Tabooleh

Back in March I was very fortunate and blessed to get to visit Beirut, Lebanon. You can see my vlogs from this trip in this and this blog post to see more of what I was getting up to there and some of the food we experienced.

Since coming home I have tried making some of the traditional Lebanese food for myself, one of these dishes being the well known tabooleh. This is a very finely chopped salad made up mostly of parsley, tomato and onion and dressed in olive oil and lemon juice. Very simple but amazing and flavourful.



The recipe below is adapted from Taste of Beirut's Tabooleh Salad

Tabooleh

Ingredients
2 bunches of flat leaf parsley
1/2 bunch of fresh mint
3 scallions or 1 small onion, finely chopped
2 large tomatoes
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
pinch of salt
pinch of pepper

Recipe
1. Wash and dry the parsley and mint. Remove the leaves from the stalks and finely chop the leaves.
2. Wash the scallions and finely chop.
3. Wash the tomatoes and finely dice.
4. Mix together the herbs, scallions and tomatoes in a bowl.
5. In a small bowl mix the lemon juice and olive oil together using a fork.
6. Mix the dressing into the salad and serve!

Curried Cod Fillet

The hubster has been out working a few more evenings recently, meaning dinner for one, meaning a choice of anything for dinner! I had a fillet of cod in the freezer and a recipe in mind just waiting for a special occasion like this!

Thanks to Jamie Oliver for this one from Ministry of Food!

Curried Cod Fillet

Ingredients
1 portion of cod fillet
2 tbsp curry powder
olive oil

Recipe
1. Roll the cod in the curry powder to coat evenly.
2. Heat a frying pan to a medium high heat and add some olive oil.
3. Fry the fish in the pan on each side for 3-4 minutes until cooked through.


Simple and beautiful.

Naan Pizza

Nigella published this idea before me but I had the idea before coming across it so I think I'm due a book deal and tv show of my own for that.

Today is international pizza day so it seems right to enjoy some in celebration of this dish that is a favourite worldwide. My nod to the pizza is one made with naan bread instead of dough, this idea is a great quick dinner and simple too. While I love it with tikka chicken and chunky tomato sauce, today was a frugal one with some leftovers acting as toppings - ham, fresh pineapple, sweetcorn and mozzarella.

5 minute microwave chocolate cake

Ever need a quick chocolate cake fix? Then this is it!

I had heard about this little beauty years ago but it slipped my mind until a colleague in the world of youth and children's work reminded me about it because she had used it as part of a children's talk and in planning our Christmas family service I remembered it again. After all that it just seemed right to make it and I did a couple of times in practice and also as a practice for my own cookery show by making it during the church service! Nigella better watch out!



5 minute microwave chocolate cake

Serves 3-4, but I made it stretch to about 20 -30 that Sunday with all the kids wanting a little piece.

Ingredients
1/2 cup plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup cocoa
2 eggs
1/3 cup milk
1/3 cup oil
1/3 cup chocolate chips (optional)
a splash of vanilla extract

Recipe
1. Mix together dry ingredients
2. Add the eggs and mix thoroughly.
3. Pour in the milk and oil and mix well. Add the chocolate chips (if using) and vanilla extract, and mix again.
4. Pour the mixture into a 10cm diameter cake tin and cook for 4 minutes at 1000 watts
5. Allow to cool a little, and tip out onto a plate if desired and decorate with icing, or for an even quicker option chocolate spread!

Happy New Year!!!!!!!

Taste and Create: Twice the Spice Chicken

I owe you all a big apology. I haven't been blogging the last fortnight because I've been a little distracted with work and by our second anniversary celebrations!

About a month ago Rob and I decided to plan surprises for each other to celebrate so on Sunday when I got home from work, Rob told me to pack my bags and surprised me with a trip to Paris for a couple of days!



I'm surprising Rob tomorrow, but it won't be anywhere near as exciting as Paris!!!!

For now though I'm cutting it tight on posting this month's Taste and Create entry. I was paired with In the Garden of Eatin' - a fun food blog filled with recipes for every day healthy cooking on a budget.

I decided to make twice the spice chicken. A quick tasty dinner for sure!

