Sunny lunch at Caravan

The sun was shining so we decided to head to Caravan on Exmouth Market, it is one of the few places with seating outside in the area around work where you can eat.

It took ages to decide, so we supped on the yummy house white wine whilst we had a little think about it. Myself and a vegetarian friend decided to go for 4 smaller plates and a side to share. This mini feast included grilled asparagus with a decent sprinkling of salt, cheese filled aracini with a tomatoey dip - the cheese just oozed out, crispy tofu with beansprouts and a vietnamese sauce, a pickled mushroom amd watercress salad and a goats cheese pancake. Everything was amazing and only an hour later I want to go back and try more!

In the background of the second picture was a large plate of wagyu beef my other friend had with duck fat roasted potatoes - even though the size seemed small she was satisfied with the taste by the end of the meal and full enough to head back to work.

Lemon Drizzle Birthday Cake

After quite a meat filled couple of days we decided to cook a huge vegetarian chilli con carne for friends who were coming to watch the England Euro 2012 game (which turned out to be the country's last in this competition) and for dessert a lemon drizzle cake for the boyfriends birthday.

I used a recipe my nan has always used which I think may be from a very old Mary Berry cookbook, with the addition of making it in to two cakes and layering with lemon curd and fresh whipped cream in the middle. The recipe makes enough for two 23cm cakes, just half the ingredients if you want one single layer cake or 12 cupcakes. 

Lemon Drizzle Cake


Ingredients

For the cakes:
• 12oz self raising flour
• 8oz soft margarine
• 8oz sugar
• 4 eggs
• 2 tsp baking powder
• Pinch of salt
• 8 tbsp milk
• 2 lemons - rind grated

For the filling:
• Lemon curd
• 200ml Fresh whipping cream

For the topping:
• 4oz sugar
• Juice of 1 lemon

Method

• Preheat the oven to Gas Mark 4/160 degrees Celsius. Line and grease 2x 23cm springform cake tins.
• Combine all the ingredients for the cakes and whisk, add a little extra milk if the mixture is stiff.
• Divide the mixture between the two tins and bake in the oven for 30 minutes. Check after the time and if springy to the touch or a skewer comes out clean remove from the oven, if not give another 5-10 minutes. When cooked remove from the oven and tins and leave to cool on a cooling rack.
• Whip the cream until stiff.
• When the cakes are cooked, spread the bottom one with a think layer of lemon curd, then with the whipped cream and top with the other cake.
• Mix together the sugar and lemon juice for the topping, make little holes using a skewer or a knife in the top of the cake and pour over the lemon and sugar mixture.
• Eat immediately, but if you can't it is best kept in the fridge if it is hot due to the cream melting.

NB: If making cupcakes, half the mixture. Bake for 15-20 minutes. Once cooked and cooled cut a circle out of the top of each cake, fill the cake with a little lemon curd and whipped cream and place the cut out section of cake back on top like a top hat.

Hawkesmoor - More meat please

As Mat's birthday weekend continued we went for out for a real treat to somewhere that is reputed to have the best steak in London. Hawkesmoor now has three restaurants around London and we headed to the one in Covent Garden, as it makes a change going out in central London. As we stepped out of the tube we remembered why - tourists everywhere, blocking the pavement so we hurried straight to the restaurant and as soon as we walked in and the heavy wood doors closed behind us I felt like we were transported to a bar in old school New York. Oak panelling, dark lighting, exposed brick walls and glass desk lamps, the place is buzzing but in a very relaxed way that makes you feel you are in an episode of Mad Men.

We skipped the bar and went straight to our table as we were starving and this is the same reason we skipped a starter. We are not very knowledgable about red wine (apart from Malbec, we know we like that) so are usually guided by price, which is one of the great things about Hawkesmoor they wines start at a reasonable £20. We went for a Rioja, priced at £25 it was lovely not amazing but very easy to drink. I did love the flying pig on the label though.

Our waitress was very helpful and went through the different types of steaks we could have, either to share or separately and explained that if you go for one to share you pick a weight from on the blackboards dotted around the room and they then mark it as being sold, a really nice touch. We went for the porterhouse steak at 900g to share, and cooked medium rare as recommended. About 150g is bone and the cut includes fillet and short-loin. It arrives cut from the bone and already sliced in a metal skillet with the bone place on top (incase you want to go all cave man and get off every last piece of meat). It was amazing, one of the best steaks ever. I think I was expected slightly more meat but with all the sides we had we were stuffed.

The sides were in season asparagus, irony creamed spinach and beef dripping cooked chips, which were crispy on the outside and soft and fluffy inside, again some of the tastiest chips I have had in a while. For me, the star was the roasted bone marrow, a gluttonous treat but it just brought out the flavour of the steaks. Oh, and don't forget the sauces - a classic peppercorn and a Stilton hollandaise, both great but for different reasons, the slight spice of the pepper and the creamy kick of Stilton, my mouth waters thinking of it.

