Lamb’s Devilled Kidneys Recipe. I’ll Stick to St. John, thank you

Just before Christmas, all  of a sudden, I had a kidneys craving. It was ironic as in October I’d suffered with a terrible kidney infection which had sent me rushing to A&E, off sick from work for a week, tending to myself with two lots of antibiotics and codeine (which I promptly put to the back of the medicine cabinet when I read how addictive they can be).

I have no idea where this sudden rush came from. In an ideal world, I wanted to have it at St. John or a similar restaurant but I instead decided that I would try cooking it. Off I went to Tesco, purchasing TWO packs of lambs kidneys. I read various recipes and settled on my trusted chef Nigel Slater, who had a great but simple recipe of devilled kidneys.

Cristina’s Restaurant – The Best Steak in Barking

There are times where I think about my first childhood home. It was a great house. Largely because of the space. A massive loft, cellar and kitchen as well as a through lounge, in “proper” East London – Forest Gate to be exact. All this despite it being a terraced house. My parents decided we should move when I was nine years old because they didn’t rate the secondary schools in the area and wanted better schooling for me – many parents have similar challenges in life! To this day I always say “if only you could pick up your house and move it to your ideal area”. The same could be applied to restaurants in some cases.

Le Relais de Venise L’Entrecôte – City of London

I made a bit of a faux pas – I went out to eat and I didn’t take photos! Imagine that! *covers face* In my defence it was a business lunch so it wasn’t really appropriate to take pics – also in the city of London with all of those toffee nosed stuck up City B-Wankers – it’s really not the sort of environment to take pics. I had to just tell you about my visit to Le Relais de Venise in Throgmorton Street, London.

Recipe | Easy Dinner on Monday | Beef Chilli with Kidney Beans

Last weekend I decided to get ahead of myself and cook dinner for Monday so that I could go to the gym after work and still have a good nutritional dinner after.

I came across a recipe for “Game Day Chili” (yes, spelt like that). Named so, I assume, as it’s the perfect thing to cook if you have a lot of hungry men to feed whilst they watch the game. It’s easy, filling and can be served by itself, with tortilla chips or rice. Simples.

The “chili” turned out well, and bear in mind I cooked this on Sunday for Monday’s eating… You know anything that takes a long time to cook always tastes good the day after it’s made!

A visit to Hawksmoor; Seven Dials, Dishoom and Pix | all in 30 hours.

Last week was a pretty epic week for eating out. I was lucky enough to be taken to Hawksmoor, treated to brunch at Dishoom and I also met a friend for lunch at Pix. All in the space of 30 hours. Foodieclaire doesn’t do things by halves. Unfortunately I couldn’t take pics at Dishoom as it was a business lunch and I didn’t have my badass camera with me. Pix was a catch up lunch and so to have snapped away would have been rude. Plus it was an afternoon on the tiles so I didn’t want to irresponsibly take my camera out whilst on the Sauvi B.

I did however have my camera for Hawksmoor. Good old Hawksmoor. My first steak love. I still think the Spitalfields branch beats the Seven Dials one hands down (maybe its because I once spent £96 on a cut of steak at Spitalfields. Yes £96). Or just because… It’s the first branch. The one and only original. It’s heavenly Hawksmoor minus the suits and tourists. Heavenly I tell you.

Recipe | Posh Bangers and Mash | Venison Sausages with Bourguignon/Red Onion Gravy and Mashed Potatoes with Peas and Mint

I always try to plan weekly dinners in advance to save time deciding what to eat when I get home (often after 7 in the evening). Going to the supermarket I like to have an idea of at least 4 meals for the week. I almost always make a batch of my marinara sauce. I always stick a tub of marscarpone in the trolley, a bag of spinach, frozen prawns are essential as they don’t need to be defrosted. With this I can create some sort of creamy white wine sauce with spinach & prawns and then serve with linguine. Or, using my marinara sauce I can heat through the sauce, prawns & serve with fusili pasta.

On my weekend shop last week I decided I quite fancied bangers & mash. I have certain views about this dish – I don’t think pork sausages can be served with mash and a good onion gravy. It just has to be red meat! I should have thought this one out earlier though, and gone to the butchers as Sainabury’s selection of beef sausages was terrible. They only had one kind. Reluctantly I picked them up and then noticed they had venison sausages – perfect.