Blog Forman and Field

The Forman family have been smoking salmon since 1905 so they’ve learnt a thing or two along the way. Stick to Lance Forman’s 10 golden rules and you’ll never be disappointed by smoked salmon again.

1. If you like fish smoky, have a kipper! Salmon should be delicately smoked.

2. Cheap, fatty smoked salmon may need lemon but Forman’s doesn’t – especially not the wild.


3. If you see sugar on the ingredients label it’s a bad sign. It’s only there to cover up too much salt or old fish, don’t buy it.


4. Eat smoked salmon as freshly as possible; it won’t taste as good at the end of the shelf-life.


5. Only Wild Scottish salmon has the great reputation. English is considered inferior and Irish is no longer available. Wild Norwegian and Baltic is good, Wild Alaskan salmon is a totally different breed.


6. Organic salmon is not wild and no more natural than regular farmed, so should not be more expensive. Don’t be fooled.


7. Try ordering and carving smoked salmon yourself – it will taste even better.


8. Gravadlax is not and should not be smoked.


9. Don’t buy salmon whose packs state it is “matured” – fish does not mature, it goes off!

10. The key to smoked salmon and any fish is the freshness. Forman’s smoked salmon is carved for you the day before you receive it.

If you have any suggestions of your own or questions that you’d like Lance to answer on smoked salmon please do leave a comment below.

Forman & Field Chef Lloyd spent a day in our kitchens making puddings with Chloe Scott of the Metro newspaper a couple of weeks ago. She wanted to see how we translate home baking to a larger scale and how you make a proper Christmas pudding without cutting corners. The short answer is ‘just as you would at home’ – by hand and with a whole lot of stiring!

Forman & Field Christmas Puddings

If you didn’t get a copy you can read the whole article here: Christmas Puddings Article Metro 17th December 2009

Since they’re made by hand and need time to rest we only make a limited quantity each year: once they’re gone, they’re gone! Do place your order early, perhaps take the chance to test run one or two other Christmas specialities at the same time.

You can see our selection of Puds here: Order Christmas Puddings

We’re pretty new at this blogging stuff. In fact we’re not quite sure that this really is a blog but it seems as good a way as any of keeping you up to date with our news. Someone who’s rather more au fait with the mysterious world of food blogging is Ms Marmite. More importantly, by all accounts she lays on a mean spread and we were delighted to read her praise for our salmon in one of her recent posts!

“I got the salmon from Forman & Field who smoked it on Thursday in their London smokery. Right that does it, I’m never buying cheap smoked salmon again. The difference in texture, taste, colour compared with the cheap stuff is astounding.”

Read the full story here: http://marmitelover.blogspot.com/2009/09/two-nights-on-trot.html

Thank you Ms Marmite!

If you’ve enjoyed your orders from Forman & Field please take a minute to vote for us in the Good Housekeeping food awards. As a small independent battling it out with the supermarkets to promote good British food it would mean a lot to us to win.

You can vote by clicking the following link: http://www.allaboutyou.com/food/good-housekeeping-food-awards-2009/v1

The most appropriate category for us would be ‘Favourite to your door food supplier‘ and you will need to enter us into the ‘other’ box at the bottom.

Thank you for all your support.

We were delighted to read this review of our best-selling potted lobster in Good Housekeeping last month. This really is one of our easiest and most popular dinner party starters.

Review of our potted lobster

‘For a super-easy and very special hand-around starter, try the potted lobster from Forman & Field’, says the head of the Good Housekeeping institute Karen Barnes. ‘Take it out of the fridge an hour before you need it, then spread it on squares of warm, toasted, thinly sliced granary bread so it melts slightly. Serve with chilled white wine… Fabulous.’

Click here to order our Potted Lobster and try it for yourself!

It’s National Sausage Week (we admit, we didn’t actually have it at the top of our calendar so do please forgive us jumping on the bandwagon so late) this week which seems reason enough to draw attention to our humble and not so humble selection of snorkers.

Channel4Food chose our Simply Sausages range on their site as one of their Top 10 Guy Fawke’s Night bangers. You’ll be in good company since these are served at The Ivy and Gavroche no less.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE ARTICLE IN FULL

But what of our other snags? Musk’s of Newmarket have held no fewer than four royal warrants over the years, most recently to the late Queen Mother. All the pork used is from fully traceable, free range British pigs so you can be assured that your banger has nothing to hide. The key difference in Musk’s recipe is that the pork is blended with fresh bread rather than rusk which gives a softer texture and succulence that sees queues outside their butchers on Newmarket race days. There’s room in our lives for many types of sausage from a humble chipolata to a punchy toulouse but for breakfast these are the only choice.

Our newest addition to our troop of porky wonders are the chef-made sausage rolls that are produced for us by Kerwin Browne and the Yumi Food Company. Kerwin earnt his stripes under the tutelage of Marco and Gordon amongst others, men who are serious about their sausages. These sausage rolls are a world away from cardboard supermarket versions or bland high street efforts. There are four flavours in each pack and all are made with high class meat, perfectly seasoned and rolled in the most buttery pastry.