Tuesday 18 May 2010

Genius gluten-free tea!

Thanks to the lovely people at Mission Media, I was invited to the Genius gluten-free tea at Claridge's last week. It was the start of a genius friendship between, erm, Genius and Claridge's - who will now offer a gluten-free tea, similar to the Ritz (see previous post).



In my humble opinion, Genius bread is the best g-f bread available, and it lent itself amazingly well to crustless, triangle sandwiches with delicious fillings - anyone who didn't know would have struggled to identify the fact that they were sans gluten. As the harpist serenaded us, and champagne glasses clinked, we were brought more and more sandwiches, and then, joy of all joys - GLUTEN-FREE SCONES with cream and jam!



This was something I seriously missed at the g-f Ritz tea and these were small but perfectly formed mouthfuls of pure heaven. Lucinda Bruce-Gardyne, the creator of Genius products, is a michelin-starred chef and has spent years developing her g-f recipes. Her passion for creating great g-f food really comes through in the flavours and textures of her products and these scones were no exception! Such a treat. We also scoffed Claridge's desserts that were naturally g-f - raspberry macaroons and gorgeously rich chocolate mousse-cake but nothing triumphed the fact that here we all were, eating gluten-free tea - with finger sandwiches and scones - just like the rest of the gluten-eating world. Genius.
There was a great speech by Lucinda herself, who just proved what a lovely, down-to-earth person she was, and her dedication to the g-f cause is something we should all be very thankful for. With more people like her pushing great g-f products to supermarkets etc, hopefully they will respond by stepping up their game, meaning that g-f products just keep improving! Yay!