It is all about the Turkey curry!

Well hello there everyone.

For those of you that regularly follow my blog. You will know we like to follow a cooking theme which is one of my hobbies and today... Let's have a chat about the refreshingly light, post christmas, annual Turkey Curry!

So, every year out come the sprouts, the humungous quantities of roasted meats, the wines flow and the tins get lighter and lighter as they fill with empty wrappers as opposed to scrumptious truffles. Well, naturally... even after bubble and squeak and a treat for the dogs. There is always masses of meat left and gravy, vegetables and winter warming roast dinners can begin to wear a little thin on our increasingly large christmas tummies.

So, upon coming home this monday evening... Christmas is nearly over and after a few christmas drinks in the afternoon with my friends, I'm a little peckish. I start off by slicing the turkey into thin little strips and heat along with some, onions, mushrooms and green pepper. Then comes a long the tomatoes, garlic and cream along with a dash of curry powder and some potatoes. It's starting to smell good guys!

I let it stew for a good 45 minutes so all the flavours in the sauce penetrate the meat and the veg and I am starting to hear rumbles from the bottom of my wine-lined tummy! It is time to start dipping and having a  few of those "little tastes" before it is served and the flavours are incredible, and the meat- so, so tender. A taste EXPLOSION! Like the crackers 2 days before... Everyone loves a good curry!

It is the new meal, It is after Christmas, Its light, Its full of flavour and of course. It's made with love.

It is Ben's Turkey Curry.

Once a year, and I love it

Stay tuned for your favourite consultant's top cooking tips as move into 2011... Next time,

Lamb, with red wine sauce and sweet potato mash!

Goodnight to all and to all... A GOOD NIGHT!

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls. In the words of Noddy Holder

"ITS CHRISSSTTTMASSSS!"

So, it is time to start wrapping... toasting, eating, opening and most definitely celebrating!!!!

I would just like to wish everybody a wonderful christmas, may the chunky man in the red suit bring you everything you wish for and may the festive period make special memories.

To all my customers of 2010, I would like to thank you for your custom and I look forward to welcoming some more lovely cruisers over 2011

Seasons Greetings to you all

Snow Brings A "mini break" to the Allsopp household! mmmm, caramelised onions!

Due to the incredible snow that we have here in north Worcestershire- I havent been home this week as I live about 15 miles from the office here at http://www.cruise.co.uk/  and have spent the last 3 nights at my Dad's house just round the corner from work.

Well, the first night I stayed- Lin (my stepmom) was working until around 7pm and by 6.30pm, myself and my dad began to get particularly hungry after dealing with all the snow and needed a nice winter warmer dinner. Those of you that follow my blog will know one of my real passions in life, besides travel is cooking. I love to cook! So, I said "right then, im starting the cooking... my speciality sausages and mash?" and off i went, empyting the fridge of some beautiful pork and apple sausages and a mountain of root veg.

Whilst I was cooking one of my signature meals which all my friends love, I though- oooh i could have some nice crispy onions on top of those sausages and red wine gravy and this is where the world of cooking changed:

THE NEW PHENOMENON!


It's Ben's special caramelised onions!

I began hastily with some onions which i peeled into rings and began to cook with butter and a little brown sugar which i simmered for about 25 minutes until they wilted and turned a goregeous golden brown. After whipping the mash made up of potatoes, carrot and parsnip and then topping with sausages... the onions just sat on top creating a nice garnish and also some texture, aboslutely lovely. I was popular that evening!

Then, last night- I chose to leave the idea of chancing the train and made the short journey back to number 2 where i walked in to "What are you making tonight then Ben?" so out came the knives, oven on and once again... We're cooking on gas everybody! Tonight, its carbonara with garlic baguettes- this time white wine was key to the sauce along with fresh garlic (added right at the end to prevent it from becoming bitter) and lashings of cream. The chicken and bacon was a nice compliment and this is when Lin says to me

"Ben, I'ts been like a mini break having you here... You can't go home!"

