Monday 3 December 2012

Bargain food (part 2)

It appears that readers like to hear how I regularly rummage in the reduced section of supermarkets with the best of them so here it is… the next installment of my Bargain food thread.

As before, the challenge is to create meals inspired from these special offer findings. To begin, I happened to stumble on a small treasure of reduced items by being in the right place at the right time when I popped in to pick up something on the way home from a meeting. Nothing mind-blowing but definitely useful – a bag or organic spinach down to 49p, fresh baby plum tomatoes at 39p, fresh egg noodles down to 39p and a bag of large courgettes for just 49p.

Of course, this is just the beginning so the next morning I set off on my quest for additions to create actual meals. First off, I find a pack of fresh prawns, substantial enough for two and a reasonable £2.80 and a £1 bag of bell peppers they are so versatile and always a safe bet. Meal number one is born – sweet and sour prawns with the fresh noodles.


There are two other vegetables that I love to cook with – red onions and spinach. As the spinach is at it the end of its peak, I want to use the whole bag so for the second dish so opt for a vegetarian option. I already have a red onion in the fridge, plus the red and yellow peppers so I’m going to go for a red Thai vegetable curry.


I find a pack of garlic and coriander naan breads for 60p and then for an extra touch, I pick up a £1 bag of new potatoes. Rather than boil them, I pop them in the oven and the results are perfect – baby baked potatoes.

These two meals have achieved my target of using up all the bargains with no waste. And as the third meal is falling on a Sunday evening, it’s time for a lazy treat – fabulous barbecued ribs, half price at just £1.50 and plenty for two with chips and a pepper, red onion and tomato side salad.




Sunday 25 November 2012

Home comforts

There’s nothing quite like sitting on your sofa, looking out at the darkness through the raindrops on your window and knowing that you don’t have to leave the house.

It’s the long holiday weekend, beginning with the rudimentary Thanksgiving dinner. Part of the enjoyment is an 'all hands on deck' approach and it's not long before a developing aroma of turkey, roasted vegetables, stuffing and gravy seeps from the kitchen as pre-dinner drinks are served.


While many dash off to the shops for Black Friday sales and offers, I like to think of the day as simply being an extension of time out, with dinner being an impromptu leftover creation.

On this occasion, it’s a heart-warming sausage casserole, which is made for a simple base of tinned tomatoes, a red onion and gravy granules and can be adjusted to incorporate whatever’s in the fridge. A couple of jacket potatoes are at hand, as are the remaining Yorkshire puddings (because I am self-confessed Yorkie pudding fiend).


Saturday is equally as miserable weather-wise so more comfort food is in order and what can’t fail to make it special but homemade bread? When I was growing up, I was (and still am) a big fan of The Good Life, so take great delight in enjoying organic basics and the satisfaction of eating something that you’ve created from scratch. The slices of bread are then rubbed with a simple garlic and butter mix and toasted, to provide a great accompaniment to tonight's lasagne.


All in all, it’s a thoroughly enjoyable holiday weekend and good preparation for the forthcoming festive month of December.


Wednesday 14 November 2012

The harbour beach

(written for Groovy Reflections)

“Oh! I do like to be beside the seaside
I do like to be beside the sea!
I do like to stroll upon the Prom, Prom, Prom!
Where the brass bands play:
Tiddely-om-pom-pom!"


The day had arrived. My two sisters and I all pile onto the back seat of our family car and look back at the stack of suitcases and beach bags behind us. We’re on our way!

Every year in May, we would take our annual holiday in Tenby, west Wales, in the same maisonette overlooking the harbour. My dad would park the car at the kerb outside and we’d climb up the steps into the familiar smelling hallway and take the stairs up to the next floor.


The living room had a wooden staircase that led up to the bedrooms, which was slatted, meaning you could see (or at that age maybe fall!) between each stair. There were two paintings on the wall, of homeless children sitting in the street, reminiscent of the images described in the song Matchstalk Men & Matchstalk Cats & Dogs.

My parents’ bedroom was at the front of the building and had a small iron balcony outside the window where you could look out at the beach and imagine the adventures that lay ahead over the next two weeks.

