I'm pleased to report that the Fat Duck in Bray has now reopened, two and a half weeks after the closure due to a health scare.

Tests have ruled out food poisoning, and at present the cause is still unknown however Heston Blumenthal has confirmed that "the Health Protection Agency and the local environmental health office have given ...

Following my previous post commenting on the temporary Closure of the Fat Duck, it would seem that the number of customers who have fallen ill has risen from 40 to 400 according to the BBC.

Rigorous testing of the kitchens and all items on the menu, but no health issues have been detected. Samples have been taken from all staff to establ ...

Heston Blumenthal's restaurant, the Fat Duck has been one of my "Restaurants to Visit before I Die" for some time.

However it is reported in the Telegraph and The Times that the restaurant has been closed by the chef / owner as a precaution following a number of customers falling ill, after dining in the 3 starred Michelin restaurant.
...

As a wife, mother and a dedicated cook, I was inspired to produce my own website, Dinner at Home to list some of my favourite recipes and share my ideas with regard to entertaining at home.

This blog will allow me to share more of my thoughts regarding food in general, including my favourite restaurants, my comments on recent food related ...

Well, last Christmas we were lucky enough to get a Mr & Mrs Smith voucher as a Christmas present and I can't believe it took us until October half term to actually sort out a weekend when we could cash it in!

We looked at several different places but didn't want to be too far from Suffolk where the girls were staying. We had had a lo ...

We are always eager to try new places to eat so on Saturday were excited to try a new place with our friends Mark and Sarah. It was Mark's birthday and we had all been eyeing up a curry for a good while so ended up at The Wheel in Rearsby near Leicester.

This is a traditional English Pub but with a twist in that it serves only Indian food ...

We heard some exciting news this week with the launch at Penally Abbey of the Pembrokeshire Pasty and Pie Co. My cousin Ollie (Oliver Booth) and his old friend Dominic Spencer-Churchill have been sourcing great local ingredients from the Pembrokeshire area and have come up with some scrumpious flavours of pies and pasties which include the Tenby ...

We've had a really nice weekend down in Tenby over half term - a journey from hell which took over 6 hours in the thick snow (!) but worth it as the weather in Pembrokeshire was glorious.

We had the obligatory fish and chips on Friday night from the Park Road Fish Bar - delicious as ever and then last night ventured to the Ocean Restauran ...

Last week at work was all quite exhilarating lets say and I am now moving departments to hopefully a more manageable job in the hours I work (9 till 3). My friend is also moving departments which means our food banter on a daily basis will no doubt come to an end. What a shame!! The good news is that she brought a recipe in anyway and said it wa ...

A fairly quiet weekend this week as the weather has been fairly rubbish again! Promised the kids we would go cycling today with the promise of a picnic but the weather looks horrid so we played Cluedo instead - Jon pipped me to the post and had blatantly ignored the fact it was for the kids not him!

Anyway - just sharing a rather nice rec ...

Despite being the middle of summer, the rain made it seem the right time for some French Onion Soup.



Really tasty especially if served with Gruyere Toast.

If you fancy trying some yourself, have a look at the recipe for French Onion Soup

Serves6

Ingredients

Stew

• 900g ( 2 lb ) Stewing or braising steak


• 3 tbsp plain flour


• Vegetable oil


• butter


• 3 carrots


• 2 large onions


• 1 tsp tomato puree


• Few springs thyme

...

We are very excited this week as we put the finshing touches to our on line shop "Dinner At Home Gifts"! I have always thought it would be great to be able to find great gifts, suitable for a wide spectrum of people for sale on a foodie website that recognises the kind of thing that foodie people might like as a gift.

We went to the Spri ...

We're excited this morning following the arrival of stock for the new Gifts section of the Dinner at Home website.

We'll be checking through the order to make sure that all of the aprons, oven gloves, and other coordinating items are there and then start taking photographs.

Check back soon to see the range of gifts that are availab ...