So, everybody- it turns out not only can I answer all your cruise questions. I'll give you some cooking tips too!

For the youngest and multi talented cruise specialist here in the office. It has to be Ben. 0800 408 6156

Where is my Sangria??

Hola!
For those of you that regularly follow my blog, you will know that i have just returned from a wonderful weeks holiday in the winter sunshine of Fuerteventura. We had a great time!

The weather was in the high twenties every single day and the sangria and pina coladas were flowing like the waters of niagra, we couldnt fault our villa, absolutely huge with 2 terraces and the staircase was outside! (beware after a long night, spiral staircases are not friends!) As mentioned, i went wih a group of friends, 2 guys and 2 girls and we were on holiday on an all inlcusive basis, therefore the food wasn't exactly amazing, however for the amount of money I paid i thought it was excellent value. I mean i was eating 3 or 4 courses 3 times a day for a week, and we absolutely made the most of our all inclusive drinks!

On my blog previously, I told you about the beach and i was expecting it to be absolutely beautiful.  Well, it wasn't- It was INCREDIBLE! I can honestly say that the beach was faultless, it is 32km long, really wide, absoluetly peaceful and the sea was just stunning. really shallow, perfect waves and completely turquoise. I would reccomend the Canary Islands to anyone as they really do have something for everyone, and for about 335 days a year, fantastic weather! For example, we were in a really quiet, very chilled and scenic resort on Fuerteventura called Jandia (abolsutely wonderful for sea front walks either on the beach or across the promenade) here there were wild chipmunks you could feed in the sand dunes and lovely little parrots living in the palms across the beach front.

 

 Here is our group and the view from my bedroom with the El Faro de Morro Jable in the centre ( lighthouse)

And below is a photo i took along the beach directly infront of the hotel, see- i told you it was amazing!

One day we took out our hire car and headed for a day (and night out) we called our little VW POLO "Carlos" and he served us well, we past through the very barren, uninspiring secnery across the centre of the island and were bound for Lanzarote! Along the way across the island, we stopped in the national park just outside of Corralejo in the north of the island, Here another AMAZING beach where it is like being in the desert, the sand stretches inland for miles and extends out to sea to make the most incredible beaches, heres a few photos of it, excuse the slight silliness. I was on my holidays...

So after running around the sandunes for a while, we headed into town to find the ferry to take us to our neighbouring, busier island LANZAROTE! So after the vast white sand beaches and chilled out bars of Fuerteventura, we were struck by little coves and busy towns in Lanzarote where we went to act our age for a night and hit the strip across Puerto Del Carmen. It sure was lively but by the next morning, we were definiitely ready to go back to our peacfl and quiet resort with all the holiday makers asking us "What are you four doing down here?" Well, as i repiled to all of them, "We are young, we DO like to have a good time. But we like nice things and have taste, thats why we are not in Faliraki right now." We just wanted a relaxing holiday and it was perfect for that.

So ultimately, I had a great holiday, It is sad to be home, but its nice to come back to work and plan my next one. Im thinking about booking onto P&O Azura on a carribbean cruise in the early summer. We shall see...

But as I said earlier, Where is my Sangria? I can always pretend I am still there.
                                                                          Can't I? 

and I'm off!

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls I am here to report that I am taking a very well earned holiday next week. It's -9°c outside, the ground is glistening in white and the trees are bare. I’m exchanging this for rolling white sand dunes and crashing blue Atlantic waves!

Can you guess what it is yet?

I’m off to Fuerteventura! Myself and a few friends are off for a whole week of sunshine, cocktails and hopefully a bit of luxury. We have booked a 2 bedroom villa near the beach with sea views, fingers and frostbitten toes crossed it should be lovely. So unfortunately I will be out of the office until Tuesday 14th December where I will be back in chatting away to you all about our favourite pastime- Cruises!

