The Council of Chow

Last night was an interesting night. We went to the Town hall to watch my mother become Deputy Mayor. As it turned out there was a last minute challenger for the post but Mum won by 8 votes to 7. She gets to wear an official chain of office and everything! Woo hoo for Mum!

After the ceremony and official stuff was over there was food and wine laid on for assembled guests etc. Food was provided by a nice young lady named Jess from Tea At The Oast, a place on Woodchurch Road that I've been meaning to go to sometime but haven't yet. Well, not to worry. After last night I am officially moving it up on the agenda to somewhere near the top. If last night's food was anything to go by, and I'm sure it probably is, this is a fab place to eat (at least as long as Jess works there). The table was loaded with lots of little nibbles, and as I approached I had a slight feeling of dread that I wouldn't be able to eat much of anything because I suspected that there might be lots of meat-based things on offer, as is sometimes the case. I needn't have worried, however, because Jess did us proud.
First thing I noticed were lots of little thimble-cups filled with a green liquid which turned out to be chilled asparagus soup. What's more, it was damn good asparagus soup. I went back for about 5 more, I have to be honest. She also had miniature cheese scones with a chive butter (divine), cheese sandwiches and egg & cress sandwiches (fab), cheese straws of course, mini Stilton rarebits (to die for), but my two favourites were (a) the little breaded balls filled with an aranchini/saffron risotto (wow. Just wow.) and (b) the little mini bruschettas topped with a purée of peas, broad beans and mint with a mini dollop of crème fraîche on top (no way to describe this but a pure delight to put in your mouth). Beautiful stuff Jess - keep it up and I promise I'll come down to the Oast soon.

Today I popped into Cinnamon in The Fairings, a place I mentioned before in a fairly recent post. I had once again the Mozzarella, Tomato and Spinach sandwich on Granary Bread, and once again it was top-notch. The double espresso I had with it was pretty darn good, too. Love it.