Twice the Spice Chicken
Source: In the Garden of Eatin'

Ingredients
1.5 lbs Chicken (I used diced chicken breast)
1/3 cup Canola Oil (I used rapeseed oil)
1/2 Tbsp Chili Powder
1/4 Tbsp Onion Powder
1/4 Tbsp Season Salt
Spicy Garlic Wing Sauce (I've never heard of this before, so used Jerk/BBQ sauce)



Recipe
1. Heat grill pan (or normal pan) to medium high heat.
2. In a large bowl combine oil, chili powder, onion powder and season salt (this is your first spicy layer). Toss chicken to coat.
3. Transfer chicken to the grill pan and cook through.
4. When the chicken is done cooking stir in the sauce and cook for 2-3 minutes.

Pan fried glazed pork chops

I was given Jamie Oliver's "Ministry of Food" book for Christmas and have only recently been making stuff from it. There's some great recipes in it and a lot of the book suggests varieties on each recipe too to help with learning and trying new things.

This is a straightforward recipe and a really delicious one and with some variety in the choice of glaze. I used mango chutney but you'll see some other ideas in the ingredients list.



Pan fried glazed pork chops
Source Jamie Oliver's Ministry of Food, p 230

Ingredients
2 pork chops
olive oil
salt and pepper
apple sauce/mango chutney/apricot jam/maple syrup/honey to glaze
lemon juice (optional)

Recipe
1. Trip the skin off the edge of the chops and cut into 2 long strips.
2. Rub the pork chop with salt and pepper and heat a little oil in a pan.
3. When the pan is hot add the strips of skin and move about. Remove when crispy and golden.
4. Lay the chops in the pan and cook for 4-5 minutes on each side, turning every minute.
5. Spoon a large spoonful of your glaze over each chop and keep turning to be sure both sides are evenly glazed. Cook until golden red.
6. Remove from the pan and leave to rest for a minute before serving.
7. Squeeze a little lemon juice over the top to balance out sweetness

Pork and Mango Stir Fry

My hubby, Rob, is working in Liverpool these days which means there are loads more options for me for dinner. I threw this together for myself and absolutely loved it!



Pork and Mango Stir Fry

Serves 1

Ingredients
1 tbsp vegetable oil
150g pork pieces
2-3 tbsp mango chutney
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tsp soy sauce
pinch of dried chili flakes
handful of mixed vegetables (I used broccoli, red pepper, onion and peas)
2 rings of fresh pineapple chopped up
Add to wok noodles for one.

Recipe
1. Heat the oil in a wok or frying pan and add the pork. Stir fry until cooked through (about 5 minutes)
2. Add the mango chutney, oyster sauce, soy sauce and chili flakes and stir through. Cook for 1 minute.
3. Add the vegetables and pineapple and cook for 3-5 minutes.
4. Stir in the noodles and cook for 1 minute and serve.

Leeking Mushrooms

Over the past week I decided to make a little change to my diet. I do eat fruit and veg, and I love to eat fruit and veg but I don't eat enough of it. So I've been increasing the vegetable content in my meals, eating a little less meat and also trying to bring fruit and veg into my diet that I've never really had much of before.

When I saw this recipe on Dharm's blog it was around the same time as I made this decision and seemed like a great way to get more leeks into my diet and also a great recipe for my food blog event: Bookmarked Recipes.

Thanks Dharm for some tasty mushrooms!!! I loved the mix of the leeks and mushrooms and the herbs, really tasty. I'll definitely be making this again!

Buttered Chicken

This week's bookmarked recipe is from a cookbook called "Simple chicken recipes" that I bought in Tesco quite some time ago for 96p and after looking through it had bookmarked a few then left it to gather dust for a while. I needed a quick and tasty dinner this week, and fancied something different from my usual quick dinners and this was the result: buttered chicken.

Absolutely delicious! I will definitely be doing this again.



Buttered chicken

Serves 2

Ingredients
2 chicken breasts
Pinch of Salt
Pinch of Pepper
Flour (about 1/3 cup)
2-3 tbsp butter
1 tsp dried parsley

Recipe
1. Place the chicken in a sandwich bag and flatten by bashing with a rolling pin.
2. Mix the flour, salt and flour on a plate then dredge the chicken through it until it is well covered.
3. Melt the butter in a frying pan on a medium high heat then add the chicken, leave to cook for 5 minutes
4. Turn the chicken over and reduce the heat. Sprinkle the parsley over the top and leave to cook for 5-8 minutes until cooked through.

Tried, Tested and True 2: Pitta Sweet Chilli Stir Fry Pizza

When Giz and Pshygrad of Equal Opportunity dinner announce Tried, Tested and True 2 I was incredibly excited but have only just found the time in the last few days to make and post my entry thinking the dead line was today but turns out I'm a month early.. This time round we've to submit healthy dishes that are low calorie - adapted from high calorie dishes and I think I've done it with this. They're also linking this round of TTT to organ donation - a very important thing we should all consider!!!!

