Hungry Jenny

Easy Mini Egg Chocolate Brownies (psst, pass it on)

2018-03-25T20:36:00.000+01:00

Now, I've got to admit something - the base of this brownie recipe belongs to my friend, Emma.

Well, to be fair, the recipe doesn't actually belong to Emma either.

This beautiful brownie was originally discovered in chocolate orange form at a party that Emma went to, where upon tasting the brownie, she just HAD to get hold of the recipe.

In later months, Emma then recreated the brownie for me and our other friend Vicky. Where upon tasting the brownie, I too just HAD to get hold of the recipe.

That was a while ago now and I've since made this a few times, each time with the most devastatingly divine outcome. And the best part about it? It is easy to play around with the recipe to experiment with different flavour combinations, yet still get that same light and fudgey moist texture that I'm sure you've experienced at same time in your life and fallen in love with. (If you haven't, then I'm sorry but you're just weird).

Basically you can switch out the mini egg quantities below with any kind of chocolate (or nut) that you like. I've done this with just normal dark chocolate chunks, Smarties, hazelnuts...mm the possibilities are endless! I've also switched in some desiccated coconut for some of the flour, and likewise with ground almonds too.

Yes I have used this recipe multiple times now, and I apologise that I haven't got around to posting it just now. But after making these Mini Egg Chocolate Brownies (again) today, I realised that I had a duty to pass on the recipe again. Because once you taste this brownie, I guarantee you will want to get hold of the recipe! And you too, will also want to pass it on!

Enjoy!

Easy Mini Egg Chocolate Brownies

Print-friendly recipe

For a 12 x 8" tray
Makes 24-30 squares...depending on how generous you are with your slices ;-)

150g unsalted butter
150g dark chocolate
100g plain flour
50g cocoa powder
150g mini eggs, crushed + 50g to decorate
3 eggs
225g sugar

1. Preheat the oven to 160 degrees C.
2. Gently melt the butter and dark chocolate in a pan. Set aside.
3. Sift the flour and cocoa powder into a large bowl. Fold in the 150g crushed mini eggs.
4. In a small bowl, beat the eggs with the sugar. Mix into the melted butter/chocolate mixture.
5. Pour the whole lot into the cocoa flour mixture, folding in until mixed.
6. Tip into a lined tray, then scatter the remaining 50g crushed mini eggs on top.
7. Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.
8. Allow to cool completely (if you can wait that long) before slicing into squares.

More Hungry Jenny cakes here.

Other chocolatey recipes you might enjoy.

Blag-it Blackberry Cinnamon Cake

2018-01-28T19:43:00.000+00:00

I was going through my fridge yesterday morning (as I often do), when I randomly recollected that my butter was due to go out of date this month.

Ah, I’m sure it was at the end of the month, I thought, as I dug it out.

Oh, it goes out of date today.

Ah, I’m sure there’s only a little bit left, I can just bake some cookies with it.

Oh, there’s half a tub left..!

Hmm.

So I had 250g to use up within an hour and a half. (Because I was due to go out and not get back till late, not cos it was nearly midnight!)

Now, considering the vast majority of my cake bakage has often been butter-free, it was proving a bit troublesome to quickly pull out a favourite from the archive.

But after a quick search for '250g butter' in my blog, I came across my 2009 post on 'Fruit cakes for hard nuts' with Peach and Raspberry Squares which uses exactly 250g butter.

Bingo!

But I didn't have any peaches. Or raspberries for that matter. I usually have a wealth of frozen berries, but at this point in time I only had a sad little bag of blackberries. Well, those would just have to do.

As I put the mixture together, I realised just how few berries there were. The preheated oven was beeping away, ready to receive a cake to bake, so in a panic, I opened my spice cupboard, took a quick scan and tossed in some cinnamon.

Blackberries and cinnamon work together, don't they?

Well, it was too late now. I stuck the cake in the oven, and quickly scrambled to get myself ready to go out. I was running late by that point and so when the cake was done, I whipped it out and dumped it on the counter to cool.

I rushed out and for the rest of the day had that little niggling voice stewing in my head thinking, did that cake work, or did it not?

Ten hours later, I was home. I was shattered, but I had to sample that cake before bed.

One little slither, one tentative bite...

Phew...it WORKED!! The cinnamon saved it I think.

Now, I have adjusted the recipe below because I didn't have many berries in my one - so this one should be even more flavoursome!

Convinced yet?

