A recent article in the Guardian has inspired me to talk about bagels….or is that beigels?? As regular visitors to the East End of London we always visit the Brick Lane Beigel Bake (founded over 50 years ago) for what can only be described as ‘THE bagel experience’. Continue reading
Well, I couldn’t let this momentous day pass without an anniversary post to my blog. A year ago today the fun started in my lovely new kitchen at ‘the hillside’ in Edinburgh…and four thousand and ninety five hits later (yay!!!!!) I’m still eating, baking, concocting, shooting (photos….) and living a foodie dream with the lovely Mr Predictable.
As yet I am still doing the day job (hrmph), fame still awaits me, but mymonkfish blog has given me the chance to garble on about what I do and like best – FOOD!
Mrs Monkfish senior is not shy in complaining that my blog is not updated enough, ‘I know’ is my usual response and ‘there’s not enough hours in the day’ blah blah blah, tis true! Inbetween diy, number crunching and pottering around with Mr Predictable I try my best! Twitter has provided me with short sharp bursts of foodie related wafflings so please follow me at ‘hilsters’.
In the meantime I’ll stop garbling and sign off as in a few hours time I’m boarding the 8am eurostar at St Pancras and am off to paree with Mr P. Living the dream as per bl**dy usual, life’s tough eh?! Happy birthday to me and my blog x
PS….as a nod to myself I ate monkfish last night in a Thai green curry. YUM!
Posted in edinburgh, in the kitchen, out of the kitchen
Tagged anniversary, foodie, london, Paris, twitter
Well, what a weekend I had in London, it was just like Treasure Hunt with Anneka Rice but I decided against the red jumpsuit on this occasion. Reason for the comparison is that I managed to squeeze in lunch at ‘LEON’, a take-away cake from ‘Ottolenghi’, an outside view of ‘Sketch’ (I did intend to get inside but they were having none of it! see posts below….), tea and cake at ‘Liberty’s', cocktails at the ‘Light Bar’ at St Martin’s Lane Hotel, mojitos, margharitis and street food at ‘Wahaca’, tea at ‘Peyton and Byrne’….phew, I think that’s it…there was a take-out from M&S for the journey home but hey, hardly up there with the other offerings we sampled!
So, my second visit of the year to LEON, tremendous…sweet potato falafel flatbread for me and spicy chicken flatbread for Mr Predictable (ooh, convinced he would go for the meatballs)…yum, a good start to the weekend and a visit to the first original Leon to open in London just near Carnaby Street.
lovely lovely LEON
Leon…done. Sent Mr Predictable on his way while I went off to meet the girls and the Sketch debacle commenced, not much more to say there. Onwards and upwards we headed to the cafe at Liberty’s and after a short wait we were safely in our seats perusing the cake options. After getting over the shock of a cupcake costing £3.75 (I know!) we settled in for an hour of tea, cake, and gossip, lovely, just what us girls need.
This was the cupcake that my friend ‘Coffee-mate Kate’ got her chops round..
Libery's vanilla cupcake
And this is ‘Coffee-mate Kate’ in action….
Coffee-mate Kate in full cupcake chomp!
And here’s me with my carrot cake…or I should say carat cake..it cost £5.50!
Liberty carrot cake and me!
And finally the three of us in cake heaven…
Happiness!
After a spot of window shopping we headed to the Light Bar at the St Martin’s Lane Hotel for some cocktails, a snip at £13 each! Still, they were lovely, Vanilla and Rhubarb Martini for me, yum yum yum. Ultra cool interior and a real place to be seen in….have since found out it’s open to members and hotel guests only so the girls did do well!
After a few more pre-dinner aperitifs at slightly cheaper establishments in Covent Garden we headed to Wahaca for dinner. Mr Predictable was once again in tow but he behaved himself and ordered what I thought he would. ha ha…already had one shock at lunchtime so I couldn’t have taken any more! Wahaca was set up by Thomasina Miers who won Masterchef in 2005. It’s a mexican restaurant but refreshingly different from most mexican’s I have been to. Wahaca specialises in ‘street food’ which is basically small dishes like tapas that you can share with your fellow diners.
Wahaca street food
Wahaca street food
And that was Saturday…phew…
Sunday, woke up feeling surprisingly refreshed considering the number of mojitos consumed! Two treasure hunt items on the foodie agenda today, Ottolenghi and Peyton and Byrne, both successfully ticked off, hurrah.
First tick in the box was Ottolenghi in Islington…the queue was out the door unfortunately (are you seeing a theme developing bloggers?!) so we opted for a ‘take-out’, in other words the best cake they had in a lovely little box to be consumed out with the premises. Not a problem for a professional cake eater such as myself..I will eat cake… anywhere….job very well done..
more cakes!
Ottolenghi in Islington
What a top weekend it had been, just Peyton and Byrne to visit and we were done…had walked miles but that meant all the cake had been burnt off so I was happy in my foodie pursuits!
Ended up at Peyton and Byrne in St Pancras at the end of the day absolutely exhausted but still delighted to see the lovely font adorning their packaging…geeky but true….a nice gill sans! Could only manage a cuppa, their pies are worth mentioning but even Mr Predictable couldn’t manage one, he was full to bursting and so was I! Maybe next time.
what a lovely font!
London….food fest….DONE 
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged cake, cupcakes, gill sans, leon, london, ottolenghi, Peyton and Byrne, sketch, tea, wahaca
Well….I’d love to be able to let you all know about my tea and cake in Sketch, but….the nearest I got to chomping one of their French fancies was approximately 2 metres from the front door! No, I wasn’t turned away because I wasn’t dressed appropriately (well, I’d like to think not….) but according to the ‘door-girl’ they were full to bursting and were taking ‘NO MORE’! Gutted! Then again I’d read plenty of reviews before arrival and I have to say they were mixed to say the least. Style over substance apparently, check out the exterior below…
We headed swiftly to Liberty’s and indulged in their lovely offerings instead….all was not lost
