Delia (1977) on the cover of "Recipes from Look East 3"

Over Christmas while visiting relatives we raided their kitchen shelves for old cookbooks. How can you resist a 1977 Delia cover?

Recipes from Look East cost 45p and was sent out to viewers of the BBC’s Look East programme. Delia appeared each week on their cookery spot; a star of 70s East Anglia TV. The recipes in the book are mostly traditional (Toad in the hole, rabbit pie etc.) but there are a few, like gnocchi, which must have seemed exotic and daring at the time.

Delia writes about exciting new ingredients like anchovy fillets arriving in English food shops; new, strong tastes to use in the kitchen. How bland much of post-war Britain’s food must have been.

We found this great clip on YouTube of Delia talking about vegetarian food, including an interview with the fabulous Kate Bush. Do watch, though be warned the non-meat loaf looks atrocious.

Mmmm. The delights of "Family Circle's Illustrated Library of Cooking" 1972

Looking at old cookery books, you can’t help but notice quite how bad food photography was in the 70s. Claire fished out an old favourite of hers Family Circle Illustrated Library of Cooking which has fantastic headers like, “Go gay with kebabs” and the most unappetizing food photos we’ve ever seen.

But in amongst the 70s finger food buffets and lurid colours are some great recipes. Ingredients and recipes which are back in fashion (with just a bit less gelatine and dayglo food colouring). It is the photos which make vintage cookery books so enjoyable – and there are loads of retro cookery books lurking in Lewes charity shops waiting to be re-discovered.

The wheel of food fashion comes full circle: 1972 hors d'oeuvre featuring "Bitsy Burgers"

Love the backdrop for this plastic looking shot of "Maryland stuffed ham"

Family Circle Illustrated Library of cooking: Terrible coffee. Great cups.

Brenda Poppy Cox

Sometimes amazing things happen in Lewes. A couple of months ago a woman stepped through the cafe door, “Do you want some art?” – a great opener to any conversation. It turned out that this surprise visitor had come to clear her mother’s home on South Street, Lewes. She had discovered a mass of her mother’s drawings, paintings and sketches that she simply didn’t have space to keep. She told us that she was on the cusp of throwing the papers away.

Zoe-Anne Wadey told us all about her mother and how she had painted and created all her life while living in Lewes. We were intrigued & moved by her life story; we encouraged Zoe to come back with whatever she couldn’t keep.

Zoe disappeared and returned an hour later wheeling an amazing, heavy old painted stove, tin watering cans and a box of sketches. A magical and utterly charming collection; everything decorated with fairies, elves and gnomes. These were the artworks of her mother, Brenda Poppy Cox.

Brenda Poppy Cox's work in The Buttercup Cafe. Photo taken from www.vivalewes.com

We think most of the painted objects were made by Brenda in the 1960s & 70s; she has a child-like, naive style to her drawing and painting. Many of the pieces look like narrow boat art at first glance.

Brenda Poppy Cox lived on South Street until her death in 2004. She had always written stories and drawn but her daughter told us that Brenda had to turn down offers of formal training and a place at art school to look after her family.

We are delighted to have Brenda’s artwork on display across the cafe in The Buttercup yard at the moment thanks to the kindness of her daughter. Come and have a look at a truly local artist’s work.

Stories & Poems from The Mulberry Tree - published by Arthur H Stockwell Ltd

Brenda’s daughter also had her mother’s stories and drawings published in 2004. They are magical tales, many set around Lewes. There’s an old tree with a fairy door at its roots, a tree full of “funny little men” and it is based on the majestic Mulberry Tree in The Grange Gardens:

“To my surprise the fairies were playing hide-and-seek,
And one by one I found them upon the bark, behind the twigs, in every cranny and creek”

One story tells of a giant’s cave found by the builders of Cuifail tunnel; a cave full of giant cooking pots, chairs and beds. You’ll never look at that dull tunnel in the same way again!

We have a copy of the book (Stories & Poems from The Mulberry Tree by Brenda Poppy Cox) in the cafe. Do come and read one of the magical tales while you have a coffee.

You can see the painted stove we have on display in The Buttercup yard in the background of this photo

Did you know Brenda Poppy Cox? We’d love to know more about her and her work. Please do share with us your stories and memories.

Who needs California when you've got The Buttercup Cafe on your doorstep?!

