Pinoy Hubby

This weekend is the Singapore Grand Prix and when I started thinking about  what I could make for Formula 1 Foods , the blog challenge I've been running this year, my mind went straight to one thing: Singapore Slings. I discovered the cocktail when I was on holiday in Singapore and had one at the Raffles hotel where the drink was invented; you can read my review here . Here's the recipe for the cocktail itself, on the back of a notebook I bought in the hotel. Until now when I've made it at home I've left out the Dom Benedictine as it's expensive and you only use a tiny amount (and I don't know any other cocktails it's used in) but this time decided to push the boat out and buy a bottle. I decided to recreate the flavours of the cocktail in a cake and that the form of a bundt would work best. I turned to bundt queen Rachel McGrath's website Dolly Bakes and used her 'build a bundt' recipe for the basic mixture to which I could add my own flavours....

We missed the Italian Grand Prix as we were on holiday but my fiancé was following it online and I made sure I did my post for Formula 1 Foods before I went away! It did mean I didn't have much of a chance to promote the challenge though so there were only a couple of entries; I had hoped there would be more as Italy is a much easier theme than many! I did an entire Italian buffet for my fiancé's birthday this year and hadn't blogged about it until now so here you can see a selection of ideas and recipes which are really easy if you are feeding a crowd. Suelle at Mainly Baking  made this almond, raspberry and rose polenta cake which is both gluten free and dairy free;  she says it's one of the best cakes of this kind that she has ever made and the fresh fruit gives a lovely seasonal twist. The other entry this month came from Johanna at Green Gourmet Giraffe who made angel-hair pasta with feta, sundried tomatoes and spinach. I'm always on the look out for interest...

      My two closest friends from work have recently left – one is on maternity leave and the other has transferred to a different team in another building. He’s only a few minutes up the street but I’d been missing our daily chats so right after he started his new job we had lunch together so he could tell me all about it. There are loads of restaurants around Spitalfields which is near our offices, so I thought this was a good opportunity to try out one I hadn’t been to before.   I actually went to a branch of the Real Greek about ten years ago – it launched in 1999 – and the company has changed hands since then. It is now run by a Real Greek (as the website explains) and operates in what is called the ‘fast casual’ space – in between fast food and a more casual restaurant. They have a special lunch menu for instance where you can easily be in and out within less than an hour, which gives simple choices of the ‘Greek Trio’ or the ‘Skewer plate’, for £8.95 (not inc...

    I set out to make strawberry blondies to use up some leftover strawberries, and found this recipe on the Food Network website. As I started making it, I realised that it used strawberry jam rather than fresh strawberries, and butterscotch chips, which I thought sounded really nice but not necessarily combined with strawberries… so  I set my punnet of strawberries to one side while I found a different recipe to use those, and made what I am calling Butterscotch Blondies instead!   You need 4 tbsp butter 1 cup light brown sugar 1 tsp vanilla flavouring 1 egg ¾ cup plain flour ¼ tsp baking powder ½ cup butterscotch chips   Preheat oven to 180C. Line a square baking tin with parchment, or if you have a brownie pan like I do, spray each section with Cake Release.   Melt the butter and the sugar in a bowl in the microwave for 1 minute on high. Stir in the vanilla and the egg.            In a larger bowl if necessary, fold the bu...

  Kings Stores (no apostrophe, which bothers the grammar nerd in me) is a ‘proper pub’ in London’s Spitalfields. It features dark wood; serves craft beers and has a pub-grub style menu. At the same time it has a dining room on the first floor though I’ve always sat downstairs when we’ve been for drinks after work.   This time we had lunch in honour of two colleagues visiting from other locations. Incidentally, my Scottish colleague has just discovered Honest Burger, which is only in London, and says it’s the best burger he’s ever tasted. He had one in Kings Stores and said it was very good – but not quite the same.   I’d gone along thinking I would have a starter of grilled sardines with a side order of fries, but by the time we got there it was later than I usually have lunch and I was ravenous – it was lucky I had a big meal in the end as I ended up working late and not having dinner until 9pm.   My eye was caught by the burger: Angus beef, topped with Cajun pulle...

Colourful and communal are the two words that spring to mind when I think of Comptoir Libanais, the “Lebanese Canteen”. I’d actually only ever seen them in airports before, but there several outposts of this restaurant around London, including one in the newly-redeveloped Broadgate Circle near Liverpool Street station.   We seem to have had quite a few team lunches recently as we have colleagues visiting from other offices and go out for lunch together (we all pay for our own food). We actually intended to go to a pizza place this time but hadn’t booked and the wait time was too long, so we went to Comptoir Libanais instead.   The main menu is divided into mezze (hot and cold); wraps; salads; from the grill; tagines, mana’esh (flatbread) and fattets (fried flatbread pieces); chef’s specials; extras and desserts.   Two of my colleagues had a mezze sharing platter which they really enjoyed; I didn’t want anything as substantial as the koftas from the grill (though the grill...

Doesn’t the name alone sound indulgent?   I realised that despite launching The Brownie Blog a few months ago I haven’t made brownies – or posted anything on that blog – in ages. I had some blueberries left over from another recipe (these chocolate blueberry cakes ) and I also had some of the blueberry flavour icing that I’d made up from a packet from Sugar & Crumbs as I’d made a little too much. I wondered if I could incorporate the two into brownies and remembered seeing some nice brownie recipes in my Hummingbird Bakery book. They had a recipe for raspberry cheesecake brownies so I decided to borrow that idea, using blueberries instead, but rather than blending the blueberries into cream to go on top, I used the leftover blueberry icing.   These are pretty easy to make – I knocked them up in about an hour around 10pm one evening!   You can find the recipe in the Hummingbird Bakery book or online on GoodtoKnow (the website for various women’s magazines including E...