Masseys More than just another village Shop

Gorgonzola is not so much a blue cheese as a green cheese: its distinctive, soft green veining brings an unmistakable element to its smooth, creamy body and generally mellow tangy flavour. The strength of flavour varies according to the age of the cheese: sweet and soft when young (when it can also be known as Dolcelatte), as it ages it becomes firm, crumbly, robust and spicy.

It freezes well, though after freezing it will become extra crumbly and is then best used in cooking or salads. Its flavour becomes milder and sweeter during cooking; it melts deliciously when stirred into a simple risotto.

Here’s a recipe for Jamie Oliver’s Apple & Walnut Risotto with Gorgonzola

Gorgonzola Facts

Gorgonzola with Marsala is the Italian equivalent of Port and Stilton. Gorgonzola also pairs well with champagne, full bodied red and sweet red wines, and with pears, apples, peaches, nuts and raisins.

Gorgonzola was first made in the village of that name outside Milan, though the village has now been absorbed into the city after centuries of urban growth. Some date the history of Gorgonzola production precisely to 879 AD, others go as far back as the Romans – but however long its pedigree it remains hugely popular worldwide. Many cheese makers have attempted to imitate Gorgonzola, but it is protected as fiercely as fine rare wines, and imitators are unable to replicate the balance of moulds which continue to give it its distinctive flavour. These moulds occur naturally in the caves where it was first ripened centuries ago.

Trivia point – The London Stock Exchange is known as ‘Gorgonzola Hall’ because of the greenish marble used in its interior!

Posted under Food ideas, Recipes, Shop news

We’ve taken all the hard work out of shopping for cook books. Just  launched:  our cooking shop.

To start with, we’ve searched for cook books from some of the celebrity chefs we all love and hate. Let us know if we’ve missed your favourite – we’ve only picked a few to start with.

And given the recent news from the farmers’ survey which indicated that many children don’t know about the origin of every-day food ingredients, we thought it would be a good idea to include cook books for children and cooking equipment for children in our lists.

Our final launch category is cooking with vegetables. We’re all dealing with post-Christmas belt-tightening, and looking for healthier ways of dealing with food. What better way than to increase our fruit & veg intake. If you’re looking for new ways to prepare your daily 5, have a browse through our bookshelf now.

We’ll be adding categories from time to time – special diets and seasonal cooking come to mind. Which others would you like?

Photo credit: Roland

Posted under Recipes, Shop news

Here’s another another quick and easy recipe – this time for a starter – that you can make from basic store cupboard ingredients. It can be refridgerated for a few days after making.

1 x 210g tin of sardines in oil
4 hard boiled eggs
30ml mayonnaise
10 – 12 drops Worcester sauce
Pepper
30ml stiffly whipped double cream

Crush the sardines in a bowl, add the mayonnaise and mix thoroughly.
Roughly chop the eggs and then crush them through a sieve.
Add about 2/3 of the eggs to the sardines together with the Worcester sauce and pepper , whip the cream and stir in.
Place the mixture in an open dish and sprinkle the remaining egg on top.
Serve as pate.

Many thanks to Judy Oswald for this recipe.  If you’ve got any favourites you’d like to share, please pop them on an email to Marc and we’ll publish them on the website.

Photo credit: Desheboard

Posted under Recipes

Originally created in 1816 by Trappist monks at the Abbaye du Port du Salut in Entrammes in the Loire Valley, by 1873, the cheese was being sold in the market in Paris. The name was registered in 1874 and Port Salut has become a  popular cheese with British customers.

Port Salut is a mild flavoured, soft cheese that can be used in cooking and is equally good on a cheese board.

Here are a few recipes you could try if you’ve got Port Salut in your fridge. Or you could pop in an pick some up from the shop if any of these make your taste buds tingle.

French Farmhouse Pork

A very quick pasta bake recipe with Port Salut

Jumbo jacket potatoes

Posted under Food ideas, Recipes, Shop news

We’ve always made a point of providing a personal service for our customers, and last week we found a new way to do that. And we’re thrilled with it.

One of our customers gave us his weekly shopping list – the list of groceries that he would usually be driving to Waitrose to buy. He asked us if we could fill that order – and we managed to get all but a few items (which will be in stock next time he asks). His order was packed up and delivered to his door on Wednesday evening.

After we had delivered it, I went onto the Waitrose website and priced every item – like for like – and discovered that not only did he get his shopping personally picked, packed and delivered,  he also paid £6.63 less for his shopping. If you add in the cost of a drive to Waitrose, at 40p a mile, that increases his saving a further £4.48 to a total of £11.11.

Even we were pretty impressed with that.

In fact, I was so impressed I decided to see what we could do on a different list – a smaller, every day basket of shopping:
1 litre semi-skimmed milk
1 litre grapefruit juice
6 eggs
1 loaf of medium sliced white bread
250g button mushrooms
225g cherry tomatoes
500g Utterly Butterly
1 medium head of broccoli
600g green beans
1 medium cauliflower
1kg carrots
Brussel sprouts
700g clementines
8 apples
700g new potatoes
1.2kg butternut squash

Here’s how the second sample worked out:

Waitrose price including travel cost: £34.81

Masseys price including £1 delivery charge £25.21

Total saving on this sample shop £10.60

And for those who like to shop at Tesco – the saving from shopping at Masseys would be £2.52.

I think this is a rather nice example of how shopping locally can help save the planet as well as saving money.

What do you think?

Photo credit: Alan Cleaver

Posted under Food ideas