The Rude Shipyard

If you were to ask me for three qualities that make a perfect cafe I would say amazing cake, lovely staff and the observer newspaper with a proper home made breakfast on a Sunday. Oh and a unique charm,  and tranquil atmosphere...and new and interesting music every time you visit...and hundreds and hundreds of books! OK, I got slightly carried away there, the reason being is that The Rude Shipyard possess all of the above in abundance!

There is nothing as special as an independent local bookshop. The selection of books there is vast and varied with each one deserving an appreciative home. For me, its a 'home away from home' as I'm there almost every other day. No other place in Sheffield has such a relaxed ambiance with the most genuinely lovely staff. They make every visitor whether young, old, strange or curious feel like a valued friend. 

This oasis of bookish tranquillity also hosts regular live music gigs (including the incredibly popular cupids in nooses anti valentines festival), free wifi, a book club, whiskey and drinking songs nights and Thursday supper to name a few exciting happenings.

Back to the food...not only do they serve self proclaimed hugs made of cakes, they also do a amazing breakfast on a Sunday with local sausages and bacon and home made soda bread. In the week you can find varying delights always including unusual sandwiches, soups and salads, plus the greenest hummus and more substantial meals such as burritos, curries and tortillas. Vegan and gluten free options are available.

If that wasn't enough they also have a delicatessen where you can purchase home made dukkah or hot chocolate with mahlep, as well as aubergine pickle, hazelnut oil, smoked salt and paprika and much more.

The Rude Shipyard feels like one of those undiscovered gems that doesn't get nearly as much attention as it deserves. I want to keep it to myself and yet I feel it is only fair to share it with you. It never fails to intrigue, inform and refresh me with every visit so I'm sure you'll love it just as much as I do. Go check them out!

Noodle Inn Review

I feel as though I haven't written an actual review of a restaurant for ages. Don't get me wrong, I've eaten out a fair few times, but I've just been visiting the same places I always go, and have reviewed many times.

Sheffield is currently experiencing an amazingly beautiful heatwave. The last time I was able to go outdoors in just a vest and yet still remain warm, I was in China. It's probably due to this reason that I've been craving Chinese food, particularly black bean aubergine...I can't remember the name of this dish so I quickly searched google. This result is a variation but I'm mainly sharing it as the English translation made me giggle. "people should not eat the weak stomach cold old eggplant".

Inside the restaurant they have a huge pillar aquarium complete with large fish and a wide screen TV which was showing you've been framed complete with subtitles. They also have a section with descriptions and history of different types of noodles. Other clientèle include mainly families. One of which is Indian with a curious toddler. There are also few young couples and an older sunburnt and dazed couple.

I also chose salt and pepper tofu as a starter. My family went for a set menu. I washed this down with a refreshing lemon iced tea.

The tofu was, without doubt the best tofu I have ever eaten. It was crunchy, spongy, salty and spicy. Everything you'd want from a lump of bean curd. My family has crispy duck with pancakes. I stole a pancake and filled it with a couple of chunks of tofu and garnished with the leek, cucumber and plum sauce. It was a nice combination! 

Soon a wave of massive plates of food arrived on our table: Crispy sweet and sour chicken, beef in sizzling sauce, king prawns, egg fried rice, cooked lettuce with a dark sauce and my black bean aubergine on a bed of fluffy white rice.

I was already salivating, even though the tofu was rather filling. I greedily scooped mine into my small bowl and plucked out a strip of shiny aubergine with my chopsticks. It was silky and tender and exactly like how I remembered it from China. This pleased me very much, clearly as I  filled up my bowl twice more and happily munched my way through the perfectly cooked rice and rich savoury sauce. The rice was tender the grains had just the right amount of clingy-ness.

My family made various comments in regards to how fantastic their food was too.

They end their meal with complimentary ice cream. I buy two scoops of Yeekwan's mango sorbet. If you read my last post you'll understand my immense love of this fruit and this sorbet does not disappoint.

The menu for all four of us was £57, with drinks. If I ate this in China, the bill wouldn't be more than £15 worth of Yuan. But then I probably would eat all my meals there and be vastly overweight so it's probably best saved for the occasional treat!

To sum it all up, check this establishment out for some delicious and authentic Chinese food! 

Food - 10/10

Service - 9/10

Value - 8/10

Vegan peanut butter brownies recipe

Woohoo! This recipe was recently published in Now Then magazine!
This makes me happy. These brownies are seriously good, no one will know they are vegan.
Cook them and put them all in your mouth....mmm, nice.

