Getting saucy for the festive season

Leather's Smithy was made for Christmas.

Built in the 18th century alongside Macclesfield Forest Reservoir at Langley, Cheshire, the stone-built pub, a former smithy, is as warm and inviting as an Andy Williams album cover, with real fires and a stone-flagged bar area.

Named after William Leather who, in 1812, received the first licence to sell ale and porter from the site, Leather's attracts walkers and fishermen, also has regular fans from nearby Macclesfield.

As the festive season approaches, Leather's is sounding out its local game suppliers and, to finish off every festive dish has been working with stocks and gravy supplier Essential Cuisine.

For a fortnight from every December 24, Leather's becomes Christmas personified, heaving with hungry punters wanting a glorious, quintessentially English, festive supper for around a tenner a head. Each week, 500 or so covers are dished up alongside hot mulled wine by the fire.

Licensee Paul McMahon - who has run the Scottish & Newcastle Pub Enterprises franchise with partner Trisha Ambrey for nine years - says: "Our mainstay at Christmas is a blackboard of specials alongside the traditional set meal, with all sorts of wonderful game dishes from venison to wild boar.

"We don't do the stereotypical party package, but I think this will be even more popular this year as people don't necessarily want to shell out; they want something a bit more individual and cost effective.

"For the first time in a long while, Christmas menus across the pub industry will have to be cost-led and pubs will have to grab hold of what they can when it comes to trade."

Game on

According to Mintel, four out of 10 people now regularly enjoy game meat, a low-fat, high-protein, natural and free-range alternative to meat traditionally eaten by UK diners.

Of the game sold, 47 per cent is venison, while pheasant, partridge and grouse make up 31 per cent. 'Other' wild game, including pigeon and hare, account for the remaining 22 per cent.

Game is critical to the festive offer at Leather's Smithy, says McMahon - although a successful dish is only the sum of its parts, according to Paul, and the right finishing touches made for a profitable point of difference.

Served alongside roast potatoes and other freshly prepared vegetables, Leather's Christmas dishes are accompanied by a range of sauces designed to bring out the rich taste and texture of the meat.

Until five years ago, they used red wine as a base, which worked, but did not set the meal alight. Problem was a lack of pre-prepared sauce bases on the market that could do such a distinctive choice of game, as well as other meat options, justice.

"For years, everyone's been trying to make or interpret a stock or a sauce base that tastes kitchen made and it's nigh on impossible," says Paul. "If it's not Marmite-y, it's cosmetic and synthetic. Making your own, however, is incredibly labour intensive and, if you do not have the skill base or the time, you need something off the shelf that will do dishes proud."

Leather's happened upon Essential Cuisine, the producer of kitchen-made tasting stocks, jus, glace and gravy maker for professional chefs, four years ago. It was the supplier's glace that really got the pub interested.

"It is incredibly multi-functional," says Paul. "At Christmas, we rely on Essential's Game Glace as a stock reduction for our sauces and as an integral element of our dressings. Before we discovered them, we would simply use any red wine as a base for sauces and in the likes of our redcurrant sweet oil dressing."

The Game Glace is rich and meaty, and can also be used as a stock reduction for casseroles and hearty stews. It also adds a finishing touch to Christmas game dishes, whether you use it in a sauce or as a glaze.

Hand & Trumpet in Wrinehill

This Christmas will be third festive season for the Hand & Trumpet in Wrinehill, near Crewe, under pub company Brunning and Price.

In line with its quality without pretensions philosophy, head chef Dave Edwards and his seven-strong kitchen team have put together a festive menu of honest, unfussy, but tasty, fresh food. Good local produce is relished and food is cooked simply, without cutting corners.

"Many of our chefs come from 'rosetted' restaurants and, although we're part of a group, we pretty much have free reign to decide how we draw up menus and create what we feel is right," says Dave, who has been working in the industry for 20 years.

"We're about food you can cook at home, using the finest ingredients, and we've drawn up a Christmas menu that reflects this, whilst being that bit special."

In addition to the typical festive fayre dishes include potted smoked salmon and trout with horseradish and chive crème fraîche, roast pork loin stuffed with apricot and lemon thyme, and iced parfait of mandarin, meringue and pistachio with passion fruit sauce.

Due to demand, Christmassy salads have also been introduced, from cured pigeon, black pudding, beetroot and bacon salad to crispy lamb, feta, date and mint salad.

The economic downturn is part and parcel of Christmas this year, paving the way for a more flexible approach and a keener eye on pricing. "We are not a two for one, which our customers understand and love, but we know we have to keep the costs down," said Dave.

"We've kept prices relatively low this year and introduced a lot more lighter options for that bit more choice. If customers don't want to pay £9.95, for example, there are £6.95 options, something we've been pushing on our main menu, with a definite increase in sales.

"Quite uniquely, we've also introduced a two-course Christmas menu for £18.95 in addition to three courses for £23.95, which gives customers that extra flexibility."

The Hand and Trumpet expects to serve 2,000 covers a week - and when cooking stocks and sauces can take around as long as 18 hours to make the pub has been looking for some external support in the area.

"To do a proper stock from scratch is extremely time consuming and, in reality, we do not have the time," says Dave.

"As an industry, we also do not have the skills we once did, and while we are very lucky to have three great lads as trainees, many of today's young chefs do not necessarily know how to prepare stock from scratch."

The only pre-prepared stock Dave will use to guarantee that coveted kitchen made taste is the range from Essential Cuisine. "This Christmas, we'll mostly use Vegetable, Turkey and Beef," says Dave.

"The main reason we use them is that they incorporate extra, intense flavour into our sauces, and give them a lovely, homely feel, particularly in our gravy."

Being a special occasion, Dave will also be using Essential Cuisine's Glace range to add extra class to Christmas dishes; Beef Glace in the braised beef bourguignon, Game Glace in steak and venison and mushroom pudding, and Lobster Glace in the sauted prawn salad.

Visit www.essentialcuisine.com ​