A Look Back at 2013…

As 2014 inches ever closer, I thought it would be a good idea to have a look at 2013 and what’s been happening with the blog over the last twelve months. Remember any of this? 

Argentina

 

Obviously we took the family to Argentina in March, to visit family and friends, many of whom I met for the first time (it only took us 10 years!). I ate garrapiñadas at the stadium while watching San Lorenzo play, enjoyed a few asados and totally fell in love with facturas (I was already in love with dulce de leche to be fair, before I set off). I came back and blogged my trip, and a few Argentina-inspired recipes, as well as doing a talk with my husband to local primary school children and gave them all alfajores to try. I’d love to go back – I miss everyone so much (and of course the facturas, too…)

Studying

Something away from the blog really, but still a big thing for 2013. I discovered MOOCs – online courses from universities all over the world, that are totally free to join. I took a course in Astronomy – something I’d always been curious about – and learned about black holes, cosmic background radiation and radio telescopes. I’ve enrolled in courses about Shakespeare for 2014 and also photography (so hopefully I’ll be able to get my photographs looking more sumptuous for you all this year). 

Diets and Health

It seems that over the last twelve months I tried – and blogged about – almost every lifestyle diet choice there is. I went on an elimination diet using Gwyneth Paltrow’s book, then went vegetarian and then decided to go vegan before settling for a diet that most closely resembles the paleo diet: meat, veggies and fish. It wasn’t initially to lose weight – I just didn’t feel healthy and settled in myself so looked for a diet (less of a diet in its temporary sense than a lifestyle choice though) that made me feel strong and healthy. I still cheat, of course – the odd slice of pizza or chocolate biscuit creeps in – I do feel much better though.  Hurray!

Moved House

A week and a half before Christmas, we moved house (you thought it was quiet on the blog, didn’t you?). This is good, because although we loved our flat, it now means I have slightly more room in the kitchen and also a garden, so expect some serious barbecue action this summer. 

Writing
I’m so glad to be able to write for all of you – on comfort food science, my favourite recipes or sharing what I’m cooking that day on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. I’ve written for Yahoo! this year again, too. I love to write, and it has put me in touch with some truly talented people. Writing in 2013 was pretty epic. 

Thank you for coming back to look at the blog and what I’m posting, and for all your continued support on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. I love to hear from all of you and it means so much to me to see your likes, comments and tweets over the year. Please all keep in touch and here’s to a happy, abundant and healthy 2014. *clinks glass*

What were your highlights of 2013? What are you looking forward to eating and drinking over the coming year? 

Comfort Bites’ Most Popular Posts of 2013

2013. We talked about hot dog-stuffed pizzas, healing diets and Argentinian sandwiches. We tried Jamie Oliver’s home-made ketchup, Gwyneth Paltrow’s elimination diet and brownies made with Nutella. But what were the most-viewed blog posts of the year on Comfort Bites? Well I’ve done some number crunching and here they are (click on the title to go to the individual post). Remember any of these? 

Butterflied Slow-Cooked Leg of Lamb

 

Gorgeous, moist lamb that practically melts in your mouth. That’s my slow-cooker butterflied lamb leg. It got the most views of any other post over the year and was pinned a fair bit, too. It might take 6 hours to cook but requires minimal effort from you, and you’re rewarded with flavourful, pull-apart meat. One of my favourites of the year, too. 

10 Elimination Comfort Food Recipes

 

Lots of people searched for recipes for the elimination diet this year. An elimination diet aims to remove potential allergens in your food, or foods that can upset your body’s balance, such as soy, nightshades and gluten. It’s a bit hardcore for the first few weeks, but then you start to reintroduce foods one by one, keeping a look out for any reaction in the body. Knowing how difficult it was to know what to eat in the beginning, I put together a list of some elimination diet recipes that can provide a bit of comfort too. Because for me, that’s what eating is all about. 

Argentinian Salads

 

I thought I would come back from Argentina an expert on cooking steak. But I came back with a craving for salad. I blogged about some of the salads I ate over there at asados – the key to a good Argentine salad is to chop everything small, remove the skin on the cucumber and always dress it with olive oil, vinegar and salt and pepper. It feels like summer’s getting closer already. 

10 Ways with Mash

 

Mashed potato is lovely, but sometimes needs some adjustment to keep it interesting. I offered ten ideas on ‘pimping up your mash’ – the only one I would add is to beat soft goat’s cheese into mashed sweet potato and scatter in a handful of snipped chives. 

