The Gurnard’s Head – more than the sum of its parts

“Some people get it and some people don’t. We don’t have TVs in the rooms for example. What people can do however is come downstairs, sit in front of the fire and have a drink.”

Manager Andy turns all the radiators up, tells us to order fresh milk for the morning if we want tea or coffee in our room and closes the door behind him. It’s dark outside but beyond the Robert’s radio in the window, the wind is whipping around one of Cornwall’s most desolate westerly headlands, punctuated only by granite chunks and bent tree stumps.

The Sunday recipe: Marmalade with everything please

Scraping a zester across the dimpled skin of an orange or hovering a split lemon very close to your nostrils and inhaling against the damp is the equivalent of culinary angel dust in winter. Not only can they literally boost mood by raising serotonin levels, but citrus fruits are the earthly embodiment of the Mediterranean sun; bright plump orbs filled with a promise of sustained sunshine in the tunnel of winter.

The Friday Review: Oliver’s Falmouth

It’s not often that I sit down to a menu and want to try everything. Literally. The January menu at Oliver’s, Falmouth is one such example. Call it greed but I’d much rather lay the blame firmly with the owner and chef Ken Symons.

Best Chef 2013 Emily Scott reveals what life is like behind the scenes at The Harbour Restaurant, Port Isaac

The world of food is undoubtedly a male-dominated one. I say this not as a feminist but simply as a matter of fact. I wrote a piece on the Great British Menu 2012 in which it was noted that only one out of the 24 contestants was female. In an interview last year, Angela Hartnett described how she had to prove to Gordon Ramsay in her early days that, “I could last in the kitchen like men could.”

Bringing back the bacon to Cornwall for Farmhouse Breakfast Week

According to Jay Rayner, we may well be sick of hearing about ‘dirty fast food’ in 2012; sick even, of hearing people say they are sick of it. Bacon is different. Unlike sausages, hot dogs and burgers (whose recent ‘inclusive’ animal policy would make even Noah proud), bacon not only looks like meat but is impervious to the oscillations and whims of food twitter twattle. The only difference is that we are eating more of it and in different ways: bacon brownies, bacon jam and even, as created by food blogger Niamh Shields, brown sugar candied bacon honeycomb butter (the very name induces heart palpitations).

Rafferty’s Café and Wine Bar St Merryn: open for business

You could be forgiven for thinking that Padstow is the foodie capital of Cornwall but you would be 1) narrow-minded and 2) missing out. Head just a few miles south and you reach the village of St Merryn where food presents itself three ways: Stein’s Cornish Arms (good quality simple pub food), the Farmers Arms (local pub) and Rafferty’s, which replaced the very popular Rosel & Co. and opened on 5 November for food.

Bin the stockings this Christmas with seasonal teas: Tregothnan Christmas Blend Manuka

2013 is ostensibly the year of the breakfast and about time too. Is it just me or is everything (about breakfast) shit? From dried flakes of corn sprayed with vitamins for a premium price in an irritatingly bright box to wannabe continental pastries that flop with industrial man-handling to ‘gourmet’ museli (oats with extras in a brown box) to the likes of a grande iced half caf triple mocha latte macchiato with a shot of Christmas gingerbread syrup to go, the British breakfast is in dire need of holding its head high above the seething cesspit of marketing ploys that has become the first meal of the day.