Monday 28 April 2014

A Tasty Monday

Last years Easter bank holiday I was nursing a hangover and eating pizza, oh how times have changed. This year I baked these little bad boys.....

..went to the garden center (when did I get so old!) and also cooked this spicy little beauty.

I really hate to admit this but this is based on a ready meal I had. A M&S one I might add.....but a ready meal non the less. However this was much tastier and so easy to make. Don't be put off by the long list of ingredients (is there any Asian recipe that doesn't say that in the foreword?), all are available from the supermarket.

What you need


500g pork mince
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 thumb piece of ginger, grated
2 spring onions, finely sliced
3 tbsp Toban Jhan (chilli bean paste)
1 tbsp tahini
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp sesame oil
1 tbsp tomato puree
1 tbsp soft brown sugar
1 packet of red miso soup
1 tsp Sichuan pepper corns
2 packs udon noodles
handful kale and tenderstem broccoli

What you need to do


This is a really quick dish to cook so get yourself organised first. Boil the kettle for the noodles and have the garlic, spring onions and ginger together in a bowl. Then in another bowl mix the Toban Jhan, tahini, soy sauce, sesame, puree, sugar, red miso and pepper.

Get a wok smoking hot with a tbsp of oil and then add the mince. Cook until crispy and then drain on kitchen paper.

Add another tsp of oil into the wok and then stir fry the ginger mixture for roughly a minute. Add the liquids with a cup of water, broccoli and  then bring to the boil. 

Put the noodles on. Add the pork and kale to the mixture and cook until the kale is cooked. Mix with the noodle and serve.


Monday 21 April 2014

A Love Story



This post is ridiculously overdue. Like February overdue. So apologies but hey,I got there in the end.

In February I was fortunate enough to be invited to the most beautiful wedding in Seattle. The Groom was my old flatmate Danny, one of the most amazing boys with the best ear lobes in the entire world. Danny was marrying the love of his life, Maddie. Their story truly is a love story. It's one of those stories that brings tears to your eyes and makes you believe that fairy tales truly are real.

They met on the back of a taxi in Thailand (Maddie saved Danny's life, sigh) and it was love at first sight. They carried on their love over Facetime and the other techy wonders of the modern world. Danny went to visit her. She came to visit him. Then they decided to get married.

I was devastated to loose Danny (only because he was my mechanic, not because he was awesome) but over the moon that these two wonderful people were making their love official.

True love
So, in February half term a group of us went over to Seattle. I have to say that before this trip I had slightly bad view of Americans, I don't really know why but I found them annoying. Well not anymore. Every single person I met in Seattle was amazing. There was drinking, hoola hooping, Spice Girls and lots of laughter and it truly was one of the best holidays ever. And then came the wedding.

Maddie is one of those amazingly creative people and their wedding was a testament to her talents. Which brings me nicely on the the point of this point which is these little bad boys. There were lots of amazing things about that week and this was definitely one of them. They are SO nutty, chewy and just amazing; simply the best cookie I have ever eaten. They were so good I smuggled some back to the UK (I was so scared of being arrested that I showed them to the bored patrol guy and asked if I was in trouble, he looked at me like I was a nut job - a peanut job......) Maddie is an awesome baker and these are her brainchild. Find the recipe here and definitely check out her other culinary delights.



The only thing that was changed was I used crunchy peanut butter. This was only because the cookies I had were made by Maddie's mum who used crunchy. I'm not going to argue. You can by Crisco off Amazon. DO NOT use butter, it wont work. If you don't want to invest in Crisco (these are so worth it) then use Trex with an extra tbsp of butter.




Photos of Maddie and Danny were taken by their very talented photographers, website here