Month: May 2015

Shortbread Jammy Dodgers

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My first memory of cooking is making salt dough decorations. If you’ve never made salt dough with kids it’s so much fun. The recipe is basic: 2 parts flour, 1 part salt & 1 part water. Mix into a dough, roll and cut into whatever shapes you want. Pierce each with a pen so you can string them up later. Bake in a low oven at 100˚c for 3-4 hours until they are completely dry. Cool, then paint and hang with string. Note: do not eat! You will be sick. Now, the only biscuits I really enjoy baking (and can be trusted to make) are ones where all the ingredients are mixed up in a food processor, rolled and cut with my retro cutters, just like salt dough. The shortbread recipe I use is from Adam Stokes on Great British Chefs. It’s tried and tested and i’ve made them so many times – it makes light buttery biscuits that are lush and soft in the middle with a short snap. I’ve taken the vanilla and cinnamon from the recipe …

What I learned at Cinnamon: the art of Indian cooking

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I ate like a Queen this weekend. Beautiful, refined and proper clever Indian cooking. The food successfully mixed authentic flavours from all over India with more classic European cooking techniques and styles, which always did service to the original dishes but enhanced the dining experience. This type of cooking is a real art; a dish is never changed for the sake of being different. Everything I tasted was true and intelligent, without trying to be fashionable or in trend. I was privileged enough to spend the weekend as the guest of Vivek Singh at two of his three London restaurants, Cinnamon Club and Cinnamon Kitchen. As well as the chance to explore the kitchen at Cinnamon Club, where I skipping around with a spoon like a kid in a sweet shop, I also attended their Wine & Spice pairing at Cinnamon Club and a Vegetarian Masterclass at Cinnamon Kitchen, hosted by head chef at Cinnamon Club Rakesh Ravindran Nair and manager Hari Nagaraj. I took away with me so many tips. Here are my favourites: A pinch of sugar: …

Vietnamese Chicken Pho

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Right. This might sound strange but I find nothing more satisfying than pulling the skin off a chicken – it’s like peeling off your support tights at the end of a long day (I hope this imagine doesn’t freak you out when you have a go yourself). Pho is a bowl of soup literally full to the brim with the big 5  flavours of Vietnamese cooking: sweet,sour, spicy, bitter, salty. Most of the ingredients you can find in any small supermarket. Feel free to use those squeezy bottles of ginger and lemongrass puree if you can’t get fresh, but don’t bother with dried herbs as they just won’t do the job. This recipe is so delicious, so virtuous, clean and fresh with subtle spice. A big bowlful will clear any cold or fill you up after a long day.. just make sure you take off your support tights before diving in. Serves 4 1 whole chicken 5 inch piece of ginger 2 sticks of lemongrass 3 hot red chillies 2 garlic cloves 1 stick of celery 2 star anise pods …

Giving in to the Instagram Fitspiration b****es again!

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I’m used to taking pictures of lovely food porn that makes my eyes bulge and my mouth drool. But today is Tuesday, the day before Monday, which (every week) is the beginning of my healthy eating regime (again) and, as well as flailing about in the free weights section,  i’m keeping a food diary to keep my meals in check. If I don’t I can happy end up eating two dinners quite without noticing. So here’s some sickeningly wholesome dishes that i’ve been knocking up in the last few days. I’ll be awaiting my medal in the post… If you’d like any of these virtuous recipes, do drop me a mail 🙂 x

Michael Sander’s E7 Supper Club

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The prospect of a night of communal eating with strangers can be a bit daunting. Especially when you’re not on holiday in a tropical village, sitting on the floor eating with your hands in an attempt to  ‘live like the locals’, and instead in London, where if you try to start a friendly conversation on the tube you’ll probably end up on the front page of the Metro as: Creepy Welsh girl who made conversation with stranger on London Underground is sentenced to 10 years imprisonment for too-social behaviour. But this week my boyfriend and I visited our first supper club and all our reservations were thrown out of the window. Michael Sanders (MasterChef 2014 Semi-finalist) and his girlfriend Naomi run their pop-up restaurant/ supper club every month in E7, underneath a railway arch, in The Wanstead Tap. A table of 20 sat people from all walks of life, some locals, some from far away; but we all had one thing in common. We all just wanted to eat great food – that is the beauty of …

