May food news: editor’s picks

Design to Serve

For Clerkenwell Design Week, RCA alumni Jo Davies and Haidee Drew, supported by the Craft Central, curated an exhibition entitled Design to Serve. Inspired simply by the new prevalence of entertaining at home and the fetishisation of food, they invited a number of young independent designers to deliver fresh product design on the theme of food prep and presentation. The offering included knife blocks, preparation boards, paper bowls, ceramic plates, and this beautiful collection of table top pieces by Peng You, a current RCA student, midway through his MA. The collection, entitled 'Living will be a Material', are the result of an exploration of new ways to treat old materials. He combines twigs and branches with contrasting materials in the series, which includes an egg cup, salt and pepper pinchpots, pasta jars, oil and vinegar set and small platters, taking care to ensure functionality and durability alongside novelty, sustainability, and some rather lovely aesthetics.

Pictured: Egg cup, by Peng You; www.benwustudio.com

Writer: Emma Moore

Design to Serve

For Clerkenwell Design Week, RCA alumni Jo Davies and Haidee Drew, supported by the Craft Central, curated an exhibition entitled Design to Serve. Inspired simply by the new prevalence of entertaining at home and the fetishisation of food, they invited a number of young independent designers to deliver fresh product design on the theme of food prep and presentation. The offering included knife blocks, preparation boards, paper bowls, ceramic plates, and this beautiful collection of table top pieces by Peng You, a current RCA student, midway through his MA. The collection, entitled 'Living will be a Material', are the result of an exploration of new ways to treat old materials. He combines twigs and branches with contrasting materials in the series, which includes an egg cup, salt and pepper pinchpots, pasta jars, oil and vinegar set and small platters, taking care to ensure functionality and durability alongside novelty, sustainability, and some rather lovely aesthetics.

Pictured: Bottle set, by Peng You; www.benwustudio.com

Writer: Emma Moore

Design to Serve

For Clerkenwell Design Week, RCA alumni Jo Davies and Haidee Drew, supported by the Craft Central, curated an exhibition entitled Design to Serve. Inspired simply by the new prevalence of entertaining at home and the fetishisation of food, they invited a number of young independent designers to deliver fresh product design on the theme of food prep and presentation. The offering included knife blocks, preparation boards, paper bowls, ceramic plates, and this beautiful collection of table top pieces by Peng You, a current RCA student, midway through his MA. The collection, entitled 'Living will be a Material', are the result of an exploration of new ways to treat old materials. He combines twigs and branches with contrasting materials in the series, which includes an egg cup, salt and pepper pinchpots, pasta jars, oil and vinegar set and small platters, taking care to ensure functionality and durability alongside novelty, sustainability, and some rather lovely aesthetics.

Pictured: Storage jar, by Peng You; www.benwustudio.com

Writer: Emma Moore

Finest Roots Spirits, Greece

Traditional spirits typically come in antiquated packaging, but thankfully that is not the case with new Greek brand Finest Roots. It decided to revive and revise four traditional local liqueurs with the help of one of Greece's oldest working distilleries and local design house, Bob studio. The designs have won two prestigious Golden 'EBGE 2013' awards, one for the best alcoholic drinks packaging and the other for the overall graphic design concept. The spirits themselves are reworks of concoctions dating as far back as the 12th century. The packaging is modern and visually intriguing, with each bottle being stamped with a symbolic representation of the primary ingredient within. 'Rakomelo' is a 12th century recipe of raki and honey and the hexagon on the bottle symbolises the high honeycomb content. 'Mastiha' carries a rhombus on its front, which is representative of the crystals that form in the resin of mastic trees (native to Chios Island) - the main ingredient. 'Tentura' is a spicier brew containing subtle notes of cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg, and the circle represents the oval shape at the bottom of a stick of cinnamon. The herb spirit was created using dittany, a herb of the mint family native to Crete, which gives a fragrant peaty taste, and the cross on the bottle reflects monastic connotations often related to the herb.

www.finestroots.com

Writer: Romy van den Broeke

Finest Roots Spirits, Greece

Traditional spirits typically come in antiquated packaging, but thankfully that is not the case with new Greek brand Finest Roots. It decided to revive and revise four traditional local liqueurs with the help of one of Greece's oldest working distilleries and local design house, Bob studio. The designs have won two prestigious Golden 'EBGE 2013' awards, one for the best alcoholic drinks packaging and the other for the overall graphic design concept. The spirits themselves are reworks of concoctions dating as far back as the 12th century. The packaging is modern and visually intriguing, with each bottle being stamped with a symbolic representation of the primary ingredient within. 'Rakomelo' is a 12th century recipe of raki and honey and the hexagon on the bottle symbolises the high honeycomb content. 'Mastiha' carries a rhombus on its front, which is representative of the crystals that form in the resin of mastic trees (native to Chios Island) - the main ingredient. 'Tentura' is a spicier brew containing subtle notes of cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg, and the circle represents the oval shape at the bottom of a stick of cinnamon. The herb spirit was created using dittany, a herb of the mint family native to Crete, which gives a fragrant peaty taste, and the cross on the bottle reflects monastic connotations often related to the herb.

www.finestroots.com

Writer: Romy van den Broeke

Junmai by Small Sake

Good things come in small packages, such as this premium rice wine, now available in a 163 ml mini-can from Small Sake. Junmai sake, which means 'pure rice' in Japanese, is a truly international effort - brewed near Nara in Japan (said to be the birthplace of the Japanese beverage) it is the invention of Pontus Karlsson, a Swede based in Hong Kong. Best served chilled, the pale beverage, with its notes of nuts and tropical fruit, gets its subtle flavour from the Hitomebore rice grain. The grain is carefully polished, leaving only 70 per cent of its desirable starchy centre, before the natural fermentation process takes place through the addition of water and heat.