Blag-it Blackberry Cinnamon Cake

Print-friendly recipe

For a 12 x 8" tray (28-32 squares):

250g unsalted butter (softened)
225g sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
200g self-raising flour
200g frozen blackberries, chopped
1 tsp cinnamon

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C.
2. Mix the softened butter with the sugar. Beat in the eggs and vanilla extract.
3. In another bowl, sift in the flour, then fold in the blackberries and cinnamon.
4. Pour the mixture into a lined/greased 12 x 8" tin.
5. Bake for 30-35 minutes, or until springy to the touch.
6. Wait to cool before cutting into delicious little squares.

More Hungry Jenny cakes here.

The Story Behind Hungrier Jemma's Chocolate Orange Cake (not Terry's)

2017-02-03T20:59:00.000+00:00

Eh? Terry's Chocolate Orange Cake?

"No, it's MINE!"

Actually, it's not. This was for my sister, Hungrier Jemma, for her birthday earlier this week!

I had planned this idea with Kylie, my brother-in-law's sister, about a week before. At first, we didn't really know what cake to make Jemma. She does enjoy a good cake, but there's quite of the classics that she doesn't actually really like.

So naturally, we figured 'you can't go wrong with chocolate'. But then we were stuck on what kind of chocolate cake to make. Despite my many baking efforts and rather extensive recipe list, I've not made many large celebration type cakes, or ones with tiers. (I prefer making the portable kind, like muffins and traybakes!)

"How about a chocolate gateaux-type cake?" Kylie suggested.

"Ooh, that sounds good! Do you have a recipe?" I replied.

"Erm, no, it's just my preference!" Kylie laughed.

I scoured my recipe books and found a rather impressive looking 'Brooklyn Blackout Cake' (from the Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook) - a triple layer chocolate sponge sandwiched with chocolate custard and covered with - yep, you guessed it, more chocolate. But reading the recipe was exhausting enough, it looked quite tricky!

Swiftly moving on, I turned to my scrapbook, where I collate recipes from the web and magazines for inspiration. And this is where I came across a Giant Jaffa Orange Cake recipe! I remember ripping this out of a magazine years ago (from one I bought by the way, not just ripped out randomly from one in a shop) and is something I've always wanted to try making.

Unfortunately, on reading it through, I then remembered why I still haven't got round to making it yet. It's just too darn hard. You have to make a jelly the night before, get involved with gelatine leaves, build in a load of chilling time and all sorts. Aint nobody got time for that.

Kylie and I quickly realised that we needed to scale back our ambitions a bit. But seeing the Giant Jaffa Orange Cake reminded me of my sister's current love of those Terry's chocolate orange minis.

Lighhhht. Bullllb.

"Let's make her a Terry's chocolate orange cake! A chocolate orange sponge with the segments on top!" I exclaimed.

"Yes! With orange in the chocolate icing too!" Kylie squealed.

And thus, Jemma's Terry's Chocolate Orange birthday cake was born...

Terry's Chocolate Orange Cake

Print-friendly recipe

For a 9" round tin (10 slices):

250g self raising flour
1 tsp baking powder
175g unsalted butter, softened
125g white sugar
2 eggs, lightly beaten
50ml olive oil
Juice and zest of 1 orange
100g chocolate chips

For the icing:
75g dark chocolate
50g unsalted butter
Zest of 1 orange

To decorate:
12 Terry's chocolate orange segments

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C.
2. Sift the flour and baking powder into a large mixing bowl.
3. Mix in the chocolate chips and zest of 1 orange.
4. In another bowl, beat the 175g butter with the sugar.
5. Beat in the eggs, oil and orange juice.
6. Fold the orange juice mixture into the flour mixture.
7. Pour into a lined tin and bake for 25-30 minutes (or until you can pull a toothpick out clean).
8. As the cake is cooling, slowly melt the dark chocolate with the 50g butter.
9. Once it's all melted, take it off the heat and stir in the zest of 1 orange.
10. Spread atop the cake and decorate with the Terry's chocolate segments!

Happy birthday, Hungrier Jemma!"

More Hungry Jenny cakes here.

Other chocolatey recipes you might enjoy.

Lemon and Sage Cake (butter free)

2017-01-26T14:26:00.000+00:00

I found myself with a load of sage to use up (as you do), but didn't really fancy just throwing it into each of my dinners for the next 500 nights.

Ok I'm being dramatic, it's not like the time I had a massive wodge of coriander to use up.

In any case, I wanted to try and just use it up all in one go and naturally, I figured baking it into a cake would be a good way to go. Now, I've never baked a cake with sage in it before, but I've done an Orange and Rosemary Cake before, so figured, hm, I should be able to create something from that, right...?

