Throwback: Wimbledon Fever

Everyone knows that (apart from tennis) the things most closely associated with Wimbledon are strawberries and cream. Throughout the weeks that the tournament takes place, there are always promotions in supermarkets and on the television, encouraging people to buy what's on offer. 

One day while the tournament was taking place, I had a sudden urge to bake, so decided to take inspiration from 'strawberries and cream' by making some mini victoria sponges. I popped up the road to Waitrose to buy all the essentials for my cakes. I don't normally shop there, but out of the three supermarkets on my local high street, it's the one that has everything you'd need to bake a good cake! While I was there, I found some heart shaped cutters which were reduced and thought that instead of making actual mini sponges, I'd make 2 bigger ones and cut them out. 

Here is the recipe (Paul Hollywood) and method I used, along with some pictures to help! I decided to make butter icing instead of use fresh cream so they would last longer. 

INGREDIENTS
(makes 8)

Sponge
175g unsalted butter, softened
175g caster sugar
3 eggs, beaten
175g self raising flour

Filling
3 tbsp raspberry jam
150g unsalted butter, softened
325g icing sugar (25g to dust)
1-2 tbsp vanilla essence
8 strawberries or raspberries

METHOD

1. Set the oven to 180C/gas 4. Lightly butter two sandwich tins, each with a diameter of 20cm. 

2. Cream together the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, and then slowly add the beaten egg. 

3. Fold in the sifted flour and spoon the mixture into the prepared cake tins. 

4. Bake for 20 minutes. Leave to cool and then remove from the tins. 

5. While the cake is cooling, make the buttercream icing. Beat the butter until soft. Then add half the icing sugar and beat until smooth. 

6. Add the remaining icing sugar and vanilla essence until the mixture is smooth. 

7. By now, the cakes should be cool. You can now cut each cake into 4 hearts. With the left overs you can make a trifle or mini sponge, jam and butter icing bites (my brother loved these). 

8. In turn, cut each of the hearts in half until you have 16 thinner hearts. Cover 8 with jam and 8 with buttercream icing.

9. Sandwich them together and dust with icing sugar. Cut the strawberries in half and place on top of the cakes for a beautiful looking wimbledon treat! 

Healthy Summer

Since coming back from Italy I decided that it was finally time to lose some weight. I haven't been happy with my weight for a while now and that isn't helped by the fact that I love the experience of cooking and eating tasty food. However, my family still need to be fed, and eating healthily doesn't necessarily have to be boring. Here are 4 recipes I've found (2 soups and 2 salads) which are all under 310 calories, still taste amazing and are extremely filling! 

Cream of Tomato and Basil Soup

INGREDIENTS
(serves 2, 200 cals/serving)

1 garlic clove
1 onion
1 stick celery
1 carrot
1 tbsp olive oil
4 tbsp dried basil
1 tin chopped tomatoes
200ml vegetable stock
2 tbsp double cream/creme fraiche 
handful of fresh basil

METHOD
1. Chop onion and celery, grate carrot and crush garlic clove. Cook in olive oil until softened and sprinkle over dried basil.
2. Add chopped tomatoes and vegetable stock and simmer for 15 minutes
3. Whizz ingredients in a blender, stir in double cream and add fresh basil.

NB. Only add cream and basil if eating straight away. Otherwise, refrigerate and then heat, add basil and cream before eating. 




Carrot and Coriander Soup

INGREDIENTS
(serves 4, 105 cals/serving)

1 tbsp olive oil
1 onion
450g carrots
4 tbsp ground coriander
2 pints vegetable stock
large bunch fresh coriander
salt and pepper

METHOD
1. Chop onion and carrots thinly. Heat oil in a pan and cook onion and carrots until starting to soften.
2. Stir in ground coriander and season. Cook for 2 minutes.
3. Add vegetable stock and bring to the boil. Simmer for 10/15 minutes until vegetables are tender.
4. Whizz ingredients in a blender and add fresh coriander

NB. Only add coriander if eating straight away. Otherwise, refrigerate then heat and add coriander before eating.



Griddled Chicken & Corn on the Cob Salad

INGREDIENTS
(serves 4, 236 cals/serving)

2 skinless chicken breasts
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tbsp paprika
1 tsp ground cumin
juice 1 lime
2 tbsp olive oil
2 corn cobs
large handful lettuce leaves
1/2 cucumber 

METHOD
1. Cut the chicken breasts into strips. Mix the garlic, paprika, cumin, lime and 1 tbsp of oil with some seasoning and cover the chicken with the marinade. Leave for at least 15 mins.
2. Heat a griddle pan to high and cook the chicken for 3/4 mins each side until cooked through. Brush the rest of the oil over the pan and griddle the corn for roughly 5 minutes until evenly cooked. Remove from pan and cut off kernels. 
3. Mix the lettuce and cucumber, top with corn and chicken and your choice of dressing. 