SEK44; www.smallsake.com

Writer: Micha van Dinther

Junmai by Small Sake

Good things come in small packages, such as this premium rice wine, now available in a 163 ml mini-can from Small Sake. Junmai sake, which means 'pure rice' in Japanese, is a truly international effort - brewed near Nara in Japan (said to be the birthplace of the Japanese beverage) it is the invention of Pontus Karlsson, a Swede based in Hong Kong. Best served chilled, the pale beverage, with its notes of nuts and tropical fruit, gets its subtle flavour from the Hitomebore rice grain. The grain is carefully polished, leaving only 70 per cent of its desirable starchy centre, before the natural fermentation process takes place through the addition of water and heat.

SEK44; www.smallsake.com

Writer: Micha van Dinther

Les Bébés Cupcakery, Taipei, Taiwan

The once all-American cupcake craze is now sweeping Asia. Taipei's Les Bébés Cupcakery is the latest bastion, tucked away on a small street in the heart of the city. The shop is the brainchild of Elaine Tseng (owner of local food lab cum cooking school Mise-en-Place), whose cooking credo is to re-create memories of home baking with simple ingredients and classic recipes but often with a twist. Flavours range from the classic Red Velvet to the more innovative Earl Grey and Black Sesame, while the look is elegantly minimal, with frosting arranged in small polished domes or piped peaks.
Tseng commissioned Johnny Chiu's Taipei-based architecture firm JCA to design the interior, which is both playful and intimate. The glass façade features a solid black door opening onto a brightly-lit whitewashed space, with accents of brown and yellow and a long counter on which the cupcakes neatly sit, awaiting hungry mouths.

149-4 Chao Chou St, Taipei, Taiwan; www.lbb.com.tw

Writer: Rosa Bertoli

Les Bébés Cupcakery, Taipei, Taiwan

The once all-American cupcake craze is now sweeping Asia. Taipei's Les Bébés Cupcakery is the latest bastion, tucked away on a small street in the heart of the city. The shop is the brainchild of Elaine Tseng (owner of local food lab cum cooking school Mise-en-Place), whose cooking credo is to re-create memories of home baking with simple ingredients and classic recipes but often with a twist. Flavours range from the classic Red Velvet to the more innovative Earl Grey and Black Sesame, while the look is elegantly minimal, with frosting arranged in small polished domes or piped peaks.
Tseng commissioned Johnny Chiu's Taipei-based architecture firm JCA to design the interior, which is both playful and intimate. The glass façade features a solid black door opening onto a brightly-lit whitewashed space, with accents of brown and yellow and a long counter on which the cupcakes neatly sit, awaiting hungry mouths.

149-4 Chao Chou St, Taipei, Taiwan; www.lbb.com.tw

Writer: Rosa Bertoli

Les Bébés Cupcakery, Taipei, Taiwan

The once all-American cupcake craze is now sweeping Asia. Taipei's Les Bébés Cupcakery is the latest bastion, tucked away on a small street in the heart of the city. The shop is the brainchild of Elaine Tseng (owner of local food lab cum cooking school Mise-en-Place), whose cooking credo is to re-create memories of home baking with simple ingredients and classic recipes but often with a twist. Flavours range from the classic Red Velvet to the more innovative Earl Grey and Black Sesame, while the look is elegantly minimal, with frosting arranged in small polished domes or piped peaks.
Tseng commissioned Johnny Chiu's Taipei-based architecture firm JCA to design the interior, which is both playful and intimate. The glass façade features a solid black door opening onto a brightly-lit whitewashed space, with accents of brown and yellow and a long counter on which the cupcakes neatly sit, awaiting hungry mouths.

149-4 Chao Chou St, Taipei, Taiwan; www.lbb.com.tw

Writer: Rosa Bertoli

Oak Smoked Water by The Anglesey Sea Salt Company

The reach of the food smoking trend is widening ever further. The latest product to get the treatment is water.  Marvellously simple in concept, oak smoked water is being sold in a sealed sachet by The Anglesey Sea Salt Company, the brand behind the award-winning Halen Mon sea salt. The convenient water pouch is ideal for those who don't have time to smoke their own grub and can be used to bring flavour to soups, stocks and rice dishes. And for those partial to a Bloody Mary, the water can be frozen in an ice tray and the cubes added to the drink to bring a smoky depth.

£2.75 for 150ml; www.harveynichols.com

Writer: Romy van den Broeke