Thankfully, the answer was yes!

I decided to pair the sage with lemon, using both the juice and zest. The sage is finely chopped and mixed into the cake mixture, as well as sprinkled on the top. I was a bit worried about the sage leaves burning on the top, so had initially decided not to do this. However, after 10 minutes in the oven, I thought, ah, might as well. So I whipped the cake out again quickly, added more sage on top then popped in back into the oven.

And look, it worked! No burnt sage! And you know what? It really was delicious too - it went down very well with those I shared it with.

Lemon and Sage Cake

Print-friendly recipe

For an 8" square tin (15 slices):

2 eggs
200g sugar
175ml olive oil
Juice (50ml) and zest of 1 lemon
150g plain flour
1 tbsp baking powder
12 + 6 sage leaves, finely chopped

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C.
2. Beat the eggs in a bowl with the sugar, oil and lemon juice.
3. In a large mixing bowl, sift in the flour and baking powder. Mix in the 12 chopped sage leaves and zest.
4. Add the egg mixture to the flour mixture, folding in until just mixed.
5. Transfer to a lined tin, then bake for 10 minutes.
6. Sprinkle the remaining 6 chopped sage leaves over the top of the cake, then return to the oven for about 20 minutes, or until you can pull a toothpick out clean.

More Hungry Jenny cakes here.

Other butter free baking recipes that might take your fancy.

Hungry Jenny vs Cheesecake

2017-01-15T15:45:00.001+00:00

There might be something a little bit wrong about my first and now second post of a fresh new year being about Cheesecake.

But hey, what can you do when you're presented with this magnificent beast...?

I think you already know the answer, don't you?

I had arranged to meet up with some old work friends in Portsmouth and one of them who used to live there had raved to us many a time about a particular cake shop in Southsea - the Parade Tearooms. (And actually, quite a few of my other Portsmouth pals have done so too!) Queues out the door (they don't take bookings in advance) and large portions of delicious homemade cakes are two things I've often heard about this place - and they weren't wrong.

When we arrived, there was already a small crowd of people gathered at the entrance and we were told it would be about a half hour wait. With our rumbling stomachs, we were tempted for a split-second to maybe go elsewhere, but the power of wanting to experience this place took over. So we got added to the waiting list and bundled in with the rest of the crowd (it was way too cold to wait outside!)

During that half hour, there was a continuous cycle of a group entering, being told there would be a half hour wait, and the group saying they'd happily wait, putting their name down. Definitely a good sign if this many people are willing to wait!

Finally, it was cake time and I had already decided what I wanted - the strawberry cheesecake. As the slice was cut up and passed over, one of my friends laughed that it actually looked like the size of my head!

As we settled down with our huge cake slices, we were all a little worried about whether we'd finish it all. The other girls all decided quite early on to ask for a doggy bag to take half of their slice home, but I wasn't ready to admit defeat just yet.

Yes, I was having a particularly lardy moment, but I figured that if I took half of it home, I would probably end up eating it the next day and that would mean two straight days of eating a rather heavy cheesecake. Which, in my head, would be worse than eating it all in one go. (I swear to you there is some logic there).

So I kept going, savouring every little bite - I most certainly wasn't going to rush! As I neared the end, the cheesecake fell over on its side and suddenly it didn't look so appealing. The syrupy sauce on the top in particular was now getting too sickly sweet. But the base. The biscuit base. So thick and crumbly. Too good to pass up. I munched the rest of the base up, had a couple more little bites of the filling and then put my fork down.

A pretty solid effort though?

I would say that I've had my cheesecake fix for the rest of the month now, but even now as I write this (the day after eating it) I'm not so sure... ;-)

More cheesecake adventures here.

The Ultimate Indulgence...No-Bake Ferrero Rocher Cheesecake

2017-01-07T16:13:00.000+00:00

A cheesecake. With Ferrero Rocher. And it doesn't even need to be baked.

Is that music to your ears or what?

"Oh monsieur, with this Rocher you're really spoiling us!"

So this has been on my 'to-make' list for absolutely ages. The Christmas season always has lots of Ferrero Rocher flying about - at least one person in the family always gives a box to someone else in the family and vice versa. It's fair to say that we're never short on Ferrero Rocher at our house at Christmas.

However, my parents and my sister Jemma are not fans of cheesecake. I know, right? I don't get it either.

