kitchenlaptop

Let's see how this works then.

2010-05-29T12:25:00.001+01:00

Test post!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

So, I'm still here...

2010-05-29T11:12:00.002+01:00

What a long time it's been!

Having a long weekend off work at the moment has me returning to kitchenlaptop.com to lament on my inability to blog as much as I originally wanted to.

In a way it's because I always find myself flitting from one thing to another and getting caught up in the moment. Realistically it's because I'm lazy and indecisive!

Hopefully I should be able to get some thoughts on here more often as I treated myself to a shiny new iphone and can post directly. My poor trusty laptop is feeling sorry for itself though as it's been gathering dust of late, so I decided I'd let him out today for a while!

Hopefully I'll be here more. Sometimes cooking, sometimes out and about, sometimes just wittering on as usual.

Speak soon!

Back with a bang!

2009-08-26T16:47:00.004+01:00

I apologise about the lack of posts of late. Life gets in the way and the school summer holidays are here.
I'm busy marinading some tuna at the moment and will post the results a little later today, with any luck. Wasabi, soy sauce, chilli, brown sugar, lemon and sesame oil....pan-seared tuna me thinks!

MMMMMMMM!!!!!

Here's another creation from a couple of weeks ago for you to feast your eyes on:

Oven baked Butternut Squash wedges with Rocket, Pastrami, Cucumber and Parmesan cheese. And a HUGE dollop of Sun dried Tomato and Basil Hummus! I could eat this everyday!

Plumtastic pud.

2009-07-24T21:48:00.015+01:00

I recently bought 2 punnets of plums that needed eating up pretty quick. They were reduced in price as they were already ripe so being the bargain hunter that I am, I figured I could find a recipe to use them up and grabbed them off the shelf at the supermarket. Each punnet had about 9 plums in and was reduced to 49p! That's less than 6p per plum!I had 18 plums to squeeze into a recipe and I had to do it quick before the plums went bad.

I found a basic cake recipe and amended it as always. The results were pretty good and the plums didn't go to waste. Result!

I'd definitely say it's a "pudding" type of cake rather than an "afternoon tea" type of cake. You eat it with a spoon and a smile, not dainty fingers and a napkin. It's heavy and filling and would go great with hot custard on a cool Autumn evening. Since it's not Autumn yet and the weather's still nice I paired it with chilled lavender cream.

Honey and Almond Plum Cake with Lavender Cream

Ingredients

For the cake

90g butter
80g soft brown sugar
4 Tbs of your favourite honey. I used Eucalyptus honey
1 tsp of baking powder
35g toasted flaked almonds (bake some plain flaked almonds until nicely toasted whilst preheating the oven)
135g of plain flour
2 large eggs (beaten)
2 Tbs milk
Loads of plums! I used about 12 I think. Maybe more. I might have eaten a couple whilst baking though ;) Half and stone them.
Pinch of salt

For the topping

45g butter
75g sugar
3/4 tsp cinnamon
2 eggs (beaten)

For the Lavender Cream

600ml double cream
1 1/2 Tbs of fresh lavender flowers
2 Tbs honey (again I used Eucalyptus honey)

First of all mix the ingredients together for the Lavender cream in a bowl. You can use a wooden spoon to bruise the lavender flowers whilst in the cream to release more flavour. Place cream mixture in the fridge to chill then get on with the cake!

In a mixing bowl cream together the butter with the sugar until light and creamy.

Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together.

Whisk the eggs and the milk together.

Add a little of the sifted flour and the egg mixture into the creamed butter at a time, mixing well between each addition, until it is all thoroughly mixed. I used my electric hand mixer.

Add the toasted almonds and stir well.

Spoon the cake mixture into a cake tin. I use a 9"/24cm spring form cake tin. Butter the insides and line the base with baking paper if you like.
Smooth the mixture down gently then arrange the plum halves cut side up on top of it. I squeezed in a few extra pieces in between the halves.

To make the topping, melt the butter, stir in the sugar and cinnamon and when cooled a little mix in the eggs. I have to admit, I didn't want to put the topping on as the plums looked so nice but I figured I better to try it out. I'm sorry plums! I feel like I've drowned you!