I love making pizzas with sweet chili sauce, chicken and various vegetables - I started doing it one night when hubby wanted pizza and I wanted stir fry so I combined the two to make a pizza (topped with a little cheese). In order to make it lower in calories and healthier I've been preparing them on pitta bread instead of making the pizza dough and leaving out the cheese and chicken. Really tasty and quick and easy.



Pitta Sweet Chili Stir Fry Pizza

Ingredients (I've left out measurements and quantities to allow for personal preferences)
Pitta bread
Sweet chili sauce
Mushroom, sliced
Sweetcorn
Baby corn, chopped
Bean sprouts
Scallions, chopped
Red bell pepper, chopped

Recipe
1. Preheat oven to 170˚C
2. Lay out pitta bread and spread a little sweet chili sauce on top. top with the various veg and drizzle on a little more sauce.
3. Bake in the oven for 10 minutes.

As easy as that!

Jamican Jerk

Over the past few months I've noticed lots of blogs and tv shows that have been making Jamaican Jerk Chicken, with rice & peas and fried plantain. Anytime I've had jerk chicken I've loved it so it only seemed right to try this complete dish, so I set about trying to find plantain. I hunted and hunted for about 3 or 4 weeks and gave up, just when I did I happened to spot them! The lesson - give up searching sooner and you'll get what you're looking for.

I had bookmarked a recipe from We are never full when I had seen it a while ago so looked it up straight away and got cooking.

Cooking everything was all very straightforward and kept me busy in the kitchen for a bit while Rob was playing some xbox and it all came together at the same time. It was very tasty however the jerk may just have been a little too spicy for my tastes but that's easily fixed in future.



Jamaican Jerk Chicken

SERVES 2-3

Ingredients
2 breasts of chicken, skin on
2 legs of chicken, skin on
2 tbsp. allspice
1 tbsp. dried thyme
1 teaspoon hot paprika
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon onion powder
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 scotch bonnet pepper (or other spicy hot pepper)
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1/2 cup of cilantro (you can substitute 1 teaspoon coriander seed)
juice of 1 lime
splash of orange juice
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 scallions
1 teaspoon soy sauce
pinch of salt and pepper

Recipe
1. Grind the spices down with a spice grinder. Then blend all the ingredients together in a blender until smooth. Adjust the amount of oil to make it a thick paste.
2. Rub this on your chicken and leave to marinate for at least an hour.
3. Cook your chicken pieces at 200˚C for 45 minutes to 1 hour, or until juices run clear. For the last minute, crisp it up on a hot frying pan.

Rice and Peas

Serves 2-3

Ingredients
1 cup white rice
1 can red kidney beans
1 small onion, minced
1 clove garlic
1 scallion, sliced
chicken stock OR 1 can coconut milk and water

Recipe
1. Sauté the onion and garlic on medium heat for a few minutes then add the rice, scallions and beans and stir together.
2. Pour enough chicken stock/coconut milk & water over your rice that it comes up the width of 2 fingers above the level of the uncooked rice.
3. Bring to the boil and allow to cook down until it reaches the level of the rice, stir ONCE, turn your heat to low and cover. Cook on low for 20 minutes.
After 20 minutes your rice will be perfect, give it a stir and enjoy.

Tostones (Fried Green Plantain)

Ingredients
2 Green Plantain
Vegetable oil
salt

Recipe
1. Heat the oil in a pan. It needs to be about 1/2-3/4" deep.
2. Peel plantains and cut on the diagonal, about 3/4" thick.
3. Fry the plantain once for about 2-3 minutes. Dry on paper towels, then give each a smash with a mallet. Return to pan and fry for another 2 minutes.
4. Drain and serve seasoned with a little salt.

Thanks to We are never full for this recipe.

I've used this as my entry for my Bookmarked Recipes food blog event for this week.

Pasta - Breakfast Fry Up Style

Yesterday I got a call from my hubby saying he was heading out for dinner with some guys at work so I had to plan a meal for myself - usually when I'm eating alone I take the opportunity to make something that I know hubby wouldn't eat in a million years. I decided to use up some leftovers with a few fresh ingredients and make a pasta dish. While cooking I realised I had included quite a few components for a fried breakfast, plus a couple of non fried breakfast ingredients. Is it cheating to count the egg as included in the pasta?

