Strawberry Jam Cakes

It took an “English Garden Summer Party” theme at last month’s Guilty Pleasures to get me thinking about ‘cupcakes’ a bit differently. Always one to bring a new signature cupcake to the monthly gig – I felt this was an opportune time to bake alongside the theme. That said, “English Garden Summer Party” brought up images of croquet, linen, strawberries and cream and Victoria sponge – the last two of which while inspirational, are not exactly cupcake friendly. Leave it to the domesticated goddess and former tax invader Martha Stewart to come up with the perfect solution for me.

These little mini cakes wooed both the Dream Bears and SpandXXX, didn’t wilt in the July ‘heat’, and have been lovingly added to my permanent collection. I honestly can't remember the last time I swooned over something that's come out of my oven, quite as much as these cakes.

With their dose of strawberry jam (or whichever your preference) hidden in the middle these are nuggets of pure gold. Even better, without a typical cupcake frosting (ala buttercream or cream cheese) one can (and did) justify eating them for breakfast, mid-day snack, and dessert.

swine shwine...

It really is on the tips of everyone’s tongues. Long lost are excuses based on allergies and hay fever. The common cold has gone by the wayside like obvious excessive consumption. In its place, with every sniffle, cough and tissue are looks that could peel paint. I’ll admit I’ve perpetuated this problem. Stick me next to someone on the Tube with even a slight sniffle and I physically turn my body and even give a bit of an eye raise glare too. My antibacterial gel is my new accessory of choice. This was all well and good until I was the one sitting at work last Monday thinking:

11:00 am: “Dang, my allergies are really bad today. I’m feeling quite congested.”

12:00 pm: “Hmmm, I’ve a bit of a tickle in my throat...that’s just symptomatic of being STARVING. What’s for lunch?”

2:00 pm: “Hmmm, my allergies don’t really ever give me a sore throat. Must be some new cleaning product they have introduced to the office.”

4:00 pm: “Cough. Cough. Cough. Achoo. Cough. Cough. Cough. I feel like a dumpster garbage truck. How am I getting home on the Tube without people taking me out?”

One week later I’m still quarantined in my flat - having been sent home from work. My pleas of "I'm REALLY fine" made no difference to those who really didn't want to be sat near a coughing sneezing mess. Still, I’ve made it out a fair bit (nothing short of bringing Miss Candi Cupcakes out for a performance at Koko) – and even snuck into the office three days last week. Still, I've been “that person”. The one with the embarrassingly red nose, the one that was interviewing for a new project and had to say “sorry, probably best if I don’t shake your hand” , the one who has sworn over and over that “it’s not swine flu – if it was... certainly I’d have a fever and upset tummy (I didn’t) and wouldn’t have an appetite (I did).”

Lucky for me, in the midst of all of this I received my first ever “Organic Fruit and Veg” box from Abel and Cole. Technically for 1 person– forget about your '5 a day' – it was more like '12 a day'. There were so many carrots, potatoes, broad beans and zucchini I couldn’t even begin to think of what I was going to do with them. Throw in a massive head of cabbage and I was at a loss. Considering this was all just about when the cold was kicking off – I figured that a batch of vegetable and bean soup would work nicely.

Clearly with so many veggies to try and use up (and I only used about 2/3) my measurements were a bit off...and needless to say what was meant to be about 3-4 servings of veggie soup turned into 12.

I now say – swine flu – come if you must! My freezer is chock full with enough soup to get me (and my flatmate - she's having some for dinner tonight as she thinks she's coming down with whatever I have too) through a round of it...or really bad "allergies"...whatever comes first!

Relais de Venise L’Entrecôte

It really was the making of a Hollywood romcom. Three friends sitting around a table discussing life, debating love, eating good food and drinking wine. A pact was made – signed in (well, a secret steak sauce...naturally) with promises to return back to the same restaurant 12 months later. What would change in a year? Would relationships, psyches and work still be the same? What would they be proud (or maybe not so proud of)?

Fast forward to last Sunday, 12 months to the day. Not exactly all the drama that a Hollywood studio would have crammed into 90 minutes (which would have resulted in friend A dating friend B and friend C ending up gay)– but lots of real life none-the-less.

A few dating stories for the ages, one new love, a fair bit of sharing, a touch of smuttiness, about 30 pounds lost, a near battle with tears, a ‘professional’ dancer, and more promises for another check-in – in 12 more months.

