Posts from ‘event’
BIG SLURP RECIPES!
The second Big Slurp was as resounding a success as the first. If you missed it… and unusually for a Twuttle / Twuddle event, it is kind hush-hush… please leave a comment below together with your email address, and we’ll include you on the invite list for the next one.
Overall winner of the soup competition was Nick Pope with his utterly-delicious Carrot Soup with Coconut & Lemongrass. However, there were so many great soup recipes, it was nigh on impossible to pick a winner. Next time, we’ll devise a fairer voting system (not that Nick’s soup wasn’t worthy…) as those who’s soup was heated up last perhaps got a unfair crack of the whip. (Sorry Lesley, I didn’t even get to taste yours… which I’m told was delicious).
Winner of the bread competition was Hari Cover… Hari are you going to let us ‘publish’ your recipe or do you want to keep it secret?
We were even treated to two superb desserts… another winner from Nick with his gobsmacking Pear & Almond pudding / cake… and a gorgeously moist Carrot Cake by Sharon Abrams.
By popular request, recipes are below including (by popular demand), Hari Covert’s Beer Bread. 
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CARROT SOUP WITH COCONUT & LEMONGRASS
Serves 4
Prep 15 mins Cook 35 mins Freeze up to 3 months
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 onion, chopped
1 lemongrass stalk, trimmed and tough outer layer discarded
2 garlic cloves, chopped
2 teaspoons finely grated root ginger
1 tablespoons red Thai curry paste
450g (1lb) carrots, sliced
900ml (1½ pints) hot vegetable stock
3 kaffir lime leaves
165ml (6fl oz) can coconut milk
salt and freshly ground pepper
lime wedges, to serve
Method:
Heat the oil in a large saucepan, add the onion, and fry to 3-4 minutes or until starting to soften.
Meanwhile, finely chop the lemongrass, then add to the pan, along with the garlic and ginger, and fry for 2 minutes.
Add the curry paste and fry for 1 minute, stirring all the time.
Add the carrots and fry for 2 minutes.
Pour in the stock, add the lime leaves and simmer for 20-25 minutes or until the carrots are tender.
Remove from the heat and take out and discard the lime leaves.
Pour in the coconut milk, then whiz in a blender or food processor until smooth.
The soup shouldn’t be too thick – dilute with more stock if it is.
Season to taste, then serve with a grating of black pepper and lime wedges.
From “The Soup Book” (Soil Association) published by Dorling Kindersley
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PEAR & ALMOND PUDDING / CAKE
Serves 8
Prep 10 mins Cook 45 mins
2 pears
125g/4½oz butter
125g/4½oz caster sugar
2 free-range eggs, large or medium
65g/2¼oz plain flour
65g/2¼oz ground almonds
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 table spoon flaked almonds (optional)
1 dessert spoon of caster or demerara sugar (optional)
Method:
Preheat the oven to 180o/350o/gas 4.
Peel the pears and cut into 4 lengthways, removing the seeds and core. You should end up with 8 pieces.
Grease and lightly flour a round cake tin.
Beat together the butter, caster sugar and eggs until light and fluffy.
Add the flour, ground almonds and baking powder and mix thoroughly.
Spoon mixture into the cake tin.
Arrange the pears on top of the mixture.
Sprinkle with flaked almonds (optional) and additional sugar (optional).
Bake in the preheated oven for about 45 minutes, checking at around 35 to 40 minutes.
Serve hot, warm or cold.
© Nicholas Pope
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SHARON’S CARROT CAKE
8oz self raising flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
5oz muscovado sugar
4 oz carrots (grated)
2 ripe bananas (mashed)
2 eggs
5 fl oz sunflower oil
Topping:
6oz low fat soft cheese
2oz margarine
4oz icing sugar
Few drops vanilla essence
Method:
Pre heat oven to 180 C / 350 F / gas mark 4
Line an 8″ (20cm) deep round cake tin
Place all ingredients for the cake in a large bowl and mix well until roughly
blended and smooth, turn into the prepared tin and level the surface.
Bake in the preheated oven for 50-60 minutes until well risen and shrinking away
from the sides of the tin.
Allow to cool in the tin for a few minutes before turning out and leaving to
cool completely on a wire rack.
For the topping blend the ingredients together until smooth and spread onto the
cold cake.
© Sharon Abrams
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HARI COVERT’S BEER BREAD
375g Self Raising flour
3 tablespoons Caster Sugar
330ml Beer ( I use a Moodleys beer which is live with natural yeasts)
Teaspoon of salt
Mix all ingredients to a wet batter then pour into well greased loaf tin
sprinkle top with sesame seeds or whatever you prefer!
Bake for 40 – 50 mins in preheated oven at 180 degrees C
© Hari Covert
For more Hari Covert recipes and for information on his Secret Underground Restaurant visit his blog here.
The Fourth Tunbridge Wells Photowalk takes place on Sunday 1st of April. The theme is LOVE & HATE ~ what you love and hate about Tunbridge Wells. We are asking you to take one photograph for LOVE and another for HATE.