Authentic Argentine Chimichurri

 

You don’t get more authentic than this. I learned how to make this at my husband’s uncle’s asado in Buenos Aires, where they served it with Argentine chorizo, chicken and, of course, beef. Really easy to put together, it’ll last for a few days in the fridge – I’ve filled chicken breasts with it. If you want to be really authentic, split a white crusty dinner roll, add a cooked, coarse pork sausage and spread chimichurri on the inside. It’s called choripan and it was one of my favourite snacks over there. 

What posts do you especially remember in 2013? Did you try any of my recipes? Let me know in the comments below…. 

Pairing Food and Drinks with Waitrose This Christmas

This Christmas was brilliant. It was a lovely family occasion (my husband only got Christmas Day and Boxing Day off work, so we all made the most of the time together) – watching films, pulling crackers and eating. Lots and lots of eating. 

And as well as all this, it also worked as a kind of food and drink experiment too. 

Just before Christmas, Waitrose asked me if I’d like to test out their Food and Drink pairing guide for myself, so the day before Christmas Eve, we stocked up on a few bottles to try alongside our favourite festive treats. 

 

For the canapés for Christmas Eve, Waitrose recommended their Bright and Fruity sparkling wine from Northern Italy. At £6.49 a bottle it’s a good price, and has a refreshing apple flavour among all the grape in there. Alongside it, we nibbled on Lapsang Souchong tea-smoked salmon on blinis with cream cheese and black pepper. The wine was definitely refreshing against the smoky salmon and I reckon it’d be a great party drink for Christmas or New Year too. I made a risotto on Boxing Day using the last of it and it worked really well. 

With cheeses, Waitrose recommended their Tawny Port (£8.49), which tasted sweeter than other ports I’d tried before – obviously a classic flavour combination with cheese, although they do recommend white wines with creamy cheeses. We also tried the Hungarian Royal Tokaji dessert wine (£12.29) with Stilton too, and it complemented it well. The sweetness of the wine contrasted with the savoury cheese perfectly, even though the wine wasn’t as sweet as some other dessert wines I’d tried in the past. It has quite a pronounced honey flavour, so would work well with other cheeses too, such as Brie or Tunworth for example. 

I wouldn’t really have considered pairing the deli meats with an ale, but I loved it. Oakham Ales Citra is quite a fruity ale with a dry finish – the label states it has ‘grapefruit, lychee and gooseberry aromas’ so you have some idea of the flavours going on there with the deeply savoury meats such as chorizo, salami and pastrami. 

With Christmas dinner, we drank a glass of Joseph Drouhin Chorey-Les-Beaune (£12.79) and although we ate chicken the red wine paired really well with it, along with the stuffing, sausages and gravy. It’d be fine with a beef or lamb roast, too. I always have a soft spot for wines from Beaune as I went there on holiday once and toured the cellars underneath the city. 

Waitrose recommended that your drink should always be sweeter than your food, and suggested the Royal Tokaji to go with Christmas pudding, too. And it did, of course, the honey flavours in the wine complementing the fruity, spicy flavours of the pudding (the Brandy cream might have been a touch too far but hey, it’s Christmas). For those who weren’t partial to Christmas pudding, they drank some with a slice of apple tart and again it paired beautifully. 

Take a look at the food and drink matching infographic Waitrose have come up with for the festive season – it relates not only to Christmas but also New Year, when there’s another round of feasting and drinking to be done. The highlight of all this was the discovery of Oakham Ales Citra – something I would never have normally bought to go with our Christmas Eve food – and the Royal Tokaji went down beautifully with the cheese and of course the Christmas pudding. 

The cost of the wines was covered by Waitrose for the purposes of the review. 

Comfort Food Challenge: 7 Twists on the Christmas Yule Log Cake

The Yule Log has become a firm family tradition for us at Christmas time. We’ve been making it a bit of a Christmas centrepiece for the last seven or eight years, to mark Christmas of course, but also the ancient festival of Yule. At this time of year, to our ancestors, everything during the winter was barren and dark, and the Winter Solstice (the 21st December or thereabouts) marked the returning sun, as the days started to get lighter and longer again. 

And to recognise the prospect of longer and lighter days (and to make the Yule Log a bit more fun to eat) we follow a little tradition on Christmas Eve. When we’ve finished our picada (snacks, salamis, olives and cheese) we bring the Yule Log to the table and place a candle in it for each member of our family. We light them all and then take turns to blow out one candle each, making a wish for the coming year. Then we slice the cake into chunks and eat it. Lovely. 