Clearly the venue needed to be consistent - Relais de Venise L’Entrecôte. Perfect in its simplicity (I don't believe they even have a menu) and with locations in London, Paris, New York, and Barcelona, the restaurant does one thing – and one thing only. Thankfully it does it well - steak, salad, and frites accompanied by their secret sauce (which I’ve deconstructed to be about 75% butter, a bit of pesto, and a couple other special ingredients). Oh, and please don’t ask for your steak medium-rare (imposseeblah)! It is served rare or it is served medium. No maybes. No ifs. And certainly no in-betweens. It really is the perfect spot for the indecisive.

Keeping with our not-so-healthy theme of the evening we headed back to C’s flat for some home-made coconut strawberry cheesecake and a bit more gossip. Not usually a cheesecake fan, it had been a special request from B – having recently celebrated a 29th birthday. However, I impressively polished off more than B and C combined (somewhat atypical ) but again – may have been the boozy mango vodka I added into the mixture....a delicious addition I must admit!

Glastonbury Eats

As one who typically plans what she's eating 2 to 3 meals in advance, I was slightly worried about my first Glastonbury experience. In short I packed enough food for a family of 4 to survive the long weekend. Needless to say there was a fair bit that got binned in the end.

Weighing down my backpack:

3 litres of red wine
1 litre cranberry juice
1 litre tonic water
1 litre apple juice
Assortment of bottled water
Tins of tuna (3)
Cashews
Granola Bars (10)
Home-made banana-nut muffins (10)
Home made “Hidden Treasure” biscuits (20)
Thai Green Curry Rice Cakes
Harvest Grain Snacks (aka Sun Chips)
Apples (7)
Clementines (10)
Package of Ryvita
Package (large) or starbursts
(Miscellaneous items which I can’t completely remember)

It was a brilliant idea to bring food for breakfast; those apples and granola bars got eaten right up. Probably the only place I really got it wrong was with the beverages. We used up the tonic water and apple juice when mixing our daily cocktails but probably 2.5 litres of the wine went to waste. Not surprisingly none of us really felt like drinking red wine when it was about 85 degrees out (unless it was chilled and being served in a sangria jug) which clearly it was not.

I’m not sure what I’d expected to see when it came to food at Glastonbury but there really was something for everyone. Worried that I’d be resigned to greasy burgers I managed to do quite well gobbling up a very tasty falafel wrap on the first day, some jerk chicken and salad which much to my surprise was perfectly ‘jerky’, a “Heidi Pie” (goats cheese, red onion and butternut squash) from Pieminster, late night post-Neil Young fish and chips, and one of my personal faves - the noodles with veggie tempura that I happened upon twice in 36 hours.

Surprisingly enough we actually only managed around 1 meal a day (not including breakfast detailed above). Occasionally there was also a midnight snack to be had. Clearly we were resigned to consuming most of our calories in a liquid version - found primarily in pints of cider throughout the day.

Winners and Losers

This month there have been some clear winners. Some of the losers have come up just a tad short and others miles off. For those that weren’t up to snuff…there was an element of rushing (trying to get two desserts out of my oven between 11 pm and 6:30 am (mid-week)) and others just didn’t fit as snugly as they should - although it didn’t stop me from eating them.

Winners:
Individual crustless cheddar, prosciutto, asparagus, mushroom quiches:
1. Filling
2. With salad, perfect for a mid-week dinner
3. EASY to make

Caramel cake (cupcakes) – both versions with slight variations made within a 72 hour period
1. Heaven
2. on
3. a
4. plate

Spinach Salad with roasted Aubergine, toasted pine nuts, grilled garlic chicken, pickled beets, feta and dried cranberries
1. Healthy
2. Perfect sweet, salty, bitter, tart combo
3. Except for setting of my smoke detector three x roasting the aubergine, EASY


Runner-up:
Chocolate brownies with fresh raspberries

I was told by one event attendee that the brownies were “the best brownies I have ever had in my entire life”. But seeing as the comment came from a professional nutritionist who eats products with sugar only once every 10 days I wasn’t sure if it was her sugar-deprived mind talking. I mean, I almost thought it could have been spoonful of fluff and she would have said the same thing. WEIRD.

2nd to last place:
Peanut chocolate caramel brownies

With a name as heavenly as this how could these have been bad? Well whatever random combination I threw together resulted in a cake like brownie – not a gooey fudgy bliss bar that I’d been hoping for. I really wanted to like them as indicated by eating 4 in a row – almost willing it, but in the end I just thought they were ok. Again, lots of friends thought they were great – but I wonder sometimes about these friends of mine…that maybe they're using the old positive reinforcement to just keep the food coming. I’m on to you guys!

Last place – relegated to el dumpster-o.
Coconut almond macaroons

Trying hard to get something made as quickly as possible and not having any time to make it to the supermarket resulted in these tasteless and gummy like cookies. Not my shining moment. Even when doused in really good dark chocolate - it was like wrapping Pamela Anderson up in Chanel.

