Month: December 2015

focaccia bread recipe serving suggestion

Focaccia Bread Recipe

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Focaccia bread is a popular Italian bread typically topped with olive oil, salt, herbs and sometimes olives. I love eating focaccia sandwiches and since I’m not in Italy, it is quite difficult to find shops or bakeries that sell focaccia bread. I now mostly  make my own focaccia bread recipe when I’m craving a nice sandwich for lunch.

I used to work for an Italian company and did a bit of travel over to Rome and back for 2 years so I really got to try some really awesome food on my travels. This was when I was introduced to focaccia, I may have had it before back home but it never struck me enough to stand out. One of my favourite lunch spots in Rome was a small little cafe style shop that did focaccia bread sandwiches. These lovely sandwiches were topped with olive oil, olives, sun dried tomatoes, parma ham and smoked cheese. I’d often eat there for lunch every day I was working! Continue reading →

making pesto in a food processor

Basil Pesto Recipe

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Here is my fresh homemade basil pesto recipe. I’m a big fan of fresh basil pesto. I put it in sandwiches, in salads, with chicken wrapped in bacon, on crackers with cream cheese as a small snack, the list goes on. It is such a versatile dressing or sauce and goes well with a wide variety of dishes. If I’m in a rush, I buy Aldi’s own brand pesto as it is quite tasty too. But most of the time, I tend to make my own, so I thought I’d share with you my basil pesto recipe.

The first time I made it years ago, I was astonished at how quick and easy it is to make pesto. It literally takes 2 minutes! Try it for yourself and you’ll be amazed at how fresh and delicious it tastes. Continue reading →

salt and chilli prawns recipe

Salt and Chilli Prawns Recipe

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My Salt and chilli prawns recipe is one of my favourite Chinese dishes. The crispy fried prawns along with the crunchy vegetables and the lovely spices of the chilli salt makes this colourful dish a huge hit with my friends and family.

One of the more popular dishes on this blog is my salt and chilli chicken recipe which you can find here, this recipe is very similar but both chicken and prawns go really well whatever you may choose! Continue reading →

Preparing Frozen Prawns

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I love prawns or shrimps, be it a prawn cocktail, my prawn spring rolls recipe or salt and chilli prawns. You can normally buy frozen prawns or ready to eat prawns in a wide variety of shops and fish mongers. Here I’m going to explain the process of preparing frozen prawns

Over the years, I’ve tried a wide variety of different prawns from local supermarkets and ethic food shops. Continue reading →

serve spring rolls with sweet chilli sauce

Prawn Spring Rolls

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So after buying a batch of frozen prawns for my salt and chilli prawns dish, I had a surplus amount of prawns left over. I decided to do something other than making a prawn cocktail or a prawn salad so decided to use them up by making some delicious Chinese style prawn spring rolls.

This recipe was given to me buy a friend who runs his own Chinese takeaway. This is by far one of his most popular starters and they are delicious! You don’t need to use prawns if you don’t want to, you can substitute them with other meat like pork, chicken or just use the vegetables for some lovely vegetarian spring rolls. Continue reading →

vanilla ice cream ingredients

Vanilla Ice Cream Recipe

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So we recently received a gift of a Magimix Ice Cream maker, ‘Le Glacier’. Having tried a few different recipes from the recipe booklet that came with the machine, I decided to experiment with my own vanilla ice cream recipe. I’ve made this a few times and have made some minor tweaks on each occasion to try and get the perfect texture and flavour. This included using double cream (which I found way too thick and heavy), whole eggs vs egg yokes only and vanilla extract vs vanilla pods. I think I’ve settled on the recipe below. Continue reading →

brussel sprouts and bacon

Brussel Sprouts and Bacon

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It’s nearly Christmas so I thought it would be a good time to share with you my brussel sprouts and bacon recipe.

I’ll be honest, I’m not really a fan of brussel sprouts as I’m sure many of you aren’t but I had Christmas dinner in my uncles one year and he made these wonderful brussel sprouts and bacon. They’re not the traditional boiled brussel sprouts that we all associate with Christmas dinner which are typically bland and tasteless. They’re actually really tasty and really easy to make (let’s be honest, if you add bacon to anything, it always tastes delicious!). It takes less than 15 minutes.

Continue reading →