Our song of the month: The Mamas and The Papas’ California Dreamin’. If you’ve got the January blues then watch this great video,  and sing along at the top of your voice:

“All the leaves are brown, And the sky is grey, I went for a walk, On a winter’s day, I’d be safe and warm, If I was in L.A., California dreamin’, On such a winter’s day…”

Our food is always full of naturally bright, colourful & delicious vegetables but especially so during the bleak mid-winter. We bake, stir and lovingly prepare freshly made dishes with a new menu every day to cheer you up and make you smile. Our vegetable box runneth over with rosy red tomatoes, purple cabbages, the greenest of courgette, fresh bunches of coriander, lashings of olives and more!

Our winter opening hours are 10am to 4pm Monday to Saturday. All day breakfast served from 10.30am to 4pm on Sundays.

We are now closed. Claire will be opening the cafe doors again on Tuesday 3rd January 2012 at 9am for breakfast, lunch and all day cake. We promise the cafe will be an oasis of calm after the maelstrom of Christmas!

We look forward to seeing you all soon x

Sarah Weal's Book Christmas Tree. Photo taken from sarahweal.blogspot.com

We’ve been inspired by this amazing book tree on a fellow Lewesian’s blog (Sarah Weal’s Tales Through a Lens). It made us think that maybe we should start building a book tree here in The Buttercup Cafe – made from everyone in the cafe’s best reads over the next 12 months. Anyone up for joining a Buttercup book club for 2012?

Every newspaper, TV show and radio programme seems to have had their review of the year. So why shouldn’t we! Here is The Buttercup Cafe book-loving team’s very own literary review of 2011.

Claire’s first recommendation is Alan Bennett’s Smut. “Observational, dark and of course very funny in that Bennett way.”, she says.

Claire’s dad (aka Pappa Buttercup) has chosen Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese, a novel based in Haile Selassie’s Ethiopia. “Takes a while to get into but is brilliant.”, he says.

Dani-Lola's best read of 2011: Patti Smith's Just Kids

Dani-Lola has picked Patti Smith’s autobiography, Just Kids. A great description of a hip, New York world of artists, writers and musicians in the 1970s. Oh, and it has a very cool photo on the cover too.

Helena’s picked the moving and very cleverly written Stuart: A Life Backwards by Alexander Masters. Make sure you’re feeling robust before reading this bleak biography.

Amanda says, “In Watermelon Sugar by Richard Brautigan (first published in 1968) is a perfect balance between beauty and tragedy.”

Harvey’s picked Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. “A brilliant interweaving of fairytales. Dark and captivating.”

Flora recommends Ottolenghi’s Plenty. A collection of vegetarian recipes from Yotam’s Guardian column which has been running for the last 4 years. “An elegant cookbook; fresh recipes that work well after inevitable over-indulgences of Christmas cooking! Try the globe artichokes with crushed broad beans”.

Claire says The Healing Code will change your life! “And Sue Minns’ Soulmates is a great book to reflect on both good & bad relationships in your life.” Ideal for those New Year’s resolutions.

Puff G (known as Geoffrey to some) is king of the audiobook. Crime, murder and extortion are his favourites. A wonder that he sleeps at night! He’s picked Nemesis by Jo Nesbo (Scandinavian crime fiction) as his best this year.

Sophie says Dickens’ Our Mutual Friend is her read of the year. Mr & Mrs Boffin, Mr Venus and Mr & Mrs Veneering – surely some of the best character names ever. (And yes, we’re all very excited about Great Expectations on the telly this Christmas. BBC1, Dec. 27th, 9pm)

Will's pick of the books for 2011: Dick Francis' Whip Hand

Will says his pick of the year has to be a Dick Francis. He’s chosen, Whip Hand, “a classic racing thriller”.

Flora’s pick for younger Buttercup visitors is The Doll’s House Fairy. “A beautifully illustrated, magical book by Jane Ray about a wild, chocolate eating fairy that moves into a doll’s house and causes havoc.”

And Jasper says his best book of the year will always be The Beano Annual. Unbeatable.

Happy reading to one and all!

p.s. Have you spotted Ilaria’s handmade paper christmas trees in the cafe?They are made from the Guardian’s The Guide supplement. The mag makes the most robust of Christmas trees. Who would have known! A great piece of recycling which we’re sure the Guardian would be most proud of.