Try not to miss me too much, I’ll try and raise a glass for everyone at the office and make sure I have a good old relax ready for a cosy Christmas in the UK. I'm looking forward to brushing up on my holiday-rep Spanish acquired in Majorca and we are going to try and a go karting track for a bit of adrenaline as we're not exactly going to the liveliest place on earth. The beach looks beautiful though, and I do love a good beach. At home I have about 15 bottles of sand that I have collected on my travels, so I’ll be sure to fill report back on the quality of the Playa de Jandia- reputed to be the best beach in Europe. We shall see...

So take care, Don’t miss me too much and let's hope for the most dramatic tan lines the world has ever seen!

Until then,

Adios!

 Whilst i am enjoying that lovely beach pictured above, if you have any questions, please email contactus@cruise.co.uk or call 0800 408 6200.

SHARK ATTACK!! Key Red Sea resort loses it's main attraction

I’m sure many of you have heard about this weeks 3 separate shark attacks in the world famous Egyptian beach resort of Sharm El Sheikh. Having travelled to Egypt myself 5 times for my love of the sea life out there I am very shocked to hear this breaking news. Reports read 3 attacks have occurred in the crystal blue warm waters of the Red Sea, just off the coast of the bustling resort injuring three people whom have lost limbs and hands due to the unexpected attack by what is believed to be White tipped reef shark.

Diving and water sports are the main reason why Red Sea holidays have taken off in such a big way over the past few years, along with almost guaranteed sunshine and great nightlife. These attacks are 3 of only 9 recorded in the whole world by this breed of shark and currently all water sports are out of bounds until the believed culprit shark is captured and returned in deeper, open waters. Surely he's had enough to eat by now? I hear Russian Arm is a delicacy in the world of  sharks!

As the biggest diving destination in the world, this can only come as a shock and the tourist board is really losing out at the moment. If you are cruising across the red sea soon or planning a holiday there, let me assure you Egypt is one of my favourite holiday destinations and even if the water sports are still banned... just enjoy the sun, have another cocktail and think of me in the office gazing out across the increasingly white landscape!

I am sure this will not affect the popularity of Sharm El  Shiekh as the underwater world there is so amazing and it is definitely a great place to go on holiday, also within such close proximity to the majestic pyramids of Giza and the tombs of Luxor. It definitely won't stop me from going there, ill just swim a little more cautiously. This has not been a good year for Sharm with the worst rainfall in 11years bringing down the airport roof in January, the crash of the Costa Europa cruise ship (now Thomson Dream) in March and now this!

I’m sure we can all agree we hope the injured people involved have a successful recovery and that the water sport market can start making the money they so readily rely on.

The amazing sea life in Sharm El Sheikh

Myself in Egypt in 2009

We're Back! I experienced a drought in Belgium in NOVEMBER!

Here at http://www.cruise.co.uk/ we have all just returned from our Christmas party onboard P&O Aurora, and what a party it was! Amongst sailaway champagne, karaoke, casinos, theatre shows, spa treatments, round the clock dining and company presentations... I’m here to tell you about how we felt like we were in the Belgian desert this Sunday morning in maximum temperatures of -3°C!

After a wonderfully relaxed embarkation, (it’s so nice not to have to go through the whole airport rigmarole) we boarded and were wowed by the AURORA, I would always say, it is really nice to cruise from the UK to make your holiday start even quicker!

 Upon boarding AURORA I imagined her to be quite understated but I was shocked... she really is very elegant and a fantastic feeling of space. Upon arrival into my balcony stateroom, again I was very impressed...at 10years old, she is not the youngest of ships but everything was immaculate- gleaming carpets, polished wood, flat screen televisions and after bouncing around for a few minutes in the cabin excited... we wondered off to the buffet for a bite to eat and a well earned weekend drink. The buffet was incredibly busy, a completely different feel to everywhere else onboard but the food itself was fine. not mind-blowing but ok for a spot of lunch straight after 2000 passengers embarked with empty tummy’s! We then wondered past the various swimming pools, elegant teak decks dotted with Jacuzzis and headed to the one of the bars... the champions sports style bar reminded me of a pub in an airport, very busy with people very rapidly downing pints... we chose to move on passing through the casino and up to the Crows nest, this suited us a lot better, a really relaxed atmosphere and very pleasant surroundings with some light background music. By the time we had all relaxed we were almost ready to set sail across the channel towards our Belgian delight... Zebrugge, the gateway to chocolates, traditional buildings and sweeping Flemish fields.