Chicken with Couscous Salad

INGREDIENTS
(serves 4, 304 cals/serving)

200g plain couscous
1 red pepper, diced
4 spring onions, sliced
50g raisins
300ml chicken stock
2 tbsp pine nuts
juice of 1 lemon
2 skinless roasted chicken breasts
salad leaves

METHOD
1. Put couscous, spring onions, pepper and raisins into a heatproof bowl. Pour over the chicken stock and cover for 10 mins.
2. Fluff up the couscous with a fork and stir in pine nuts and lemon juice.
3. Season and serve with the chicken and salad. 




All four of these recipes are filling and delicious - two words a lot of people wouldn't normally associate with healthy meals. I found all of them on the internet (BBC GoodFood) but have adapted them ever so slightly which is why I haven't just posted the direct links. I know it's summer and soup is more of a winter dish, however for me it's a really quick, easy and filling meal and adds a bit of variety to "boring old salads". Try them for yourselves and let me know how it goes! 

Fermentum

Throughout our trip to Italy, I had some of the most amazing food I've ever tasted. However, there was one meal which came out on top by a clear mile. Before we left, my gran gave us both £20 to spend while we were out there, so we decided to spend it on a meal in a restaurant called Fermentum. It was recommended to us by Alessandra and Marco - the owners of the B&B where we were staying in Rome. It was situated in a beautiful location on the outskirts of an aqueduct park on Via Lemonia and was the perfect place to spend my gran's money. Ale and Marco had told us that the pizza dough was slightly lighter than normal and that the toppings were 'special' and 'different'. We didn't really know what this meant, but seeing as we received 20% off our total bill due to where we were staying, we decided to head to Fermentum on the second night of our stay in Rome.

Fermentum - cibando.com

Aqueduct park - TripAdvisor

We'd spent the whole day sightseeing around Rome and were really hungry so wanted a really filling and appetizing meal and fortunately we were not disappointed! Not sure what to have, Jack and I asked the waitress (who luckily spoke a bit of English) what she recommended. For the meat-lover she suggested the 'Pizza All'Amatriciana' (which normally comes as a pasta) so Jack went for that (even though he had no idea what was in it!), whereas I decided to have a spicy sausage, mushroom and bacon pizza. We also decided to order drinks; a beer for Jack and a glass of Prosecco for myself which was absolutely divine! Fruity, yet light and extremely refreshing.

To start, we ordered Classic Suppli, a typical Roman dish which Ale and Marco had raved about. We had no idea what to expect - apart from the fact that there was rice involved! What arrived was basically a ball of tomato flavoured rice and mozzarella. It sounds so simple yet it was so delicious! Here is the link to their facebook page - click here to see more Suppli: https://www.facebook.com/Fermentum?filter=1

It seemed as though all the locals were trying the more exotic styles of Suppli, but we had no idea how to go about ordering those and were happy enough with our classic ones. I have to say at this point that being a language student, yet not properly managing to communicate with people in their own language was quite frustrating! I didn't want to come across as a typically arrogant Englishwoman so tried my hardest to speak as much basic Italian throughout the duration of the holiday. This proved a huge struggle and explains why we didn't order more! 

After our 'Suppli Starter', our pizzas arrived. We were sat right by the chef's station and therefore we could observe the whole process - from the rolling out of the dough, to the plating up of the meal, which was a real privilege. Jack described his as 'the best pizza he's ever eaten' and mine wasn't far off whatsoever. The pizzas were HUGE and Marco was right about the dough - it really was something else. As for the toppings, I'd be quite intrigued to try the Pasta All'Amatriciana and see what it's like, but the pizza exuded flavours and aromas of smokey bacon, rich tomato & parmesan and as promised was like nothing I've ever tasted before. As for mine, the kick from the spicy sausage combined with the earthiness from the mushrooms and classic toppings of bacon and mozzarella created a damn good pizza!

We left feeling extremely satisfied with the food, drink and price. Just want to say thanks to my gran for helping us to have such a lovely meal in such a lovely place! As it was outside of central Rome, it wasn't touristy at all, and it was really nice to eat in a restaurant that the locals loved as it proved just how good the food was. 

We ended up eating out a bit later than we would normally as we needed a nap and relax after our tiring day out, which meant that by the time we actually got there (around 9pm) it was buzzing. There were people sat inside and out, and there was generally a really good atmosphere which made the whole dining experience really enjoyable. I'd most definitely recommend this restaurant to anyone who is travelling to Rome and/or staying in the outskirts. 

To find Fermentum on the Metro (how we did) just hop off at Subaugusta on Line A and head towards the aqueduct park where you will find Via Lemonia. Follow the road down and you can't miss it. And... if you want to enjoy 20% off at Fermentum I'd most definitely recommend a stay at the B&B Acquedotti Antichi with Marco and Alessandra. They were extremely hospitable and provided amazing breakfasts! For us, their B&B was in a really good location. Not central, but close enough to the centre for us to be able to do all the touristy things that we wanted to do. 

As I've said, the holiday allowed me to experience some of the most delicious food I've ever tried. However, now I'm back, I'm trying to lose some weight and therefore eat more healthily - so in the next post I'll be sharing some of my healthy meal ideas with you!