Spoon the topping over and around the plums on the cake and bake in the middle of your oven on gas mark 4 for 1 hour until set.

This cake makes your kitchen smell gorgeous!

Remove from the oven and cool on a wire rack for a while before removing tin.

Remove the cream mixture from the fridge and strain through a fine sieve to remove flower pieces. Slice cake, pour on cream and enjoy! Any extra Lavender flowers can be used for decoration.

Do you Lovefoodhatewaste???

2009-07-24T19:52:00.006+01:00

I feel terrible for not posting for over a week now so I'd like to apologise. I've had some lovely meals and cooked some dishes that were delicious but nothing I've made felt inspired/inspiring enough to post here.
I have yesterday baked up a late-night cake that I want to share with you all but first I found something which I think is pretty important, and I know a lot of you amazing cooks out there will feel the same.

I came across a fantastic, informative site called Lovefoodhatewaste.
It's a UK based site but has some great ideas and tips for you where ever you are in the world.

Now the main reason I love Lovefoodhatewaste is the fact that it doesn't preach how terrible we all are and then tell us to change. It gives us the facts and then gives us a huge amount of ideas on how to change our cooking and eating habits to be kinder to the planet and importantly to save money.

Have a look at the tabs along the right-hand side of the site.
There's some great tips for food storage, a 2 week meal planner, a diary download to track your waste food, loads of recipes for leftovers from other cooks and celeb chefs, and my favourite part: the Perfect Portion planner!

If you're cooking family meals day in, day out, then you'll know how easy it is to overestimate the amount of pasta, rice, veggies etc you need. Sometimes it just feels easier to use a whole bag of pasta or add a few extra florets of broccoli to make sure there's enough. The Perfect Portion Planner takes the guess work out of serving sizes so you no longer have leftover carrots sitting limp and cold after everyone has had their fill. Less waste means more money saved as your food goes further.

As well as showing us how to make some great savings it highlights the alarming problem of food waste and how the impact affects the planet and our purses. Throwing away a little food leftover from a meal doesn't seem such an issue, does it? And that pack of ham in the fridge went out of date yesterday so what's the big deal?

Well, if you think of the resources that went into producing the food you throw away then that's when you realise how much of an impact it has on everyone. Energy and water were used to grow the food and produce the packaging. Fuel was used to ship it to the store you bought it from.

If that still doesn't get the message through then consider this:

If we stopped food waste in the UK then the impact on carbon emissions would be the same as taking 1 in 5 cars off UK roads.

And to make it absolutely clear:

As of 2008 there are 34.2 million registered vehicles in the UK according to the Department for Transport website.
Eradicating food waste would have the same impact as taking approximately 6.84 million cars off the UK roads!

The UK throws away 6.7 million tonnes of food every year. For a population of almost 61 million that's pretty appalling. But consider that the food we throw away costs each family £420 on average per year then this is also completely ludicrous. (That's $690 for you readers across the pond!)
I know I would rather have the money to spend on my home and family than dumping my hard earned cash in a landfill site! I'm sure you all agree.

Lovefoodhatewaste is all about showing us how to be creative cooks and eat great meals without it costing us the Earth!

So go check it out. Add your voice and leave a tip. I love the message it's trying to get across so much that I added one of there buttons to my site here.
It's not all about saving the planet. It's about saving you money too, which I just know you wanna do!

Sweets for my sweet.

2009-07-16T21:19:00.009+01:00

I noticed in a local shop recently that they had some large chocolate bars on special (which is always a good thing!) I decided to grab a few a cook up some sweet treats using up some raspberries I had spare. I love kitchen experiments!

Since I usually prefer savoury recipes I figured this would make a nice change and it would keep my kids happy as they get to taste test the results!
Now, don't get me wrong, I like chocolate but I'm not a huge fan. I prefer fruity tastes if a course is gonna be sweet so I knew that the raspberry taste would have to shine through to get my approval.

