'We love Lucy's' - Lake District Life
Today Ambleside; tomorrow the world! Who would put it past them? Lucy Nicholson and her team of feisty females, fizzing with new ideas, have built a mini empire whose reputation is expanding much further than the delightful Lakeland town. Even movie director Steven Spielberg, creator of ET, the extra terrestrial, has enjoyed a close encounter with one of Lucy's hampers.
It all began back in 1989 when Lucy, a Londoner who married Brian, a landscape gardener from Windermere, opened her specialist grocery shop just as the appreciation of good, locally produced food was beginning to take off in the UK. Buoyed by its successful appeal to Amblesiders and visitors alike, it was followed by Lucy's on a plate - a tearoom started with a kettle and a domestic cooker next door - now a critically acclaimed restaurant winning high praise from among others Giles Coren.
Lucy's Bite on the Side, the upstairs function room soon followed and three years later, Lucy4, a Mediterranean style wine bar/bistro took wing across the road. Lucy's Inside Out, the outside catering arm was launched and Deli t'dor will deliver an entire Christmas feast in a box, including the creations of Lucy's Just Desserts, by mail order. And coming soon to a place very near will be LucyCooks, a cookery school specialising in the preparation of food produced in Cumbria.
Little wonder then, that when guests for Lake District Life's spring luncheon met for their canapes and Chateau Bauduc Punch (the vineyard, just outside Bordeaux, is run by Lucy's brother Gavin Quinney) in Lucy4 there were well over 70 of us gathered in feverish anticipation. Luncheon was served in Lucy's on a plate just across quaint Church Street, a charming two roomed cafe-restaurant with scrubbed pine tables, chapel chairs and a warm and welcoming unpretentious ambience. That there was a choice of three starters and three main courses spoke volumes for head chef Dale Blacow's proficient kitchen brigade and the effectiveness of the front of house team.
I started with a Cumbrian Platter of wonderful local delicacies; smoked Herdwick lamb from Farmer Sharp and Richard Woodall's increasingly famous Waberthwaite air-dried ham with delicious Lyth Valley pickled damsons from Hawkshead Relish. And Mrs K's proffered forkful of her buttery Morecambe Bay potted shrimps, served with Melba toast, chilled dill cream and petit salad, confirmed the intense flavour of these mighty midgets. Celebration melon - a trio of water, cantaloupe and galia melon with Champagne sorbet and plum coulis was as sophisticated a vegetarian option as they come.
Main courses highlighted two of Lucy's favourite signature dishes, again making splendid use of local bounty. I chose delicately flavoured fillets of Windermere char which swims deep below the surface of England's largest lake, simply roasted with herb butter and served with roasted new potatoes flavoured with rosemary, sea salt and green salad with Lucy's own piquant dressing. Mrs K had Cumbrian fell bred lamb shank, slowly braised in red wine to melting tenderness and presented on a minute dice of root vegetables and sweet potato and thyme mash. The portion was so generous that I gleefully helped her demolish it. The vegetarian savoury bread and butter pudding enveloped game-flavoured wild mushrooms and came with caramelised onions set on sweet potato mash with fresh vegetables.
Cumbria met Umbria for a super cheese course combo of Thornby Moor Dairy's Cumberland Farmhouse cheese and a slice of baked figs and the lemon and ginger crush with Valentine heart-shaped biscuits was an indulgent creamy sensation.
Accompanying wines, presented by Tony Jackson of Lakeland Vintners, comprised
intensely plummy Groote Post Vineyards Merlot 2003 from South Africa's Darling
Hills and delightfully aromatic McHenry Honnen Sauvignon-Semillon 2004 from the
Margaret River in Western Australia with the starters. The same vineyards provided
perfectly matched wines for the main courses too, supple Barrel-Aged Chardonnay
2002 from the former and the rare but rewarding red blend of Tempranillo-Grenache-Mataro
2004 from the latter.
As they say in these parts 'once discovered, never forgotten.' We loved Lucy's
- she's right up there in the sky with diamonds!
