january sun and a bbq

Only in England would a sunny day in January warrant a celebration by bbq. Yesterday was that day. The first time the sun shone in months I swear. I felt a happy buzz in the air. We decided the weather could not go to waste, it must be appreciated with a bbq and garden games. After braving the worst supermarket around (it's owned by Walmart... I LOATH Walmart) Tom and I drove to the sleepy village of Ovingdean which is right outside of Brighton and home to our friends Panda and Geno. Tom met these guys through rugby and luckily for me Geno's very sweet girlfriend Dilara is down most weekends. We soon arrived at theirs with everything required for an afternoon of outdoor fun.



Lasso Golf, Tom's birthday gift from my parents, was quickly set up and the competition on. Their garden is set perfectly in the direction of the sun and the perfect size for this game that involves tossing balls attached by string in hopes of wrapping them around the pvc ladder 20 feet away. I do have to mention the bit of grass in the shade did still have frost, but we didn't pay much attention to that. It was at least 40 degrees F, a beautiful day!

Then came the food. It is hard to beat a homemade burger. Tom prepared two different types, herb and chili/onion burgers... very yummy.


It was a wonderful afternoon. As the sun set behind the hill we rapidly became cold venturing back inside to warm up with tea. Dilara and I enjoyed a couple of hours of the show "Come Dine With Me" curled up in blankets as the boys were being boys playing online poker. An excellent afternoon. I can't wait until summer is really here!

Love

one month in and resoluting strong

As January is quickly coming to a close I feel it is necessary to report on my culinary achievements thus far. I am determined to stick to my resolution this year and be a proper foodie by Christmas. This month I have done much more cooking than usual. The banana muffins were a hit as was my English fry up and steak in a garlic and red wine sauce. Another favourite was made towards the beginning of the month I can’t quite remember, but I know I made something yummy… need to look that up. Not everything was a success such as a watery stew I attempted from scratch and chicken and veg in tomato sauce that needed spices for flavor. I am starting to feel more adept in the kitchen though and ready to take on more of a challenge.


Goals for February:
1. Remember to take pictures of what I cook to share with you my loyal readers.
2. Master gravy. It is a staple here in England and I am near hopeless with it.
3. Cook a meal with a four chef hat difficulty out of five from my cookbook.
4. Make one of your suggestions….. send them my way please!

Love

yoga for foodies

I discovered an amazing article yesterday, ideal for me, and HAVE to share it with the world! It is a well written, intelligent article discussing the collision of yoga with delicious food. Check it out…..

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/27/dining/27yoga.html

Perfect for me! I am yearning to be a wonderful mistress of the kitchen and my secret goal is to become a certified yoga instructor. I just have to wait on attempting that certification until I earn a bit more dinero. But this article is really intriguing and catching on as well, it,s all over the Internet.

For example have a look at this blog….
http://www.yogadork.com/2010/01/27/yoga-for-foodies-sinful-delights-in-a-sacred-setting-gluttons-rejoice-kindle-veg-debate/

The actual class even has it’s own Facebook page,
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=251725406984&ref=nf

If I lived in Manhattan and had a little spare cash I would be there in a heartbeat! Almost a good enough excuse for a little journey to the Big Apple.

What do you think, would you attend?

Love

birthday celebrations continue into the weekend

After Tom spent his birthday with his beautiful girlfriend, Saturday was a day for partying with friends.

Of course, I still had a birthday meal to make. I cooked fillet steaks in a garlic red wine sauce with twice baked potatoes and roasted brussel sprouts. It was divine! I received lovely compliments from Tom which showed he was impressed as well.

Around eight that night the house party began in anticipation for the clubbing ahead. The dart board was hung in the living room with care and drinks on the table for all to share.

The house was soon full of friends, a couple of Tom's mates from home, rugby guys and even new friends from work. Luckily for me a couple of other girlfriends were around so it wasn't just me and smelly boys. The darts board was a hit!


Soon cabs arrived to take everyone to the club. Coalition on the seafront. I was horribly excited as I could barely remember the last time I had really been clubbing. I seriously think the last time was in October. I LOVE clubbing! After dancing for nine years of my life this is the only time I still get to experience that passion. It was a perfect night! A full club, wicked music, great friends and loads of fun.

Love

tom's celebrates another year

On Friday 22 January Tom celebrated his 24th birthday. What an old man. We had an excellent weekend of celebrations.

We both took the day off of work to spend a relaxing day together and use up holiday days that rolled over into January. After a wonderful lie in my job for the day was to be at his command. I only agreed to this (well more suggested it) because I know what I am like on my birthday... I believe my birthday is the one day a year everyone has to wait on me and do as I wish, it is my day to be pampered. So I thought he deserved the same in return.

I got up and made him tea and cereals in bed to enjoy as he opened his pressies. Then it was back into the kitchen to make a full on English breakfast/fry up. I didn't miss out on a thing, the meal included; toast, eggs, beans, bacon, black pudding, sausage, mushrooms, tomatoes and hash browns. It was a first for me making this meal completely by myself, usually I am the sous chef. Its was delicious and everything was ready and hot to serve at the same time. I was quite proud of myself.