Thai-tally Awesome

I hate peppers. I have always hated peppers. Except for black pepper in seasoning, I’ve never met a pepper I liked. In particular I hate bell peppers and I don’t discriminate by colour – yellow, green, red…they are all horrible. I mean really, what is it about peppers that makes them like large sweaty wife-beater wearing men on a hot, humid day…you can smell them from a mile off and they permeate everything they come near.

Now chili peppers are a slightly different story for me. I’d been under the assumption these too would be my Public Enemy #1. However, in the past year or so I’d noticed I didn’t really mind if I saw little flecks of red in my food – it gave whatever I was eating a little kick but didn’t actually taste like a pepper. Still, while I was happy to foray into the world of sweet chili sauce I’d never actually cooked with chili peppers in my life. Sad for someone as food-loving as myself, but what can I say? I’ve been a chicken.

Always looking for something new, interesting, quasi-healthy and easy to add to my ever growing list of dinner staples I recently made a “Thai Burger” recipe I’d found on the BBC food website.

Alongside the burgers:

- Corn and Cilantro fritters with a sweet chili sauce
- Strawberry, Raspberry and Rhubarb pie (didn’t really go with the Thai theme but I’d been craving some in-season rhubarb I was seeing at the farmer's market)

While it wasn’t meant to be a competition and all three items turned out well, the front runner of the night was definitely the Thai Burger. When I came across the recipe I’d been slightly concerned with the mention of a red chili pepper. What would it be like if I just skipped it? Where would I buy these strange peppers? I know, I know...I was being an idiotic scardy cat. I even almost scrapped the whole idea and went for a Beef Kofta recipe I’d seen instead. However, after realising that these chilies are as common as basil and thyme (in a little package at Waitrose with all the other fresh herbs) it just seemed silly to keep this battle with chili peppers going any longer.

The only tips I'd provide based on the as-is recipe below is that I went the ground pork route and thought it was outstanding. I also did a variation on their suggestion of sweet chili sauce on the bread. Instead I mixed equal portions sweet chili sauce and hoisin (plum) sauce and spread that on instead. And don't skip the cucumbers- fantastic with the burgers.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/thaispicedburgers_70173.shtml

American Girl

You can take the girl out of the US but you can’t take the US out of the girl. It’s now been over 2 years since I first moved from across the pond, and with my recent news that I won’t be kicked out of the country any time soon, I've been able to sit back, relax, ponder (and bake).

Contrary to friend's and family’s expectations, in my time here I've not acquired a faux British accent like Madonna (ok, perhaps on a night out if I get wound up). BUT to be fair – in equal measures when living in Boston I would whip out a Southie accent when having a few beeahs with my friends. It's always a good giggle.

While I may have skipped Madge's accent I’d be lying if I said I’d not acclimatised in some ways. Clearly I now use ‘s’s instead of ‘z’s (I blame that on work). On the flip side I do stick true to my roots by keeping words like ‘folks’ and ‘dang’ active in my vocabulary. At work, probably what makes me stick out the most as a stars and stripes lover is that I’m perpetually on time to meetings. My British counterparts find it socially expectable to start 5-10 minutes late…oh and I smile. Apparently it’s not ok to smile at people unless you’ve known them for a few years. If you haven't and you do you are deemed:

A. a psycho

B. on medication

C. a smitten stalker OR

D. all of the above

Eh, don’t get me wrong – I love my “glass is half empty” life here in London and I wouldn’t want it any other way. I mean invariably the glass fills up, you just have to be patient for about a day - because no doubt it's going to start raining again soon.

There are many things that are Americana to their core:
- Baseball
- Burgers
- Plastic Surgery
- Chocolate Chip/Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

I may have skipped the raisins because I was feeling greedy and wanted to double up on the chocolate instead, but last week I pulled out some amazing Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies. Ironically, even though the cookie is reminiscent of home, one of the best recipes I’ve come across is by Ozzie chef, Bill Granger. They were snatched and loved up in equally quick measures. I think it must be because with over 2 cups of oats they are actually “healthy", right?

The recipe comes from Bill's book "Bill's Food".

Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies

150g unsalted butter
230g soft brown sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
125g plain (all purpose) flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
a pinch of salt
235g rolled oats
175g chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 180C
2. Cream butter and sugar until fluffy and smooth
3. Add egg and vanilla and beat until smooth
4. Add flour, baking powder and salt into bowl and mix lightly
5. Add oats and chocolate chips and stir to combine
6. Roll tablespoons of mixture into balls and place on baking tray
7. Flatten with a fork dipped in flour
8. Bake 15-20 minutes, or until pale golden
9. Remove from oven and cool for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely