Pinoy Hubby

Last weekend's Grand Prix in Monaco inspired me to make a dish called chicken Monte Carlo , even though I didn't have all the ingredients I needed - it still tasted really nice! There were a couple of other entries for my Formula 1 Foods challenge; Suelle at Mainly Baking made this aniseed and orange frangipane jalousie. She's been a great contributor to this challenge and did a lot of research into potential bakes, and came across something called a fougasse. Suelle used that as inspiration and made a frangipane-filled pastry which looks great. Fougasse was also the idea hit upon by Jane at Onions and Paper  who has also been a very welcome regular contributor to this challenge! She made this with almonds and fennel, and couldn't find a recipe so devised her own. She said the flavours made a gorgeous combination. The next Grand Prix takes place in Montreal, Canada, from June 5-7. I'd love to see your Canadian recipes whether they are sweet or savoury; please add

If you're bored of having your eggs the same way at breakfast why not try these cute eggs in bacon cups? They are pretty quick to make and are a bit different!   Preheat the oven to 180C. You need one rasher of bacon per egg. Spray a muffin pan with Fry Light and place a strip of bacon around the inside of each muffin hole. Snip off a little piece of bacon and put on the bottom.   Crack an egg into each muffin hole Bake in the oven for ten minutes and that's it! Serve as part of your fried breakfast or on their own

Red pepper houmous is really easy to make and a nice change from the plain variety. Making your own houmous also means it can be low in fat and salt and generally quite healthy. It's really good to take to a barbecue or if you are having lunch al fresco at home. You need: 410g tin of chickpeas 1 clove garlic, crushed 2 roasted red peppers from a jar - in brine is healthier than in oil squeeze of lemon juice 2 tbsp. olive oil Put the chickpeas and garlic in a food processor with some salt and pepper, then pulse. Add the peppers, lemon juice and oil and pulse until you have a smooth paste. Spoon into a bowl and serve with crudites or breadsticks.

Life, or Death? No, not a threat, or a philosophical conundrum - but a late night kebab choice for the students of Cambridge. When I went back for a college reunion recently, we had a lavish dinner but I couldn't not go to the Van of Death - and I couldn't miss telling you about it. Like many things in Cambridge, the Van of Death - or VoD as it is affectionately known - officially has another name: Uncle Frank's. But this is common - the nightclub we went to was known as Cindy's, and appears to still be called Cindy's by students now, even though the name had changed to something else (Fifth Avenue) even by the time I started university in 1998, and I think it's now called Ballare. So Uncle Frank's will always be the Van of Death to  us. Situated on the left hand side of the market square if you are facing King's, there is also a similar van on the other side of the square - known as the Van of Life. There were various myths and legends as to how the nam

Birdcages are a common theme at weddings and recently they have become popular as birthday cakes as well. I went to a wedding a few years ago of a couple whose surname is Bird, and they had a birdcage on each table – which I actually sourced for them – filled with flowers and decorated with little birds. I was given one of them to keep afterwards and replaced the flowers with dried ones, and I have it on display in my bedroom.   I’ve noticed a few birdcage cakes on the internet and thought they were really pretty and when I was sent a pair of bird cookie cutters to review by Cake Mart, I thought this was the perfect opportunity. I also used another item they sent me for review which was not exactly the purpose it was meant for, but it worked really well! The cake itself didn't quite turn out as I'd hoped; despite making sure that my cakes all looked even, when I covered it with the fondant it looked a bit lumpy. I'm not sure how else I could have done this on this scale - i

  We had my boyfriend's family over for his birthday in April and he wanted a buffet meal that people could help themselves to and eat while standing up. His mum does great buffets on Boxing Day with the same dishes every year - quiche, cocktail sausages, pate etc - and so I wanted to do something a bit different. I had the idea of an Italian themed buffet which worked really well, as I could buy a lot of things ready made and could prepare some other things in advance. One thing I made was these Italian stuffed peppers. They are very easy to make and don't take long; you can do them while you've got the oven on for something else and then serve them either hot or cold which makes them ideal for buffets. They are also a good substantial vegetarian option. To begin, slice some red peppers in half and remove the seeds. Turn the peppers so the cut side is facing down and place on a piece of baking foil. Roast in the oven at about 180C for about 15-20 minutes until the skins ar

  Monday – bank holiday Lunch: bacon sandwich Dinner: roast chicken breasts with poutine   Tuesday Lunch: bulgar wheat, apricot and chickpea salad Dinner: fish and vegetables for me, gammon steak for him   Wednesday Lunch: salad Dinner: I want to try out my new spiralizer and am going to make this sweet potato pasta , and my boyfriend can have normal spaghetti and meatballs.   Thursday Lunch: out with a colleague Dinner: honey soy salmon for me, sausage and mash for him   Friday Lunch: salad or sandwich Dinner: end-of-week treat: burger and chips   Saturday Lunch: baked potato with spicy chickpeas with tomato dressing Out for afternoon tea Dinner: probably won’t want much but my boyfriend will (as it’s a ladies afternoon tea) so he can have a pizza from the freezer   Sunday Lunch: Out – we’re taking part in the London to Brighton rally Dinner: something quick from the freezer as we may be back late

It's been a lovely bank holiday weekend and we've been to a barbecue today for my boyfriend's mum's 60th. It was hosted by her other son so I wasn't needed to provide the food (and didn't get to make the cake unfortunately!) but I did want to help out if I could. I was asked to make some sort of cous cous salad - since the other bases were already covered - and immediately thought of Deliciously Ella. Have you come across Ella Woodward yet? Her cookbook was the fastest selling debut ever - though Ella had already become something of a celebrity through her blog, Deliciously Ella . The recipes are all extremely healthy, as Ella changed her way of eating after being diagnosed with a rare illness. I'd seen some of her recipes online and they appealed to me, so for my birthday I asked for - and got - a spiralizer and a copy of her recipe book. The recipe I chose for my salad dish is available online here . It actually uses quinoa, though I found that the quanti

     This weekend is the Monaco Grand Prix in Monte Carlo and so I've made a recipe called Chicken Monte Carlo. I found it online but couldn't find any explanation of why the dish has that name so I don't know if it has anything to do with Monte Carlo itself but the name alone means it fits with my Formula 1 Foods challenge!   I found several recipes for Chicken Monte Carlo online which were all slightly different and as I wasn't sure which to use, I picked different elements of each. They all seemed to use broccoli  which I always have in the house so was very surprised to find when I started cooking that I had run out! I decided to make the dish anyway and use leeks instead so this ended up being a fairly random recipe but it did actually taste very nice.   This recipe is the closest one to how I made it but I was surprised at the amount of mayonnaise it called for and used far less, and I didn't use any stuffing. I had to use leeks instead of broccoli and Red L