Well I say they aren't fans - they have never even tried cheesecake before! They all seem to have this preconception that it'll be too 'cheesy', no matter how much I try to explain otherwise.

Now that my parents have moved to Norwich which is where my sister and her family are, plus my brother-in-law's family are there too - it's meant I finally have some people to make this for!

And the result?

It was everything I ever dreamed it to be - and more.

*sigh*

The others seemed to enjoy it too - it all went a bit quiet (which I take as a good sign) and there were positive murmurs floating around. My mum and sister still refused to try it but I managed to convince my dad to try a little slice. Although I don't think he really understood the concept because as I passed him a slice, our conversation went a bit like this:

"Can you take that bit off for me please?" (he points to the top of the cheesecake with his fork)
"What bit?"
"That bit, the chocolate."
"What, the Ferrero Rocher?"
"Yeh, I don't want that bit."
"But you LOVE Ferrero Rocher!"
"No, I don't know what that is."

As I rolled the rejected chocolate off his plate and onto mine, I pointed to an unopened box of Ferrero Rocher under the Christmas tree and said, "It's that - that's Ferrero Rocher!"

"Oh."

😂

No-Bake Ferrero Rocher Cheesecake

Print-friendly recipe

For a 7.5" springform cake tin (8 slices):

150g dark chocolate digestives
50g roasted hazelnuts, roughly chopped
100g butter

250g cream cheese
250ml double cream
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3 tbsp icing sugar, sifted
50g chocolate with hazelnut (eg Dairy Milk Wholenut) OR 4 Ferrero Rocher, roughly chopped
12 Ferrero Rocher (keep 8 whole for decoration, and roughly chop the other 4)

1. Line the base of the tin with greaseproof baking paper. Grease the sides of the tin with butter.
2. Put the biscuits and hazelnuts in a ziplock bag and bash to a breadcrumb consistency using a rolling pin.
3. Melt the butter in a pan, then take off the heat and mix in the biscuit mixture.
4. Press the mixture to the base of the lined tin, level out and leave in the fridge to set.
5. Whisk the cream cheese, double cream, vanilla and icing sugar in a large bowl until smooth.
6. Carefully mix in the 50g of chocolate hazelnut (or your 4 roughly chopped Ferrero Rocher).
7. Pour the whole mixture into the tin on top of the biscuit base.
8. Scatter the chopped Ferrero Rocher over the top, then add the 8 whole Ferrero Rocher evenly around the edge to decorate.
9. Place in the fridge overnight to set.

More cheesecake adventures here.

How to Eat a Giant Pretzel...

2016-12-28T18:34:00.004+00:00

...the Hungry Jenny way...

Now, when you're given a Christmas menu which lists a 'Giant Baked Pretzel' as a dessert, you immediately think, "Hm, I wonder just how giant this giant baked pretzel can be?"

Well, that was my immediate reaction anyway.

So of course, I ordered it and waited most eagerly. And it was a situation where the meal was booked weeks in advance (it was for my works Christmas lunch), so the wait was pretty long. During this time of course, my wonderment about this Giant Baked Pretzel grew...

Hm, I wonder if it'll be the size of my FACE?
Or maybe even bigger?
Will it be served in a paper bag like the ones you get from the stalls?
I wonder what it'll be served with - or will it literally just be a humongous pretzel?

Then at last, the day arrived and so did the greatly anticipated Giant Baked Pretzel...

Hm. Now how do you eat this?

1. Use the dessert spoon you've been given to scoop off the ice cream (yes I'm weird, I'm not a fan of ice cream).
2. Pick up the pretzel and place near face to gauge size*.
3. Put pretzel back down and make a couple failed attempts to hack into it with the dessert spoon.
4. Throw spoon down in despair.
5. Proceed to go in, KFC-style instead, using your fingers to rip the pretzel apart to eat it.
6. Make regular apologies to your laughing colleagues playing witness to your ever-growing sticky chocolate state.
7. Realise towards the end that it probably would have been wiser to request a knife and fork.

*Verdict: Not quite the size of my face but sizeable enough!

Ok, so on reflection, this is perhaps not the most sociable way to eat a Giant Baked Pretzel, but my colleagues are still talking to me so I can't have scarred them too badly...

You might be intrigued to learn how to do other random things the Hungry Jenny Way

Week 4 #KindnessAdventCalendar Round-up

2016-12-24T22:46:00.002+00:00

Wow, this month has just flown by - can't really believe it's going to be Christmas Day already tomorrow! And like a giddy little child, I cannot WAIT!

