For A Sweet Tooth: Chocolate Brownies Recipe

I'm such a cake person, I love a nice slice of Victoria sponge or a fruit tart so today I present you with my quick and easy recipe for Brownies!

Ingredients

• 150g butter, melted (I put in the microwave for a little as it usually quite hard)
• 325g of brown sugar (or more depending on your taste)
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 150g plain flour

3 eggs

• 100g unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 75g mini chocolate chips 

Method - Serves 8-10

1. To begin with preheat the oven to 180 C / Gas 4. Lightly grease and flour a baking tin (now this is dependent on how many you want to make)
2. Beat butter, sugar and vanilla. Add eggs in gradually one at a time.
3. Sift flour, cocoa, salt and baking powder and add this all to the mixture. Beat it slowly and make sure it blends together well, once its all mixed in properly add chocolate chips then mix again thoroughly
4. Pour it into the baking tin and bake it for 20 minutes or until a skewer poked into the centre comes out clean. Don't mistake melted chocolate chip from the batter. The skewer has to have a bit of chocolate stuck to it. But if it's a lot of chocolate stuck, then it's not ready yet.
5. Let it cool. With brownies its important to let it cool down properly so that its not too crumbly and is more soft and chewy. Slice as desired and serve with ice cream or custard or cream or whatever floats your boat!

Hope you enjoy x

Vapiano Inspired Spinach and Bacon Lardons Pasta

One of my friends introduced me to the joys that lies in a meal from Vapiano! 

I had a Spinach and King Prawn Pasta which was lush! 

                 

Ever since I went to Vapiano I've been planning my return but in the mean while I thought I'd improvise at home and make a meal inspired by my visit.

So here is a quick recipe for a Spinach and Lardons Pasta (didn't have any king prawns at home so lardons it was)! 

So here is the end result of my meal and I must say all the family throughly enjoyed it! 

                          

                          

Ingredients: 

500g Pasta (I used Fusilli pasta and I used a lot of pasta because I was cooking for the family :)..so you may need more or less...mine fed 5)

                         

Spinach (100g) 

                         

Mozzarella cheese 

                          

Philadelphia  3-4 spoons

                           

Milk (semi skimmed)  - Half a pint

                           

Bacon lardons (You can use Chicken or Prawns instead)

Sunflower Oil (4 Table Spoons)

All purpose seasoning, mixed herbs, garlic, chilli seasoning.

Bay leaves

Sea Salt

Lets start cooking...

Boil some pasta (whilst you are cooking the rest keep your eye on the pasta and drain once cooked)

First of all add 4 table spoons of an oil of your choice and a thin slice of butter into your pot, after a few seconds add the lardons in to the pot and lightly fry (ensure you stir every few seconds to avoid it sticking)

Once you can see the lardons have fried add a quarter of half a pint of milk to the pot. Allow it to cook for 2 minutes and then add spinach into the pot.

Stir the spinach in the pot for a minute or two and then add the seasoning (garlic, all purpose, thyme, chillies etc)

Add 3 tablespoons of Philadelphia to the pot and stir in gently.

Stir in well

Make sure you taste the sauce and add more seasoning if you need to.

 At this point I added a bit more milk just to liquidise the sauce a bit more

                                       Add the cooked pasta into the pot and stir in gently

At this point you may find the spinach bunches together and causes an issue with distribution. Just take a fork and separate the chunks.

Once the sauce has been stirred in well. Its time to grab the cheese! (You don't have to use Mozzarella but its my favourite!) 

Add the cheese with a splash of water too and stir in. It will become quite sticky now but keep stirring.

Taste and add more seasoning if needed

Serve with BBQ chicken drumsticks or grilled salmon

                           

Tuck in x

Our Little Nandos Secret

I love myself a Nandos, obviously on card to some people it just chicken and chips but I can tell you its much more than that to us die hard Nandos fans!

Now the thing is I really do not like spice. I hate spice. I can handle a tiny bit. A very small amount. As soon as people start getting heavy handed with the chilli im not involved! Those of you that go Nandos know that they have a wide range of tongue twisting, mouth burning spicy sauces and I never participate in allowing them to smear that stuff on my chicken - No thanks! Im spicy enough as a person, don't want to overload myself with excess spice!

This is were my secret comes in - I really didn't want to continue telling people because my fear is one day they will run out and it will all by my fault. But sharing is caring and my parents brought me up to have manners so.........

If you look on the kids menu you will see.....

The Per-Tamer sauce is basically one of Gods many gifts to us humans on earth! It is a sweet BBQ flavoured sauce, it isnt spicy and they only put it on the menu for kids to enjoy...until one faithful day I tried my luck and BINGO, Peri-Tamer can be used on any meal!

So for those of you who like to push the boat out a little bit and broaden the horizons of your taste buds, next time you are in Nandos ask for Peri-tamer instead of your usual 'Hot' or 'Mango and Lime' and Thank me later!

*Also you can order grilled mushroom as a side in Nandos - but I cant lie when I ordered it to try it didn't look very appetising, it was extremely wet and not exactly the 'grilled' side I thought it would be. However don't let that deter you, it may be nicer in another area!.

Also apparently there is an Avocado starter....

x