Tickets, priced £7.50 each, are available exclusively from REDBOX CAMERAS on Monson Road. They go on sale from Saturday 24th March. Each ticket gains entry into the competition plus a large photographic print of your chosen images, which will be exhibited at Wobblybridge Gallery on Camden Road. As with the last Photowalk, entries will be judged by all who attend the opening night of the exhibition ~ one vote per person.
Here’s the clever bit… both of your chosen images must be arranged to make a diptych. What’s that I hear you cry? Well, quite simply, your two images ~ one for LOVE and one for HATE ~ should be arranged within a single frame. The two images can be the same size, or one can be smaller than the other. You can divide the image as you wish, by a straight line or a curved line. It’s totally up to you!
Some suggestions as to how you might arrange the two images are shown below. The staff at Redbox Cameras, who have great experience in all aspects of photography, will be able to help you and make suggestions. They will also create the ‘diptych’ image for you if you wish… just brief them and they’ll do the rest.
And of course, you don’t have to have a fancy dividing line between the two images at all… they can simply sit side by side, or one above the other. But the final overall ‘canvas’ size MUST be landscape and not portrait.
The event starts between Noon and 1pm at FLOWERS AT COLONNADE (the florist shop/café on Monson Rd in Tunbridge Wells ~ opposite Redbox Cameras), where in exchange for this ticket you will be registered to take part in the competition. The café will be serving their excellent teas and coffees… plus a range of grub if you’re feeling peckish.
The event will finish at SANKEYS in Tunbridge Wells, from 3.30pm onwards, where we’ll all be gathering to sample their famous fish fingers sarnies (kindly donated to the event by Matt Sankey) and no doubt sampling a glass or two of their finest ales.
If you have any queries, or to express interest in taking part in the Photowalk, please leave a comment below.
Hello my fellow twuddlers.
After an amazingly successful (approximately 20-30 people) inaugural #twuddle Tunbridge Wells Real Ale Pub Crawl in November 2010, and promising to run them once a quarter, @MrCRTW and myself @mannyvw have finally got around to organising the 2nd Tunbridge Wells Real Ale Pub Crawl nearly 18 months later
Starting after lunch around 2pm on Sunday 4th March 2012 at the Ragged Trousers on the Pantiles. We will then visit around 8 Tunbridge Wells pubs, consuming a half of a real ale in each pub, in half an hour and then moving onto the next pub, giving ourselves walking time between pubs. A kitty will organised for those who will be having the recommended ale in each pub, non-real ale drinkers and people who will only be joining us for part of the pub crawl please organise your own drinks.
Myself and @MrCRTW will again be choosing 8 Tunbridge Wells pubs, although the exact list and route is still being worked out, the great news is, in the time since the last pub crawl, 2 excellent new real ale pubs have opened and we will be adding them to the list, we will also be switching some of the pubs around, so we both look forward to seeing you on the pubcrawl, more details nearer the time.
Thanks
Update 25th January
The #twpubcrawl will start as mentioned at the The Ragged Trousers at 2pm on Sunday 4th where we will collect £12 from each person who wishes to join in on the recommended beer in each of the pubs. Please buy your own drink in the Ragged as am expecting people to arrive at different times and it will be difficult to keep track who has had theirs. Once we know numbers we will leave the Ragged Trousers around 2.30pm and then visit the following pubs, spending approximatly half an hour in each pub:-
The Compasses
The Royal Oak
The Wells Kitchen
Sankeys
Beau Nash
After the Beau Nash we will make our way to the The Bedford for a beer bat, which comprises of 3 1/3 pints of beer served on….well a bat (so 1 pint in total), Mark from The Bedford has also kindly agreed to lay on some pub snacks comprising of their excellent scotch eggs, Port Pies & Sausage rolls. If there is any cash left in the kitty at this point can use towards further beers
There is now a Facebook event for the pub crawl Please click on attending if you would like to join us, and use hashtag #twpubcrawl on twitter. Thanks
The highlight of the summer season are the various events and meet-ups we arrange through twuddle in addition to the regular Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s.
What would you like to see happen over the next few months, here are some suggestions. Which ones would you like to attend, what else would you like to see happen and, perhaps more importantly, which ones can you help with. These events only happen because someone makes it so!! Most events just need a champion, get a date and venue fixed, garner interest, make it happen! This list is far from exhaustive so if you have an idea, float it here and see who bites.
Arts & Crafts
The 4th Photowalk is almost certain to happen over the summer but details have yet to be sorted.
Food and Drink
BBQ – Alastair (taywell_online) has offered to host this but it needs to be organised.
Picnic – a casual (sunday afternoon?) meetup in Dunorlan Park (?) or perhaps on Royal Wedding day!
The Big Heat – A curry night run along the lines of The Big Slurp.
Twuddle Pub Crawl
Sport
Petanque was very successful last year and we would like to do this again.
Inter-group competition (twuddle, twuttle, cruttle, etc).
And of course there are loads of opportunities to just get together in an informal way! If you’re going to something like the Mela 2011 or a Pantiles Jazz evening then shout out and you might be able to create an impromptu twuddle.
So what would you like to do, how can you help? Let us know…