Baconnaise, with Sweet Potato Fries

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The first time I had baconnaise was at GBK; what a revelation. I know it has become the trend in recent years to add bacon to everything (just type Bacon into Buzzfeed and you’ll find bacon jam, bacon sushi, bacon wrapped pizzas, chocolate bacon… i’m going to be sick!) Where most of these sound pretty gruesome to me, baconnaise – mayonnaise flavoured with smokey bacon, with crispy bits – is divine, especially with sweet potato fries. I couldn’t find a good recipe anywhere (and GBK don’t post their ingredients online…damn cheeky) so i’ve been trying to replicate it myself. And i’ve gone and cracked it!   Serves 2 Ingredients   2 large sweet potatoes 3 good quality smoked streaky bacon rashers 250ml mayonnaise 2 egg whites light olive oil 3 tbsp flour 2 tsp smoked paprika ½  tsp garlic powder a pinch of celery salt black pepper Add the bacon rashers to the cold griddle pan, turn the heat on high and cook until really crispy on both sides. Remove the bacon and leave on a …

Avocado & Lime Houmous

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Two years ago ready made houmous was my shopping basket essential – you can dip in almost everything, and it doesn’t break the bank leaving more money for your night out (it also makes for amazing late night/ early morning snack when the kebab shops are all closed). But now i’m no longer a student, and try to think a lot more about my waste line, and making everything from scratch. Avocados are now a shopping basket staple and so the avocado houmous was born. All you really need is a food processor, and something to dip in. I like to keep mine chunky – its nice to get a good chunk of avocado on your nacho… Makes a good bowlful Ingredients 1 really ripe avocado 1 can chickpeas small bunch coriander extra virgin olive oil 1 garlic clove 1 lime ground cumin ground coriander ½ tsp chilli flakes Roughly chop the coriander, bash the garlic to remove the skin and add to the food processor with the drained chickpeas, cumin and coriander. Blitz a couple of …

Homemade Flatbread with Sticky Chicken Thighs & Curryslaw

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This is one of my favourite summer time evening meals. I used to buy flatbreads until I realized how blimmin’ easy they are to make at home, and how much tastier they are too! Indian coleslaw is a revelation, and goes PERFECTLY with sticky tender chicken thighs and fluffy flatbreads. Watch the video for this recipe here: Ingredients (serves 4) For the Sticky Chicken 4 chicken thighs, skin and bone removed 1 tbsp curry powder ½ tsp garlic powder ½ tsp onion powder ½ tsp mustard powder 2 tbsp honey 1 tsp black and white sesame seeds olive oil salt and pepper For the flatbread 160g self raising flour 140g full fat greek yoghurt 1 tsp sesame seeds 1 tsp mustard seeds 1 tsp cumin seeds 1 tsp fennel seeds salt and pepper For the Curryslaw 1 small red onion ½ red cabbage 2 carrot 4 spring onions small bunch coriander 1 lime 1 pomegranate 100g mayonnaise 50g creme fraiche 1 tsp garam masala ½ tsp turmeric ½ tsp nigella seeds salt and pepper For the coleslaw, peel …

Korean Fried Jumbo Chicken Wings

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If you’re in London, you have to try pop-up Izakaya ‘Beer & Buns’. Their jumbo fried chicken wings are served in 3 flavours and are seriously unctuous and morish – my fave is  Tebasaki Soy Garlic and is what gave me the inspiration for this recipe. Hot, juicy, tender chicken, with a proper crunchy KFC batter and a rich sauce that’s spiked with chilli and crammed with garlic and sticks to everything it gets in contact with (making it the worst first date food in history). I just had to bring this flavour into my own kitchen. I’ve never made proper fried chicken before so took inspiration from one of my favourite bloggers Helen Graves’ PKFC (Peckham Korean Fried Chicken) recipe. The sauce is the result of all my favourite Korean ingredients shaken about in a pan, and it’s magic. You can used it as a dipping sauce for prawn crackers or spring rolls, spread over roast chicken or pork, or tossed in noodles and stir fry. Korean Fried Jumbo Chicken Wings  (serves 3 – …