Then on to the desserts, I was surprised by how great these were for a place that specialises in meat and those things savoury. They choice was pimped up classics - sticky toffee puddings, crumbles and sundaes. I went for the peanut butter shortbread with salted caramel ice cream, two of my favourites things (the excitement was almost too much tom bear), it was more delicious than I imagined it to be. The shortbread was swirled with soft crunchy peanut butter, which didn't taste like shop brought stuff either and served warm with ice cream on top. Salted caramel may be my new favourite thing. Mat went for the sticky toffee sundae, we he seemed to enjoy immensely as we both went very quiet for this part of the meal as we got stuck in.

It was a great meal but a bit pricey than I thought it would be. Definitely worth it but only as a special treat.

Street Feast London

The boyfriend's birthday was fast approaching and with any excuse for a get together we decided to head to the highly recommended Street Feast London. A collection of some of the best street food vans London has to offer all congregating in one place, serving booze every Friday evening during the summer months. The vendors change and rotate every week, and the location changes every month or so, it was first in a disused car park with seating in the old car wash and next it headed to Camden Brewery. You can book a table and have waitress service but we just turned up and wandered around trying to decide what to eat.

The Camden Brewery is a great venue, the huge metal stills loom over the seating areas outside, inside kegs of beer become seats and there is a cool bar with the guest beers written on a chalk board. It is one of London's micro-breweries and is in Kentish Town under the railway arches, a great little find with the bar open every Friday even when Street Feast moves to a new location at the beginning of July.

So, the food. I couldn't decide as everything looked and smelled amazing. We decided to get a few things and share. Mat queued up at Mother Flipper and took a ticket for a double cheese burger, whilst I headed to Kimchi Cult for one of their Korean inspired cult burgers - cheese, bacon, a meat patty and kimchi (Chinese cabbage pickled in salt for a few hours then mixed with ginger, chilli, fish sauce, sugar and onions). My favourite was the Kimchi Cult Burger, the bun was glossy and slightly sweet and the kimchi really added an extra dimension, but to be fair the Mother Flipper double cheese burger was one of the best burgers I have ever had - there was nothing greasy burger van about it, just great meat cooked really well. It was also a lot easier to eat than the kimchi one, where all the filling kept trying to escape.

After this meat feast I headed to Hardcore Prawn who specialise in Asian skewers, noodles and soups, I went for the spicy Tom Yum soup which was filled with soft noodles and little shrimps, it had a real kick and is one of the best Tom Yum soups since my trip to Thailand all those years ago. I couldn't resist some grilled skewers of chicken and prawn - perfect bite size chunks of deliciousness. I did share with Mat but rather begrudgingly.

Thinking I was approaching full and some of the stalls had sold out (I missed out on the speck mobile), I thought it was time for cake so headed to what I think was called My Sweet Tooth Factory for a red velvet cupcake, which I think may be better than those from The Hummingbird Bakery, which is an amazing achievement as I love cakes from there!

It turned out I wasn't quite full though, sitting outside next to Mama's Jerk Station with the smell of jerk chicken wafting past as we chatted the night away, me and a friend decided it wouldn't be right unless we tried one more lot of street food before the night was over. We went for a jerk chicken wrap to share which was the perfect amount to satisfy my cravings - the chicken was really well seasoned and had enough kick for me, perfectly balanced with the creamy mayo sauce.

We had such a great night and we left as the stalls closed up shop, slightly intoxicated but with very full bellies and satisfied tastebuds.

Cottage Pie

After a weekend travelling to and from Birmingham in 24 hours, I came home to Mat making me a cottage pie from scratch. It was delicious, I especially loved the cheesy topping on the mash potato and the really fresh tenderstem broccoli and asparagus.

The recipe was from the BBC Good food website and can be found here.

Italian Friday Night Dinner

We had a rare Friday night in so I decided to make a little extra effort for dinner. I really wanted to use the huge amount of basil that has been overtaking my herb garden so I thought a really simple salad of mozzarella, really fresh tomatoes, torn basil and olive oil.

We followed this with a prawn, lemon, courgette and spinach risotto, as you can see from the picture it was covered in parmesan - some people frown upon the mix of cheese and seafood but I am not one of them.

We used the Jamie Oliver basic risotto recipe and I fried the courgettes separately and stirred in the prawns and courgettes five minutes before the end, and the spinach and zest of one lemon at the end of the cooking time before serving up with lots of parmesan and more lemon zest.

Foody Faces Do London

It has been planned for a while but the weekend had finally come for Emily to visit Sunnyside for the first time since Jade moved in. In true foody face style the weekend was packed full of food, gin, shopping and gossiping, so in honour of this we have decided to do our first ever joint blog post.

Friday Night - Salmon

JS: In preparation of Emily's visit I made a triple ginger cheesecake (it is from a previous blog post that you can find here) the night before her arrival and poured over my cookery books for something I could make quickly and easily so cooking did not eat in to gossip time, but I still wanted a challenge and for it to feel special - a tall order from any recipe.

I went for a Jamie Oliver recipe - Salmon wrapped in prosciutto served with lentils. I had never cooked lentils before and was ready for the challenge, even though I was nervous they would be a bit dull. I did 'back up' new potatoes too!