I decided on making truffles but that idea quickly went out the window as I wasn't following any recipe and the mixture I ended up with was just a teeny bit too soft.
Never-the-less, the results turned out pretty good and I'll definitely try this again with other flavourings to see if it turns out as nice.

So on with the show. Look away now if you're on a calorie controlled diet!

Raspberry and White Chocolate Cream in Dark Chocolate Baskets
(Makes approx 80)

Ingredients

4 x 100g bars of White Chocolate
600ml Double Cream (approx 1 pint!)
200ml fresh Raspberry Puree or enough raspberries to make this much!
2 x 100g Dark Chocolate (I used Lindt Dark with Sea Salt)
Raspberries and cocoa powder for decoration.

See, it's sounding pretty simple already. Just a few ingredients needed.

What to do:

First of all, try not to eat too much of the ingredients whilst making it or you might not have as many finished chocolate baskets.
If you find it too hard to resist just make sure you eat a little of every ingredient so the recipe stay pretty much the same!
Now that's out the way let's get on with it.

Grate or finely chop the white chocolate and place in a large bowl. Don't be alarmed if you grate it and it looks like toenail clippings! It still tastes gorgeous and no one will see it like that. Now is a good time to eat a little bit if you really must.

Pour the double cream into a medium saucepan and slowly bring to the boil, stirring gently.
Pour the boiling cream onto the white chocolate and stir until all the chocolate has melted.

Add the raspberry puree and a pinch of salt and whisk until all nicely mixed together. It should be a pinkish colour and smell heavenly!

Pour the mixture into a deep tray and refrigerate for a couple of hours minimum.

When time's up, break up the dark chocolate and place in a ovenproof dish. Place it over a pan of boiling water on a low heat giving it a stir to make sure there's no lumps.

Drop a small amount of the melted cholate into a load of silicone mini-muffin cases and swirl it around until the sides and bottom of the cases are coated in a thin layer of chocolate. Pop these on a plate and chill them in the fridge until set hard. Carefully peel the silicone cases off. You should be left with little chocolate baskets just ready for filling.
You may have to repeat this step a few times if you haven't got a huge stash of silicone cases.

Take the raspberry and white chocolate cream mixture out the fridge and set out your chocolate baskets on a tray.
Carefully spoon some of the raspberry mixture into each basket.
I used a butter knife to add a little extra of the mixture to each basket and gently press it down.

Try and keep everything as cool as possible whilst working with the baskets and don't handle them if you can as they are fragile and are prone to melting!

Once you've filled each basket to your liking. Sprinkle each one with a little cocoa powder and decorate with a few pieces of raspberry. Refrigerate until ready to serve. Eat and enjoy!

Did I mention a made a few baskets in full size silicone muffin cases too!!! All I have to do now is decide if it would be a bad thing to pour cream over the giant chocolate baskets and serve them as a dessert?

Ceviche, capiche?

2009-07-14T18:12:00.014+01:00

The internet is a great way to find new ingredients and ideas, I'll admit it. But what makes cooking even more fun for me is to cut loose from the recipe and make some changes every once in a while. Spice things up, ammend the amount, skip a suggestion and do your own thing! Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I hit upon a winner looking to make my first ever ceviche. Well, I think so anyway! I'd browsed for ideas and was forming a plan in my head of what I wanted in it. :)

I had crayfish tails to use up and a load of prawns that I'd been looking forward to. The local fruit and veg shop had the most delicious looking vine tomatoes so I grabbed a few on the way home, along with a huge fresh cucumber, some spring onions and bunch of coriander. I'd forgotten limes but figured lemons would work fine this time. I wasn't planning on "cooking" the seafood with the lime juice this time! I really just wanted to get an idea of the flavours together.
The idea was taking shape! These tomatoes smell divine! I'm not a huge tomato fan but these are amazing. I got home this evening and got started.
He's how it went:

Crayfish and Prawn Ceviche Wraps

Ingredients (makes approx 4 wraps)

180g cooked Crayfish Tails (I used a tub of brined tails)
180g Prawns (shelled and cooked)
1 medium Red Onion
1 Pointed Sweet Red Pepper
4 Spring Onions
1 medium Avocado
2 large Tomatoes
5 inch piece of Cucumber
Juice of 3 Lemons
1 handful of fresh coriander
2 tbsp Tomato Puree
2tsp Easy Chilli (approx 2 small chillis)
Seasoning of your chioce.

