recent Lifestyle blogs
bacon and brie bake

bacon and brie bake

When we go to Lidl - either here, or in Slovenia, which is probably the closest one to us - and they have a Special Week, we often stock up. When it's Greek Week, the trolley is full of smoky tuna, halloumi, pitta breads, olive oils. Spanish Week and it's olives,...

cheesy irish soda bread

cheesy irish soda bread

A while ago I discovered the easiest bread recipe using just four ingredients - plain flour, baking soda, salt and 0% fat plain drinkable yogurt. For the record, Siggis yoghurt is the best. By far. Since making the initial loaf, we've experimented with different...

creamy mushroom stroganoff

creamy mushroom stroganoff

We made this last night, and it is utterly delicious. It's super simple to make and requires very few ingredients that you'd probably have in the cupboard anyway. what you'll need 2 tbsp butter/olive oil 1 onion finely chopped 4 garlic cloves crushed 500 g (1lb)...

savoury summer tart

savoury summer tart

I'm so glad summer is here for lots of reasons, but one of the main ones, is that our food intake changes. Gone are the stews and heavy soups of winter, which are delicious, but can be just a bit too much on the comfort side of food. Over the past couple of months,...

creamy roasted pepper soup

creamy roasted pepper soup

It's definitely red pepper season here, as supermarkets are bursting with them. We picked up a big bag of them recently and made a super spicy chilli at the weekend, full of these flavoursome ruby red vegetables. But there was still an excess of them and rather than...

retro sunbeds

retro sunbeds

We decided this summer, with the garden revamp and everything, to replace the wooden sun loungers. Bought when we first moved in, we committed the initial rookie error of never oiling them, and then after the first year, left them outside over each winter. I did try...

one pan dahl recipe

one pan dahl recipe

If you're a fan of a dahl, and also a fan of not using lots of pots and pans and creating lots of washing up, this is the recipe for you. It uses one pan or casserole dish, a chopping board, a bowl, a knife, a spoon and a masher or a blender. Plus, whatever you choose...

time for tea…

time for tea…

We do love our tea in this house, but we like tea which is very uncomplicated. I have bought leaves and strainers - and even went so far as to bring back rose petal from Morocco - but the just ends up sitting in a pretty containers and the various strainers just take...

spicy salmon curry

spicy salmon curry

I had to share this recipe as it's the easiest - and easily most delicious - curry, we've made in a long time. And, we are trying to extend our curry repertoire as we currently don't have Indian or Nepalese or Thai restaurants on our doorstep. so this has been a find...

homemade hummus : a recipe

homemade hummus : a recipe

I've dabbled in the past with making homemade hummus, but it's never become a habit. Hummus is so widely available that it just seemed a bit of a faff, and I could ever get a consistent recipe that I was happy with. When we lived in West Didsbury this was fine, as we...