Ok so I'm actually two and a half months in but I'm blaming that on my birth week, I can't see the point in restricting it to a birthDAY so I do a week, and besides, it was the big Seven Zero so it had to be done.
I had a surprise visit from my daughter which, apart from being a fantastic surprise, did reveal to me that I am surrounded by seriously sneaky people, yes, you know who you are!!!!
So Karen was driving up to Larnaca airport, well who knew that? The flight was two hours late which created a lot of panic. People were making strange comments and bets and how come I didn't realise it at the time. Then at 10.00pm in the evening Alli walked in (two hours late) and everything clicked into place.
On the 6th Feb, I had a great birthday meal down at Don Carlo with Karen and Alli and then, on the 7th, although I was working I had a great night down at the bar with all of those seriously sneaky people.
Thank you everyone I had a great week. Anyway, enough about me getting old, what happened at the bar in January.
OK lets start with food. We're gonna do platters. No we're not, we're going to do tapas. No we are not, we're going back to platters. So why the big discussion. Well, if you are going to do food it has to be done properly with high quality and consistency and we only have a small limited space kitchen. With hot foods, we needed to get back into ovens and stoves etc. With platters we can do it all from the fridge and the prep time is not going to be that different.
So Obi Wan Kenobi (that's Gabriel) and I did some practice platters and I took a couple of pictures. So here are my initial thoughts.
Gourmet Cheese platter.
Gourmet Meat Platter
Ploughman's Lunch
Baked Camembert
More Lite Bites - Middle East dips and bread.
I might add that the picture above is not the finished product, just a test run. We will probably add some ham in there, some grapes and other seasonal fruits and nuts and put the bread on the side.
I digress, have you ever asked Chat GPT to write a marketing description for you? Try this.
"Savour the epitome of culinary craftsmanship with our Gourmet Cold Meat Platter, a symphony of premium cured meats expertly sliced and artfully arranged. Delight in the perfect balance of flavours and textures, inviting you to experience the pinnacle of charcuterie excellence in every exquisite bite."
So if you ever see anything like that on our menu, don't accuse me of having verbal diarrhea, blame it on Chat GPT.
In terms of a Ploughman's lunch, Obi Wan didn't actually know about the great British institution of Branston Pickle and individual pork pies. Has he been living in a cave I ask myself? We have installed the chiller for the kitchen and should be able to start offering platters from March onwards.
What else? Ah yes, Gin. We are up to over 50 gins and have introduced a number of new products. As an example, Ginarte, from Italy. I quote from their website on how they make the gin. BTW, every bottle has it's own artistic picture on the side.
The main notes are those of juniper berries, strictly picked in Tuscany, infused in pure wheat alcohol at 65% and then distilled in vacuum discontinuous alembic, because the vacuum reduces the boiling point of the infusion to preserve the more delicate aromas.
Together with juniper, we selected Calamint, safflower, mignonette, rubia and indigo which were used for the creation of colored pigments by the most important Renaissance painters. In addition, herbs such as angelica, lavender, hibiscus, elder flowers, pine buds, mountain pine and pine needles complete the botanicals. Both group of herbs are infused in two separate batches in pure 55% wheat alcohol, then distilled in a small discontinuous non-vacuum alembic still to maintain the aromatic components of all ingredients.
We introduced our Winter/Spring opening times in January. We are now open 6 days per week, 12.00 till late. Closed on a Tuesday. Most of the square is closed on a Monday so we thought that we might try giving people the option of More Social being open on Mondays. However, although a lot of people have welcomed the idea I can't say that it's been great success in terms of bums on seats so, we will give it another month and review at the end of March.
The upstairs room is progressing in terms of construction. I have built the unit at the end of the room, the doors should go on this week. The TV is working and people have been watching the Six Nations. The fridge goes in this week. We have a temporary table in there while the main table is being built. This will hopefully be full operational by early April.
Talkin Tables. Karen kicked off Talkin Tables which is a weekly session where people get to meet up and chat. We have had three sessions now and all have been well attended. I did a separate blog on this if you care to read about it.
That's about it for now so be good, have fun (actually, that doesn't make sense LOL) and hope to see you soon.
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