Here's what I did:
Roughly dice 1 large tomato and the cumber and place in a large mixing bowl, seeds, juice and all.
Small dice the red onion, spring onions and red pepper.
Put it all in the mixing bowl with the tomato and cucumber then throw in the crayfish and prawns.

Looks great already doesn't it? Yum! After being sorely tempted to just scoff it all there and then, I resisted enough to get on with the recipe. I'm glad I did too!

Next, roughly dice the avocado and leftover tomato.

Blitz the tomato in a blender till really squished. Add the avocado, coriander, tomato puree, lemon juice and chillis (or easy chilli) and pulse until pretty well blended.

Season it at this point as well. I used freshly ground black pepper, a little salt and some ground red chilli flakes.

From this: To this: It doesn't exactly look that great but the smell of coriander is amazing and it tastes fabulous! It has a lovely strong lemon and coriander flavour to it and a real chilli kick.
Let's get it mixed in!

Fold the mixture into the crayfish, prawns and diced veggies carefully so as to keep the seafood from getting broken up.

I stirred in 1 tbsp of mayo and a couple of spoonfuls of sweetcorn at this point but only to hold it together a little better and to add even more colour! Don't use if you don't want to.

Pop it in a suitable container and place in the fridge for 1 hour minimum.

When you're ready to serve it, place some mixed salad leaves on a soft salsa tortilla and top with the ceviche. Roll and enjoy!

Think I might have another one for supper! :P

Crazy Combination Comes Up Trumps.

2009-07-12T13:11:00.008+01:00

So I figured I better use up a few bits and pieces lying about in my fridge from the past few days. I decided on baked potatoes as I had 4 large potatoes leftover that needed using up before they sprouted, and it's easy to throw a topping on a potato and come up with something tasty for lunch!

Hmmm....what needs using up?

Soft cheese? Check!
Eggs? Check!
Onuga? Check!

Not enough ingredients. There's something missing. But what?

Aaahhh! Of course. Tinned mackerel fillets in tomato sauce!
For a recipe that came about from leftovers, the results are pretty amazing!

Mackerel, Boiled Egg and Onuga Baked Potatoes

You'll need (makes 6 potato halves):

3 Large potatoes
2 x 125g tins of Mackerel Fillets in Tomato Sauce
4 Eggs
175g of Reduced Fat Soft Cheese (I used 4% fat but you can use full fat if you're feeling devilish!)
4 tsp of Onuga
Butter
Black Pepper

Method:

Baked your potatoes so they're soft and fluffy inside. I nuked mine in the microwave but you tradionalists can oven bake them if you like. Hard boil and peel your eggs whilst you're at it.

Grab a big mixing bowl and tip in both tins of mackerel in tomato sauce. Next add the soft cheese. Mix them together until it's a lovely pinky colour and a bit sloppy.
Chop and add the eggs and give them a quick stir. I left them quite chunky for mine. Add a few teaspoons of Onuga and some fresh black pepper then mix it all together. I didn't add salt since the mackerel and Onuga are pretty salty.

Half your baked potatoes (careful, they're hot!)
Scoop out the insides leaving about a 0.5cm wall around the edges. Add the scooped out potato to your pink mackerel mixture along with a tablespoon of butter. Stir it all up. I aimed for some soft chunks of potato in the mixture rather than trying to blend it too smoothly. I figured it would make the texture a little more exciting.

It should now look a little something like this:

Place the potato halves on a baking tray and spoon the mixture into them. Fill them really full then plop a small dollop of butter on the top of each one like so...

Pop them in the oven at around gas mark 6 (200 C) for about 15 - 20 minutes until they're starting to brown.

Serve with salad and enjoy!

I'm loving the weekend!

2009-07-11T10:14:00.004+01:00

I am the biggest fan of weekends ever! I mean they are absolutely the best part of my week.
In celebration of it being Saturday and to show my love, I made some cute eggs in warm rolls for the kids and my breakfast this morning. A slathering of our favourite sauce and they were a perfect start to the day.

