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Food and drink

I really like food. Not "Italian-style meal solutions". Food. Fresh and to be cooked. By me or often, mostly, Tom. And if I could spend all day wandering around a French market, buying non-pasteurised cheese and squeezing melons for ripeness then I would. But I live in Clapton so I buy most of my food online. All the sites below have reliable delivery services in my experience, and pretty good websites, plus of course good quality produce.

Most stuff

Abel and Cole

Every Monday morning my organic box arrives. The driver would probably quibble at this point as he has to carry to the door my two boxes of fresh produce (one veg, one fruit), my dairy box, my extras bag, my four litres of milk and any of the other things I regularly order from Abel and Cole - rice, couscous, olive oil, cordials, eggs, Ecover cleaning products. If you live in London then this seems to be the company to use. I've been using them for four years and since I started, they've expanded their range substantially so it's really not just about the veg. The website is very cleverly designed so that you can adapt and modify your weekly orders ad nauseum, tell them when you're on holiday and so on. The produce is excellent, the company is ethical but not in a woolly way (e.g. they use one organic herd for milk and cream having saved the farmer from giving up, and now the milk is fresher than ever), they use LPG vans and they are very helpful and friendly. You will get sent stuff you don't recognise occasionally, or at least don't know how to cook, but that's half the fun and I recommend you get Jane Grigson's Vegetable Book for help. And you will pay a bit more than you might for some (not all) of the products (Ecover for example). But it is wonderful to get your fresh food regularly without having to think about it too much.

Ocado/Waitrose

I do use a supermarket delivery service. I used to use Tesco but their service just wasn't up to much - too often late, stupid substitutions (a basic chicken is not the same as an organic chicken...), and you had to pay around six quid for the privilege of waiting in for two hours. So now I use Ocado - free delivery over £75, one hour slots, and really nice produce without silly substitutions. Oh and they bring the stuff into the kitchen which when you're 7 months pregnant is a real plus. I have a friend in a top floor flat who likes that part too.

Special things

Chocolate

The Chocolate Trading Co

This is based on my mother's recommendation as I bought the stuff and she ate it (Mother's Day present). Apparently the ones I sent were very superior and enormous so you could only eat one at a time. Sounds ideal. Somehow I haven't managed to order for myself yet as it just seems too self-indulgent, so for presents and the more confident or gluttonous, use this site.

Coffee

Algerian Coffee Stores

Apparently my great-grandmother used to get her coffee from this shop and my grandmother certainly did. We drink it strong high roast, with lots of milk. I didn't know coffee beans weren't all dark and shiny until I grew up and I still can't take the taste of less roasted beans which is probably much more refined but to me is just insipid. The Algerian Coffee Stores does it all of course including fair trade, and even more tea varieties. The shop itself is lovely. It's next door to the Admiral Duncan pub at the west end of Old Compton Street. It smells fantastic and is well worth a visit. If you can't get there then use the website.

Flour

F W P Matthews Ltd

I bake my own bread, roughly one batch a week, using a vast mixing bowl my grandfather used. And I use this company's flour, buying in 16kg sacks of their white and their "cotswold crunch" which is a seriously meaty flour, full of flavour and seeds and stuff. I use them because they are closer to London than the others I found on the net. So search and test for flavour (FWP Matthews can send you a selection pack which is a good way to start).

If all this sounds a bit earnest domestic goddess for you then buy a breadmaker. Plenty of other people (Felicity Lawrence in Not on the Label and Rose Prince in the New English Kitchen) have written on the problems of shop bought bread so here's a quick summary: it is full of additives and sugar and water and god knows what else and is made far too quickly and with the main intention of using as little flour as possible to produce a loaf. So what you get is stuff that has little goodness in it and can be squished into a ball of dough very easily, showing just how little actual food is in the loaf. Real bread is made from flour, water, salt and yeast with a tiny bit of sugar or honey or something to get the yeast going. That's it. It's wonderful stuff and good for you (sorry, not really into this gluten free Atkins stuff). And a loaf if you make it yourself costs about the same as the cheapest rubbish from the supermarket. Breadmakers are good at what they do and save the work or rather the hanging around, as there's only about 10 minutes actual work in baking bread.

Honey

I love honey. We get through jars and jars and jars of the stuff in our house because almost every day I have bread and honey for breakfast (and now Emilia does too). And I really love unblended honey. Most of the stuff you get in supermarkets will say something like "produce of many countries". It is cheaper and I do eat it sometimes though I try to get honey that comes from as close to here as possible. But for really fantastic honey, see below.

Quince Honey Farm, South Molton, Devon

Wonderful stuff from Devon. Prices include postage and they do different types including heather which is amazing.

Chain Bridge Honey Farm, Horncliffe, Northumberland

I haven't ordered online from here, but I have visited and it was lovely and so was the honey. Unfortunately you can't get the honey online yet, but you can order their skin products. If you ever stay in a B&B in the Borders your honey will probably come from here.

Wine

Tanners Wine Merchants (UK)

Tanners are very very good at what they do. I'm sure there are other very good wine merchants on the net but I've been to the Tanners headquarters in Shrewsbury which is lovely so that's why they're here. The site is easy to use and informative. Their wines tend to be old world rather than new, consistently good and most are over 6 pounds a bottle. You can search for cheaper wines thankfully. And they also do a good selection of sherries, whiskies (including from the smaller less known distilleries) and other spirits. You could learn a lot about wine, reading their literature and buying accordingly, or you can just drink the stuff.