Tag Archives: Siren FM

Adventure lamb with Mark Sargeant

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British food has become more than just your meat and two veg as international flavours are influencing home cooking.

Research by Simply Beef and Lamb has found that British people, especially children, are more adventurous at mealtimes.

The Michelin starred chef Mark Sargeant has been working with Simply Beef and Lamb to create some easy lamb recipes and spoke to Siren FM about the changes in our tastes.

Chef Mark Sargeant chatting about exciting lamb recipes | Photo: Robert Nunn via Flickr

Tagines, curries and enchiladas are just some of the international dishes that have become popular in our kitchens. Research found that parents are also making these dishes for their children, admitting that their kids are eating more exotic foods than they did at their age.

Mark encourages children to try new foods and says: “I get very excited by the prospect of my daughters growing up with a really wide and varied palate. It’s very important for me to get in there at a young age and that wasn’t done so much certainly when I was younger.”

Being creative in the kitchen helps when it comes to being more adventurous with food. Mark says: “That’s where it’s so good to be relaxed in the kitchen. Understand that you’ve got a lovely piece of lamb and understand what goes with it and what you like and hopefully you’ll end up with some really good adventurous recipes.”

Mark’s top tips when it comes to cooking lamb this spring are:

  • Quality  — “Try and get really good, organic good quality lamb. That’s the most important thing. If you start with good lamb then you’re going to end up with a fantastic dish,” he says.
  • Be adventurous — “If you want to keep it simple that’s completely fine… but try and be a bit more adventurous.” Mark mentions that the Simply Beef and Lamb website is filled with plenty of recipes  and promises: “Your spring lamb will never taste as good as it has before.”

You can listen to the full interview with Mark Sargeant below. This interview was originally broadcast on Siren FM.

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John Torode speaks to Siren FM

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Celebrity chef and Masterchef judge John Torode travels down under to showcase the best food available in his home country in the new series John Torode’s Australia.

John Torode | Photo: Lichfield District Council via Flickr

The show gives John Torode a chance to revisit the places where he learnt to cook as well as explore the types of food that different cultures have brought to the country. He does think it is funny that Britain has a stereotype that Australians just cook everything on the barbecue. Although there is more to Australian cooking John Torode does defend cooking things on the barbecue saying that it is great for everyday dishes as well as fine steak.

John Torode gave some encouraging words to people who want to learn how to cook new and different dishes — saying they should focus on learning the culture surrounding a type of cuisine. However, he thinks people aren’t put off from trying new foods saying: “Are we a bit scared? Maybe. But a lot of people know what they like and I think that’s not a bad thing at all.”

But when it comes to himself, John Torode says: “If I went through any day and I didn’t learn anything about cooking I think it would be a sad day.”

John Torode’s Australia starts on Good Food on Monday 3rd March at 8pm.

You can listen to the full interview with John Torode where he talks to me and Sam Pidoux about why he doesn’t like cooking cheap food and why he enjoyed not having the responsibilities of Masterchef when filming his latest television show.

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Celebrations at Siren 107.3FM

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Siren FM recently celebrated winning the title of East Midlands Station of the Year. The Radio Academy Award was part of their Nations and Regions awards which celebrates local programming.

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It’s fantastic for Siren to win this award and have the hard work of all the volunteers appreciated. We found out about the win at the station back in December but it was great to have an evening dedicated to receiving the award.

The accolade was awarded to Lincoln’s first community radio station because:

“Siren FM is a really ambitious and creatively interesting station. They’re doing something different but in their own way and are firmly rooted in their community. A mix of local experiences and stories with global themes – relating the world to Lincolnshire and vice versa.

“This entry displayed a great range of voices and topics on air as well as a great mix of youth, heritage, diversity and local history. A student station that demonstrates good engagement with both students and the wider listener. The schedule was eclectic and the station sounded good and fresh.”

Our winning entry included lots of clips from a variety of Siren shows, and I am happy to say that my radio documentary following the Burton Road Chippy was included.

Here’s some photos from the night.

Behind the Headlines

Last Friday I was a guest on Peter Smith’s Behind the Headlines on Siren FM. His show looks at what’s in the papers as well as looking at the ways the papers cover the news.