And although up until now my Yule Log is always shop-bought and never home-made, I thought it would be handy to compile seven Yule Log recipes with a bit of a twist that you might consider making. 

Fancy making any of these? 

Butterscotch Yule Log (from Handwritten Recipes)
This Yule Log doesn’t require any baking – just chilling – and is made from butterscotch pieces, condensed milk and nuts. 

Mocha Yule Log (from Not Quite Nigella)
This Nigella-inspired Yule Log comes from the Not Quite Nigella blog – coffee would make a gorgeous addition to the traditional chocolate recipe I reckon. 

Bailey’s Chocolate Yule Log (from Sorted)
Many of us can’t resist a tipple of Bailey’s at Christmas and incorporating the flavours of Irish Whisky in a chocolate Yule Log is a GREAT idea. Hic!

Eric Lanlard’s Chocolate Yule Log Recipe (from Homemaker Magazine)
This Yule Log incorporates crème de marrons (chestnut purée) and marrons glacés for a really luxurious finish. 

Chocolate Peppermint Icebox Yule Log (from Joy the Baker)
Another no-bake Yule Log, this time with the traditional Candy Cane flavours of peppermint. 

Mini Chocolate Amaretto Yule Logs (from The Little Loaf)
These super-cute Yule Logs use Nigella’s recipe as a base but with the addition of Amaretto cream. 

Paleo Gluten-Free Christmas Yule Log Cake (from Natural Kitchen Adventures)
After all my adventures in Paleo eating, I had to include this Yule Log from Kitchen Adventures, showing that you can still have a grain-free Yule Log at Christmas. Hurray! 

I’m entering this into this month’s Christmas-themed Comfort Food Challenge. Do you have any Christmas-related posts planned? Then you still have time to link them up – check out the details here. 

Have a Cool Yule!

Review: Hotel Chocolat The Sleekster ‘Classic Christmas Selection’ Box

Honestly, the things I do for you guys. 

I’ve been ‘testing’ out Christmas chocolates. *coughs*

Last week Hotel Chocolat contacted me to ask if I would like to try out one of their chocolate boxes and obviously I said yes. First off, in the interests of transparency, I have to admit that I am already a fan. I love that they push boundaries with flavours – you’ll often find chocolates containing flavours that you don’t find (or expect to find) elsewhere (more on that later). 

L-R: Rum Punch, Marzipan and Amaretto Truffle and Christmas Mess

And not only have I always found each chocolate so beautifully crafted that you almost (almost) feel it’s a sin to gobble it up, the quality of the chocolate is really good. The dark chocolate is dark and bitter and the white chocolate is speckled with real vanilla, for example. 

And this ‘Sleekster’ Classic Christmas Selection box was no different. 

The first thing I found, after opening it, was that it was full of colour. Pinks, greens, oranges – all set among the usual shades of chocolate. And then the flavours.

Pistachio Praline Crunch

There were the usual solid dark chocolate and white chocolate pieces, but then quite a few Christmassy flavours too. Like ‘Christmas Mess’ which contained a strawberry mousse, cranberry ganache and meringue sprinkles all set in white chocolate. The Caramel Supernova was a dark chocolate star with caramel – it was great but I do prefer caramel (preferably salted) with milk chocolate rather than plain. But that’s just me. 

The Rum Punch chocolate, according to the leaflet inside ‘could blow your socks off’ and it was quite boozy, a Jamaican rum truffle with ginger and orange. The Pistachio Praline Crunch was one of my favourites – as was the Nutmeg and Almond Praline – there isn’t usually a great deal of nutmeg in chocolate, but perhaps there should be. The spice gives the chocolate a gentle, seasonal warmth. 

50% Milk Chocolate Bauble and White Chocolate and Vanilla Bell

The leaflet’s handy too, giving you a quick guide to which chocolates contain gluten, egg or alcohol, which is really handy if you’re sharing the box around during a Christmas film. 

Can I think of anything I would have liked to see or wished wasn’t there? Yes – I would have liked to have seen a salted caramel in there somewhere but that’s it. Every chocolate was beautiful, full of flavour and with the whole package, felt luxurious enough to enjoy on a special occasion. 

Are you a fan of Hotel Chocolat? What was the best chocolate you ever tasted? 

Nutella Filo Parcels

It’s nearly Christmas, and I have to say it’s been pretty hectic. I’ve finished an astronomy course, moved house and only just got around to finding the mugs, 3 days later. And with Christmas just a few days away, the excitement’s definitely building at home. There’s the tree, presents to wrap and of course the dilemma of what to leave out for Santa this year…. 

