It has come to the time of year where there are endless summer balls. Wonderful events. Rather sadly, as a result of many garden parties and similar events, my dresses have become a little on the tight side. 

The next ball I’m attending is Saturday, 25th July.  A mere eleven days away. As a result, I’m on a detox to ensure that I can wear the dress. Day 1. I’ve had more day 1s than most people on the planet. 

I’ve already consumed more mint tea than a health-nut and the headaches have kicked in. I’m fantasising about the acai and blueberry flavoured chocolates upstairs and my monthly box from Hotel Chocolat dropped through the postbox this morning. Can I really exist on shakes for the next ten days? 

Dan is already worried that I’m going to be extra grumpy. He’s right. Also, why are there more food adverts on the TV when you’re on a detox? This is genuinely a thing. 

  
Last night, Dan and I went to eat at this lovely little pub. Set in an enchanting village (think thatched cottages and a Father Brown style church), The Boot is a relatively undiscovered gem, with its very good reputation kept fairly quiet by the locals. (Let’s face it, when your local is that good, you don’t want outsiders coming and booking all the tables!) 

Last night was one of the many trips we have made to The Boot this year. We went first on Valentine’s Day and have been back five or six times since. It’s very close to the Hampshire Wiltshire border and, for the area, has an unusual menu. They offer English, Thai and Malaysian cuisine, all to a very high standard. Unlike so many other pubs, they also cater very well for vegetarians and those with dietary requirements.

When we arrived, we headed straight for the bar. It was relatively warm yesterday, but I still fancied a glass of wine, so I opted for a Chardonnay white wine spritzer. That really was the only way I could justify it to myself since (a) I’d promised myself I’d detox and (b) it really was too hot just to drink wine on its own. Dan ordered a beer- no idea which one. 

We’re now fairly familiar with the menu. For a starter, chicken satay usually wins, although they do have very good chilli shredded beef and breaded brie. Other options include garlic mushrooms, soup, patê, crispy duck and many more which I can’t recall. Last night, we ordered two chicken satays. Succulent chicken (eight pieces) in a homemade, spicy peanut sauce. It’s nice to have a spicy, as opposed to very bland, peanut sauce. I imagine that that is achieved by the addition of chilli oil, but am not certain. For the main course, Dan ordered beef massaman curry with egg fried rice (no peas, no sweetcorn) and I opted for the chilli shredded beef and coconut rice. Dan always orders beef massaman. I would say that The Boot’s version has a more prominent lime flavour than anywhere else, although it is not overpowering. Lime is also infinitely superior to lemon. The crispy beef was very tasty, although a little too soggy for me (there really wasn’t anything crispy about it). A little disappointing since it had been crispy on Valentine’s Day, when I’d had it last. That said, I would order it again. So tasty. 

The portions at The Boot are huge. Each time we go, we say that we can’t manage two courses, but we always try! The truth is, the food is so good that there are multiple dishes you can choose from, and you feel cheated unless you order as much as you think you can manage. The food is always so fresh and full of flavour. I suppose it’s a little surprising having such excellent oriental food in such a traditional English pub, eating prawn crackers and rice whilst sitting below exposed wooden beams, but that somehow has an added charm. 

The Boot is one of our regular haunts and for good reason. I’d advise you to give it a try, but don’t pass it on to your friends- it’s difficult enough to get a table as it is!

#pubs #countrypubs #sunday #dinner #theboot #shiptonbellinger 

Last Friday, my boyfriend and I went to eat at Tandoori Nights in Amesbury. I was a little apprehensive (I’m not a big fan of Indian food), but I’d heard so much about the place that I thought I’d give it a try. Due to the temperature, I wasn’t even that hungry (and I had a bar of chocolate back at home), so I knew I wouldn’t be going to bed hungry, even if I hated the food.

The restaurant has a small frontage and the entrance struck me as a little pokey. It really felt as if we were going to a takeaway place as opposed to a sit-down meal. 