On the show we discussed the latest in the Edward Snowden story, the missing Doctor Who episodes and possible changes to driving licences for those aged under 18-years-old.

It was fantastic to talk about news on the radio and analyse the stories, as well as accidentally teaching the host and the other guests the phrase ‘tramp stamp’. Honestly it was relevant, as you will find out if you listen to the Behind the Headlines podcast.

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Valentine Warner on Food for Thought

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Celebrity chef Valentine Warner has recently been to Scandinavia to find out about the food and the culture. He’s now sharing his experiences over on his Good Food show Valentine Warner eats Scandinavia and in an interview for Food for Thought.

Photo: UKTV

Valentine Warner is passionate about using local and seasonal foods — which is also a popular approach to food in Scandinavia too. During his travels Valentine went ice fishing with only a drill and bait, he also cooked with some unusual ingredients including blood and moss. In fact he enjoyed his trip so much he sounds like he wants to move there.

We also talked about why is so passionate about using seasonal goods, his inspiration when it comes to cooking and why he likes listening to music when in the kitchen.

Food for Thought regular Samantha Pidoux joined me for the interview and has written about it on her blog to get another take on our chat with Valentine Warner.

If you’ve liked this podcast then try listening to Food for Thought as it goes out live on Siren FM every Wednesday at 2pm .

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Valentine Warner opens with a joke

Recently on Food for Thought I interviewed the television chef Valentine Warner. It was about his new show Valentine Warner eats Scandinavia which will be shown on the Good Food channel.

I’ll post the full show later but here’s a teaser of our chat. It’s always strange to start talking to someone off the television as if you’ve known them for ages, and this is how Valentine Warner started things off.

listen to ‘Valentine Warner opens with a joke’ on Audioboo

Best of Food for Thought

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If you’ve never listened to Food for Thought before then this ‘best of’ episode is a great place to start. I like to interview the people running Lincoln’s cafes and restaurants so I get to learn about the amazing food that you can find in Lincolnshire as well as hear people’s interesting stories.

This week’s show is snippets of interviews from the past few weeks, including the Angel Coffee House, Baked by Eileen and The Little Espresso Company.

Listen to this week’s show here:

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The places featured on this best of are:

Little Espresso Company

The Little Espresso Shop on Silver Street in Lincoln. | Photo: Charlotte Reid

The Little Espresso Company is the smallest coffee shop in Lincoln, and possibly in the country. Remember though, good things come in small packages. Adam Lowiss, who owns and runs the Little Espresso Company, opened the shop because he wanted to have his own space to share great tasting coffee with others.

He’s also just started a coffee delivery service. During the day if you’re unable to escape the office for lunch he will bring the Little Espresso Company to your desk at work. And you get to order online. Find out more about the new delivery service here.

Angel Coffee House

We’ve had the smallest and now to the prettiest, the Angel Coffee House. It’s an independent cafe based in the old vestry hall for St Swithins Church.

The new owner CJ used to work at the Angel with the previous owner so she knows what the customers want. At the same time she has a few plans of how to put her personality into the place as well.

You can listen to the full original interview here.

Revival Lincolnshire

Revival Lincolnshire is a community cafe, run by the local community, for the local community. Revival is a pop-up store on Sincil Street and offers workshops, a health and wellbeing centre and a craft cafe.

I met up with Angela Porter, who leads the Revival Lincolnshire project, to talk about the importance of supporting Lincolnshire and the people who live in the county.

Revival Lincolnshire | Photo: Charlotte Reid

Baked by Eileen

Eileen Robertson makes all her cakes in her kitchen at home using local and seasonal produce. Eileen mostly sells her cakes at the Castle Sqaure Market in Lincoln, but some of her cakes are also stocked in cafes around the city too.

Baked by Eileen is a relatively new venture for Eileen. She’s surprised by how successful her business is when it started as a simple idea a couple of years ago. Find out more about Baked by Eileen here.

Next time

On next week’s show I find out more about how we can stop wasting our food and and I’ll be explaining what is cultured beef.