If you can't quite read the text in the photo, here is the recipe

250g dark chocolate
250g soya margerine
100g flour
350g sugar
3 tbsp gram flour
2 tbsp white wine vinegar
200g peanut butter
1 cup (give or take) of soya or other alternative to milk

1. Melt the chocolate and margerine together in a bain marie.
2. Beat together sugar and peanut butter
3. Gradually add rest of ingredients, adding the milk last.
4. You may need more milk, it should be easy to stir.
5. Bake at 180 for 20 minutes, so its still gooey and delicious!

Sharrow Marrow

I first visited Sharrow Marrow when it was newly opened, and wow its changed a lot!
In fact I enjoyed my stay so much I decided to write a whole post about it.
The shop owners were taking full advantage of the fact that today was the farmers market, and had a dazzling display of colourful and enticing products outside. Such delights included chutneys, watermelons and yellow courgettes, with lots of free tasters!

 

 

 

I nibbled on a slice of dewy and refreshing watermelon, picked up some plums, a bulb of smoked garlic and a yellow courgette and went inside.

 

This place is full of gorgeous tempting fresh fruits and vegetables plus loads more goodies. The daughter of the shop owner has her own company - brambles, and makes such delights as cakes, jams and cordials here too.

The range of high quality nuts, spices and other store cupboard essentials make Nigella's larder pale in comparison.You'll find Sheffield honey, tempting snack bars and a vast selection of local cheeses.

The lovely ladies were happy to pose for a photo and were keen to hear more about what I had to say, even though they were super busy!

So its definitely worth popping by when you are in the area. I'll be coming up specially to visit and I'd even go as far to say its my new favourite place on sharrow vale road!

Sharrow Vale Farmers Market

Today the residents of hunters bar plus visitors, came together to celebrate and enjoy food!
Sharrow vale road is already full of treasures for the adventurous foodie to discover and so it comes as no surprise that the local businesses clearly benefited from this quarterly event.
People were sat outside the greedy Greek, enjoying slovakis and falafel and cafe Ceres's and Fancie were rammed to the rafters with happy faces spectating the hustle and bustle, whilst simultaneously being stuffed with delicious goodies.

Most of the traders will be very familiar to those who frequent these kind of events, much like myself and others keen on the local Sheffield food scene. I've visited before and photographed those people so this time I did my best to take some snaps of a few new folk...

The rather suave Italian foccacia guy.

This lady is super friendly, has refreshing drinks and advised me where to visit in Mexico! Oaxaca apparently!

These fooled me for a second...they are bath products!

This is gorgeous pumpkin oil. I'd love to experiment with it in a cake...

Friendly and familiar mushroom stall.

Newcomers on the scene. A German bratwurst van.

Lastly, the famous cat that sleeps in the window of that shop..I always forget its name but this soporific feline always makes me smile.

Lunch on London Road...Fanoush and Cake R us Reviews!

The weather was deceptively cold. Glorious sunshine but bloody freezing!
This could have been due to the fact that I'm at optimum warmth around 10% of the time. Also I have to remember, this is England, we get a handful of days per year where I'm comfortable enough to leave the coat at home, often only to be caught in some freak hail storm a couple of hours later.

London road - watch out for that rain cloud!

My first stop was Fanoush. Minimal decor inside, one wall displays the menu, the other wall holds an array of upcoming Sheffield nights out, gig dates and even a poster I handed in earlier in the month for my charity cake auction!

glorious salads

The salad bar is adventurous and exciting. There's beetroot, olives, two types of hummus and loads more. You can forget your token limp lettuce supplied with a dodgy kebab from most of the eateries around here. This colourful entourage has salivating in anticipation.

I choose a fanoush wrap with extra halloumi. 10 inches of it! I get a mix of all the salads except tomatoes and onions (not too keen on those raw) and spicy hummus, tahini sauce and mango pickle!

I'd spent three hours climbing and another rummaging through piles of clothes at a clothing exchange so my ravenous-ness was perfectly understandable.
I chose a carrot and orange juice to help ease the monstrosity into my gut.
That first bite confirms what I already knew. It's beautiful. A harmony of flavours from the nutty falafel to the spicy hummus and creamy tahini. Contrasting textures make each mouthful satisfying and leaves me wanting more. Crunchy cabbage, dense falafel and squeaky halloumi. Wow and the mango pickle just joined the party in my mouth. This is amazing.
If anyone thinks vegetarian food is dull, hand them one of these. I'd eat this over a steak at every single opportunity. It's practically all my favourite foods rolled together in a nice warm wrap! How can it not be perfect?