The sail way was great, half price champagne (which was a really nice tasting champagne I have to say!)
and a band on the ground playing us out... the funnel made itself heard and off we went! Also the fact it was so cold outside gave everybody a bit of movement and we were all having such a great time already. The evening continued into the very early hours with the music playing, people laughing and everybody genuinely really enjoying themselves, myself so much I even took the plunge to serenade the sports bar with a karaoke version of The Killers, one passenger shook my hand after (He must have had a fair bit of that sail away champagne!) So later on, dancing the night away in Masquerade disco we had a great evening. Here are a couple of the Photographs including my slightly champagne fuelled karaoke! My colleagues found this quite amusing!

So, the next morning docking in a beautifully sunny and snow capped Zebrugge we headed to breakfast discovering more and more of the ship all the time before retiring for a chill out afternoon watching  few movies in our lovely cabin and heading up to the spa. Now this is where I’m going to tell you about how we gasped for hours literally just wanting a lemonade with some ice, we contacted room service and it was engaged, so I left it 20 minutes and tried again, to no avail of course. Following trying several times I began to feel a little angry that I could not even pay to have a drink delivered to my cabin? So I contacted reception who "transferred me" to a dead line. Room service this weekend was completely unobtainable! This really annoyed me as we were just having a lazy afternoon, I really didn’t want to have to put all my clothes on and walk up to one of the bars. We really were thirsty though and joked how we didn’t know Belgium offered desert style attributes in December! This is one of the only things I didn’t enjoy about the ship, I found the service not up to what I have experienced before. The fact it is just a 2night cruise may have something to do with it in my opinion!

So with regards to the AURORA, I have had a great time. I think she’s a lovely ship but a few things were lacking this weekend. So anything you'd like to know more, just ask me! If not...

Happy Cruising

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The REAL life of a holiday rep!

In the summer of 2010, I worked a holiday rep for Thomson on the island of Mallorca, starting off living in Magaluf, i have quite a few experiences to share: When i first began, I was working in a very nice adult only cruise and stay hotel where i greeted many customers who had the first week of their holiday onboard the Thomson Dream cruise ship. Ex. Costa Europa. It is no secret that when this ship first began sailing under the Thomson brand, it encountered a few problems- HARD work on my part as people were expecting something completely different to what they received, However, some intense work took place onboard the ship at the end of June and from what i witnessed, some MAJOR improvements took place and i am pleased to confirm i greeted a lot of very happy Thomson Dreamers.

This is the block i lived in in Magaluf

Aside from my hotel duties... walking to work was an event every single morning. June 2010, the height of summer is nearly here, the sun is high in the blue sky for 13 hours a day, the bars are full to bursting with drinks offers: Pint of vodka and coke €2, Free shots, zombie coctails- the list is endless. Also to my misery, The World Cup was in play, reeking more havoc across south western Majorca but Magaluf (europes largest youth resort) and every morning just after 8am on may way to work, walking through the rubble produced the night before, past the world famous superclub BCM I would see men unconscious on benches with their shoes missing and their last drop of Redbull in their hands, and have very wobbly people on their feet asking me the time as the sun began to really heat up. "8.15" I'd tell them to be greeted by nothing more than a scream of both shock and anger as they were positive it could not be later than 3am...

Oh dear!

   Above you can see Magaluf strip at 1am in June, in all its glory

Below, an example of those unconscious people...