It shows how wrong first impressions can be. When you enter the restaurant, there’s a decent sized bar with a sitting area and, what the restaurant lacks in width, it makes up for in depth. We were greeted by really friendly staff in amazing uniforms (Indian military) with the company logo sewn on (which should have looked tacky, but actually didn’t) and offered a table set for four so that we could have more space.

The menu was a pleasant surprise- it’s the only Indian restaurant I have visited where ostrich and venison are on the menu, and not just as a “daily special”. Finally an Indian where it’s not just the predictable curries!

As we were perusing the menu, we were brought some popadoms and a variety of dips. As some of you will know, I am not a fan of coriander. This meant that I avoided two of the dips. I did, however, try the mango chutney (average as far as chutnies go) and a mint dip (which was yellow, so I’m guessing that it may have had some saffron in there). 

Despite having such an menu from which to choose, I was predictable and ordered the chicken korma (they had two variations and I opted for the creamier, more coconut based version) and sag rice (tri-coloured rice with spinach). My boyfriend ordered ostrich tikka masala and naan bread. We also ordered two Kingfisher beers. I don’t care if it looked unladylike, beer is better with a curry than wine. 

From my very first mouthful, I regretted the fact that my appetite was so small. The food was really good. Really good. I never thought I would say this, but Tandoori Nights reminded me of my all time favourite Indian restaurant (The Panahar, Esher, Surrey). High quality meat, full of flavour, very fresh and incredibly tasty, without being overly fragranced. Dan was looking at my korma, and no matter what he says, he had food envy. I tried a piece of his ostrich and really enjoyed that. The masala sauce was slightly too perfumed for me, but I could have eaten it and enjoyed it. I probably would have liked his more had I not tried mine first.

Despite my best efforts, I could only eat about a half of my curry. The portions were very generous and next time I think I’ll ask to have the rest as a takeaway. Dan demolished his, but even he couldn’t finish mine. 

After the main course, we were both struggling to move, so a pudding was out of the question. I did, however, spot kulfi on the menu, so I shall definitely be placing an order on my next visit!

Overall, I really liked the restaurant and I’ll make a trip there when I’m in the area again. I quite liked their canvases on the wall (pink and purple hued nature scenes), Dan would have liked it to have stayed true to an Indian theme. I was just pleased that, rather like their menu, their décor was unexpected too. 

#food #curry #indian #restaurant #friday #amesbury 

So, this is my first ever restaurant review and it’s an old haunt of mine. Just down the road from Harrods (quite literally a three or four minute walk) it is perfect for a post-shopping-spree meal. 

It doesn’t look like much from the outside. A rather small frontage with a predictable red and gold colour scheme, but I would say that it’s worth casting aside any reservations and venturing inside.

We sat at the back of the restaurant, which has a nice conservatory roof, and had an elevated view of the restaurant. For a large part of the evening, ours was the only occupied table in this section of the restaurant. Whilst it can feel a little secluded at the back, the staff are reasonably attentive, and you have the added bonus of being far enough away from the road that you can’t really hear the commotion outside. I would say that this is the part of the restaurant to ask for when you book.

I ate with a group of six other people and we shared a mixture of starters: chicken satay, prawn dumplings, smoked chicken, pork dumplings, and two types of squid. I must confess that I passed on the prawns and squid. The chicken satay was fairly standard and not as good as it has been there in the past. The meat didn’t seem particularly lean and the peanut sauce was under a layer of oil, so, whilst it was delicious, I could just feel the calories settling in my body, and not in a good way. Based on how that was this evening, I probably wouldn’t order it there again. The smoked chicken was a dish I hadn’t tried before as were the prawn dumplings. Both were surprisingly nice. I’m not sure whether I liked them because I had had fairly low expectations based on my mental preconceptions, or whether they were objectively good. The smoked chicken was not overly smoked and came in a delicious thin batter, which I wasn’t expecting. Very light, but full of flavour, and slightly salted. The pork dumplings were rather tasty too, though, other than the texture of the dumpling, I wouldn’t have said that there was anything particularly oriental about the taste; it was just like standard sausage meat. Very pleasant to eat, but the sort of food you could easily eat whilst talking to someone and not recall eating. In other words, it didn’t stand out.

