Chef serves up a real gourmet treat

Mar 25 2008 by Ben Schofield, Liverpool Daily Post

CELEBRITY chef Mike Robinson whetted the appetites of people visiting the final day of Chester’s Food and Drink Festival yesterday.

A regular on BBC1’s Saturday kitchen and BBC2’s Ready, Steady, Cook!, Mike said he was trying to turn the foodies attending the show on to game.

He skinned and butchered a 30kg roe deer he shot on Saturday in front of the Chester Race Course crowd.

He told the Daily Post: “People don’t challenge enough these days.

“It’s necessary to show people food in its natural state.

“Everyone was quite excited by it and nobody left.”

Mike said he hoped he had convinced people to try game who might not have done so before.

He added: “Game keeps the countryside going and it’s excellent value for money.

“As a nation, we have become squeamish and incredibly politically correct.”

At a demonstration later in the afternoon, he prepared the raw delicacy venison tartare, the deer’s liver and a venison dish with crab.

He said the meat was delicate and somewhere between lamb and beef in flavour.

“I don’t expect people to go out and shoot their own, but I think people should try these products – they’re healthy and delicious,” he said.

Thousands of food lovers flocked to the three-day show at its new racecourse venue over the weekend.

There was a producers’ market featuring 100 stalls selling local cheeses, meats, fruit, vegetables, ice cream, shrimps, salmon, cider and homemade chocolates and preserves.

Mike had planned to bring a deer he had shot before Easter, but hungry customers over a busy holiday at his pub – The Pot Kiln, near Newbury, in Berkshire – had eaten the deer he had originally set aside.

Four younger chefs, all under 25 years old, and each with less than two years’ kitchen experience, also took to the stage in the young chef of the year competition.

They cooked lamb, chicken, veal and rabbit dishes.

Winner Rob McDermot, 23, who works in the kitchen at the Red House Brasserie, at Cheshire Oaks, prepared loin of Cheshire Rabbit wrapped in smoked bacon with prunes in Port, haricot beans, whole grain mustard, cream and cracked black pepper.

Collecting his award, Mr McDermot said: “This is fantastic – I’m really pleased. I want to do well in this profession.

“I used lots of Cheshire products in what I cooked – I wanted to see what I could do with them.

“I wasn’t really nervous.”

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