Any Saturday that starts with a heart-shaped egg is just destined to be great!

Have a great Saturday everyone :)

Yo Sushi!!!

2009-07-09T21:28:00.009+01:00

My oldest sons birthday today was just another excuse to be getting creative in the kitchen.
He decided we were to have sushi and I bought the supplies. I bought alot of supplies. As in, FAR too many supplies.
Expect to see more sushi pics in the near future as I try to use up everything I've bought!

We sorted the ingredients we wanted to use and got cooking. Since it was our first ever sushi-making session we decided to stick with easy ingredients. We chopped and prepped the fillings whilst the sushi rice was cooking.
The rice was cooled a little and then I mixed in a rice wine vinegar, sugar and salt mixture to get the taste right. Unfotunately I forgot to buy mirin so had to make do without) It was pretty straight forward but a bit messy. One important point to remember....keep your hands wet, it makes things so much easier.

Here's what we made:

Maki roll filled with mackerel, prawn, soft cheese, sesame seeds and cucumber.

Gunkan maki topped with Onuga.

Maki roll filled with crab stick, avocado and sweet red pepper.

Maki roll filled with Mackerel, avocado and tamagoyaki (Japanese omelette)

So pretty!

Rolling them got easier with practice.

Served with cucumber garnish, ginger, wasabi and soy.

Surprisingly easy and fun to make, and delicious to eat. Next time I'll have to try some other combinations of fillings. I might even make some at the weekend since I'm off work and have a huge amount of sushi ingredients to use up! :)
I'll let you all know how it goes!

Turning Japanese! Bento continued...

2009-06-24T22:34:00.011+01:00

Just a quick post to add a few new pics this week! I've been carrying on with the bento every morning but they're nowhere near as cool as some you can find online. But, hey, it's early days so I'm still happy with the results (plus it gets me thinking up new ideas for food combo's too!)

So...... a few more bento:

Japanese seaweed nuts, radish, cheese, cherries, grapes, iceberg lettuce, marinaded mushrooms and peppers.

Leftover noodles and pork with a few marinaded mushrooms, grapes, cherries, dried pineapple, cucumber, radish, raisins and iceberg lettuce.

Ham sandwiches, cheese, grapes, iceberg lettuce, carrots, red peppers and cherries for the kids.

Nothing too exciting or unusual but they make lunchtime a little brighter at work or school!

The carb pots (as I call them) have been either, rice, noodles, veggies or sandwiches for the kids. I marinaded/cooked some mushrooms, diced onion and red peppers in soy sauce, a little balsamic vinegar, lemon juice, basil and red chilli flakes to make a tastly carb pot for me and then stirred through a few cashews for good measure! Yum!

Here's the mushrooms soaking up some of the tasty marinade as they cook a little.

I also made pork and noodles in soy, sesame and satay sauce and had some of the leftovers in my bento too. Super tasty the next day and resourseful too as it uses up all the odd leftovers!

And that one above is the pork and noodles. I used plain and singapore style noodles to mix things up a little. As always, mushrooms were thrown in and a little sprinkling of red pepper over the top finished it off. Cold leftovers were lovely with a few sesame seeds added the next day.

As always, it's all about the fun I can have rather than the precision. Cooking should be free-form sometimes as the results can be suprising in a good way!

So, there you go. Just a few things I've been cooking up this week. Stay tuned to see what else gets rustled up next in my kitchen and let me know if you've got any ideas, tips or comments!

Big in Japan

2009-06-22T17:19:00.007+01:00

So I've been reading up on Bento recently and decided to have a go at making bento box lunches for the kids and me to try. I came across justbento.com and found it to be a fount knowledge, so I made our first bento lunches today!