Hmmmm……

Well, how about these? 

Santa definitely needs calories for his whizz around the entire planet on Christmas Eve so these Nutella parcels would help him out a lot. They’re fudgy in the middle, crispy on the outside, and, dusted with icing sugar, make the perfect Christmas or New Year treat. Or for birthdays. Or Easter, or parties or Sunday afternoons… etc, etc etc. (You know where I’m going with this…)

Nutella Filo Parcels

Makes 16-20 depending on size

Ingredients

270g pack filo pastry, thawed if frozen

approx 200g salted butter, melted

16-20 teaspoons Nutella

icing sugar, for dusting

Method

Unravel the filo sheets in front of you, longest side facing you. With a sharp knife, cut three equal strips down the filo, so you have four piles of long thin rectangular sheets of pastry. Brush the pastry with a little butter – you don’t actually need too much, just enough to moisten it and then dollop a heaped teaspoon of Nutella in the top right hand side of one of the strips. 

Next, grab the top layer of your strip of pastry and fold the corner of the filo down, to make a little triangle shape. Fold the other way, and keep going and folding downwards, adding a little more butter if the pastry starts to look dry. Eventually you should end up with a triangular samosa shape of pastry. Lift and place on a baking sheet lined with greaseproof paper. 

Repeat for the rest of the pastry strips – I find that one layer works fine as you are folding the pastry over and over again, but if you find one sheet has broken, then by all means use two layers and fold. 

Bake the pastries in an oven preheated to 200ºC for 10 minutes, or until golden and crisp. Allow them to cool a little bit before serving – they’ll be really hot in the middle and dust with icing sugar for a snowy look. 

Baobab Fruit Powder and a Tangy Raspberry, Coconut and Baobab Smoothie

Baobab fruit powder. Ever heard of it? Well I hadn’t, but as it turns out it’s very nutritious and good for you. 

It’s made from the fruit of the Baobab tree, which is known in Africa as The Tree of Life. It’s also known as the ‘upside down tree’ because the branches look like roots sticking up in the air. 

I was sent a few sachets of baobab fruit powder from the Eden Project, to try. It’s quite a fine, yellow powder that tastes a bit citrussy – imagine a softer-flavoured clementine but sweeter and tangier and you’ve more or less got it. 

You can blend the powder into smoothies, juices or sprinkle over yoghurt. I’ve done a bit of trawling online and found that people also stir it into porridge, stews and curries as well. Basically you can use a sprinkling of baobab powder when you need a bit of a pick me up – it’s packed full of antioxidants, vitamin C and fibre, so I’m told. It also seems to have a good amount of calcium, too. 

As I was making a smoothie I decided to add the baobab powder to it and see what it was like. I chose raspberries which pair well with citrus flavours in general, and used the usual coconut milk and frozen fruits. 

Raspberry, Coconut and Baobab Smoothie
Serves 2
Ingredients
1 x 400ml can coconut milk
Handful frozen raspberries
half a banana, frozen
1 x 5g sachet of baobab fruit powder
1 chunky slice frozen papaya

Method
Combine all ingredients in a large jug or blender and blitz until smooth. Pour into glasses and enjoy cold. 

Ever tried baobab fruit powder? How do you use it in recipes? 

How to Make Popcorn and What Else to Do With It

Check this out. 

Microwave popcorn: 66p per 100g. 
Maize: 32p per 100g. 

Which means it’s more than twice as expensive to pop it in a microwave than it is to pop it yourself in a saucepan. And don’t even get me started on what they charge you at the cinema. 

Popping popcorn is easy, and not actually very scary at all. It’s actually quite a lot of fun. The kids love it, listening for the pops, and the smell of it once it starts popping will draw everyone into the kitchen…

How to Pop Popcorn

Measure out 50g maize – this will feed two people fairly generously and will fill a large-ish saucepan, so if you want to make more, make it over two batches. Next, find a large-sized saucepan with a lid that fits (very important). In your saucepan, heat a couple of tablespoons of oil (I use a vegetable oil because it’s handy but you could use coconut oil I suppose – I just haven’t tried it). 

Once it’s warm, tip in the maize and shake the pan over the heat so all the maize is coated in the oil. Place the lid firmly on the saucepan and heat, shaking every few minutes, until you start to hear pops. 

It’s tempting to peek under the lid while this is happening to see how it’s getting on, but don’t – you’ll end up with searingly hot, fluffs of popcorn bouncing around your kitchen which could be fun, but is also quite painful if one gets you (I speak from experience). Just keep shaking and heating until the pops start to die down a bit. There’ll be a few seconds or more between lone pops.

