Isn’t it funny how the simplest of foods can sometimes be the most calming and comforting? I’ve been on a bit of a roller coaster of emotions the last couple of weeks with the knowledge that my book will be hitting the shelves in a month’s time. I’ve asked my team from Penguin to involve me as much as they possibly can and so, I’m doing a lot of the behind the scenes stuff which I’m enjoying but of course, with extra work comes extra stress. And when I’m stressed, I eat. Not good, wholesome foods…no, I like sugary, carb-loaded foods that make me feel good all of one second…
Simply Delicious
A general food and cooking blog. I like to experiment and try all different types of cuisine and I have a passion for food photography and styling.
Posts Tagged ‘Basil’
These may seem finicky and like they take a lot of trouble but I can assure you that could not be further from the truth. These gorgeous and delicious tartlettes are so easy to make, I would trust my 19-year old brother to do it (please note that my brother can barely make himself toast and he’s a master at making 2-minute noodles! What is important to remember when working with phyllo is that whatever filling you add needs to be relatively dry or else the pastry will go soggy and that kind of defeats the purpose as you want the pastry to stay beautiful and crisp. These tarts are…
Throughout Winter, most people turn to a bowl of soup, stew or curry to get warm and toasty but at times I feel like it’s just a bit too heavy and I need something lighter, but no less comforting. Enter pasta with hearty sauces. Chicken Parmigiana is originally made by crumbing the chicken breasts, frying them and then placing them in the tomato sauce to bake. I never do the crumbing part. I find that the crumbs almost always goes a little soggy because of the tomato sauce and it adds unnecessary fat to the meal. By just browning the chicken in a tablespoon or two of olive oil it…
Everywhere I look lately I see tomato soup recipes and photo’s. This might be the reason why I was so amped to make it last week, and why my husband was so surprised to find out that I’d never made or eaten tomato soup before. I think it’s the fact that in our high school Home Economics class, the teacher always said you can’t make tomato soup in certain pots, I think it was Aluminium, because the acid in the tomatoes react with the Aluminium and this gives the soup a metallic taste. The thought of that petrified me and I was always too scared to make it. Meanwhile, we only…
When I first started cooking meatless meals I thought constantly whether I would be able to do it once a week, I never though there was more than maybe 5 proper meal options. But it turned out that the more I cooked vegetarian food, the more ideas came to me. Most often, the ideas that come easiest are pasta dishes. It’s very easy to create a filling and delicious meal without meat when you have pasta as a base to work from. It can be incredibly simple or really complicated but it’s very hard to go wrong with pasta. In Nigella’s new book “Kitchen”, she has a recipe for Marmite…
Yesterday, whilst thinking about dinner, I knew I wanted to do something with Lamb. But I was so not in the mood for the regular stuff I do with it. I was after some serious inspiration but none of the 100′s of websites I visited gave it to me. I needed something fresh, and something I could make my own. After about an hour of Googling and searching, I gave up and started going through my cookbooks. I went through about 9 before I gave up on that idea. There was just nothing that was grabbing my attention. Out of pure desperation, I reached for the cookbook we all had…
Have you ever seen beautiful, fresh produce in your supermarket and bought it just to come home and realise you have no idea to use it? Bought a new cut of meat to try and you find it too hard to think of something to do with it? This is the dilemma many people are faced with when they try to be adventurous with their grocery shopping. I used to be one of these people. Therefore, I’ve decided to introduce Themed weeks to my blog. I will be choosing different themes every second week (from different vegetables to spices and meats) and I will discuss the uses, storage options and…
