullet experiment. The boats used larger nets to avoid catching smaller inshore fish like Pollack. We are working on using some of the lesser known species that are abundant in our waters around the Falmouth Bay area, these come from small boats and a kayak, from Cadgwith Cove to the Helford Passage, we can also identify on our invoices, which boat caught which fish. We would like you to give these a try and if you feel that we haven’t done the fish justice, I’ll give you your money back!

Regards Nik

NOVEMBER 2010

Did you know?

We open the doors everyday at 10am except Sundays, come rain, snow or shine. If you are just passing whilst doing a spot of shopping, why not pop in and have a cup of coffee and a millionaire slice or perhaps a toasted homemade teacake with Kea plum jam. Maybe you missed breakfast and fancy a bit of crib, how about eggy bread and mushrooms or if you are ravenous, 10 Deadly Sins and a pot of Tregothnan tea.

 You’re still here? Lunch starts at 11.30am, we serve anything from light lunches i.e. pepperonata and pine nut frittata or scallops and nero risotto, club sandwiches and fuller main meals like Trewithen pheasant or plaice with olive potato cake or the Chopsticks Farm pumpkin tasting plate. But by far the best value is the Express Lunch with a little mezze plate to start, followed by a daily changing meat or fish special, washed down with a glass of house wine; all for £12.50, also there is a dessert of the day for £3.00. We recommend this menu for those of you in a hurry or if you have a few friends joining you for a lunch party.

 Lunch ends at 3.30pm, then we get ready for the evening. First up is when we reopen at 5 O’clock is our Early Supper menu which is a steal at £10.00 for two courses and £13.00 for three courses. This is ideal for those going to a show at the Hall for Cornwall, Cathedral or Cinema. Maybe you just don’t want to cook tonight after a busy day at work or it is late night shopping in Truro, but beware this can get very busy at times and we recommend that you always book, last orders 6.45pm! However if you feel that you would like a more robust meal we offer our a la carte Dinner Menu which includes Gara Barton partridge, Fowey mussels, kayak caught sea bass from Kernowsashimi and fillet steak from Trevilley Farm. The Kitchen Menu is available daily for lunch and dinner this is a weekly changing set meal, totally dictated by the availability of local produce three courses all for nineteen pounds and fifty pence. Oops we nearly forgot about the desserts! Nothing is bought in, we only use seasonal fruits and flavours, we like puddings, tortes, chocolate and wacky ice creams, do you?

Regards Nik

SEPTEMBER 2010

Hello,

Late summer has crept upon us, that weird time of year, when you seem to get all the seasons in the space of a week and the produce of the Cornish summer harvest bangs on the door of the kitchen. Have you ever noticed how the colours gently change from the rich greens of peas and beans in July, through a yellow haze of courgettes, patty pans and corns, to the rich reds of chillies, peppers and aubergines in September?

 Upstairs in the kitchen, (yep that is why you get a crash above your head every now and then), we tend to go out foraging a bit more this time of year, apart from the obvious blackberries, there are many wonderful goodies to had from pillaging the neighbourhood. Rowan berries, rosehips, crab apples, wild plums, sloe berries and even figs can be found growing not far from here and Richard the window cleaner, you know the man with ladder going down the middle of the street, is trying to get me into service tree fruits. This all means that the hedgerow dessert plate will be on the menu soon, along with a consortium of apples, pears, plums and quinces.

  Down on the Helford, Dylan of Kernowsashimi is slowly rewiring my education about fish. As you may have noticed we tend to use rather a lot of local seafood off the markets, however Dylan is sort of, gently steering us towards even greater sustainability. Bog standard is that we don’t buy farmed fish, don’t get me started (or him) on this subject, the sea bass are always line caught and most of the fish comes off day boats. However nowadays we are closely following the migration of fish stocks. For example we are just entering the red mullet season and there are plentiful around the coast at moment. Squid will follow shortly and I’m over the moon because the spider crabs have come back from their summer migration. While we are on fishy matters, I must say a massive thank-you for all the seafood lovers that we have had over the summer, it has been our ever summer for fruit de mers and grillards, kitchens need to be challenged and this has certainly given us a buzz.

Regards Nik

JULY 2010

Welcome back, I trust that you haven’t been left too devastated by events of the World Cup, Wimbledon or the general state of the world. Here at Saffron we keep trudging through the produce and sometimes we find it hard to keep up. Lots of ingredients come and go very quickly at the moment and we try to do justice wherever we can.

