You would be right in thinking that this is not something which you will see very often in this kitchen . . .  chocolate cake.  The Toddster doesn't like chocolate cakes, pies or cookies, or puddings for that matter  . . .  and with my diabetes I try very hard not to eat this stuff, but when I was having four missionary elders for dinner a week or so ago I decided that I would bake them a chocolate cake for dessert.

I want to tempt you just a little bit this morning with a tasty recipe from my Big Blue Binder. This is a big blue plastic covered binder that I have been carrying around with me since I was a little girl. (I was 9 or 10 when I started it.) It is old and tatty now, and bulging at the seams . . . but it is also filled with beautiful gems . . .

 One of the things I love most about chicken is it's ability to go so very well with a lot of other flavours. It's just so very adaptable, and delicious.  The breast meat is of course a lot leaner, but also very easy to dry out . . .  the thighs and legs have a lot more flavour in the, and require longer cooking so that they are nice and tender, but it's no surprise that they actually have more flavour as they are the part of the chicken that gets the biggest workout!  (If you are not buying factory farmed chicken that is.  If you are, none of it will have much flavour)

AMY’S MOBILE KITCHEN TOURS THE UK WITH HEARTY LUNCHES TO
SUPPORT CHARITABLE ORGANISATIONS

#amysmobilekitchen

For the month of February 2016, vegetarian and organic food experts Amy’s bring you Amy’s Mobile
Kitchen - a vintage van that will serve delicious Amy’s soups and chillis across London, Manchester and
Glasgow, free to those who make a donation to local charitable organisations. The delicious & warming
soups & chillis will be accompanied by outstandingly good bread from local artisan bakeries.

The van will make its first stops in London, visiting a variety of locations from 1st – 14th February 2016.
Then it’s up North to bring some vegetarian goodness to Manchester from 16th – 21st February, followed
by its final stops in Glasgow from 23rd – 28th February. The van’s exact location will be announced each
day on Twitter and Instagram via @amyskitchenuk using the hashtag #amysmobilekitchen.

Using carefully selected organic ingredients, Amy’s Kitchen produces vegetarian frozen meals, soups
and chillis with delicious home cooked flavour. Amy’s is a company with a conscience - environmental
awareness and sustainability is at the heart of its production and contributing to community projects is
a big part of its ethos. With this in mind and in recognition of their great work, Amy’s Mobile Kitchen will
be partnering with charitable organisations that are making efforts to support the young and homeless across the UK, with profits from lunch service being donated in each city. In addition, all packaging used for Amy’s Mobile Kitchen will be from 100% recycled and ethically sourced materials.





















 Details of charity partners in each city are below:

London: Café from Crisis - An inspirational social enterprise that provides on-the-job training and
experience for homeless people and ex offenders. http://www.crisis.org.uk/pages/-crisis-skylightlondon-cafe-62496.html

Manchester: Back On Track - A charitable organisation focused on supporting some of the most
disadvantaged in Greater Manchester through training, work experience and mentoring, helping them
to overcome major barriers and turn their lives around. http://www.backontrackmanchester.org.uk/

Glasgow: End Youth Homelessness – A national collaboration of charities and businesses across
the UK coordinated by Centrepoint who have come together to tackle youth homelessness by raising
awareness and lobbying government to make a change. http://www.eyh.org.uk/ 

Amy’s tasty vegetarian soups will be available in a variety of flavours including Organic Chunky Tomato (my personal favourite), Organic Cream of Mushroom and Organic Lentil Vegetable. There will also be the option of a vegetarian medium chilli for those after something a bit heartier. Quality artisan bread will be offered from local bakeries in each city; in London delicious sourdough from The Dusty Knuckle bakery, a social enterprise aiming to help disadvantaged young people. In Manchester visitors to the van will have the chance to try some mouth-watering spicy corn bread from Lancashire bakery Artisan Food Works and Glasgow residents can sample loaves from bakery47, who regularly have fans queuing round the corner for their creations.

Also joining the Amy’s family for this very special project is artist Alice Stevenson, who has previously
created illustrations for fashion designer Marc Jacobs. Alice has created a bespoke logo for Amy’s
Mobile Kitchen as well as designing the bright illustrations that will adorn the van, making it impossible
to miss as it travels the UK streets.

About Amy’s
Amy’s is a family owned business founded by husband and wife team Andy and Rachel Berliner in 1987 and
named after their daughter Amy. It all started with a mission to create delicious vegetarian food that is full of
organic ingredients and home cooked flavour, yet quick and easy to prepare.

Every product contains certified organic ingredients and there are absolutely no additives, no MSG, no
preservatives and no GMOs. The Amy’s range is a best seller in the UK and is stocked in all of the well-known supermarkets as well as independent retailers and health food stores such as Whole Foods and Planet Organic.

Amy’s also caters for a variety of diets, including gluten free, dairy free and vegan so everyone can enjoy the
delicious home cooked flavour. Amy’s products are all Vegetarian Society approved, and all products in their
gluten-free range hold the Coeliac UK Crossed grain Symbol Licence.

https://amyskitchen.co.uk/
https://twitter.com/amyskitchenuk
https://www.instagram.com/amyskitchenuk/
https://www.facebook.com/AmysKitchenUK

I am always looking for a different way to cook potatoes.  I love  potatoes.  Unfortunately I need to watch how many I eat these days.  