That site is amazing for anyone looking to find out more about bento as they have some great recipe ideas and all the info you'd ever need on bento. It's saved to my favourites already.
So a bento is a home prepared packed lunch, Japan style! Rice is popular alongside meat, vegetables, fruit and sauces. Often the appearance of the food is considered very important too and some of the lunches look too cute to eat!
Personally think it's a great way to make school lunches fun and healthy and use up left overs fro dinner the night before aswell as help me spend less in the works canteen! :)

I worked out a rough menu of items to put in our lunch boxes for our first bento.

They were:

Iceberg lettuce
Cucumber slices
Carrot batons
Egg fried rice
Kiwi fruit slices
Seedless grapes
Cherries
Fresh ground beefburger
Hard boiled egg
Mini hotdogs

All easy to prepare and easy to eat finger foods. They turned out pretty good and I'm thinking up new ideas already for food to put in them as the kids loved the idea (although a few friends thought they were weird!)

I've made up some mini falafel burgers and put them in the freezer. I need to get some sushi rice and nori to include too as I wanna do a sushi supper soon and a few Nigiri would be great in our bento. Nuts, seeds, noodles, egg rolls, lychee and chicken will all make an appearance soon with luck.

All in all, bento are great fun to make if you set aside a little extra time the night before for preparation and also in the morning for packing your lunch. Definitely worth the trouble to keep lunch times interesting! I could have happily played about and made loads of different bento today but I had to go to work!

Here's a few pics I managed to snap before heading out this morning. Hope you like them. (Google "bento" if you wanna see some lunches that are works of art! )

So cute!

Rice and cashews (above)
Or
Bread and butter (below) for my fussy boy!

Go, get organised and make your bento!

Mamma Mia!

2009-06-17T19:03:00.014+01:00

I can hardly move from my table as I'm so stuffed! It's the same mistake every time I make pasta.....I cook too much of it!

Tonights dinner was to make a change from the pizzas the kids have been having recently in the evenings. I wanted fresh food. Real fresh food that needed chopping and stirring and preparation! With no recipe in mind, dinner was gonna be fun for me. The kids would probably hate it but I didn't care! Junk food can be a bore after a while.

First off was quick and easy prep. Dice a large red onion and slice about 12 mushrooms. Throw them in a pan with a little oil and a dab of butter and leave them to soften down on medium heat. Only stir them when they need it. They taste better if you leave them to their own devices and quit hassling them for a while.

Whilst they're cooking, trim some green beans and find a medium pan to put them in. Top with boiling water and cook for a few minutes, depending on how soft you like them.

I tipped a couple of bags of fresh tortelloni in a larger saucepan. I chose it filled with cheddar, ricotta, prosciutto and smoke ham figuring it was more child-friendly than some of the others I could've chose. Top up with boiling water and a pinch of salt and turn on the heat. Don't do what I did and out too much water in as the tortelloni expands and floats when it's ready and mine looked like it was trying to escape! Remember that fresh pasta is quick to cook. Don't overcook it!

Since the onion and mushrooms were softened down nicely, I added some crushed garlic, a tub of creme fraiche and gave it a stir over low heat. Next in the pan were a handful of torn fresh basil and a larger handful of chopped chives. A grinding or two or black pepper and it was looking good.

Once it was all pretty much ready I drained the pasta and beans. The pasta was tossed in a little olive oil and sprinkled with grated cheese, whilst the beans were mixed with a tiny bit of butter, a few drops of lemon juice and a dash of salt.

Serve with a crusty garlic bread and enjoy. Just don't eat too much like i did!

Late Night Baking.

2009-06-09T23:08:00.005+01:00

So I decided to use up some of the fresh fruit that I had leftover from yesterdays fruit salad and meringue dessert. Only problem is I decided at around 10pm tonight to use it up. By baking!
I figured muffins would be good as there's a lot of upheaval and changing departments at work at the moment and I could take a few in tomorrow to cheer people up.
I decided on a kind of Spiced Fresh Fruit and Honey Muffin! Basically a pretty standard muffin mix that I added to and messed about with.

