Right, listen to this then.

I went to the doctors a couple of weeks ago, and, you're not going to believe this, do you know what he told me to do?

Lose some weight.

Looooooooooooooooooooooooossssssssssssssssssssssse some weight!

Now then, I've actually never understood what these alien sounding words really mean, but I know a man that might.

So off I went, up to see David up at Highfield House Farm, where we discussed, over a cup of tea and a slice of warm pork pie, just what my doctor might have meant.

Well, we were both completely stumped, but after much thought we arrived at this.

EAT MORE MEAT.

So I got some, well quite a lot as you can see, and this is not even all of it, as I'm going up tomorrow to pick up some beef and lamb, for our weekend dinners, which I'm going to tell you all about later.

And it's not just me that enjoys a nice healthy appetite, as last week we changed the tasting menu for the chef's table up at East Lodge, so just eight courses to get through, but everyone seems to like it, and I think that some of the dishes might even be good for you, well, perhaps just one!

A couple of weeks ago, for about five minutes, the sun came out in Derbyshire.

Most people thought that spring might finally be arriving, I know I did, so got on the blower to our fishmongers and ordered some crabs, as I figured they would make a nice addition to the smoked salmon on the tasting menu.

So the next day four nice, lively crabs arrived, although the one at the back looks a bit fed up, I was also a bit miffed as it had starting snowing again, and was down to about -58 oc!

Anyway, this was only ever going to end one way, and that was with the crabs being put into a pot of seasoned boiling water to kill them.

So cooked for eight minutes, removed and left to cool down I was going to break them down, and start rewriting the menu!

Crabs are my favourite shellfish, they are a bit of a bore to break down and then pick through all of the white meat, to ensure there are no bits of shell left, you also have the added delight of the brown meat, which has a lovely deep flavour, and of course the shells can roasted off to make a beautiful, rich crab bisque.

Oh, yes, and I can have a superb crab sandwich for my lunch as well!

So, the first course is taking shape, and as we are always going to have our smoked salmon on the menu in one way or another, we have jazzed it up a bit this year, and remember I did think that, at last, spring might be coming.

So, here it is.

We used a much smaller amount of smoked salmon, so as not to overpower the crab, we also made a thick, spicy mayonnaise with the brown crab meat, small baked croutons were added, as I didn't want to serve bread and butter on the side, as it would be too much of a faff for our guests, trying to get the crab and the other bits and bobs onto a piece of bread.

And, anyway, I'm re-thinking the way we serve bread for the tasting menu this year.

What I would like to do is do a small plate of canapés to have with their Champagne, something a bit like these, although, a couple would have to be changed as one has smoked salmon and one had steak tartare on, so on this menu it would mean repeating the same ingredients, and I don't want to do that, but you get the idea.

Then you get a couple of amuse bouches, so you don't need bread with the meal yet, and then a couple of the courses have their own, specially made breads, baked to order, and served still warm!

Say we did a dish with some Indian spicing, we would make a small, griddled flat bread, and if we served some beef I would make a small bacon loaf and some beef dripping, so that everything complements each course, and I think it would make the dinner more interesting.

I mean, can you imagine getting a freshly baked, truffle laden mini sourdough loaf and some Parmesan butter, to go with little grilled lamb cutlets, or some toasted, garlic rubbed semolina baguette along with your ragout of lobster and leeks.

It's just a thought at the moment, but sounds as though it might work.

Anyway, back to the crab, with a small dice of pickled lemon, cucumber diamonds, caviar and some picked chervil and tarragon, it's a nice, pretty way to start dinner, and we've used up every bit of the crab.

Just like this one as well.

It's that rabbit I showed you last time, only now it's all been chopped up, cooked and rearranged!

I salted the legs and shoulders overnight and then poached them in duck fat, it keeps the rabbit flesh, which has a tendency to dry out, nice and moist.

White haricot beans were also soaked in cold water and then cooked in the ham hock stock, which was reserved from the ham hocks, that I intended to mix through the rabbit confit.

Terrines were brushed with duck fat and then lined with Parma ham, then I seasoned the meat and beans with cider vinegar and plenty of pepper but not too much salt as the rabbit and ham hocks were already highly seasoned, but you need to remember that terrines and pates should always be well salted and peppered as the fridge dulls their flavour.