Red meat isn't something which we eat in this house very often.   I know we had that BBQ Beef Pie last week.  The week before I had made this French Onion Cottage Pie for a supper one night and it was fabulous.  I used my slow cooker and cooked the beef overnight so that it was fork tender, and the gravy was absolutely delicious.   I just used the method etc. that I normally use to do a pot roast in the slow cooker.  It worked out really well.

When I was a child I was not overly fond of oatmeal . . . not for breakfast or any other time . . . unless it was baked into cookies . . . then I could be gently persuaded to eat it.  I wasn't eating cooked oatmeal for love nor money.  It was just not my cup of tea . . . at all!

 

Clearly my mother was not all that persuasive or inventive . . . I dare say if a bowl of these lovely baked oats had been put down in front of me . . . I'd have gobbled it up . . . no problem!  Sorry mom!

Have you ever had a day when you really didn't feel like cooking at all, or even doing much of anything??? It doesn't happen to me very often, but yesterday was one of those days.  I was having a horrible no good rotten day.  Nothing that I could put my finger on . . . I just felt a bit blah.  Not sick . . . just a bit tired, run down . . .  and frustrated by nothing in particular . . . yet frustrated with everything, at the same time.  Grumpy.  Out of sorts.

For lunch I rifled through the fridge and put together a pizza.  There was a few bits of cheese that needed using up, some leftover cooked sausages that needed to be used, and some spring onions and black olives left from the other day when I made some Mexican dip.  They all ended up on top of the pizza . . .



and it was good . . . but it didn't chase the blues away.  I still felt out of sorts.  Then I remembered those lovely herbal teas I was sent the other day.  They looked and smelled delicious . . .  so why not.  A hot drink is often a nice pick me up.

When my kids were growing up I used to make these little biscuit cups for them called BBQ Biscuit Cups.   They were really simple and very delicious, but it did make a lot.   

Newby Teas presents two luxury options for adding romance and a touch of health to your Valentine’s Day this year, both available in Harrods and online at Newby’s e-boutique for busy lovers.

 I don't know about you, but my pocketbook is really feeling the pinch this January.  There are days when I go to the cupboard and I feel like Old Mother Hubbard.  My cupboard looks bare.  That doesn't mean that you can't rustle up a tasty meal however.  Here are some great ideas for super meals that will satisfy and please, created from next to nothing!

There are certain times of the week, month and year that my Crock Pot is my best friend and the most valued and used tool in my kitchen!  On Sundays when I know we are going to get home from church absolutely famished, it is such a simple thing to do to pop something into the crock pot before we leave, making sure that something tasty is waiting for us when we get home.  In the summer when you want something hearty and don't want to heat up the kitchen, the Crock Pot is a great ally, and in Winter, when the cold winds doth blow, there is no better way to create rib sticking hearty and comforting meals for the whole family!   Nothing could be easier.  Just pile it all in the pot, cover and turn it on.  The pot does the rest!

Christmas and the holidays are all over now . . .   it's back to boring food again . . .
Or is it boring??? It doesn't have to be!

 


We are definitely having winter weather now.   It's been positively frigid and today is no different. It's definitely the type of day you want to spend indoors next to the fire!

There are two things in life which I really enjoy.  One is potatoes and the other is Mexican Food.  When I first moved over here to the UK, it was extremely difficult to get the ingredients to make Mexican anything.  I used to bring them back with me every time I went to Canada for a visit, or order them from a very expensive  North American supplier here inthe UK.  Happily it is a lot easier now and most grocery stores have a dedicated Mexican Food section in them.  It is very much a Briticized version of Tex Mex . . . but at least it isn't the vast no-man's land that it used to be!

 Todd is not overly fond of eating raw apples, but if you cook an apple, he is the first in line wanting to tuck  in!  He just loves baked apple desserts.   I had about half a jar of mincemeat that needed using up  in the refrigerator and I also had some apples that had seen better days as well as about 1/3 of a loaf of stale bread.   I decided to use all three and make a Betty with them.

I have several recipes posted on here for donut muffins.  This recipe for Jam Donut Muffins is very good.   This recipe for Glazed Donut Muffins is also excellent!  This recipe for Donut Muffins is my absolute favourite.  They are also filled with jam, but are more cakey than the first one.  All are good.   Today I am showing you a recipe for Baked Apple Donuts, which are a mini muffin that greatly resemble donut holes when done!

I love these kinds of recipes.   You know the type I mean . . .  the kind where you just go to the fridge and see what you have in there and then throw it all together to come up with something tasty?  Yeh . . .  I love those.  I used to love watching Ready Steady Cook when I first moved over here to the UK.

It's been colder than blazes this week.  Winter has finally arrived.  Not as cold as it gets in North America of course, but cold is relative.  It's a damp cold here and it feels positively frigid coz it gets right through to your bones!  It's soup season!

 

After all the comforts of the Christmas period, the thought of a detox can be daunting. But what if you could still eat foods packed with flavour AND be healthier at the same time? The ‘Mediterranean diet’ is exactly this, having been at the forefront of the media in recent years due to its appealing balance of delicious food and enormous health benefits. The tomato is a key ingredient in many Mediterranean dishes and tinned tomatoes are used just as frequently as fresh produce, with Cirio’s authentic tinned tomatoes being the best loved in Italy!