Once unpacked, we’d put our swimming costumes and towels into a beach bag and venture down to the sand. The harbour is small and there is always a cluster of small fishing boats moored in the shallow waters, which you could navigate in between in a rubber dingy. Sometimes, large jellyfish would get washed up on the sand overnight and we'd hop over them on our way into the water.


The town is small and centred around five stone arches. The first was built by the Normans in the late 13th century, the others added later to allow more traffic to pass through.  There was a Woolworths, a few others shops, pubs and bakeries and the Tenby Rock Shop. Its window displayed an array of sticks of rock and a selection of sugared masterpieces, including the traditional egg and bacon on a paper plate. We'd visit at the end of the holiday to stock up on presents to give to our school friends when we returned home.

There are three main beaches – the South, harbour and North. Located between the South and harbour lies the home of the Tenby lifeboat; originally founded in 1852. Adjacent to the lifeboat house is a mound, on which stand the old cannons once used to defend the town when it was under attack. We’d climb up onto their bases and shimmy up to the end, our legs dangling high above the ground as we looked out to sea.


In the evenings, we’d take a walk along the pathway between the harbour and North beach, jumping over the iron bollards used to moor the boats as we went. At the other end, was an amusement arcade we called the Bing-A-Bong (because the sounds that rang out from the machines and rides). We’d play the tuppenny pusher and watch our parents master Pac-Man and the fruit machines. Then after it was dark, we’d walk back along the seafront to the sound of the waves hitting the sea wall and we’d go to bed, full of anticipation of what lay ahead the following day.


Saturday 20 October 2012

Tuk Tuk

If you’ve been out for a few drinks with friends in the Bayswater area, Tuk Tuk is a perfect pit stop for a cheap eat before you go home. The noodle restaurant is relatively small but the service is fast, ensuring a steady turnover of customers until late into the night. The tables are positioned closely together but this is not imposing and if anything, adds to the atmosphere.


The staff are welcoming and drinks arrive swiftly. A bottle of house wine is a reasonable £10.50 and the accompanying menus illustrate that food is equally as good value for money. We opt for a starter of Thai fishcakes which are served with a chill dip. They are cooked nicely, with a slightly crisp coating and a lovely fragrant soft filling


Mains are equally rewarding, with Thai green chicken curry, which our waiter is happy to bring seconds of egg fried rice to finish. The sweet and sour dish has a lovely glaze and is a welcome addition to the table.


All in all, this is a great little west London eatery - great, fast service and excellent value for money.



Friday 28 September 2012

A taste of the Caribbean

I like blogging about food. Whether I’m eating in a restaurant or cooking it myself, I have the pleasure of enjoying the meal followed by the creative buzz that derives from writing about it. I’m not reviewing for a Sunday newspaper but I still get the satisfying reward from people telling me that they enjoying following it.

Today it’s a Caribbean fish, sweet potato and spinach curry. It’s a one saucepan recipe, will serve four but can be stretched to serve more easily. On this occasion, I’m using white sweet potatoes and for the fish, fillets of Pollock (one per person).


Instead of chilli powder, I’m adding my favourite West Indian hot pepper sauce which you can buy for about £1 in most supermarkets and Asian stores. As you only use a little, the bottle lasts for ages and can be used in all sorts of hot and cold recipes.

The method plays out in reverse of that described in my Thai chicken curry blog. That is, you start with the onion and spices then add the vegetables and then finally the fish as it cooks quickly.


So, fry an onion and add an orange pepper, some curry powder and the hot sauce. Stir in and add a tin of tomatoes (I like to throw in one or two fresh ones too) and a large sweet potato, which is first cut into small cubes. Next, add coconut milk and vegetable stock and leave to simmer until the potato is softened.

This is a great dish if you are having guests over because the first steps can all be done before they arrive and the base left to cool until you’re ready to eat. About ten minutes before serving, cut the fish into chunks and add to the saucepan, along with the fresh spinach and then leave to heat through fully. Give it a final stir and there you have it. A taste of the Caribbean.




Sunday 23 September 2012

T(ha)ime to improvise...

It’s the weekend so there’s no excuse. I can do this. Now, I’m not one of these people who can whip up anything amazing without first consulting a cookery book, but I know enough to figure out what goes with what.