The rabbit saddles were cooked in the water bath and then quickly seared on the plancha, along with some thin leeks and baby shallots, to add some sweetness to the warm salad.

The rabbit kidneys and livers were also served, pink, of course, a few black trompette mushrooms were added and finally, the rarebit.

Just posh cheese on toast really, but made with the addition of Dijon mustard, cider and grated Cheddar and a couple of egg yolks, and then thickened with cornflour.

You know, when I'm writing these, it really reminds me just how much work goes into each of these dishes, and how without having such a top crew working with me, none of these dishes would have been possible, I just come up with the ideas, Tom and Ben do the donkey work!

So, anyway, we've got a nice, warm, savoury rabbit and rarebit salad garnish, dressed with a light rabbit juice, made from the rabbit bones, and a beautiful, rich, dense rabbit and ham hock terrine, which as you will see in a few days time is exactly the same as I had for my dinner last night, well sort of.

And, it's also a nod towards Wales, what with the leeks and Welsh rarebit, and who, in about an hours time we are going to stuff down in Cardiff this afternoon!

So, now all of a sudden Derbyshire was right back in the grip of winter the next course was a bit richer.

Still using scallops, as we often do, on the tasting menu.

Want to know why?

Because they are nice, our guests like them, and they marry well with lots of different things.

I got hold of a couple of celeriac's, covered one in salt, and roasted it whole,  ready for service, and the other one was peeled, chopped up and slowly caramelised until dark and sticky.

I had some really reduced brown chicken stock and a tin of black truffles so they were used to finish cooking the celeriac in, as I was trying to have a bit of Yin and Yang going on, whereby some of the celeriac would be really clean and pure in flavour, and one would be really warming and rich.

It's just the same as I had done with the rabbit and crab, using just one ingredient, but trying to showcase it in different ways.

Penny Bun mushrooms were sauteed off, and the left over black truffles, their juices and the brown chicken stock were seasoned with aged sherry vinegar.

The caramelised celeriac was pureed and passed through a fine sieve, and some white chicken stock was seasoned with truffle oil, ready to be foamed up at the last minute.

The scallops only take a couple of minutes to cook, so with the salt baked celeriac still pipping hot from the oven, it's a quick dish to put together.

And it worked on that day as it was all cold outside again.

In fact one of guests that day was saying she had only ever tried scallops with things like lemon, garlic and parsley, and even though they are superb like that, in the cooler months different garnishes also work well with their sweet, juicy flesh.

Right, on with the next one now.

This is a prototype of a dish I want to do on the main menu, but using celeriac, but as I've just used that with the scallops I need another vegetable.

Salsify was the answer.

A really interesting root vegetable, it's also known as the oyster plant, as some people think it tastes like oyster, although I can't see it myself.

Easy to prepare, it just needs washing and peeling, and then cooked "sous vide" with some lemon juice, chicken stock and olive oil, so it stays nice and white.

What I wanted to do with the original dish is prepare some celeriac "chips", by steaming a whole celeriac, and then cutting it into thick batons, marinating them in herbs, rolling them in blitzed panko crumbs and then deep fry them.

With some sort of bearnaise sauce I though the might a nice side dish for a braised veal dish.

But as I was stuck with salsify I cut thinner batons for the fries and kept some back for a little salad garnish.

A couple of months ago I made some bacon "marmalade".

I think I was reading another food blog last year and stumbled across it.

Ever so easy to make, we used it with thin slices of brioche as a sort of fried club sandwich to garnish a pheasant dish on  Christmas Eve.

It's got maple syrup and black coffee in it, loads of cooked smoked streaky bacon, shallots and thyme, so it's got bags of flavour, and it's a pretty original way of adding another layer of loveliness to a pork dish.

So, using our "Bath Chap's", which are, by the way, a great thing to have in your larder, as they last for ages, and can be used in so many different dishes and ways.

I think that with time they could become the English equivalent of the French duck confit!

With some of the pork jowl cut nice and thick, ready to be grilled on the plancha, the remainder was thinly sliced, like fatty ham, ready to dressed and mixed with plan salsify, meanwhile the breaded batons were deep fried, some praline crackling was defrosted, ready to be sprinkled over the finished dish.