Spiced Fresh Fruit and Honey Muffins
190g Self raising flour
150g White sugar
3g Salt
1 Medium egg
80ml Milk
80ml Vegetable oil
1 Large nectarine, stoned and diced
Approx 15 cherries, stoned and halved
Approx 20 blueberries
1/2 tsp of cinnamon
1/2 tsp of nutmeg
20ml Honey
1tbs Fine cut orange marmalade Directions are kinda easy. Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl, then mix in the wet ingredients, then fold in the fresh fruit!
I like playing about with a recipe like this as you can try any combination of fruit you like.

I spooned the mixture into little paper muffin cases and manage to fill 12. They were popped in the over at around Gas mark 5/6 for about 15 minutes and they look pretty cute now they're done.

They taste good too! Especially straight from the oven with the fruit still warm. Mmmm!
There's maybe a bit too much fruit in them for some people but I like it like that. It's as if the cake part is holding together the jumbled fruit mixture. The nutmeg and cinnamon work well with the sharper fruit flavours too. Basically, they're a hit. With me they are anyway.

My kids can try some of them in the morning and I'll take a few into work for friends. If they last that long.
Maybe.

It's Getting Hot in Here!

2009-06-09T18:15:00.019+01:00

And I'm not talking about the weather!
I remembered to pick up some fresh salad, yoghurt and mushrooms on the way home this evening which put me in the mood for cooking a dinner kit that's been lurking in the cupboard for the past month. Now most people have heard of Ainsley Harriott, smiling TV chef extraordinaire. Having spied him grinning at me from a shelf in my local shop I figured I'd give the kit a go. Plus it was on special. Only £1!

Easy peasy....just supply your own minced lamb and yoghurt and you can make a delicious Keema Masala with Roti Bread. Supposedly. Inside the kit are an assortment of sachets containing everything else you need.

Basmati rice with spices

Scarey dried vegetables

Yummy smelling spices

...and Roti Bread mix.
Here it is just before I made it into dough.

Oh, you also get Raita seasoning to mix in with some yoghurt but I forgot to snap a picture of it and it sat chilling in the fridge whilst I got cooking.
I fried up the mince plus threw in a few mushrooms too as everything tastes better with mushrooms. I added the weird dry veggies, some water and the spices and let it do it's thing for 20 mins. The rice was boiled and I dry fried the Roti breads then brushed with melted butter whilst the Masala was thickening.

I've got to hand it to Mr Harriott, the results were fab.

From this......

To this......

Not bad for a cheat kit for dinner. A meal for 2 that's as simple as it is tastey.

One word of warning though. The box states it's "mild". I have to disagree. It's a definite "medium"!

Lets Get Fruity!

2009-06-08T20:41:00.002+01:00

Quick after dinner treat for me and the kids tonight. Strawberries, cherries, grapes, blueberries and nectarine in a light balsamic vinegar and sugar dressing. Yum!
Double yum was the fact that we piled the fruit salad on top of meringue nests and cream and topped it with chocolate shavings!

The leftover fruit salad is going in tomorrows pack lunch that the kids take to school. Unless of course, I eat it when they go to bed in 5 minutes! Which is more likely.

The Start.

2009-06-08T18:54:00.002+01:00

Today, I figured I would make a start on this blog. My day-to-day life is pretty much the same everyday. I wake up reluctantly, get myself and the kids ready for the day and then head to work. I finish work, pick the kids up, walk home (usually picking some shopping up on the way) and make dinner.
I bet a million people do the exact same thing everyday too.

When I get home I sit at the kitchen table in my open-plan livingroom/kitchen and turn on my laptop whilst cooking, drinking a cuppa and chilling out. The kids do their thing and I occasionally look over at the TV to see the latest on Hannah Montanah and Spongebob.

To be honest, I would be lost without my laptop. It's my little buddy who never ceases to amaze me. I have sites I check out everyday, games I play often and when I'm in the mood, it shows me a million different recipes that keep me entertained for hours. Food porn at it's finest! It's hard not to drool!

I hope on this blog to show you, dear reader, some of the creations I come up with tucked away in my kitchen in this little corner of England. They might be simple, they might be more challenging. They might be a huge success and, of course, they might be a huge disaster. Who knows! I also wanna share some of the fab recipes found whilst delving into all the food porn websites I find!

Hopefully you'll like what you see. Enjoy!