Following on from my last post about the wonders of cheap living, there’s a tray of chicken breasts in my fridge that were scooped up in the reduced section for a mere £1.65, There's also a pack of creamed coconut so I’m thinking curry, maybe Thai.

The great thing about Thai food (at least, for me) is that you can follow a basic procedure and, unless you do something horrifically wrong, generally come out with a result that appears far more impressive than it actually is.


It’s basically a three step process. Fry meat, add vegetables, add spices (ultimately incorporating the ‘guess quantities, try not to get it wrong’ technique).

In my case, I fry chicken, add red and yellow peppers, red onion and a courgette and fry some more. (I’m not sure of the timeframe – stop when they look cooked but not unconscious is a ballpark).


Then step three. Here, anything goes (keeping the 'try not to get it wrong' aspect in mind). I transfer everything into a saucepan as the frying pan is getting a little overcrowded. Add curry powder and creamed coconut and mix well. I like spicy food so finish with a good dose of chilli then stir in fresh egg noodles.

Finally, find chopsticks in the kitchen drawer to create the feel that you’re in a posh restaurant and there you have it - Thai chicken curry, just how it looks in the photo.



Wednesday 12 September 2012

Bargain food

I love a good bargain. And I also love food. So this week I decided to have a bargain inspired recipe week. I set off to the supermarket with a single mission in mind – to find ingredients on offer that would inspire recipes.

As I’ve mentioned previously, I’m a big fish and seafood fan so my discovery of four fabulous smoked haddock fillets for under £3 was a good start. Recipe number one – fish pie! I already had potatoes, mushrooms and tomatoes in the fridge so a bag of reduced price fresh spinach was all that was needed! One of the first basics that I ever learned to make was a cheese and mustard sauce, which has supported many a dish and on this occasion proved to be the perfect accompaniment. Yum.


Next up was a whole chicken, reduced to £2. The first half was used for some good old fashioned chicken and chips, leaving the second half up for grabs. I discovered an amazing jalfrezzi sauce, half price at just £1 and that sealed the deal. Mix in the leftover spinach, a yellow pepper and a tin of chopped tomatoes and serve with naan bread (also half price!).


Inspired by my sauce discovery, I ventured further down the aisle and found another bargain – a lovely tomato and mascarpone pasta sauce, also on offer at just £1. I had the remaining tomatoes, mushrooms and peppers so all that was required was a courgette to complete the equation. Some grated cheddar on top and a roasted vegetable pasta bake was a quick and easy evening meal for little extra cost.


As I carried the groceries back, I felt silently smug. A range of dinners (plus equal amounts of leftovers) were now in the bag and I had spent less than a tenner. Terrific!


Sunday 19 August 2012

Days of TV and Bod

(As featured on Groovy Reflections)

The school day seems like an eternity when you’re seven years old. I remember once getting into trouble with my teacher as we had taken our seats in the classroom for the first lesson of the day. Even at that age, I knew that having just arrived, it would be a very long time before I could go home again.

I sat, staring down at my Grease T-shirt, trying not to cry. Somehow, that image of Sandra Dee and Danny Zuko hitting the high school dance floor got me through the morning and I remember breathing a huge sigh of relief as I left the school gates and crossed the bridge that took me to the street where I lived.
In much the same way, the lunch hour then felt like a long weekend. My sister and I would climb onto the sofa and sit cross-legged to watch TV. We’d tuck into our favourite (favourite healthy, that is) treat – slices of cucumber (with the skin cut off) and a dollop of salad cream for dipping, accompanied by a cup of dandelion and burdock*, straight from the glass bottles that were delivered to our doorstep every week by the Alpine pop man.

And that’s when the opening credits of Bod would begin and we’d forget all about that long school day for a while as we became lost in his world. In my mind, there were about a million episodes, all with exciting and intriguing in depth storylines. Bod throws an apple into the air and it doesn’t come down – what genius! All the other characters arrived to find out what was going on (as they always did) - how a child just like us could wow those adults speechless! And who could forget the majestic Alberto Frog and his Amazing Animal Band? A frog that drank a milkshake to reward himself whenever he saved the day - and not just any milkshake but a different flavour milkshake every single time! It was too good to be true!


