Deluxe Malteaser Traybake and S'more Parcels

Camping has always been a cold experience for me and so something incredibly chocolately is always needed for energy about 4 o’clock. This year, it was also someone’s birthday and so I decided to try out a Deluxe Malteaser Traybake which I had found on the Goddess’ Kitchen page who in turn had got it from Ruth’s Kitchen Experiment. It was incredibly rich, looked very yummy but was probably a bit sweet for most of the boys, although this meant the girls all got second dibs for once!

As I had a couple of digestives left and was bringing marshmallows, I decided to see if I could make some American campfire treats – S’mores. Traditionally, you toast a marshmallow until soft and then squidge between two graham crackers (closest UK equivalent is digestive biscuits I think) with a piece of chocolate. This creates a homemade wagon wheel (yeehaw!)

I’ve always felt this would be a bit tricky in the dark and so I decided to pre-make some S’more packages for the barbie. These were basically digestive sandwiches with a filling of chopped marshmallow and Nutella. I then packaged each sandwich up in a neat foil package (tight at the edges) and then sat these on the cooling bbq at the end of the night.

These worked a treat and I’ve even made them at home since we’ve been back. These will also be perfect for Bonfire Night.

Thai Basil Chicken

If I had to name my top 5 dishes, Thai Green Curry would definitely be one of them. When I first came to London, I lived in Clapham and used to visit The Pepper Tree frequently for their Thai Green Curry and Big Tum Noodles. I went through a spell of trying everything to recreate their delicious curry. I made fresh curry paste, I found a place that sold Thai aubergines, I even found fresh lime leaves, but somehow something was missing. That missing ingredient turned out to be Thai Basil. For me, that slight aniseed hit really makes all the difference.

Nowadays, I don't often make the paste myself, and I don't often by the Thai aubergines or fresh lime leaves. But the one thing that I will always go to the effort of buying is Thai Basil. A handful of leaves right at the end of the cooking is now essential for me.

The trouble is, in the Chinese supermarket where we buy it from, the basil comes in pretty big bundles. So what to do with the rest of it? The solution that we've come to is the recipe below for Thai Basil Chicken. This is a really tasty recipe that we have with rice. It has lots of sauce and is very flavourful due to the amount of oyster sauce, basil and chillies which are added. This is a slightly adapted version as we added a pepper and some mushrooms leftover. Now I like this dish almost as much as Thai Green Curry.

Ingredients:

- 2 garlic cloves
- 3-4 skinless and boneless chicken thighs, chopped
- 1 onion

- 1 pepper
- 5 mushrooms

- 4 tbsp oyster sauce

- 2 tbsp light soy sauce

- 1 tsp dark soy sauce

- 2/3 cup water

- 2 handfuls of Thai basil

- 2-3 chillies, chopped

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Method:

Heat some oil in a hot wok. Add the garlic and fry until fragrant (20-30 seconds). Add the chicken and fry until opaque. Add the onion, pepper, mushrooms and cook for a further minute. Add the sauces, water and chillies and cook for a further 2 minutes. Turn off the heat, add the Thai basil and stir well. Serve with rice.

Cake Britain

If you have ever wanted to feel like Hansel and Gretel and eat your way through your surroundings, then make sure you go to the Cake Britain exhibition being held at the Future Gallery. This edible art exhibition is only around for 3 days but on Sunday (29th August), visitors will be invited to eat their way through the art. I popped in yesterday to see the (uneaten) exhibits in their pure form and was impressed by the stag head coloured with sugar crystals. Most of the ‘art’ was created by artists but there was also a competition for the best decorated cake. Sponsored by Tate and Lyle, this made for a sweet exhibition.

Cake Britain, Future Gallery, London 27-29th August 2010

http://www.madartiststeaparty.com/

Tequila - it makes me happy: Mestizo Review

Lately, I’ve noticed an increase in popularity of “authentic” Mexican restaurants in London. Now, I’ve had many an enjoyable TexMex meal over the years, but having spent a bit of time travelling in Mexico myself, I am keen to see how our capital is representing the country’s fine cuisine. I’ve visited Wahaca a few times which does a pretty good take on Mexican street food, but for a while I’ve been keen to check out Mestizo’s more substantial dishes.

Located on Hampstead Road, close to Euston Station, Mestizo is a smart, contemporary place with a very impressive bar, said to contain a choice of around 120 tequilas. They are currently holding a Margarita Festival (August 2010) and so we were promptly handed a three page margarita menu with variations on the famous cocktail (verging from the inspired to the ridiculous – a Tiramisu Margarita, anyone?!). We ordered a classic and a cherry version to have with our complementary nachos, and fortunately, we chose correctly. I’d even go as far as to say that the Classic was probably the best margarita I’ve had in London.