I added a finely chopped clove of smoked garlic that that I'd received at Enjoy the Taste of Scotland from The Really Garlicky Company. It was a huge clove! But I'm not sure it really made any difference to the flavour of the recipe, I didn't think it tasted of anything on it's own, not even of garlic! So next time I make this I think I'll just use fresh garlic instead. But check out the size of that!!! (It's beside a cherry tomato in case you're thinking it was a bigger variety of tomato lol)



I'm sending this over to Ruth at Once Upon a Feast for Presto Pasta Night



Pasta - Breakfast Fry Up Style

Serves 1

Ingredients
Spaghetti (enough for 1 serving)
2 pork sausages, cut into small chunks
1/4 red pepper cut into chunks
3 medium closed cup mushrooms, sliced
2 rashers of back bacon, chopped into small pieces
2 scallion/spring onions
6-8 cherry tomatoes, halved.
1 clove of smoked garlic (but an ordinary garlic clove would be fine too)
150ml tomato sauce (1 400g tin of peeled plum tomatoes, 1 tbsp dried basil, 1tsp dried oregano, 1 tsp garlic puree. Blend everything together until smooth - this is also my new pizza sauce recipe)

Recipe
1. Place spaghetti in salted boiling water and leave to cook.
2. Heat a little oil in a frying pan and start to cook sausages.
3. 3 minutes later add the red pepper chunks.
4. 2 minutes later, add the mushrooms and bacon to the pan.
5. 3 minutes later thrown in the tomatoes and scallions.
6. 2 minutes later stir in the garlic and tomato sauce.
7. Drain the pasta, and add to the sauce stirring through.



Serve with fresh bread (or if you want to continue the breakfast theme serve with some soda bread)

RFJ 3: Spiced chicken burgers with mango relish

The ingredients for this month's Royal Foodie Joust made me smile because I've never cooked with mango, but thought that mango, brown sugar and cardamom sounded like a great combination of ingredients. I had several thoughts for this but as soon as I remembered about a recipe for spiced chicken burgers I read in Anjum Anand's "Indian Food Made Easy" and decided to adapt it a bit and make a mango relish to go with it.

I'm also submitting the mango relish to a new and very exciting event: Putting up where the idea is to make a jam, conserve, jelly, marmalade, curds, butter, chutney, pickle, relish or preserve. I've never made anything like this before so it was fun trying something new.





On top of already using this entry for 2 blog events, I'm going OTT and entering into a third blog event: LiveSTRONG with a taste of yellow - 2008.



This was a great dish and I can't wait to make it again.







Spiced chicken burgers

Makes 4 burgers

Ingredients
2 chicken breasts
2cm piece of ginger, peeled and grated
3 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
1/2 a small onion, finely chopped
handful or coriander leaves (cilantro), finely chopped
1 tsp salt
1 red chilli, deseeded
3 cardamom pods, crushed
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp ground turmeric
1/2 tsp garam masala
1/2 tsp caraway seeds, crushed
2 slices of bread, grated into crumbs
1 egg
Oil

Recipe
1. Mince the chicken breast in the food processor. Add the ginger, garlic cloves, onion, coriander leaves, salt, cardamom, cumin, ground coriander, turmeric, garam masala and caraway seeds.
2. Add the mix to a bowl and mix in the breadcrumbs and egg. Mould the mince mixture into 4 burgers.
3. Heat oil in a pan and cook the burgers for 4-5 minutes on each side or until cooked through.


Mango relish

Ingredients
1 mango, peeled, seeded and diced into small pieces
1 tsp olive oil
1/2 red bell pepper, diced into small pieces
2 scallions (green onions), thinly sliced
Handful of chopped fresh coriander (cilantro)
Juice of 1 lime
1 tsp crushed cardamom pods
1 tsp light brown sugar
Pinch of sea salt
Pinch of coarsely ground black pepper
1 tsp honey

Recipe
Mix everything together and stir to mix well. Serve immediately or store in the fridge.

Hawaiian pizza

Ben of What's cooking has a great food blog event called "Food for plastic" which I was wanting to take part in before but never got around to it. Well this month the theme is Kid's because Tupperware is celebrating this month as "Children's Month" and are donating some of the money earned in sales to Boys and Girls clubs. So the idea is to share a recipe you make for your kids or a recipe you loved from your childhood. I have fond memories of nights when my dad was working or whatever and mum would get some Goodfellas pizza (normally hawaiian) and some garlic bread for us (mum, sister and me), so I decided to use this as my entry for this event. I suppose it's cheating if I buy frozen stuff and stick it in the oven, also it takes away all the fun of actually making the pizza dough and assembling the toppings yourself.