Now you can lift the lid a little bit – you should have a saucepan, relatively full of popcorn, with few (if any) unpopped kernels. Tumble them into a large bowl, sprinkle with sea salt and place on the table, in front of your film. 

So now what? 

Once you’ve popped your corn, you can either snack on it as it is, or try one of these recipes: 

Popcorn Power Balls by the Lunchbox Doctor
Salted Caramel Popcorn by Cookies and Cups
Snickers Popcorn by Cookies and Cups
Sriracha Sesame Ginger Popcorn by Bake Your Day
Popcorn and Chocolate Brownie Ice Cream Sundae by me
My Salty Sweet Chocolate Bars: Three Ways

Do you have any favourite popcorn recipes? 

Go Nuts Healthy Snacks

There’s new product out that aims to satisfy our sweet cravings, but still keep us healthy at the same time. It’s called Go Nuts! and it’s billed as ‘the naturally sweet protein snack.’ They contain good, natural fats and are good for your blood sugar levels too, perfect for that 3pm crash when you normally feel like cracking open a Mars Bar just to keep you going.

I was sent samples to try out, and I have to say, they tasted much better than I initially thought they would. They’re made up of just dried fruits and nuts – nothing untoward in there – and come in a variety of flavours. I was sent vanilla, cinnamon, chocolate and coconut. 

The chocolate one was probably our favourite, as it was the sweetest of the four – and felt indulgent enough to class as a ‘treat.’ But the cinnamon one wasn’t far behind – I loved the soft warmth of the spice, lovely with a cup of espresso. 

The vanilla one was covered in sesame seeds – it was tasty, but we couldn’t taste much of the vanilla. Mind you, we’ve probably been conditioned by other less healthy foods where the vanilla flavour is usually quite overpowering and sweet. 

And the coconut one was chewy and slightly crunchy from the coconut flakes used inside and to coat the snack, too. 

Part of me thought that the little packet of rolled up fruits and nuts might be better off (and more visually appealing) in a bar-shape. I could happily take these to yoga for a quick snack when I finish, but they’re a bit tricky in their current form to transport and nibble on while you’re out and about. To chuck a bar of these in my bag would be much easier. 

These really did help curb a sugar craving, and it was good to know that I could do this and still do my body some good at the same time. They’re recommended for anyone, and also as a lunchbox filler – my school has a ‘no nut’ policy which catches us out quite often when I want to make healthy lunchbox treats for the kids – which is a shame as I know they’d be really handy. 

Have you ever tried these? For more information visit the EPJ Health website. 

Kale Pesto

Kale. We all know it’s good for us, it’s full of vitamin C to help keep our immune systems healthy, iron to make us strong and calcium, for our bones. It’s a bit of a powerhouse of a veg. But lovely as it is, you can get bored of chopping it up and stir-frying or just boiling it in a pan. So for those days, I made some pesto. 

I was sent a couple of bags of kale to try, and I have to say, got through them both pretty quickly. The pesto didn’t turn out quite right the first couple of times but I eventually got the right mixture in this recipe here. Just blend and stir through hot pasta, couscous or rice – or spread onto pieces of crusty bread when making bruschetta. If you have any leftover, scrape it into an airtight container and keep it in the fridge for 2-3 days. 

Kale Pesto

Makes enough for 4 servings

Ingredients

40g kale (two big handfuls), thick woody stems trimmed off

1 medium-sized garlic clove

30g pine nuts

4 x 15ml tbsp nice, peppery Extra Virgin Olive Oil

2 tbsp Grana Padano cheese, finely grated

Method

Wash the kale and shake well to dry. Add to a processor with the peeled garlic clove, pine nuts, oil and the cheese and blitz until it forms a slightly creamy looking green paste. Keep it chunky if you like, or blitz until smooth if you prefer.

Taste and season with a little salt and pepper if needed, and stir through hot pasta. Serve with more Grana Padano grated over the top. 

Variations: 

 

• You could spice this up with red chilli flakes if you wanted to, or add chopped and de-seeded red chilli into the mixture- not too much though, or it’ll overpower the kale. 
• I think bacon works incredibly well with kale, and so does chicken – so you could always add some chicken or bacon to your pasta – pan-fry in bite-sized chunks and add the cooked meat to the pasta before stirring in the pesto. 
• This recipe is also suitable for those with gluten intolerances – just use your favourite gluten-free pasta. 

 

For more ideas on how to use kale, visit the Discover Kale website.