Stomach almost satisfied, I head to cake r us for pudding. As I walk in the friendly assistant instantly recognises me and tells me about their newest recipe - sesame seed puffs as she's remembered I'm lactose intolerant and they're milk-free. Plus wife cakes - my favourite- have just been made. I've got to eat quickly before my stomach realises the vast amount of grub I've already consumed and locks the gate.

I go for both, partly out of politeness and partly because I'm plain greedy.
The wife cake is still warm from the oven. The pastry is flaky, perfect for getting all over your scarf, trousers, hair, everywhere. Good  job I don't mind getting messy.
Secluded within the flaky pastry is the soft opaque filling. Apparently this is melon flavoured but that flavour isn't really jumping out at me. To be fair, no distinct flavour is. Only this vaguely fruity, bland gloop, but that's what makes it special.
It's comforting, like a freshly laundered duvet cover. It wraps around your tongue and makes you happy.

Onto the sesame puff. Denser pastry holds a thick, rich and almost cocoa like, nutty sesame seed filling. It's claggy is reminiscent of peanut butter. It's smokey and slightly bitter. Can't finish it though as my stomach has finally closed the hatch. I don't think I'll physically be able to stand up if I eat another bite.

I'd also recommend the bubble tea here. It's the only place in Sheffield as far as I'm aware that sells it and its an interesting experience, plus its delicious. I'm yet to brave the preserved egg puff. I don't think it's going to happen though. I wasn't tempted in shanghai, I doubt I'll be able to stomach facing the challenging snack over here.

They also do delicious fresh cream cakes!

A variety of Chinese snacks

Super cute faces!!

Delicious whole cakes made to order.

I hope you enjoyed my double feature! I'll be updating my blog more frequently now, so please follow me by clicking the link on the right hand side, or just check back often.

Thanks for reading.

La Mama Review

La mama


Last week was my Mum's birthday. This called for celebration! So off we went in search of something tasty.

As we walked down London road, I spotted La mama. I'd never been in here before, but at the eat Sheffield awards on Monday night they won 'favourite European' restaurant so I reckoned they'd be good enough for my Ma.

So in we went, me, my mum and my little sister. A friendly lady greeted us and showed us to a table by the window. I was rather surprised to see we were the only ones in, but it was around 2pm and I guess there is a chance we'd missed the lunchtime rush.

We ordered 6 tapas from their special 'happy hour' menu. The décor is what you'd expect from a tapas place: yellow walls, tiny guitars, maracas and their eat Sheffield award hung proudly amongst various other European inspired decorations.
Soon enough out came the food.

The tapas were well presented and each one had great flavour and you could tell they were home made.

The patatas bravas were crunchy with a fluffy centre and coated in a spicy tomato sauce.

The tortilla was nice and chunky. The rice was well flavoured and enjoyed very much by my sister. I enjoyed the pumpkin fritters and their accompanying green chilli and coriander salsa very much, although not as much as I enjoyed the baked aubergine and goats cheese, a nice twist on the traditional Italian melanzana parmigiana.

The mushrooms were as they read on the menu: garlicky and white wine-ey but at (cost) for 7, I felt they were a little pricey.

Tapas are all about small portions though, I suppose.

We mopped up all the juices with some house bread which was average and had been drizzled with some very very good olive oil.

Next came the desserts which I was looking forward to. We decided to share chilli chocolate cake and a banoffee pie. The banoffee looked delicious but I only got to taste a tiny bit of the sauce as it was way too creamy for me, being lactose intolerant.

My mum and sister savoured it, each mouthful accompanied by a different moan of pleasure and facial expression to match.

I had some of the chocolate cake. It was nice but I was expecting a dark, glossy sauce and dense chocolatey sponge. This however was light and with a weak sauce.

Don't get me wrong, it was nice but I am one hell of a tough critic when it comes to cakes and this didn't really fit the bill for me.

The important thing was my mum enjoyed herself and the food was overall very good.

The bill came to £34.65.

I'll probably be back as they have live music nights and I'm pleased to have found a quality tapas restaurant so close to home!


Food – 7/10

Service – 9.5/10

Value – 7/10