Get Ready to ‘Cater’ Your Self-Catering Holiday

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Cooking might be the last thing you want to do while on holiday, but there’s a lot to be said for self-catering holidays.

  • You get more room for your money on self-catering holidays than you do from all-inclusive.
  • You set the schedule – with young kids, this makes keeping to routine a lot easier.
  • You’re more in control of the menu on self-catering holidays.
  • You eat what you want when you want on self-catering holidays.
  • Makes managing dietary restrictions easier.

But I know the idea of having to cook (and wash up) makes it sound less holiday-like and more like just moving the housekeeping to a new location. But cooking doesn’t mean it must be done in the same way as you always do. Take a holiday from your usual routine: take some shortcuts, mix things up, relax your rules. We’ll get to all that in the next post. First, we make a plan. Continue reading “Get Ready to ‘Cater’ Your Self-Catering Holiday” →

Fabulous Foodie’s Summer Holiday Approach to Cooking

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I have previously mentioned that for several years when Sprog was younger, we went the ‘self-catering accommodation on family holiday campsite in France’ route for summer holidays. And it was on these holidays that ‘quick’ and ‘easy’ are my watchwords for holiday cooking – and indeed for my whole holiday if truth be told.

We’ve talked about packing for your self-catering, holiday came holiday and we’ve talked about kitchen planning and equipment – but what the heck are you gonna eat when you head off on this self -catering holiday? Continue reading “Fabulous Foodie’s Summer Holiday Approach to Cooking” →

‘When Gin’s Not Your Thing’ Lemon Vodka Twist Cake

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It was a quiet weekend – well, a quiet weekend as long as you weren’t driving at Silverstone , riding in the Tour de France or playing on Centre Court. As I was doing none of these things, I was having a quiet weekend and on quiet weekends, I often take the opportunity to bake and I knew what I wanted to tackle this weekend.

You see, earlier this week a friend from work brought a recipe to my attention – a recipe for Gin and Tonic cake. over on Pudding Lane, a British cooking blog. Gin and Tonic? A drink cake? I was not unfamiliar with the booze soaked cake concept. Remind me to tell you about effect of rum soaked pound cake on people from my past. It’s terribly amusing. But that’s for another time.

I pondered the cake. I read the recipe. I decided that this was something I was going to try. After all, my in-laws and a good many of my acquaintances are all about a good gin and tonic. To here them discuss it, it sounds the most refreshing drink in the history of drink. So, it sounded like a great idea for summer cake. It was a classic pound cake from a proportion point of view and I’m all about pound cakes as many of you know.

So Gin and Tonic cake was my intention. Until Saturday.

When I started to think, “well, but I don’t drink gin and tonic. Why couldn’t I swap in the making of one of my drinks?” And then it occurred to me, the lemon-infused vodka!

You see, several weeks back, we’d taken some half decent vodka, popped a mess-o-lemon rinds and a bit of bruised lemon grass into the bottle and left it to infused. We tasted it. DAMN it was smooth. It eventually took on SO much flavor from the lemon rinds that you could easily have just popped an ice cube into it and enjoyed it with no mixer at all. What about a twist on the drink in cake form?A Lemon Vodka Twist!

And so I did. I made a few changes beyond the choice of booze. I used caster sugar instead of granulated for the drizzle (I find it dissolves a bit better). I used SLIGHLTY less lemon juice since the lemony-ness of the vodka was VERY intense. Continue reading “‘When Gin’s Not Your Thing’ Lemon Vodka Twist Cake” →

The Inevitable Lemon

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There are three things that are inevitable in my life: Death, taxes, and that at some point in my day, I will reach for a lemon. Actually, perhaps four things, as it’s also inevitable that at some point in their blogging life every food blogger must write a post extolling the virtues of the lemon. And here I am, to do just that.

There’s an old saw that goes “If Life gives you lemons, put nine in a bowl.” I’d have a better use for every one of those lemons. Lemons are so absolutely essential to how I cook and how I live in my kitchen. It’s not that I want all my food to taste lemony, but rather that they’re so dang useful. They’re the cornerstone of my cooking. I never don’t have at least one lemon to hand, even if it is a scraggy quartered thing lurking in the nether recesses of my fridge.

In fact, once when taking part in a radio program about matters foodie, I was asked “What food item do you always have in your kitchen?”, and instead of answering something appropriately glamorous like “Pink Himalayan Sea Salt” or “Truffle Infused Honey”, I heard myself say “A dried up quarter of a lemon in my fridge. Inevitably.” Continue reading “The Inevitable Lemon” →

The Tale of The Lonely Lasagna

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A couple of weeks ago, I was brought up short by a moment of hubris.

What happened was this: A very dear friend, who has known me as well as my family since college and with whom I, in fact, used to live, came to stay the night. On her last visit we had sampled a local Vietnamese place so this time we’d be eating in. Thence came my moment of hubris. Secure in the knowledge that my culinary prowess would thrill her whatever I made, I asked “What would you like me to cook?”

Warning: If you are tempted to ask a guest, “What would you like me to cook?” … take a deep breath and don’t.

Don’t Ask

Never do this. You’re hosting a dinner, not taking requests at the cocktail lounge out by the airport.

Don’t put people on the spot (unless they’re family, in which they’ll likely demand a given dish before you’ve even asked). Guests somehow never say “Oh I’m sure whatever you make will be divine!”, thus freeing you up to make the fiendishly impressive Middle Eastern feast you’d been planning. Instead, they will ask for precisely the dish you just cooked last week and can now barely bear the thought of. Or worse, they’ll say what my guest said: “Oooh! How about you make your lasagna?”

My lasagna? What could she be thinking? I don’t have a lasagna! I’ve never made a lasagna in my life. And that’s what brought me up short: I HAD NEVER MADE A LASAGNA IN MY LIFE. Continue reading “The Tale of The Lonely Lasagna” →