                          

After working in Magaluf through the busiest times of year, living in a tower block surrounded by clubs and a very slight cocroach infestation... I WAS MOVED... to my favourite place in Mallorca, Cala D'or!

Here, I lived in a beautiful old spanish house right by the sea with a private pool! I also could walk to work in oeace and quiet across the beach and see nothing more than people just having a morning stroll looking much fresher than the tourists of magaluf. The work here was also really hard, having 4 hotels during the height of season. One of which had a major lack of sunbeds. Which of course was my fault... when i first walked into that hotel, i thought "Im going to come on holiday here, its lovely" I can honestly say, I will never walk in that hotel ever again! I hate the place! As the complaints were rolling in, I also met some really friendly guests which I was very sad to see go and have many photos at bus stops with some very tanned holidaymakers waiting for the coaches to take them back to the Airport- Which refers to my next subject... The dreaded airport runs!!!! I would visit the airport twice a week for a supposed "4hour shift" well by the time you have got to the airport which used to take up to an hour and a half, been given your spot on check in chatting away to all the people ready to go home, technically it should already be home time. But it just goes on and on with flight after flight departing or arriving, Palma de Mallorca is one busy airport! One day in Sepetmber, Howard from Take That checked in for one of our Thomson flights, he arrived at the very last second just before check in closed to be sure he wouldnt get hassled, of course he arrived just before the flight closed and didn't get his seats together next to his very beautiful travelling companion who hed enjoyed a week on the island with. Of course if he had paid the £6 per person to reserve seats together, this wouldnt have been an issue and we just waited for the famous line "Do you know who I am?" But they were very gracious and headed towards departures without any fuss. Then it was on to Arrivals as we greeted all the tired and confused passengers looking for their coaches to take them to resorts they had no idea of the name, despit booking the holiday maybe 12months in advance...MADNESS!

Being a holiday rep is definitely not just sun, sea and drinking.It is every now and again however. It is intense, hot work and long, long hours; Between airport shifts, resort transfers, weekly accounting, team meetings, excrusion guiding, welcome meetings and of course your standard 7hour daily hotel duties, you can get quite tired by the end of season! The most hours i have on record for a week in 67. As you might guess, this involves very little time for catching the rays. However, I have very fond memories of my time and i have made some great friends overseas. I also have developed such a passion for Spanish culture and the island of Majorca which is just 2 hours from the UK but is absoluetly beautiful, I am lucky to have got to know the whole island and if you have any questions about Majorca, Im your man! So, my overseas holiday rep experience was one that was different from expectations (very dull at times) intense, memorable and something I will always treasure however I do not wish to ever repeat that experience again, but what a great one to say i have had: Heres a few of my favourite memories from Majorca:

onder

This is a beach called Calo d'es Moro. I took this in August after we spent 40 mintes trying to find it.. Its a very long, forest road to get there and it is not signposted, as you can see. It was worth it! To actually access the beach, its about 60 steps down an incredibly steep sandstone cliff. I was a little shaky!



This is the beautiful marina of Cala D'or, Occasionally Id have time to enjoy the amazing restauarants down there! 



Here is a great photo, This was taken in September and shows a few members our our "rep" team. We had a barbecue on our roof terrace that evening and invited all our friends. Note our exclusive seating area on the air conditioning unit!

Heres myself and a friend Jess at Pirates, rated the second best show in the world... I really love this photo!

MY NEXT EMBARKATION!

In just 3 weeks; im heading aboard the P&O AURORA.
As you can see im boarding one of the more classic and traditional style cruise ships, the aurora for the http://www.cruise.co.uk/ christmas party. I am looking forward to this venture- to see how this mid size ship compares to the brand new, ultra modern Celebrity Eclipse which i visted several months ago.


Just to let you know P&O.. YOU HAVE COMPETITION!




I will be sure to let you know how i get on and list the antics of my fellow cruise specialists as we sail away to Bruges for the weekend. Keep Posted for the latest!

                                                Isn't she beautiful? I cant wait!