I'd made a smooth apple puree, as this dish, which was going to be a rich, warming, crunchy, soft and salty needs a bit of sharpness, so blobs were put around the plate.

I love this one, as on the tasting menu I can get away with doing a dish like that, which would be too much as a normal serving, and it's got everything going for it - local pork and apples, different textures and temperatures, just using a couple of main flavours and it's familiar at the same time, just a Sunday lunch really!

Duck's up next, and like the scallops it's good to use on the tasting menu, often because people don't cook with it at home, and it's a luxurious meat as well.

Ours are from Reg Johnston, over in Lancashire, so it's almost local! The breasts are cooked on the bone, left to cool down a bit and then removed, ready to finished at the last minute.

After the pork dish I wanted to lighten everything up a bit, so some not so local Sicilian blood oranges were required. Duck with oranges you see!

Thinking of the colours I decided
to use some sweet potatoes, and cooked them a caramel that was deglazed with orange juice, blended and with a knob of butter whisked in, it was ready to go.

Butternut squash was also poached in a honey and cracked peppercorn scented stock, ready to be glazed when the duck was called away.

With some wilted Asian greens that dish was just about there, and remember these are all classical flavours and garnishes to serve with duck, and they are perfect for a freezing Derbyshire day!

I scored the duck skin, to render the fat, and cooked it skin side down to get the skin nice and crisp, swooshed the sweet potato puree down the middle of the plate, roasted the butternut squash to give it  some colour and warmed up the blood orange segments. Some reduced duck juice was spooned over, and there you are.


And it might not even be too bad for you!

So, nearly there now, just the cheese course, and I had some cracking Stilton, Ben pickled some juilenned celery and we semi dried some black seedless grapes, a couple of rye crackers and that's the cheese course taken care, but I forget to take pictures of that one, sorry.

Yorkshire rhubarb was always going to be on the menu somewhere, and after serving it as a starter a couple of weeks ago, I thought I'd get back to normal and serve a nice rhubarb crumble.

Yeah, right!

First thing was getting the crumble topping sorted, and for that we needed some tapioca maltodextrin.

It's used to turn fats into a powder, so all I did was get Tom to make some really strong vanilla oil, then watch him spill it everywhere, and then turn it into a powder, easy really!

We also made some butter shortbread, as I wanted to give the vanilla oil powder some body, and it was supposed to be a crumble after all, so that was baked, in a low oven, as I was trying to keep it as pale as possible, then it was blended to a fine powder.

Rhubarb was poached, and some was pureed and made into a rippled parfait with vanilla cream, and then frozen.

This dessert started out from one we did for our Valentines Day menu, but we served it with deep fried custard fritters and a glass of Champagne mixed with rhubarb juice, so it was all pretty and pink!

And hot and cold!

Custard, that has been deep fried, how brilliant is that!

But I couldn't do that on the tasting menu as I had already used to fryer for my salsify and didn't want two deep fried things on the menu, and in any case it was too much to serve as part of an eight course lunch, so we just did a smaller version.

Rhubarb crumble, 2013, and it's just so light and easy to eat, as the crumble powder just melts in the mouth, some sharp poached rhubarb to cut through the creamy parfait and a massive hit of vanilla.

So, just one more to go now, and I've taken "Bakewell" off for the time being, partly as more and more people are returning to the chef's table and I wanted to give them something new.

Chocolate's always popular, and what with it being so miserable I thought it might cheer everyone up a bit, as I think chocolate is supposed to do that.

We made a dark chocolate ganache, but put loads of grated stem ginger in it, a classical chocolate mousse was pipped on top, and then we glazed it with melted chocolate.

Ginger sorbet was churned, and that was that.

I love chocolate and ginger, it's such a warming mix of flavours and quite exotic, just the thing to finish off a nice long lunch!

I 'll get the pictures sorted out for next time.

So, there you are, a great way to start loosing weight, planning eight course tasting menus all day long!

Right that's it, I'm off to sort out the load of protein I've got in my fridge, and start testing punches for Sophie's party, I know it's tough, but I think I'll just about manage!

Music for tonight - Velvet Pants by the Propellerheads, and the tambourines have bee ordered, you have been warned!