Many years later, of course, it transpired that actually it wasn’t about a million - only thirteen episodes were ever made and the stories always started the same and ended the same and were all, well, sort of the same.

But back then it didn’t matter – that eon of crazy tale-telling revived us - we could return to school and brave the rest of the day! Off we’d go, back over the bridge, turning to see our mother waving a towel out of the upstairs bedroom window to wish us bon voyage. And the rest of the day wouldn’t seem quite so long and even sometimes when it did, you knew that there would be a whole marathon of just as thrilling television adventures to go home to at the end of it!



Saturday 28 July 2012

La Martina

Tonight's trip is to La Martina, an Argentinean restaurant in Arona. Now that the school holidays have begun, this area of Las Americas has become noticably busier, with its range of hotels and apartments catering much more to the package holiday market.

The restaurant is relatively large and attractive, with an adjacent outside circular bar and a decor of murals, paintings and shelves holding a diverse range of wines.


The kitchen is open until 11.30pm so there is no rush to eat, leaving plenty of time to enjoy a pre-meal cocktail and watch the Argentinean tango performance. The staff are very accommodating and the service, both on the floor and from the kitchen is impressively fast.

Many of the meats are imported from Argentina and everything is cooked on an open plan charcoal grill. To the side of the kitchen is a display cabinet showcasing the variety on offer, from which you can select your individual cut.


If you're not in the mood for meat, there is a wide range of other dishes to suit all tastes. Char-grilled sea bass served with roasted vegetables and potatoes is €15.95 and an accompanying Vodka Sour a reasonable €5.95. The fish is cooked beautifully and the vegetables are fresh and delicious.


All in all, it's a memorable experience and excellent value for money. With so many establishments to choose from along this stretch, it is satisfying to find one that is well worth a return visit.



Written in association with

Saturday 14 July 2012

Et voila!

As I noted Independence Day last week, I thought it would be appropriate today to give a French nod to Bastille Day. Known in France as Fete la Nationale, it is celebrated every year to commemorate the Fete de la Federation, held on the first anniversary of the storming of the Bastille on the 14th July 1789.

Tuna Nicoise is, of course, a traditional French classic, to which I’m going to add my own personal touch, known as ‘dans la frigidaire’ (aka whatever’s in the fridge). Instead of plain tuna, I make my favourite and extremely simple tuna pate, which consists of a tin of tuna, a tub of cream cheese, about a fifth of a red onion and some salt and pepper. Put in the blender et voila, plenty for the salad and a few brunches of toast afterwards.


For dinner, a French-style lentil soup. Another very easy dish – fry an onion then add a jar of red lentils and the veg (potato, leek, carrot…again, la frigidaire) into a pot with some stock and seasoning. Boil, cool, straight into the lovable blender with some chilli. Usually I add gammon or in today’s case, some leftover bacon and then my own personal indulgence, a strong cheese, stirred in until it’s just melted.


The perfect accompaniment may be a nice Muscadet or similar but today is too hot even for white wine so instead it’s a can of the Swedish cider, Kopparberg. (Sadly, the local supermarket has run out of my favourite wild berry flavour so I settle for the almost-as-good pear).

C’est la vie…




Written in association with

Thursday 12 July 2012

Beside the seaside...

If there's one place that you can rely on finding great food in Las Americas, it's along the seafront. The cafes and restaurants are vast and varied and all have both daytime and evening menus to ensure a good meal whatever time you choose to dine.


With its large outside seating area just a pebble's throw from the sea, the Royal Garden restaurant is a wonderfully relaxing venue for an afternoon snack. A special is Canarian soup, made with mixed vegetables and flavoured with paprika. It's nicely thick and spicy and at €4.50 is perfect to tide you over until dinner.


I have always been somewhat of a fish and seafood fanatic, spending many an evening attempting to impersonate Rick Stein (in terms of cooking, that is, not appearance). Therefore, this Mejillones Marinera dish, served at the Little Italy restaurant is an ideal treat. The mussels are cooked in a wine, garlic and chilli salsa and at €5.75 it's excellent value for a dinner dish.


Great local food and fresh sea air are an irresistible combination on a sunny afternoon and there's nothing left to do now but sit back and relax.




Written in association with