It's not really a recipe for this post seeing as I used the pizza dough and tomato sauce recipe I posted about before, but it's made me fall more in love with this pizza dough. I topped the pizza with the tomato sauce, wafer thin ham, pineapple pieces, mushroom, mozzarella cheese and oregano. I also bought a small ciabatta loaf and filled it with some homemade garlic butter before cooking in the oven.

It all turned out great and had me reliving those nights when my mum, sister and I shared a pizza and garlic bread.

Calzone

It's St Patricks Day and the food blog world has turned green, no matter where people are from they're making green eats and treats, "Irish" themed dinners and all sorts. Me on the other hand, I made Italian.

Maryann of Finding La Dolce Vita and Marie of Proud Italian Cook are hosting a great food event called Festa Italiana where we were encouraged to cook some Italian food.

I decided to try something new but also something I knew I loved and had a feeling would be something Rob would love too: calzone (a folded pizza).

I know I've made pizza dough before, but we had recently been given Jamie at Home and he had a recipe for pizza dough and even a great recipe for some tasty tomato sauce so it seemed fitting to give these recipes a go and try a different dough for fun.

I had a few problems with the dough rising according to Jamie's instructions so I stole ideas from the last Daring Bakers challenge (French bread) and instead of draping a damp teatowel over the bowl during the rise I put cling film over the top and a dry towel over the top of that.



Pizza dough

Makes 3-4 medium sized thin pizza bases or 2 calzones

Ingredients
500g strong white bread flour
1/2 tbsp fine sea salt
7g sachet of dried yeast
1/2 tbsp caster sugar
2 tbsp EVOO
325 ml lukewarm water

Recipe
1. Sieve the flour and salt together into a bowl. Make a well in the middle of the flour.
2. In a jug mix the yeast, sugar and olive oil into the water and leave to sit for a few minutes, then pour into the well.
3. Gradually mix the flour into the liquid to make the dough. When it has all come together place on a floured surface and knead until smooth and springy.
4. Place the ball of dough into a floured bowl and flour the top of it. Cover the bowl in cling film and drape a dry teatowel over the top. Set aside in a warm room for about an hour until it doubles in size.
5. Remove the dough to a floured surface and knead it around, pushing the air out of it.

You can either use it straight away or else store it wrapped in cling film in the fridge (or even freezer). I split the dough into 2 and made the round bases, and stored them stacked on a tray in the fridge with layers of oiled and floured tin foil between each base.

Tomato sauce

Makes 500ml of sauce

Ingredients
2 tbsp olive oil
4 cloves of garlic, finely sliced
handful of fresh basil leaves, torn
3 x 400g tins of whole plum tomatoes
salt and pepper

Recipe
1. Place the oil in a pan and turn the heat on.
2. Add the garlic, once it starts to brown add the basil and tomato (make sure you squash the tomatoes in the pan to get the juices out and make the sauce more tomatoey)
3. Season with salt and pepper, then leave to come to the boil.
4. Strain the sauce through a through a coarse sieve or colander and into a bowl.
5. The garlic and basil can be disposed of, make sure you push as much of the sauce through as possible.
6. Add the sieved sauce back to the pan and bring to the boil, then turn down the heat and simmer for 5-10 minutes.

This gives plenty of sauce that can be used for all sorts of things including pizza sauce - I'll be using the rest to make some bolognese later this week

For making the calzone I didn't want to just make a different dough and make the sauce, I also wanted to use ingredients that I hadn't used before, so I used a mozzarella ball, bought a mix of mushrooms including shitake (which I'd never used) and some pancetta. Rob just wanted his regular pizza toppings (chicken and bacon) but also asked for some red pepper! I was in shock, he's asking for veg now!!!! Long may it last.

Calzone

Recipe
1. Heat your oven to maximum (about 240˚C on my oven).
2. Lay your pizza base out and dress like you would for a pizza.
3. Fold over the pizza and seal the edges by creating pleats.
4. Place on a tray and cook in the oven for 10-15 minutes.

As easy as that!!!! And even more delicious!

Royal Foodie Joust 1

I've been meaning to take part in the Royal Foodie Joust hosted by The Leftover Queen and finally got around to it!