December always feels a little 'magical' (though perhaps sometimes I might mean manic) but this year it's felt that little more magical with this Kindness Advent Calendar. It's the penultimate day of the challenge, so here's a quick recap of events.

Day 19: Be positive all day long, say only nice things to yourself and others
I would imagine that with most people, they would find it harder to say nice things to themselves, than it is to say nice things to others. Over the years, I have consciously and sub-consciously been working on my inner critic and negative self-talk - which has been as a result of the motivational/self-helpy type business books I read in my day-to-day work (as part of my job, I review manuscripts and give structural feedback to authors), and also through my aikido training, which I think has made me become more self-aware and mentally relaxed in my attitude towards things.

One of the hardest things I find is what to do when I'm in the presence of someone who is being negative - it's easy to be sucked in and become negative with them, and often times, this is what the other person wants (or so they think) - someone to have a moan and grumble with. And sometimes yes, I agree and try to emphasize with them, but other times I try to find some way to turn it around to make the conversation more positive again. Of course, there has to be a balance and sometimes you do need to just have a little wallow - but hey, just not for too long, eh?

Day 20: Take time to appreciate someone who does something you take for granted
Coincidentally, a few days before the challenge began, I came across a 'Thankful Diary' when out shopping and decided to buy it for myself. So as well as doing a Kindness act every day this month, I've been writing down three things I'm thankful for. And I've got to admit, it's been harder than I thought actually! Some days, it's really easy and other times I really struggle to think of something.

It is definitely, definitely worth doing though as it makes you pause and reflect on your day in a way that you probably wouldn't normally. Today was pretty easy though, as I just focussed all three on one person for today's kindness act - my mum :-)

Day 21: Write and leave a kind message for a loved one to find
I met up with Sam, one of my best friends this week - we don't see each other that much because we live about 5-6 hours away from each other. We've known each other forever and I've always seen her as my little sister (although in the Chinese world, we worked out that she is actually kind of my aunt - don't ask how we got to that conclusion because it hurts my head thinking about it!). I slipped this note inside her purse when she wasn't looking:

Sam then went on to find it a couple hours later when she got her purse out to pay for her lunch (should have put it in a more secret compartment!), but it was lovely to see her reaction!

Day 22: Cheer someone up
This act was labelled as cheering up a lonely neighbour or relative. I must admit that I kind of forgot about this during most of the day, because I was out doing some last-minute Christmas shopping with my parents. Then later on during the day, I was queuing up in a super busy shop (one where there are loads of cashiers in a line). It was REALLY busy and most of the cashiers looked pretty wiped and fed up. As I approached my cashier, I decided to try and cheer her up - just by the simple act of some happy small talk. Which is something I NEVER do, because to be honest, I've always found small-talk to be a bit pointless - I've got to admit that if someone starts small-talking with me, my instinct is to Shut It Down.

However, I started by complimenting her Christmas jumper (it was sincere, I swear!) and she immediately seemed to swell with pride. We continued on, chit-chatting away about Christmas presents and last-minute shopping, and as she handed over my packed shopping, she gave a bright smile and said 'Merry Christmas!' So hopefully that means I cheered her up a little! Maybe this small-talk thing isn't such a bad thing, eh?

Day 23: Buy a lottery ticket and give it to a friend, loved one or stranger
A couple of tickets bought for my sister and her husband - and I think they won about £10 actually! (I told them to check because I'm a bit fuzzy on the rules...)

Day 24: Put your loose change in a charity box
I changed this one because I wasn't due to go out anywhere today. Venture out to the shops the day before Christmas? Are you mad? But I had gone Christmas food shopping with my mum yesterday. My sister had a list, I had a list and my mum had a list, which we combined into one massive list. I wanted to offer some money towards it, but based on past experience, one of the two things always happens - she flatly refuses, or she ends up giving back some of the money I give her.

So I took a different approach and instead slipped this into a secret compartment of her purse:

I do hope she finds it someday ;-)

And that brings us to the end, sort of! Although the 'last' day of the challenge is tomorrow, it's definitely something I want to actively keep going - and I'm sure alot of the 300,000 people who also downloaded the calendar will be thinking the same thing. Some may have been cynical of this whole challenge, saying 'oh it's sad to think that we need reminders to be kind' - but it's not really been about that (not for me at least anyway). It's been great fun to be a part of something bigger, knowing that other people have been trying to spread a bit more kindness around the UK (and maybe even around the world too!)

So with that, I'd like to wish you a very happy day tomorrow, whatever you plan to do, and hope that you have many happy days to enjoy in 2017!