Then we set about doing jobs. This was Tom's idea. Laundry, cleaning then running errands. The most important task of the day was purchasing darts so he could hang his old dartboard and compete with the guys. His idea was if we got all of this out of the way today we could enjoy the rest of the weekend.

Once our tasks were complete we made our way up to Brook Farm for birthday tea. Tom's family is traditional and they have afternoon tea with cake daily. I had never experienced a special occasion tea before. We arrived and the table was set with finger sized egg salad sandwiches. Toms godparents joined in tea along with us and his parents. After the sandwiches we had a Victoria sponge birthday cake, home made of course. Everything was delicious!


Not long after tea we returned to Brighton. I had planned a special dinner, however we both were so full we decided to not waste it and have it Saturday instead With the flat to ourselves we enjoyed the rest of the evening with some wine and bubbly. A very enjoyable night together we rarely get.

I had a wonderful time on Tom's birthday and I really think he did too!

Love

oh what a workout

I am very lucky to have a corporate sponsored gym membership that allows me to pay just a mere 12pounds from my paycheck each month for LA Fitness. The money is taken straight out of my payslip so I barely even notice that I pay to go to the gym. Usually a regular membership is 35pounds, I get a savings of over 50%!!!

A bonus is that right now the personal trainers are on some kick to up their client base. Most likely because of the usual January increase in gym attendance due all of the people who ate and drank too much over the holidays and have made a resolution to now get fit. I am happy as it meant that I got an hour free session with a trainer this evening, another 35pound savings. It was the best workout I've had in ages... well except for abs blast I went to this weekend that made muscles on the sides of my ribs I didn't know existed ache for days! I loved working with a personal trainer. She had me huffing and puffing on the machines and my face turned bright red for ages. Rather than my normal nice and steady wins the race routine on the cross training she had me doing interval training that made me so out of breath I could barely manage a smile when she asked if I was alright. Her shouting to keep going and get faster and keep it up, really helped. Then some weights and push ups trying to strengthen my poor little arms. And of course crunches to improve my eight pack. I felt great, that painfully horrible great feeling that proves I did something good for myself.

Trick now is to motivate myself as she did next time I go to the gym.

Love

my beauty is back

After months of being without my beautiful Mac, it is back in my life. I am overly pleased. The poor battery died in November. I had lost the UK charger and was having to use my US charger through a converter. That stopped working. I think I should have realized that the converter getting overly hot and making loud noises was a bad sign. So when the battery went the converter wouldn't work and my computer would not turn on. I was really worried the problem was my computer. Luckily the man at the the Mac store determined it was just the battery.

Fifty pounds for a charger I knew I had somewhere and one hundred pounds for a new battery was just not within my budget when I had Christmas presents to buy. Plus I am on the computer at work all day and can do everything I need to during lunch. So I decided getting my computer to work again wasn't vital and could wait for the time being.

Yesterday we were back at Tom's parents and as he was rummaging through boxes of old stuff, he found it... my UK charger. As soon as I got home I plugged my computer in, the little green light illuminated, I pressed the power button and ta da, Power! It is back on and working as long as its plugged in to a socket, and for free even. I am so very happy inside.

Love

saturday outing

In response to the credit crunch and being poor Tom and I don't go out very often. I was incredibly excited when our friends Ade and Gemma invited us for drinks and a meal a couple of Saturday's ago. They had two for one vouchers at Wagamamas (http://www.wagamama.com/)that needed to be used. We decided to make it a late lunch due to weather conditions and met in town around two.

It was a lovely afternoon! We went for a few drinks first on a mini pub crawl. Sitting inside each pub you could see the snow falling through the windows. I almost felt that I was at a ski chateau. After a quick drink by the station we moved down the road to a pub specializing in beer from around the world (which serves the only beer I drink, a raspberry one), and then one last pub before the meal. The time was passed with good chat and a lot of laughs.

A couple of hours or so later we found ourselves at the restaurant. My food was delicious! I had a Chili Prawn Men. Spicy and seafood with wholewheat noodles, perfect for me. It was a great outing braving the snow and cold with wonderful friends.

Love

more snow more freezing cold

It has snowed and snowed all week. It's like the Antarctica here! So cold, seriously when I walk to the station in the morning on my way to work I expect to cross pass with a polar bear or at least a penguin. Haven't yet, but its supposed to get colder this week so they probably will be roaming about.

The trains have been a mess. I thought I was going to turn into an ice statue on Thursday when my train was delayed a half hour. I survived by putting my head phones in, turning my music up and dancing in place to attempt to stay warm, but I didn't get too into it as there were others around. By the time I arrived at work I was sooooo cold! Luckily I decided to forget about retaining a cool reputation and had taken my hot water bottle to work. I filled it up as soon as I got in and was so happy when it started to take the chill out of my bones.

