Tasting Menus: San Diego Mexican Food in Restaurants, a Diner, and a Market

Hola. It's been a while, eh? Well that's what a couple weeks in the California sunshine will do to a girl, dazzle her and then leave her feeling jet lagged and grey upon return to an English January. I've been eager to share my San Diego dining recommendations with you; we tried a range of Mexican food, in restaurants, a diner, and at a market. The following picks won't be found in the Gaslamp Quarter, San Diego's bustling tourist area, where many of the big hotels are located. But don't worry you only need to make very short trips to get your mouth around this fine Southern California Mexican food...

Food Gift with Long Shelf Life: Subscription to Independent Food Magazine

What publications do you turn to for interesting, evocative and inspiring food writing? I've been asking a lot of people that question recently and the "umms" and "hmphs" I get in reply speak volumes. Unfortunately there aren't many widely-printed publications putting much stock in food writing these days. I'm not talking about recipes and product guides — those are printed in abundance and make up the content of most food magazines now. But essays, investigative pieces, profiles and nerd-tastic treatises with an edible bent have been quietly disappearing from the printed page.

So hurrah for independent publishers! There are some truly brilliant food magazines being produced in various corners of the world that will satisfy your hunger for quality food writing and illustrations.

A gift subscription to a lovingly-crafted independent publication is a gift that delivers food for thought and a treat for the eyes throughout the year. Two of my favourite ad-free food magazines are 'Fire & Knives' and 'Remedy Quarterly'. Why would a subscription make a good gift? What can we look forward to seeing from them in 2012? I conducted a little Q&A session with the publishers to find out...

Give Tasteful Gift Vouchers: Cooking and Baking Classes in London

We all have so much STUFF. Instead of wrapping up more of it as a Christmas or birthday gift, consider giving — and asking for — a cooking or baking course voucher. That one little slip of paper will bestow upon the lucky recipient several hours happily spent improving their kitchen tinkering abilities, meeting new people, tasting the fruits of their labour and then hauling a sack of it home to enjoy later. Bit better than another sweater or box set, eh?

I highly recommend the following two cooking and baking instructors in London for their enthusiastic, engaging manner and varied course selection. Maria Mayerhofer and Anna Colquhoun both offer vouchers for their courses, which are seriously good value compared to other culinary classes in the city. 

BAKE WITH MARIA 

Instructor: Maria Mayerhofer
Location: The Baking Lab, Swiss Cottage, London
Website: www.bakewithmaria.com
Vouchers: Click here

Page Tasters: Rachel Cooke, Observer Journalist & Food Magazine Columnist

For someone who considers herself a creature of culinary habit, Observer journalist Rachel Cooke has a hell of a lot of recipe options to hand. She adores books — one of the reception rooms in her North London home is used solely as a library — and an ample part of the collection is of a cookery nature.

Some 200 cookbooks can be found lining her bookshelves and sitting in neat stacks in the dining room. It's only down to regular donations to a charity shop that her collection does not explode much beyond this figure.

Rachel regularly writes book reviews, refreshingly non-formulaic profiles, and a column in Observer Food Monthly magazine. She's my favourite writer at The Observer and I got in touch with hopes of interviewing her for the blog. Happily, she agreed to meet. I went round to her North London home, which has an enviably grown-up decor (love the drinks cart) to talk about pages of taste.

We had a chat at the kitchen table where she divulged which cookbooks she takes to bed, what it’s like interviewing celebrities over a meal, recipe pet hates, and “the greatest thing that has ever happened” to her (hint: it involves a cookbook).

Bake the New British Celebrity: Soda Bread

A remarkably humble baked good has recently attained celebrity status. It’s not French. It’s not covered in gold foil. And it certainly doesn’t take years of training to perfect. Soda bread has become a media darling, simply for being a quick and trustworthy loaf that the beginner baker can accomplish.

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Nigel Slater, Lorraine Pascale, and Nigella Lawson have all baked soda bread on their TV programmes recently. There are two cookery trends that have helped push soda bread into the spotlight — home bread baking and 'simple' recipes.

The convergence of these two trends set off a flurry of encouragement to make soda bread. Why does it fit the bill so well, for so many? This bread doesn’t require many of the steps that fill new bakers with fear and loathing: kneading, proving, and shaping. Even if you do feel comfortable baking, soda bread is a delight because it can be ready in under an hour.

Recently there has been a massive swell of interest in bread making, and baking books and classes have been popping up in abundance. First time bakers, keen to get their hands in and start making their own, can easily feel deflated if their initial loaves don’t meet expectations.

It doesn’t help that everything is touted as being just SO easy and quick to make now. Or to translate that into Jamie Oliver speak; while preparing a dish for his 30 minute meal TV series he exclaimed: "Even a raving lunatic can do this!"

The problem with, uh, encouraging sentiments such as this is, when you’re in your kitchen trying to prepare a simple-easy-quick-lunatic-friendly recipe and it’s not going well, you feel so raving inadequate.

I’m here, as someone who has taken a couple of bread making classes but still struggles to consistently get all the elements quite right (there are good loaves and there are what-the-hell-happened-there loaves), with assurance that you can make soda bread.

With its pillowy centre, crusty shell, and comforting nostalgic fragrance, soda bread will become a staple once you take the plunge and make your first batch. It's a gate-way bread — once you bake it, you'll be eager to try other bread recipes. That’s an addiction I’m happy to enable.

This article was written for the Bake with Maria website. Click here to read the remainder of the article and try the recipe! While you're over there check out Maria's brilliant selection of baking classes, which take place at her Baking Lab in West London. I've taken classes taught by Maria and heartily recommend.