Week 3 #KindnessAdventCalendar Round-up

2016-12-19T09:35:00.002+00:00

So - week 3 of the Kindness Advent Calendar and the acts of kindness are still going strong!

Day 12: Let someone go infront of you in traffic or at the shops
I had an interesting conversation with a colleague about this one, when I was explaining to him what today's act was. I don't drive, so the traffic one isn't one I can do anyway, but the shop queue thing is something I don't think I've ever done either. I don't know why, but this initially seemed a bit of an odd thing to me:

"I'm not sure I could do this one - wouldn't the person think it a bit weird if I just turned to them and said they could go infront of me?"

My friend looked at me slightly shocked and replied, "What, you've never done that?! I do it all the time!"

Hm. I'd still feel a bit odd doing it I think - no idea why. Maybe I'm too selfish in that situation! I didn't end up going to any shops that day anyway, but I was going on a train that evening, so ended up letting everyone board the train first before I hopped on with my bike. And still, I'm not entirely sure I'd do that every time because there were loads of people and I couldn't get myself to the bike rack as a result. Hm, maybe being kind just isn't practical sometimes...

Day 13: Share positive posts on your social media pages
I'm not actually that big on social media (in terms of platform as well as generally posting on it). I'm on Twitter, but don't have Instagram or a personal Facebook account. I'm also on LinkedIn but I only update my profile on there, rather than posting stuff as well. Since the whole social media thing kicked off, it's something I've resisted giving into completely, because I am generally quite a private person, and the idea of sharing stuff on a regular basis just isn't my thing. (Yeh, the blogging is different cos in a weird way I treat is as a therapeutic open diary that I'm guessing only a handful of people actually read, haha - and that's fine with me!)

Needless to say, I go through phases with Twitter and lately I've been on that quite a lot over the last couple weeks, since this challenge began, so I did post one of my favourite positive quotes:

Day 14: Forgive someone you've been holding a grudge against
I skipped this one because I couldn't actually think of anyone I hold a grudge against! I don't think it's something I've really done (or if I do/have, I'm blissfully unaware of this. There's just not really any point of holding a grudge is there? What's it going to achieve?

Day 15: Write and send a thank you note to a teacher, friend or a loved one
It took me a while to think of who to write a thank-you note to, but then remembered someone I had been meaning to send a proper thank-you to in some form, but hadn't got around to it. And it was to this dude, Ben Smith, from The 401 Challenge.

From 1st September 2015, Ben Smith ran the equivalent of 401 marathons in 401 days - yes, basically running the distance of a marathon every single day. I found out about him shortly after I completed my half marathon run for my niece, Eva. After doing that run, I had immediately thought, "Never again!"

But then as I followed Ben's story and his progress, it inspired me to give the full marathon a go! There were so many people who were joining him every day, completing their first ever marathon also, and it made me realise that, hey, it was something I could do too!

I joined him for marathon #392 in Portsmouth on 26 September 2016 - and I'm not going to lie, I found it pretty tortuous. I had trained pretty hard for it, in the months leading up to it, but the main thing that 'got' me was that it was very stop-and-start, due to the volume of people running. All of the marathons were about completing the distance, rather than a race to the end, so there would be groups of people running, and then stopping to wait for others to catch up, before a little rest. Ben was also being followed (with his permission, ha!) by BBC Breakfast that day, so there was also alot of stopping and starting for filming purposes too.

This was something that I hadn't factored into my training, and so every time we stopped, my legs seized up that little bit more each time and found it tougher and tougher to get going again.

The only moments I managed to enjoy was anytime Ben came and spoke to me - particularly during the last few miles (or actually I think it was during the last 6, my memory of the day is a bit of a haze), when he kept coming back to check on me. (Yes I was lagging at the back for the majority of it all.) His energy, amazing spirit and gentle humour kept me going, and I literally don't think I would have made it to the end without him!

You can probably tell from my rambling that I'm still in complete awe of him and he remains firmly as one of my top role models. Whenever I feel down or negative, I just think 'What would Ben do?' or think of that day of how he lifted me and almost immediately, my perspective is changed and I feel better. So THANK YOU Ben!

Day 16: Be the one to shift a negative conversation or gossip into something positive
Now, despite all this kindness and positivity, I had been grumbling (to myself and others) about the fact that the current Southern Rail strike was preventing me from travelling back home for Christmas - I had booked train tickets to go home on the 16th, but the strikes meant that I would be unable to get to London, and basically had no option but to travel the following day instead. Which I was dreading because it would mean a Saturday + being-the-day-after-a-strike = even more busyness and mayhem.