Our first delivery has been received and photographed and is now available to buy online.

The initial range includes:

• Aprons
• Oven Gloves
• Aprons for Children
• Coordinating Accessories

We feel that the quality and generous cut of the products make this range stand out as great gi ...

just had to put a quik note here to say what a great find! Our friends Mark and Sarah took their children over to Eurodisney for the day last weekend and came back on Sunday via Majestic Wine in Calais. Luckily for us they have a big car so were able to bring stuff back for us as well as themselves. What a bargain - way cheaper than the UK - the ...

Following on from the recent blog post regarding The Garlic Farm, the next store cupboard essential was to source and buy was some vanilla pods.

I do frequently use vanilla in a number of desserts such as Pannacotta, Crème Brûlée or straightforward custard. I prefer using vanilla pods, rather than vanilla essence, as I think that the pre ...

Do you like to throw dinner parties? Would you like to hold a dinner party with a difference?

We've been contacted by a company who are producing a new TV show and are looking for people who like to host Dinner Parties to get involved.

The show will be fronted by Charlotte Church and include people with fun friends who they would l ...

We have been contacted by the team at Kream, to ask whether any of the visitors to the Dinner at Home website would be interested in appearing on a Nintendo Television advert to be screened at Christmas 2009.

They are looking for couples who like to host dinner parties and who use a Nintendo games console, such as the Nintendo Wii or DS.< ...

I recently watched open-mouthed at the TV programme "Jamie Saves our Bacon", when Jamie Oliver highlighted some of the appalling treatment of pigs and also the way in which the supermarkets were careful to disguise the country of source of the pork products on their shelves.

I have "Taken the Pledge":

• to encourage retailers ...

One of the things I feel most passionately about is the quality of the raw ingredients I cook with.

I believe that Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's Chicken Out campaign highlights the problem fantastically and hopefully has shown a great many shoppers why they should spend a little more when buying chicken and eggs.

The conditions in ...

I've just realised that no foodie/cooking blog could possibly be complete, without the obvious mention of the brilliant, "Come Dine With Me" on Channel 4! Within my workplace everyone is completely addicted - from the twentysomethings to the old timers like me! I'm convinced one of my colleagues is going to pop up on there at some time in the ne ...

Well, it has been an eventful weekend as Imogen sat her entrance exam yesterday to get in to Loughborough High School. Competition is pretty fierce so all we can do now is wait two weeks to see if she gets a place.So, with that out of the way Scarley thought it would be nice to make and decorate a cake wishing her "well done" for taking the exam ...

As we've said on numerous occasions, the secret to dinner party success is all in the planning.

Later today we have some great friends coming for Sunday Lunch. With all of the other stresses of everyday life and Christmas just around the corner, this could be a time for hectic rushing about, but hopefully all will be in control (or will ...

Bit of a random entry here, but there we go!! Have got a day off work today to look after the kids but the weather is terrible again so we are stuck at home this afternoon. We have just made a Victoria sponge to kill the boredom and it reminded me to post something about Victoria Sponges! I am not a big fan of baking (I've never had a sweet toot ...

Wimbledon has been and gone, England are playing Australia in the Ashes, and it's raining, so that must mean only one thing - Summer's here!

The arrival of summer also allows us to fire up the barbeque and invite friends round for a summer party, but rather than serving up the same old frozen beef-burgers and burnt sausages, ...

This may seem like a bizarre thing to write about but I have to share my disappointment in my first Jersey Royals of the season yesterday!! Why can you not get them like you used to? What do they do differently now so that they just don't taste as good?
When I was little it was almost a ritual in our household - rumour would spread through Te ...

I've got another week and 1 day at work and then I've got a few days off until we go to Tenby for 2 whole weeks! This is my dream holiday as I grew up there and we still have my Dad's house down there - a gorgeous little 3 bed terraced cottage about 100 yards from the South Beach!
The cottage is just outside of the town walls so quiet but han ...