Getting home was a mission as well. I was fortunate to get home after the gym on Wednesday after practically every train being canceled. I did get one that was only delayed a half hour due to power issues. The next night though after work it was going to be at least an hour wait so I decided to cab it home.

Friday afternoon at work our commercial director called everyone into the main room. We were thinking they would say we were finishing early. That didn't happen. Instead, as a thank you for coming in all week (as we are supposed to since its our job) and especially for the hassle some people went through getting in, they gave everyone a ten pound voucher for Amazon! I was so Happy!! I went straight away and ordered the pink jeweled computer mouse I had been wanting for weeks. They were a popular gift item this year and by the time I discovered them the stores were sold out. Very soon it will be delivered to my desk bringing happiness to every working day!


Love

my new years resolution

I am VERY excited about my resolution this year. Its not the normal loose weight or quit smoking resolutions that everyone makes. Those would be silly as 1. I go to the gym regularly already and 2. I don't smoke.

My resolution is.... To become a good cook by the end of the year!

Right now if I have a recipe and all of the ingredients I can cook just about anything. I want to be able to go in the kitchen have a look at the fridge and cupboards and think "right, I'll make this" and know exactly what to make with whats there. Also, when I look at a recipe I want to be able to say, "oh I would probably like it with a or b added, or I don't have x I can just substitute z." See I want to feel confident in the kitchen. I want to feel like I know exactly what to do rather than feeling like a bit of a nervous novice. I also want to be good at timing so all the food is done at the same time and served hot. Oh, and be able to host dinner parties.

So how am I going to do this? Practice makes perfect.

In the sales I bought an excellent low fat cookbook that is big with lots of pictures. W H Smith was practically giving it away, I Had to have it. It even rates recipes on difficulty, one chef hat to five. After purchasing this I received Nigella's Express cookbook from Gemma, one of my fav new friends here. It was such a perfect Christmas pressie! Now I am set with cookbooks and ready to learn.


I have done well so far, practically started living in the kitchen. Over the weekend I made a vegetable and lentil soup, turkey ciabatta sandwiches and salmon linguine in a white wine sauce. Last night I saved some old bananas by turning them into banana muffins. I have had success so far and it's not even a week into the year. At this rate I will be an expert foodie in a year.

Any recipes or suggestions please send them my way please!

love

welcome 2010!!!

I've got a feeling 2010's gonna be a good year, this year's gonna be a good good year!

It started with an excellent celebration. NYE!!! What a night.

Lets start with the outfit... oh I loved my outfit. Unfortunantly silly me forgot to charge my camera and I didn't get a full length pic. I paired my LBD with HOT pink tights, peep toed high heel ankle boots, a fab long chunky hot pink necklace and plenty of pink and black bangles. I felt HOTT. Not to mention I braved the false eyelashes that loads of girls wear out and for some reason I miss out on. I felt like a proper girly girl and loved it!

We went to Belushi's near the seafront with loads of friends. Not quite a night of clubbing as it was more of a bar scence, which means not as good of dancing, but still loads of fun. Plus two pound jagerbombs meant my poor self could easily afford the night.

I think it was the people that made it so great. Many rugby guys as always. However, I know most all of them and they are great fun to go out with. It was both the new guys and oldboys. Some of the older ones' gf's were there who I had never met, they were super nice. Best part is that Nick's gf Frey was down so I had another girl along the entire night. Oh, and someone to go shopping with earlier in the day.


I had the perfect number of drinks and the perfect kiss as the clock stroke tweleve.

Hello 2010!

Love

a BIG thank you for a little blue box

My parents SHOCKED me this Christmas!!!! In an AMAZING way!

My Christmas package from my parents arrived the Tuesday after Christmas. Not bad especially considering unfortunately my Christmas box for my fam is still on its way to them despite early shopping and making my way to the post office at the beginning of December. Oh well, what can I do.... its on its way... i hope!

I woke up that Tuesday feeling a cold coming on and just wanting to roll over and sleep all day. We were still at Tom's family home and I heard him call me from downstairs trying to rouse me out of bed with news of a package. Of course it worked! I was downstairs in no time, package in hand.

Pressies for Tom and I from my parents, exciting! Tom received a dashing work shirt and tie. I first opened Apples to Apples. If you haven't played this game... you need to! I've given as a gift so many time but surprisingly until now never owned it myself.

Then I opened a beautiful grey dress. Perfect for work, I can't wait to wear it this week.

THEN I opened the small box. As I gently started removing the paper I began to see it... the blue, the TIFFANY BLUE!!! A second of dilemma, do I savour the moment and continue to slowly open the package, or just tear the paper away. I tore quickly. A beautiful blue box in my hand. So pretty by itself it almost didn't need opening. But of course I had to. Inside... STUNNING earrings! Absolutely Wonderful! My second holes have been lonely for quite some time. Now I have the perfect fit. I never dreamed I would unwrap a Tiffany box. Ahhhh, what more could a girl want?

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU Mom and Dad. I am definitely a spoiled girl!

Love