Diana Henry's brilliant 'Food From Plenty' published by Mitchell Beazley

Diana Henry writes for The Telegraph and has written several genius cookbooks. If you pop in to the cafe you can have a look at our favourite Food from Plenty – it’s up on our cookbook shelf at the back of the cafe. It’s the one splattered with ingredients and looking well used (loved).

As the book says, “Leftovers are at the heart of this book. For example, you’ll find delicious roast dinners followed by an abundance of ideas for things to do with the cold meat the next day. Diana’s delicious recipes from all over the world, from Sicily to the Sahara, turn ‘going without’ on its head and make it a pleasure.’

It’s a book written for home cooks and it doesn’t expect you to go and spend hundreds of pounds on equipment and ingredients which you end up using only once.

It’s a beautifully made book with colourful & inspiring recipes. For a book about leftovers & waste it doesn’t feel depressingly frugal at all.

The Telegraph has lots of Diana’s recipes on their website. I like the idea of her Edible Christmas gifts: Scandinavian pepparkakor.

Diana Henry said in a recent interview, “I suppose food was one of those things I could see always made people happy, made people cheerful whatever else was going on. You can get quite attached to something if it does that.”

We couldn’t have put it better ourselves.

When Edd Kimber came to tea at The Buttercup

Edd Kimber hosted a wonderful winter tea here at The Buttercup yesterday. We closed early (sorry!) for the special event, polished our cake stands and got our best tea cups out. Edd arrived and got to work baking his chocolate and chestnut torte which he served warm with chestnut cream. Delicious and light. He told us he thought the best affordable chocolate to use for cooking was Green and Blacks’ dark chocolate. Never use milk chocolate he said – far too sweet.

While he sliced up the cakes which he’d brought for our guests to taste, he shared brilliant baking tips and chatted about his baking life. Edd had been miserable stuck in a banking job which he hated. He sent off his application for the first series of BBC2′s The Great British Bake-Off and after many rounds of auditions and baking tests he made it through to the TV series.

He told us winning the series had truly changed his life. Now he was baking on Woman’s Hour and appearing at food festivals across the country. He’s hoping to open a bakery in London.

Edd teaching how to pipe fill his famous macarons

The gingerbread was sweet, spicey and smooth. Delicious. It was his Nana’s recipe and the recipe card he uses is 100years old. He had to decifer his Nana’s handwriting on the card and convert the old measurements. Anyone heard of a gill of milk?

We chatted about macaron flavours while he helped everyone learn how to pipe chocolate ganache into festive, bright green shells. Apparently piping to music helps keep your dollops consistent! And his other tip, was to keep the nozzle very close to the macaron shell to have more control with the filling.

Edd told us how he’d met Pierre Herme, Parisian godfather of the macaron, and tasted Pierre’s exotic white truffle macarons. Ugh!

Edd Kimber gets baking in The Buttercup kitchen

He told us about what it was like working in the kitchens of Raymond Blanc’s Le Manoir on a shift that started at 5am and ended the next morning at 1am. He baked Almondine for us, inspired by one of Raymond’s recipes. It’s a frangipane baked into a mould and topped with crumble. It’s usually filled with jam but as it’s nearly Christmas he made us some truly delicious mincemeat. It wasn’t thick, dark and sickly like much shop bought mincemeat. Oh no, Edd’s mincemeat was light and fruity.

Our guests experimented with our menu of speciality teas – Lapsang, Brainbrew, Blueberry, Veranda, Jasmine and more. It was a cosy afternoon and it felt like we were hanging out in Edd’s kitchen. He says he’ll back when he’s ready to test out his new cake recipes for his next cookbook. We can’t wait!

If you’d like to cook any of the cakes we were lucky enough to eat, British Bookshops has Edd’s book The Boy Who Bakes in their shop on School Hill in Lewes. Happy baking!

Our lovely guests having winter tea with The Boy Who Bakes

A candlelit winter tea at The Buttercup

Handmade cloth baubles

It’s the special Lewes late night Christmas shopping event from 5.30pm till 8.30pm. So wrap up warm and as it gets dark come down to the magical Buttercup yard. We’ll be festooned in fairy lights, there’ll be music, outdoor heaters, blankets and hot water bottles.