For the main courses we all shared: crispy chilli shredded beef, aromatic crispy duck, sesame beef, mixed green vegetables, scallops and sea bass. Again, I didn’t try the last two dishes. We also shared egg fried rice, steamed rice and noodles with beansprouts. The shredded beef came in a rather bright orange sauce (MSG anyone?) and wasn’t crispy at all, but still had a pleasant taste. This dish in and of itself isn’t one which would make me travel from Surrey in order to have it, but it’s fairly comforting as unhealthy food goes. The sesame beef was rather tasty, even though it looked rather unappealing (it looked like sticks of charcoal). The green vegetables came in a ginger sauce and seemed to go down well. I’m not really a fan of ginger and I thought the sauce was a little on the gloopy side (note the technical term there). Aromatic duck is and always has been one of my favourite things to order in restaurants and this did not disappoint. The duck was very lean and came with a generous serving of pancakes, cucumber, onion, and hoisin sauce. Again, only the standard accompaniments, but well executed. 

I didn’t order any pudding, but two of my group opted for vanilla ice cream. I really mix with people who live on the edge. It looked to me like the standard ice cream you could buy from a van just about anywhere this summer. Definitely not worth London prices. 

We concluded the evening with a fortune cookie. Mine said, “Someone in your family will come to visit you soon”. As I am staying with my parents at the moment, that is not exactly difficult. Still, others on my table got some real corkers, so I got away fairly lightly! 

I drank Tsingtao beer all evening as I found it too hot for wine, but some of the others shared a bottle of the house white, a 2014 Chilean Sauvingnon Blanc. No-one commented on it one way or the other, so we can conclude that it was wholly unremarkable.  

Shanghai Knightsbridge is not cheap. I would say that they charge on the higher end of what they could get away with and they are definitely London prices. That said, the management, waiters and waitresses are very friendly and attentive, providing a friendly, but not too informal, service. I have been there on a number of occasions throughout my life and I think that perhaps that is one of the main reasons why I would recommend it- purely out of habit. To me, it is a sweet little restaurant, but I would say that the food is nothing out of the ordinary. You would not have to travel to London for anything equally as good, or superior. 

#food #restaurant #review #restaurantreview #restaurantcritic 

I’m a 28 year old girl (I can still say girl, right?) raised in Surrey and based in London. Nothing too exciting there. I’m a bad cook. In fact, I’m a pretty terrible cook, but I put that down to inexperience. I’ve never even cooked a roast. (That, in part, might explain why I’m still unmarried. Well, that and many other things.)

Whilst my time in the kitchen has been of fairly short duration, I’m fairly inventive (it’s very rare that I’ll follow a recipe- I’m not enough of a forward planner to buy specific ingredients) and tend not to slave over much. I’m also a fussy eater. Very fussy.  My idea of hell is having to eat sushi with ginger, with parsley and coriander not far away, or, to a somewhat lesser degree, having tzaziki without dill. I love dill. I shall never understand why some people are obsessed with adding sultanas to coronation chicken or a chicken korma. (Genuinely, why would anybody do that?)

Whilst I admit to being difficult to please on the culinary front, I hope that some of my recipes appeal to similarly likeminded people in addition to people who like everything.

In addition to my recipes, I’m also going to write some reviews of different restaurants. They’re going to be places I visit in a personal capacity, often with friends or my long suffering boyfriend. You’ll be glad to know that he eats most things, even my mum’s cooking, so I’ll be including his opinions too (essentially, anything about fish and he’ll be the one who ate it).

I have no idea if anyone is going to read this, but I hope you like it if you do. Please feel free to contact me with any comments, good or bad.

#aboutme #lifestory #food #healthyeating