Although tempted by the tamales, it was the main courses we were there for, and so we went straight for their house specialty, the Molcajete ‘Mestizo’. We chose the chicken version in a chipotle sauce and it arrived shortly after in an impressive, big, sizzling stone pot, which kept the temperature so well I could still feel the steam coming off it ten minutes after it had arrived at our table. This Mexican stew contains (along with the chicken and chipotle sauce) cheese, chorizo, whole spring onions, coriander and avocado; and it’s served with tortillas so you do a bit of DIY to make your own tacos. It was rich and tasty, with the chipotle sauce giving it a that lovely smoky flavour, although chilli fans should not expect to feel a burn It’s more of a comforting, warmth and worked well with the icy zingy margaritas.

With eight tortillas between us, we were pretty stuffed afterwards, so given that we were not particularly inspired by the deserts (Mexican crème caramel, an assortment of ice-creams, cheesecake etc) we skipped straight to coffee. An Americano for me was nothing special (disappointingly, no mention of it being made with Mexican coffee beans) but my boyfriend was duly impressed by the cafe cortado, as he has failed to find a London establishment which can serve a proper cafe cortado or follow his instructions on how to make one. This is definitely more upmarket than your typical Mexican restaurant (think Chilango, Benito’s Hat, the new Chipotle) and the prices reflect this. Most of the mains were around £14, with starters and tacos tending to be around the £7 mark. They were amenable to groups (we saw them twice moving tables together to fit a large group) but it still managed to avoid that cheesy, forced party atmosphere that so many TexMex restaurants try to promote to bring in the Saturday crowds. Will I be back? I don’t see any reason why not to, but on the other hand, I’m just as likely to skip the food and instead head straight to the downstairs bar for some more delicious margaritas, the Classic of course!

Food: 7/10

Ambiance: 7/10

Service: 6/10

Value for money: 5/10

Overall: 6/10

I Heart Bento Boxes

I've always liked the idea of Bento boxes - a bit of that, some of this, etc, etc. I recently thought I'd look them up online and I've found tonnes of youtube videos on how to make them.

Here are my two favourites but I can't believe they both make octopus sausages. Is this traditional?




And now one showing true devotion! Cool egg mould! (Just ignore the music)

Unpleasant coloured food and drink

There are certain colours that food should not be: blue and grey.

Blue is just wrong and I don’t expect anyone to dispute that (although I did have a friend who said that as a child they used to be given ‘Alien Scrambled Eggs’ on a Saturday morning by her father who was a dab hand with the food colouring!)

Grey is actually found in a few dishes but has Dickensian connotations of thick lumpy porridge or thin, watery gruel.

With this in mind, I was surprised recently by the new milkshake introduced by a certain fast food chain as part of their Summer menu: the Mars Milkshake - a more un-summery, unappetising drink I can’t imagine. Even in the name of research, I wasn’t keen on tring it but then today I noticed a new poster with the drink contents all touched up to be a deep brown. Presumably business has been slow!

Coronation Chicken in a Warm Baguette

The base of this recipe came from Economy Gastronomy but with a few frugal tweaks, plus the inability to follow any recipe rigidly. This is amazing served in a crunchy, warm baguette with a bit of lettuce and lots of napkins on hand for spillage, because you can’t help but overfill with this mix!
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You only need a bit of coconut milk so next time, I’d probably try to do it in a week when we were having a curry with a coconut base. Otherwise, you have to become creative. In the end, I just added it to a tropical smoothie I was making (pineapple, banana, mango, milk and the rest of the coconut milk tin).

Ingredients:

Left over chicken, shredded

1 onion, chopped

2 garlic cloves, chopped

2 dessertspoon of curry powder

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp ground coriander

1 tsp turmeric

100ml stock

100ml coconut milk

200g mayonnaise (try Helman’s Extra Light – it’s really good!)

2 tsp chopped herbs (coriander is ideal but don’t buy it especially)

2 tbsp desiccated coconut toasted

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Method:

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Fry the onion and garlic in a little bit of oil until soft. Add all of your spices and fry lightly for about 30 seconds (You’ll get an amazing smell!)

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Add the stock and coconut milk. Boil until its mostly dry. It will not look particularly attractive at this stage but have faith(!)

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Allow it to cool completely. Add the mayonnaise, herbs and toasted coconut. Mix together well. Add the cooked chicken, shredded or diced into small bits.

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Serve in a warm baguette. Lush!