 The asparagus is long gone, but broad beans, humble peas and patty pans rule the pans now! Now I know that not all of you are as enthusiastic as we are, but in the kitchen we only use what is growing in the fields around us, right now. Globe artichokes are a bit of a hit at the moment, grown up at Trevilley Farm, wonderful just to pull apart and chew the tips near the heart, simple pleasures, but something different.

 Perhaps you have a sweeter tooth, the berries are back, just waiting to be crushed, wonderful tart gooseberries and their red cousins Wynhams Industry, (no chef would of come up with that name). Chocolate tart is a must if you like raspberry hit, and the currants are ready for our glazed summer fruits with an awesome sorbet.

 For the next couple of months we go hell for leather with the local seafood, half a lobster roasted with Cafe de Paris butter, or if you want a treat but can’t be bothered with the agro of picking, try our lobster salad with summer fruit salsa. I reckon some of you are a bit more adventurous, how about a Fruit de Mer or the ultimate seafood mixed grill; The Grillard, with lobster, oysters, prawns, mussels, clams, scallops and three fishes with a bit of Chermoula mayonnaise.

Now you might like to wash all this down with a drop of liquid, now we are not sponsored by breweries, so we sell real drinks that we try, like and enjoy to have with our food. Stingers comes from Miles our forager and wonderfully refreshing on a hot summers day, or try while you can, Plymouth Fruit Cup, it may be the last chance before it is discontinued, or how about Sipsmith Gin from the local boys up in the smoke and to round off, a glass of sparkling Moscato or Marco Porello Birbet.

Regards Nik

Welcome to the Cornish Spring!

It is not normally like this, rain, bit of warmth in the air and the odd dose of sunburn on the back of the head for baldies like me. I kid you not, things are different this year, it’s darn cold, we don’t seem to have scuds of rain, but there seems to be a lack of that vital growing ingredient, warm sunshine.

 But fear not, finally we have the famous Tregassow Asparagus Menu, loads of different dishes developed over the last ten years, in various combinations to bring to your plate the first hint of a Cornish summer. Ever since we came across John and Jenny Keeler at Truro Farmers Market the green spears have been a must on our menu.

We often get asked, how do we know how much of anything to order in for the restaurant. Well the asparagus tests our nerve to the limit. Demand some days can be phenomenal and with such a short shelf life, you can’t just get a load in, prep it and put it into a tub. We try to keep a fine balance, but if we do run out, they will be up in the fields of St Erme just outside Truro, cutting some more ready for the next day’s delivery; chefs have this great anti-social behaviour of ringing up suppliers late at night.

 One of the beauties of asparagus is that it fairly straight forward to cook; I mean we are not talking artichokes here. We hear various tales of mutilation, chewy stumps and turgid grey bland dishes. Asparagus has a few easy rules,

 1. Snap the woody bottom at its natural breaking point, we DON’T use knives,

 2. Only cook for a few minutes quickly at a high temperature (pinch just below the head for firmness) or try shaving or grating and serving raw,

3. Too many flavours can confuse a palette with such a great natural ingredient,

 4. Try to serve immediately after cooking, asparagus doesn’t like to be kept waiting,

 5. What are you waiting for? The season lasts only from the end of April (even later this year) to near the end of June, so go on treat yourself. Beware of imports!!!!

 With the start of a new decade, we’ve dived into tweeting, you can keep upto date with menus, ingredients and rants on twitter.com/SaffronTruro, or just simply email us to comment, source a recipe, or an inspiration

Regards Nik

Welcome to Saffron, some of you, maybe new to our establishment, others are darn good regulars or occasional visitors, when you are in the neighbourhood, But a good few have been tremendously loyal to us and have kept on coming back since we opened in 1999.

 As I probably say every year, winter going into spring is the toughest time of the culinary year, with easy temptation to purchase foreign imports of varying degrees of taste and quality, it is time to put ones chef hat on. The menus look slightly different this time of year, fewer dishes due to smaller numbers coming in to dine, due to various factors and also a few foreign ingredients start to sneak on the dishes. Tropical fruits become a must, hearty puddings from all over the British Isles and a delve to the bottom of the root vegetable box.

 But fear not warm times are not that far off. The first of the spring time vegetables is with us, the very under rated purple sprouting broccoli, delicious with Gremolata, or wonderous January king cabbages and the aptly named spring greens. Fish wise we tend to steer clear of flat fish due to roe season, however skate and pollack are excellent at the moment, you also might notice a bit of Scottish organic salmon from the West Highlands on the menu.

 Over at the butchers, John Roach is being tested with our off cuts, bet you haven’t seen a shin of beef on the bone in your local supermarket recently, this is for our new starter Potted Hough, which is Scottish for leg, it takes over six hours to boil, then flake, add the liquor, seasoning and spices. Over at Nancarrow Farm the mutton is hanging ready for us and Sally and Bill are on standby with faggots. 

I don’t apologise for not serving normal food, we only use ingredients that are in season, try us out, give the food a chance, and you might be pleasantly surprised.

Saturday is market day in Truro, when the farmers market sets up its’ pitch on the Piazza. There is a splendid wealth of local products from where we source our ingredients to use in the kitchen. It is difficult to know where to start, but we usually begin with Gara Barton, the venison people, we go for the shins and shanks, but the chocolate and chilli sausages are a different option for the barbecue. Around the corner you’ll find Chow and Jonathon at Chopstick Organic Fruit and Vegetables, whom have been supplying us with various different leaves over the years and are now sourcing all our citrus and exotic fruits. Lurking down the end of the line are the honey artisans, Heatherbell with all their wonderful honeys, our favourite is the potent heather, which has an almighty blast of flavour. Forget your supermarket Argentine sugar rush, this is real nectar.

Time to nip across to the bread stall for elevenses, even chefs need a treat! Also you can purchase Cornish Wholemeal from their own flourmill, we use it in all our brown bread and oatmeal biscuits. Next just past the tart, is Roger and his Cornish Ducks. Now you may not want to bother with his necks like we do, why not treat yourself with some of his some duck burgers, our kids love them, or how about a couple of confit legs, made by Saffron. Next up Nigel and his Cornish Cuisine smoked produce, everything is delicious, but we love his Tesyn cheese, which has won a World Cheese Award. Moving on swiftly is Bill and Sally Lugg of the Primrose Herd pork products, we buy all our bacon, sausage and hogs puddings here, the pork is first class, but our current favourite is the Chorizo sausage. Full up yet? We move on to Nancarrow Organic Mutton, Beef and Lamb ideal for Sunday roasts, stews and tagines, we like the mutton so much that we take half a beast at a time! Next is Bocaddon Farm with their proper rose veal, sorry, but you can’t have the cheeks we need them, try the mince for a lighter alternative Cottage Pie, or Emily loves the garlic and herb Cheese. Last but not least is Kernow Sashimi Fishmongers, a new supplier to us, the freshness of the fish is superb, being landed from their own boat the day before. The conger eel is top notch and we are currently putting their crab to good use.

Please support these farmers, they do put up with a lot of climatic changes over the year, but they still manage to bring fresh and locally produced Cornish goodies.

October 2009

This is the autumn, all extremes of the weather and the end of all those delicious ingredients of the summer, but fear not, the larder is not empty in the winter. Cornwall has a wealth of goodies to keep us going all year, no need for those nasty tasteless imports.

 I have just disturbed Miles the forager, while he was out pillaging the fields, to see if he will have anymore cauliflower fungus, (also known as brain fungus), this is a splendid specimen of a truly wild mushroom, found in the habitat of pine trees, these are delicious, just sliced and pan-fried with some garlic butter, definitely a step up from jews ears and honey fungus mushrooms.

 Fish is always a bit tricky this time of year with the tail end of hurricanes bobbing the boats up and down in the sea, but now is the time for squid and octopus. We have given our new fish suppliers Wing of St Mawes the usual challenge, go and find us something different and local. They didn’t let us down, not only did they bring some wrasse in; also they found a Trigger fish from the netters by-catch. A superb fish, real beast of the deep sea, tough skin and scales, but the fillets were awesome, similar to John Dory in taste and texture, as soon as we can get some more it will be on the menu!

 Out in the fields Jonathon and Chow have been busy yanking up the squashes, these wonderful varieties of the pumpkin family are dotted around the restaurant and feature heavily on the menu, for now is the time to enjoy while stocks last. The squash plate is probably the trickiest vegetarian dish that we have ever attempted, but we are enjoying the challenge of making all the different textures and flavours work together, this is the fun of using only seasonal Cornish ingredients.

June 2009

The Gen on Truro Farmers Market.