Karen Wright: Out exploring Tewkesbury and making Caribbean jerk chicken

Karen Wright writes: However, it is great to venture to pastures new sometimes, especially if someone has recommended a particular place or campsite to us. Last week we did just that and booked into the Caravan and Motorhome Club site at Tewkesbury.

Tewkesbury is a medieval market town near Gloucester. The town itself is fabulous, especially if you enjoy historic things. There are lots of half-timbered wibbly-wobbly buildings all along the high street with nooks and crannies, and alleyways to explore.

The river runs along the town and it’s lovely to sit in a beer garden and watch the world and river go by.

The campsite is situated just a few minutes stroll from the town and is bordered by a cricket club, bowling club and a large park. To top it off there is a gorgeous view of the abbey.

We spent a full day exploring the town and abbey and enjoyed our evenings sitting outside in the sunshine.

I cooked all our meals outside on a gas barbecue, everything seems to taste better in the open air! We had bacon and eggs for breakfast both mornings and my favourite evening meal was jerk chicken.

First time cooking Caribbean and I got quite creative with the marinade – pineapple juice and dark rum!

Making a marinade is the key to giving the chicken a really good flavour.

I mixed together soy sauce, brown sugar, pineapple juice, splash of rum, squeeze of lime, some salt and pepper and a generous tablespoon of jerk seasoning.

I used boneless chicken thighs and immersed them in the bowl of marinade for a few hours in the fridge.

I cooked them on my barbecue grill alongside some corn cobs and the pineapple rings from the tin – super juicy!

Traditionally you would serve this with rice and peas but as you may know John doesn’t eat rice so we had sautéed chilli potatoes.

We moved on after a couple of days to Wiltshire and had a great time visiting Longleat and Bath – more about that next week!