M&S Plant Kitchen Mushroom Spaghetti bolognese

I love bolognese so I thought I'd try the plant mushroom spaghetti bolognese which is described as delicious and savoury mushroom mince in a rich tomato sauce.

I was a little disappointed because it wasn't as savoury as expected and a bit bland.

Madama Oliva Pate

I love pate be meat or vegetable.

Madama Oliva Pate does these olive pates, there are three flavours: olives, olives and artichoke and spicy olives.

The artichoke olive pate is so delicious that you can eat it on its own. 

I ended up eating half a pouch because it was that good.

The black olive pate had a strong taste and it was quite salty with a lot of oil.

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Glebe Farm pure oaty oat drink

Finally an English oat drink and it tastes good.
You will find Glebe farm pure oaty oats drinks everywhere and it tastes a bit like malted malt.

Red Chinese Cabbage / Red Chinese Leaf

Spotted these beautiful red Chinese cabbage so I just had to get them.

Visually they look more purple / mauve than red.

When you blanch them, they become pretty as well as the water.

Overall tasty and pretty to eat.

Coren Selecta chestnut fed shoulder

Acorn fed ham is widely known but did you know you can also get chestnut fed ham by Selecta.
Available in shoulder cut as well which is softer.
I found the taste moreish and it was not too salty.
It is always good having different options of cut and not just the leg because you can experience different textures just like chicken breast and chicken thigh.

The pairing of the shoulder went really well with melon.

The Chinese ham have a preserved ham called Jinhua ham which they cook with Chinese cabbage so I experimented Coren Selecta with Chinese cabbage as a starter and the taste was surprisingly good together.

Blackthorn salt

Discovered these beautiful Pyramid salt which are formed by sea water trickling through blackthorn twigs.
As the sea water seeps along the Blackthorn twigs, exposure to Scotland's west coast winds evaporate the salt water, concentrating the resultant brine. 

In the final stages the Blackthorn Salters combine skill and alchemy to create the perfect salt.

At the Specialty food fair, there was a mini model of the blacktorn salter in action and there were paper models which you could take home and make as well as salt samples which come in a nicely designed box.

The taste of the salt was really good with the usual saltiness but the best is the shape of these salt crystals which lovely pyramids.

Video of the mini blackthorn salter in action:

Video of the mini paper blackthorn salter model:

Video of sample blackthorn salt in this intricate box:

Decadent chocolate tea by Callysthe

Tea is just my favourite drink and there are so many different blends about.

My ultimate blend is chocolate so whenever there is chocolate tea I have to get my hands on it.

Callysthe a French brand has a chocolate blend called The Noir Cacao which is a black tea base with cacao.

Looking at the ingredients, I knew I was going to like this because it was 37.7% black tea and 36% cacao beans which meants at least a third in that tin was cacao hence the chocolate taste is going to be strong.

To my delight, you can see these big pieces of cacao shell amongst the black tea.

I only used small amount to steep a cup of tea and it was simply heaven so next time I will add a bit more for a full on stronger taste.

The cacao was just heavenly and dominates the flavour as well as the black tea so this is now my favourite chocolate tea.

The paper bag that it came in had a great design, if you turn it upside down you will see something different.

Avec meaning with and sans meaning without.

As well as cheese, the French have done really well with the tea.