It’s an evening of cioccolato treats;  we’ll be serving churros con chocolat, a decadent chocolate fondue, delicious hot chocolate and yummy Nutella pancakes. Oh, and I’m sure we’ll squeeze in a couple of choccie buttons too for the Buttercup babies. There’ll also be a fresh pot of seasonal winter soup on the go in the kitchen.

Ilaria's handmade lime felted scarf

There’ll be a stall of delights and handmade treasures, selling festive treats made by artists and makers who work in and around the The Buttercup yard – Laina Watt, Ilaria Gardelli, Claire Waller, Dani Lola, Simon Keizer, Sue Hartland, Anne Schulte and more.

The Buttercup Cafe’s own Dani Lola has produced a series of hand printed Christmas cards, there are baubles & birds, candles & crochet, scarves & capes, charms & prints. It’s a crafted Christmas cornucopia. Kirstie Allsop would be proud of us!

Dani Lola's handcrafted, stiched & printed, christmas cards. From £1.10 each

We will also have seasonal, local fruit and veg for sale. We’ll be taking Christmas orders; we can make up produce hampers to order or bake special cakes for you. We can also deliver fresh Buttercup lunches or delicious party food for you and your family for any festive parties you have planned this month.

Christmas fabric birdies £6.00

Soyawax candles in vintage cup and saucer £6.00

Ilaria's printed stars

Edd is coming to The Buttercup Cafe

We’re feeling a bit giddy. We’ve just heard that Edd Kimber (aka The Boy Who Bakes) who won the BBC2′s Great British Bake-Off last year is coming to The Buttercup Cafe.

Lovely Edd is coming to bake a sumptuous winter tea for 20 lucky guests on Sunday December 4th. Tea will be served from 2pm till 4pm. Tickets cost £18.50 and go on sale here at The Buttercup Cafe today.

He’s planning on baking for us:

Almondine (with a Christmas twist)
His Nana’s gingerbread
Pecan & bourbon pie
Chocolate & chestnut torte with chestnut cream

Oh my! A seriously indulgent Sunday afternoon tea. We’re starting our diets in preparation right now.

He will be chatting about how he went from being a banker to a baker, what it was like appearing on GBBO and what he’s doing next. You’ll be able to see him at work in the kitchen too.

He’s just had his first cookbook published called The Boy Who Bakes and he’ll be signing copies. A great Christmas present for foodies.

If you’d like to come and have tea with Edd then you can buy a ticket in advance from the cafe. Places are very limited, so we recommend you come and get them quick! Ticket price is £18.50 and includes all the delicious tea you can drink, while eating Edd’s cakes  – and he’s baking all guests a little going home present too!

Guy Fawkes & friends: "Come on boys, time for a piece of Biddy's pumpkin cake!"

The whole town is buzzing and we’re getting just a bit excited here in the kitchen at the Buttercup Cafe too. So here’s The Buttercup Cafe’s guide to surviving Bonfire day and night in Lewes. And yes, it does involve a lot of eating (and drinking!):

1) Start the day with a proper Buttercup bonfire breakfast from 9am. This is vital for those who are taking part in the procession or working on setting up the societies’ displays. You need stamina and our cooked breakfast is hearty and delicious. Some of those bonfire boys and girls like to start the day with a pint (or two). Our advice is just make sure to line your stomachs first!

2) Go on a mid-morning walk around all the societies’ bonfire sites. They look spectacular all set up and ready to go. Then come and have a delicious lunch here and get warm in The Buttercup Cafe. Bangers and mash will be the order of the day. Peter Richards’ award-winning Castle Sausages and Buttercup Café’s own home made vegetarian sausages. All served up with home made cannellini spicy beans and lashings of mash.

3) The excitement starts to reach fever pitch at about 3ish when the cars start to disappear from Lewes’ roads and the bangs start getting louder. Just time for a slice of Biddy’s pumpkin cake, apple tart or Amanda’s pumpkin pie with a delicious cup of coffee to keep you going.

4) Stay safe and if you want to dodge the crowds (and possible rain) then come and hang out in our two heated outdoor gazebos which we’re setting up in The Buttercup yard. We’re keeping it simple with an oven full of jacket potatoes on the go throughout the day.

5) We think a hip flask of something warming is a very good idea while your out late at night watching the spectacular firework displays. Oh, and make sure to use ear plugs! Here’s a map of procession routes and fire sites.

Wishing all Lewes a very happy, noisy, glorious and safe bonfire night. Hope to see you in your costumes in The Buttercup too!