My backup plan was to work from home on the Friday, so that I could then pack and clean that evening, before setting off on the Saturday. Now on the Friday afternoon, there was due to be a works Christmas do in the office, which I've managed to avoid for the last few years, as I've always found it to be one of those messy, cringe-fests of Forced Festive Fun. So my plan to work from home was to avoid this also.

Then, during a dinner with a couple of work colleagues (who are also good friends), I suddenly realised that I was being silly and irrational about the whole thing. Why was I being negative and planning to just sulk at home to be away from everyone? So I ended up getting my packing and cleaning sorted on the Friday morning instead and went into the office, wearing my Christmas tshirt and Christmas spirit. And it was a fantastic evening!

Day 17: Appreciate good service - smile and say thank you to everyone who serves you today
So this was the day I was travelling back home that I was dreading, because it takes 5 and a half hours which can feel like a drag anyway, but I was also fearing the madness and busyness with it being a Saturday so close to Christmas. After yesterday, I decided again to try and turn it into a positive again - this time by going on a kindness post-it note rampage (see top of post) and sticking up as many positive notes as I could throughout my journey! It was fun being a bit of a kindness ninja, sticking up post-its when no-one was looking and hopefully it would have made at least one person somewhere smile :-)

I was also served by a bright and breezy ticket office man, who helped me with changing my ticket as a result of the train strike. He did it in such a calm and nonchalant way that I was really appreciative of - as I was geared up to be met with resistance and denial (yep a bit of negativity slipping out there again sorry). I gave him my cheesiest grin afterwards as I thanked him, wishing him a merry christmas - to which he responded - "Ah and a merry Christmas to you too!"

I also smiled at every station guard and ticket person I came across throughout my journey - this wasn't always reciprocated, I must say - but I didn't care. Just the act of smiling cheers yourself up, so there now seems no excuse to wear a frown.

Day 18: Be kind to yourself
The one marked on the calendar was actually to dance around your house to your happy tunes - but this is something that I actually do alot of mornings anyway to wake myself up - yes really! When I get up, I either go downstairs and put Kisstory radio on the TV, turn it up and go back upstairs to get ready. Or I switch on my portable Bluetooth speaker on my dressing table and put on some dance music (usually 90s!). It really does make a difference to my mood in the mornings - you should try it!

So that's now three weeks down, and just one to go...

Week 2 #KindnessAdventCalendar Round-up

2016-12-11T19:20:00.000+00:00

The first full week of December has already gone and it's going to be Christmas Day in two weekends from now - how crazy is that?!

It's also been the first full week of the Kindness Advent Calendar that I've been taking part in.

Day 5: Smile at everyone today, including strangers
This was actually trickier than I thought - it probably depends on what area you live in also, but I figured being in Chichester, people are generally quite friendly and welcoming. Don't get me wrong, they are - but what this kindness act made me realise over the course of the day is how many people just shuffle along with their heads down - either staring down at their phone or generally just looking towards the floor. And of course, yes I realised that I do this myself too, all the time.

So it was difficult to make eye contact with people, let alone break a smile at them! Then even when you do make eye contact with people, the immediate reaction/reflex seems to be to look away. It was quite a sad realisation really. But hey, something to keep trying I think. I'm definitely going to try and stop walking along with my head in my phone all the time!

Day 6: Offer to run an errand for someone who needs help
This was another bit of a fail I'm afraid, as I couldn't think of anyone I was due to be in contact with that day who might need help. A bit of a lame excuse I know, but I thought it might seem a little odd to just start randomly asking people at work if they needed anything doing. As I was going into town at lunchtime, I did ask those around me if they needed anything, but they said no.

One reason I was going into town though was to drop off a bag of donations so I counted that as my kindness act for the day instead :-)

Day 7: Sign up to the organ donor register
Now, in my head, I had this down as something that I was unsuccessful in doing before for some reason, with the intention of looking into it again one day. Which of course I never got around to doing. So imagine my surprise when I went onto the NHS Organ Donation website and got myself registered in the space of two minutes!

Heh?

As I thought about it more, I remembered that what I had previously tried to register for was to be a bone marrow transplant donor - which I couldn't because I'm not a blood donor. And I'm not a blood donor because I'm under the weight limit. Doh. I have actually been putting on weight over the last couple of years though, so I reckon I will hit the required weight limit soon, yay! (My mother did warn me that my metabolism would drop once I hit 30!)

