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The Food of the North East
From north Northumberland to the Durham 'tops', there has always been good eating in the north east. Happily, the wild open spaces, cold sea and harshly beautiful uplands are productive as well as attractive. Try some regional recipes:
Alnwick Stew
Heather Honey Cake
Kipper Paste

Sea fresh fish
Enlightened visitors are likely to build food destinations into their itinerary: crabs in the harbour village of Craster, cheese at Blagdon, not far from Newcastle-Upon-Tyne.

One dominant regional flavour is the tang of iodine. Pacific oysters are farmed off Holy Island, the atmospheric religious sanctuary where, according to 14th century records, the monks of the priory also grew them.

The crab, lobster and - before overfishing - herring catch kept this section of the east coast in business. Further north, salmon is fished from the Tweed, the border river. Plentiful game, heather honey and excellent beef, lamb and pork complete the table - and if you know where to look, there's wild food too.

Like much British cooking, dishes from the north east are useful for keeping you warm.

Singin' hinnies, made with flour, lard, butter and currants, are supposed to be so rich that they hiss and sing as they cook on the girdle, itself slicked with a little mutton fat.

Pease pudding is traditionally served with a joint of ham, but goes just as well in a stotty cake, a kind of bread roll.

Stotty cake, made from squat circles of leftover dough cooked at the bottom the oven, have a firm, floury crust. The baker would apparently 'stott' - or throw - the bread against the floor, testing doneness by the quality of the bounce.

Panhaggerty is a classic favourite and hearty filler. Cooks from Northumbria and Durham are traditionally fond of layers, stacking sliced onions, potatoes and cheese to form panhaggerty, or onions, potatoes and gammon in an Alnwick stew.

Pickled salmon, the fish is poached with mace and cloves, then steeped overnight in a combination of the liquor, vinegar and white wine and served hot.

Beyond the plate
Culinary pride goes hand-in-hand with allotment pride in this part of the country. Prize-winning leeks bring glory and the rest bring sustenance, traditionally made into a steamed, suet-based leek pudding or pasty, sometimes with a judicious sprinkling of bacon.

There's also great skill at work in Craster, where a family firm makes the famous kippers and smokes a variety of other foods. The story of the kipper apparently begins with a Northumbrian, John Woodger, who wanted to emulate the Scottish method of preserving salmon. The bony beauties make excellent breakfast food, but are also turned into kipper paste, sealed with butter and served with hot toast.

Did you know...
Think of the north east larder and you might think of rugged cattle and hardy sheep, beasts able to survive in conditions that would take the breath out of you.

It may come as a surprise that one of the thriving crops grown in County Durham is asparagus. It grows on sheltered, well-drained slopes at a fruit farm near Lanchester, and the farmer believes that the shorter days and longer maturing time make for intensely tasty spears.

But the most unlikely delicacy enjoyed in the region is undoubtedly the snail which, boiled, trimmed and baked with garlic, was once a favourite feast dish among the glassmakers of Wearside.

Debbie Roy