This month the challenge was to create a dish that included pork, any citrus fruit and pink or white peppercorns. So here's what I came up with:

Pork and Mandarin salad

Serves 1

Ingredients
1 pork chop
Salt
White peppercorn (ground)
Oil
150g tin of mandarin oranges
2 tbsp syrup from mandarin oranges
2 tbsp honey
1 tsp cider vinegar
Handful of spinach, a handful of watercress and a handful of rocket (about 100g in total)
Toasted almond flakes

Recipe
1. Cut the pork into strips, lightly salt and pepper, then fry in an oiled pan for 6-7 minutes until cooked through.
2. Mix the syrup, honey and cider vinegar and heat gently in a pan for 4 minutes.
3. Place the leaves in your dish, top with mandarin segments and pork. Dress with the syrup mix and top with the almond flakes.

Chicken Tempura

I had bought a jar of plum sauce at the oriental supermarket a couple of weeks ago and have been trying to work out what i wanted to do with it. I decided to make a little chicken tempura and use it as a dipping sauce. I love the tempura and doing it got me over my fear of deep fat frying, unfortunately the sauce was extremely sweet but also very vinegary so I ended up getting my sweet chilli dipping sauce out. As well as that this didn't pass the husband test so this will be a dish for when I'm on my own sometime.

Again I researched a few recipes for the tempura batter, most of which were exactly the same, and also researched a few recipes for cooking chicken tempura specifically. I ended up doing the following:

Chicken Tempura

Serves 2

Ingredients
2 chicken breasts, diced
Salt pepper
1 egg, beaten
1 cup of COLD water
1 cup flour
Oil

Recipe
1. Boil the chicken pieces for 5 minutes. Drain thoroughly and season with salt and pepper.
2. Heat oil (about 1.5-2" in depth) in a wok or deep pan.
3. Mix the beaten egg and cold water together. Stir in the flour gently, removing any lumps.
4. Dip each piece of chicken in the batter and cook in the oil for 4-5 minutes until crispy.

Steamed Pak Choi

I've met up with my uncle in London twice in the past couple of years and each time we meet we eat in a fancy chinese restaurant and each time we've ordered a side of pak choi. I had never had pak choi before but loved it instantly. It's been playing on my mind recently and when I saw some in Tesco I had to buy some. Straight after that I had to research pak choi and felt very educated after reading this. Then found a recipe to follow here. I had 200g pak choi whereas the recipe is for 750g, but I didn't reduce the amount of the other ingredients and also used an electric steamer for 5 minutes. Tasty and nutritious! i really have to cook pak choi more often.

Malteser buns!!!!

This is my 100th post on Ruth's Kitchen Experiments!!!!! And what better way to celebrate than with Malteser buns?!?!?!?!

I love getting these from coffee shops, they're just incredible! And bound to be jam packed with calories, but hey you have to indulge every now and again right?

There's no real baking involved making them extremely simple and filled with chocolately flavour


Malteser buns

Makes 16 "buns"

Ingredients
75g butter
2 tbsp golden syrup
2 tbsp cocoa powder
175g Rich tea biscuits
175g Maltesers
200g milk chocolate
200g white chocolate

Recipe
1. Place the biscuits into a ziplock bag and crush into crumbs using a rolling pin ( a great way to vent any stress!)
2. Melt the butter and golden syrup together, stir in the cocoa.
3. Stir in the crushed biscuits.
4. Melt the milk chocolate and stir into the mixture
5. Crush half the maltesers then add to mixture.
6. Spread the mixture on a baking tray pressing it down to compact.
7. Spread the remaining whole maltesers on top and press them into the mixture slightly.
8. Melt the white chocolate. Pour over the top of the biscuits and spread.
9. Allow to set in the fridge for 2-3 hours, then remove and cut into 16

Chocolatey chocolateness! No better way to celebrate 100 posts :o)


EDIT: See here for a new and improved version

Stir fry sauce.

Last night was another night where I was dining alone while Rob got to eat out after work, but it's good cos it means I can have things I don't normally have because he doesn't like them. So i decided to go for a veggie stir fry and was going to get a packet of sauce when I was getting my other groceries in, but when i was there decided to look at the list of ingredients for inspiration and then plan my own sauce. I ended up forgetting most of what I read on the back and just lifted all sorts of bits from my cupboards and came up with this:

Ruth's Sweet Ginger Stir Fry Sauce

Serves 1

Ingredients
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp cider vinegar (I would have used Rice wine vinegar but forgot to buy more in my shop)
1 tbsp tomato puree
1 tbsp coconut milk
1 tsp soy sauce
1” ginger peeled and grated
1 clove of garlic, minced
1 tsp honey


I just mixed it in with some stir fried veg and noodles. Delicious, nice sweet flavours that worked well with the veg. A successful kitchen experiment.