Bespoke Cooking

personal, memorable, delicious

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Bespoke Cooking

personal, memorable, delicious

Dinner Parties, Events, celebrations

We would love to be able to help you enjoy the pleasure of dining with friends in your home without any of the trouble it takes to plan and prepare a meal. We design menus around your tastes and create beautiful dishes so that you can relax and enjoy your evening. From delicious canapés to set off your drinks reception to supper parties and celebration dinners, we take care of every detail.

Seasonal Ingredients

Seasonal, Sustainable, Local

We are passionate about using ingredients that are at their best in that moment. Our menus are designed to celebrate the abundance of incredible produce that is available to us and to maximise the flavours that the seasons offer us. From home-grown and locally sourced vegetables to eggs from our own chickens, we are also committed to sourcing from as close to our home in St. Albans as possible. Where we need to use ingredients from further afield we do our best to support smaller, high quality producers and farmers. We only source sustainable seafood for use in our dishes.

Supper Club

We are delighted that we have been able to begin holding Supper Clubs at the brilliant Charlie's Coffee and Company. In her quirky little shop on London Road in St Albans we rustle up a five course tasting menu and a welcome cocktail. You are invited to BYO for the Supper Clubs, but we always offer wine pairing suggestions and the chance to pre-order wine through Flagship Wines.

Please click on the link below to see details of our upcoming events.

View Upcoming Events

Who's in the kitchen?

ALI young

CHEF

No, not Chappell or Caldwell. But I am a bit of both really.

My paternal Grandmother, Isobel, and maternal Granny, Maggie, have each posthumously lent me their maiden names for this venture. Both had a marvellous way with food, whether eating or sharing it, and I love the idea that they are both rather present in what I do.

After spending 10 years at the chalk face teaching in secondary schools, I embarked on a journey in food. Having gained a distinction in the Professional Diploma at Leiths School of Food and Wine, I went on to work at Spring Restaurant London. I am now working privately, sharing my food with others through Supper Clubs, teaching bespoke cookery lessons and working as a private chef, cooking in people's homes for dinners, celebrations and parties.

I have a fantastic team of chefs and waiting staff who I work with on a regular basis and we are looking forward to helping with any dining event you have in mind.

Instagram

Baby Bay’s even lovelier than usual this year. @tacoboysuk 🙏

364 days old. 💕

Vegans and non-vegans, early-risers and sleep-inners alike joined us today for two sold-out sittings of our vegan brunch pop-up with @charliescoffeeandcompany - we had a blast cooking for you all as part of #sustfest19 - in the last pic you can see the sum total of the food waste generated - the lower of the two compostable bags is full of green bits we’ll serve up to our chooks over the next couple of days, and the top one will be composted through our kerbside scheme. Feeling happy that @sustainablesta inspired us to think more carefully about how we source and prepare food for our events. Thank you 🙏

Just a few of our ingredients for our sustainable brunch @charliescoffeeandcompany and their provenance. Sourcing and researching takes time but it always pays off in flavour. Last couple of tickets now available for our 3 course #brunch on Sunday for the 9am sitting 🍽😁🌱Hope to see you there!

More recipe testing with home grown rhubarb courtesy of @jenny.mcwhirter for our gorgeous #sustainable brunch at @charliescoffeeandcompany this Sunday. Still some tickets available as part of @sustainablesta #sustfest19 ticket link in bio 👆

Due to a cancellation we now have 2 tickets to the previously SOLD OUT 11am sitting for our gorgeous plant-based brunch at @charliescoffeeandcompany next Sunday!! There are also a few remaining seats for the 9am sitting if you are an early riser! Come and join us for delicious, sustainably sourced food, good vibes and oodles of coffee! YUM! 🍽 🌱 ☕️

This guy loves himself a visit to Charlie’s @charliescoffeeandcompany

@jenny.mcwhirter - asparagus grower in chief.

Found by @jb_carpentry_plus underneath the floor in our Victorian terraced house, built c1890. Looking forward to cleaning it up and keeping it in our new kitchen.

SOOOO excited to be popping up for #brunch at @charliescoffeeandcompany on May 19th! We’re collaborating on this as part of St Albans Sustainability Festival so this time we are going #vegan 🌱 to up our #sustainability game! We’ll be as thoughtful as ever in sourcing and creating menus to reflect the seasons and keep our food miles under control. We hope you love this idea and decide to come along!! Ticket link in bio 👆@sustainablesta

Best teacher-training-day EVER, courtesy of @hannahmacmac 🙏 Better get my starter out of hibernation.

Jenny-wren grew some (so much) pretty rhubarb.

Fish and chips on the beach

We’re temporarily taking a bit of time off from cooking while the kitchen looks like it does (swipe to see the current situation). It’s giving me lots of lovely time to spend with this little pudding 💕 but also very excited about our new kitchen (courtesy of @jb_carpentry_plus 🔨). We’ll be back as soon as possible with a bigger space for group and private lessons and for sharing food at suppers and lunches around our kitchen table. Thanks as ever for all your support and patience while we get our house in order! We have lots of bookings from the late spring onwards, so please do get in touch if you have dates in mind for dinners/lessons/fridge-filling that we can be of help with 👩🏻‍🍳

Making #kimchi and feeling pretty joyful about it. @maangchi recipe 🙏

Swirly, blackberry, purple meringue smash. Coming soon, to garnish a very zingy lemon posset near you.

Blini-town

Today I taught the third of six sessions to two absolutely lovely young ladies who want to develop their skills in the kitchen for their #dukeofedinburgh bronze award. We’ve made so many things so far, including these delicious soda breads which they served with homemade butter and a spicy lentil and chickpea soup. Last week they made middle-eastern inspired salads and dips. Not to mention sweet bakes and home-made tarts. They are brilliant young cooks and I love seeing them tasting, seasoning and making the dishes their own.

Venison stew with herb dumplings and hasselback potatoes. All the crispy bits... 🥰 #loveyourleftovers

When the whole household is ill but you’ve got to eat. Also, stirring risotto has always been good for the soul.