Organic food?

I switched to organic foods as they use fewer chemicals and so it was out of my concern for the animals, the environment and for me and my family's health.  For several years I had the Riverford Farm box of organic vegetables and would nip in to either the Riverford shop in Totnes or Staverton to top this up. I really liked the recipes that they included each week.  I found this seasonal and used most of the veg from the box.  I only stopped using the service due to money.  I was really pleased with the quality of the goods and their customer service.

Now I pick and choose what I buy as there are plenty of organic foods at supermarkets nationwide.  I highly recommend organic carrots!  I use Tesco online as parking is difficult outside my house, and I find they stock plenty of organic products, e.g. milk, bread, stock cubes which I use all the time, as well as some more obscure ones like chilli crackers and pasta sauce.

 I use organic ingredients for all my baking needs: my organic (and Fairtrade) banana and chocolate cake

For local (some free!) organic breakfast events on 14 June go here:www.wakeuptoorganic.co.uk

Riverford are actually having one, you need to book and pay for it.
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A special organic breakfast at Riverford Field Kitchen:

 What: Riverford Field Kitchen is running a special one off breakfast event - a set two

course organic breakfast. Numbers are limited so pre-booking is essential. Cost is £10pp

 Where: The Riverford Field Kitchen, Wash Farm, Buckfastleigh TQ11 0JU

 For pre-booking: Tel 01803 762074

 When: 14 June 2017 from 9.00AM

Eversfield Organic Pastrami - great for summer sandwiches

The lovely Frankie at RAW sent me some Eversfield Organic pastrami from their Roam and Relish range.

It made a delicious sandwich for lunch for myself and my husband.  I just buttered the bread and put in some lettuce leaves from our garden

We wolfed it all down.  The meat was spicy, fresh and yummy.  We were also grateful to learn that all of Eversfield Organic meat is local (to Devon) and (obviously) organic and they age the cooked meat for the charcuterie range for maximum flavour.  I am on  the verge of vegetarianism (again - I was for 2 years 1993-1995) so that helped me to eat and enjoy it.

The Eversfield Organic range of charcuterie is available from 15 July 2016.  They sell veg boxes and raw meat too.

Pipers Farm - Ethical, Tasty Mail Order Meat from Devon

I have been hearing a lot about Pipers Farm.  They've been recommended by Rick Stein and won countless awards.  These Devon farmers certainly seem to know what they're talking about.    Everything is slowly matured and hung for a good long time in order to maximise the flavour of the meat, the animal breeds are traditional and the feed, maintenance and slaughtering seem to be above 'Organic' standards.

Their website has an awful lot of stuff on it.  I was a bit confused when I tried to add the 'Easy Selection' Family Survival Pack into my basket and yet when I clicked on the items e.g Streaky bacon or Chicken Korma to select them it returned the message that the item wasn't available.  I'm sure this is just a glitch.  They offer a great service, a money-back guarantee on all their products and next day delivery when ordered before 4pm.  Free delivery once a fortnight to Bristol and free delivery to most of Devon.

I received a package of mixed meat and ready meals to sample and overall I was very impressed.  The packaging took a bit of getting used to.  For instance, the chicken breasts stuffed with pesto had all been 'blast-frozen' (ie frozen immediately) in separate plastic bags and then all placed within one large plastic bag.  My initial reaction that this was a surplus of packaging, but when my son decided he didn't want one, I was able to just take three out of the four out and leave one for another day.  The instructions say that if you don't have time to let the meat defrost naturally, each pack can be placed in a bowl of cool water for half hour and can then be cooked immediately.  I didn't mind trying this for the lamb steaks and beef steaks, but for the chicken I chose to let them defrost completely - I'm too risk-averse!

To cook this tenderloin I used Fay Ripley's Recipe, served alongside chilli spinach - the family loved it

The steak, pork and lamb were excellent: extremely tasty, tender and succulent - certainly no harm done during the freezing process.  I did give them a very thorough dry off with kitchen roll before grilling them as they were a little damp when they came straight from the bag - there's nothing worse than getting your pan sizzling and ending up with a semi-boiled piece of steak that doesn't go properly brown and crusty on the outside.


The pesto chicken was good - not as oily as supermarket pesto - I think it was made with cashews rather than pine nuts which was a nice change.  My daughter preferred it cold in a sandwich. The chicken breasts looked attractive tied up with string with a single herb stem.

It's tricky to make sausages photogenic?!

The pies were pretty good - it may have been my oven setting but when I followed the cooking instructions, the pastry lids were all lifted off a bit and lots of the filling overflowed, but they were tasty and I loathe making pastry so this was a welcome short cut.

My least favourite item was the venison sausages -  but my husband loved them.  There were large pieces of fat speckled throughout the sausage and that's fine in chorizo or salami, but I prefer cooked hot sausages to not have visible lumps of fat.  Luckily my other half is less fussy and was happy to have all the leftovers.

Overall it was interesting to try out some ready meals from a quality producer.  I have always preferred fresh meat from the butcher's rather than the frozen variety but Pipers Farm have won me over