Luckily, it went really well even though I discovered Emily is not overly keen on fish! I think the fact it was wrapped in meat helped.

ES: Yep it's true, I'm not a fish fan, but fish wrapped in meat is most definitely the way forward! I was really impressed with the lentils too, lots of fresh flavors and a perfect accompaniment to the fish.

I thought the main course was awesome until I tasted the cheesecake, it's beyond belief how good this tastes - will most definitely be making this.

Saturday Morning - Blueberry Panacakes

JS: After Mat made the most amazing pancakes for my birthday, I thought I would make them for Emily and Mat (before he left for a stag do!), they seemed to go down a treat.

ES: Although they were smothered sugary goodness the fact they were also covered in berries made me think I was being extremely healthy. I've made pancakes like this before but the inclusion of fresh blueberries into he actual mix is a stroke of genius. 


Saturday Day - Oysters

JS: For part of my birthday treat, Emily decided to take me for Oysters - something I have never tried and she loves. We went all out and got a seat at the Oyster Bar in Harrods, a great place to sit and people watch surrounded by the buzzing environment of the food hall.

We went for six oysters each as I was pretty confident I would like them due to my love of cockles and mussels, and washed it down with half a bottle of champagne. They don't come cheap but feel so luxerious to indulge in. I loved them - simply with a little lemon on there own, with a few drops of tabasco or with one of the fresh vingeratte dips, we both preffered the shallot vingeratte over the chilli and coriander one too.

ES: This was such an experience, felt like a total tourists, but I really enjoyed every minute of it. We headed off to Harrods, I have never been there before so was pretty excited to have a little mooch about. I really wanted to treat Jade to oysters for her Birthday as she has introduced me to so many new foods and drinks (without Jade I would not be a Gin lover and Thai Green Curry eater). Knowing she had never tried oysters and the fact I love them I wanted to share this foodie moment with her.

I watched carefully as she tried the first one, it didn't come back up and she had a big smile on her face much to my relief!

Saturday Evening - Graphic and Polpo

JS: Poplo is a restaurant I have long wanted to visit, especially after visiting their sister restaurant Spuntino a few months ago, where I had one of the tastiest mouthfuls of food so far this year!

Another restaurant with a no reservation policy we rocked up and was told the wait would be an hour but it turned out to be only 15 minutes which we happily spent at the bar drinking the house wine. The principal is lots of sharing plates inspired by Italy - we went for four different ones and a couple of smaller appetisers.

All were delicious bite sized mouthfuls of heaven, but the stand out ones for me were the asparagus (which had just come in to season) with huge shavings of the best parmesan I have ever tasted with a drizzle of tomato sauce over the top and the meatballs - substantial cylinders of perfectly cooked and seasoned beef covered in a tomato sauce.

ES: All that is left to say is that Graphic is awesome, it's not style of substance. The atmosphere was chilled and the cocktails were delicious. As for dinner the concept of Italian tapas is brilliant, any excuse to try a little bit of everything instead of having to commit to one big dish is a bonus.

Sunday - Columbia Road, Brick Lane and Canteen


JS: After starting the day with a bacon sandwich to soak up the previous nights alcohol we went for a mooch around Columbia Road flower market (where I got some very pretty white roses and thistles) and Brick Lane.

JS: To cure the hangover completely we headed to Canteen in Spitalfields market and tucked into a beef roast with a huge yorkshire pudding and followed with the most amazing desserts served in little glasses, I went for the chocolate brownie caramel sundae which I didn't think I would manage to finish but was the perfect sweet pick me up to power my legs the rest of the way home.

ES: Really enjoyed exploring this side of London, the flower market was hectic but a real experience for both your eyes and nose. I was also happily surprised by the great little art galleries and shops that you find there too. Canteen was brilliant as always, never felt so sleepy in all my life though, we'd walked loads then eaten the biggest dinner ever and we were both very relieved to get the tube home and sit on the sofa and veg out. It was lovely to have an extra day with it being bank holiday so we could just chill out and wander around rather than rushing for trains. My highlight was my rhubarb trifle though, made me proud to be British to eat such a classic :-)

I was slightly amused at the two foreign tourists reaction to our dinners, they nearly feel of their chairs when they saw out Yorkshire Puds and quickly started to refer to the guide book, I couldn't understand what they were saying but every now and again you'd just hear 'Yorkshire Pudding'. They even called over the waiter to check that's what they were :-)

Monday - Carluccios


JS: We had been all over London - east, west and central but I had yet to show Emily the much of the area I lived in and near, so we took a stroll in to Hampstead and popped into Carluccio's for brunch before Emily headed home. I am a big fan of the restaurant chain (apart from the screechy child in the background) and the brunch we had was yummy. I went for the sauteed mushrooms and scrambled egg on toasted Italian bread and Emily went for the fried eggs and crispy pancetta, also on toasted Italian bread - benissimo!

ES: Brunch was yummy and loved the deli next door too. The wild boar ragu I brought for dinner was amazing. 

Thanks Jade for a brilliant weekend :-) x