Day 8: Text, tweet or email a compliment to three people
I absolutely loved this one. It was a nice exercise to just think of people and think of a nice thing to say about them. I ended up sending way more than three, but here are a few of the ones I sent:

Sent to a friend who was having a job interview that day...

Sent to a friend who has had a really rough year...

Sent to a Whatsapp group with two friends, where the conversation then proceeded to go into a series of accent-related replies! (Yes we can write in our special accents as well as speak in them..!)

Day 9: Write a positive message on a post-it and put it on your work or a public mirror
I might have got a little carried away with this one. I work in a big office so decided to write not just one positive message, but six of them (see top of post)! I stuck them up in all the toilets around the building (just the ladies ones, by the way, as I think going into the lads ones might have been taking it a bit too far). This was my favourite one:

Day 10: Give someone your full attention - put down your phone and really listen
I actually swapped days 10 and 11 around, and did this one today, because yesterday I didn't have plans to see anyone. Today I went out for a lovely festive lunch with my girlfriends at The Kennels in Chichester. We are always in contact via Whatsapp and stuff anyway but we hadn't physically met up for about a month. It was so nice to just have a relaxing sit down meal and catch up properly with everyone. No-one had their phones out, no-one was fussed about having to leave at a certain time - it felt like we were all just in the moment, enjoying each other's company.

Day 11: Be kind to yourself - go outside for a soul-soothing stroll in nature
So this one I actually did yesterday. I had a rare day off for myself, which was a blessing in itself and earlier in the week, I had all these things I had planned to 'get done' during my 'free day'. As this day approached and I looked at the 'be kind to yourself' act, I realised that filling up a day to 'get stuff done' probably isn't a healthy approach to having a free day. Sometimes you need to just be free! So I decided to hop on my bike and just take a random cycle around. Which is something that I never do, because I solely use my bike to get from A to B (I don't drive).

I cycled over to Centurion Way which is long stretch of a disused railway path. It's about 3 miles (the bit I did anyway) and is a nice, flat path, where you get to whizz through the Sussex countryside and view the landscape. It's really peaceful down there. At first it felt really odd just cycling down there for 'no reason', but this feeling was fast overtaken by a sense of freeness and calm. Sounds a little cheesy I know, but it did feel really good just to be out there cycling through the countryside, for no other reason than to just be there.

Definitely need to keep doing more things like this - bring on week 3!

Week 1 #KindnessAdventCalendar Round-up

2016-12-04T17:18:00.000+00:00

It's only a few days into the #KindnessAdventCalendar challenge - but am completely loving it already. It's so much fun!

Day 1: Share the Kindness Advent Calendar to encourage others to practice kindness this month
I sent it my family and friends on Whatsapp, tweeted it, blogged about it, posted on LinkedIn, and on my work's intranet. I've also stuck the calendar up in the kitchens at work and left out extra copies to encourage people to take a copy. I have no idea how many people will actually do it as a result, but I hope it'll add at least a few more to this lovely kindness movement!

Day 2: Surprise a friend with their favourite chocolate bar
I had spotted these cute 'Smiles' chocolates at the weekend and decided to get them for this kindness act:

I popped into the office a little earlier to be sure that my colleague and friend Vicky would not be in yet, so that I could leave it as a nice surprise for her to find :-)

Day 3: Buy a few extra items during your supermarket shop and donate to a local food bank
This is a funny one because at times when I've gone to a supermarket, I spot a food donation point on my way out and always think to myself "Ah, that's a nice idea, I should do that next time." But by the time I go into the supermarket again, I forget and then remember again on my way out when I spot the donation point. There should be signs near the entrance or something to remind shoppers as they begin their shop!

My local food bank is the Chichester District Foodbank. One of the donation points is in the Waitrose near my work and another is in a Co-op which is under 5 minutes from my house. I don't tend to do a 'weekly shop' per se (I don't drive so I tend to do an online shop once a month, then pick up little bits during the week), but needed to pick up some stuff on the Friday. So during my lunch, I popped to Waitrose and picked up a few bits that the foodbank currently lists as urgent items in need:

It sounds stupid, but afterwards, it made me realise how quick and simple this is to do - and is now something I want to consciously try and get into the habit of doing. Of course, I have to be practical about this because as much as I'd love to donate loads of items each time, I do need to make sure I stick within my own budget!

So I've made a vow to myself to donate at least one item each time I go to Waitrose and Co-op. The plan is working so far as I ended up popping to Co-op yesterday, remembered my vow and picked up a pack of sponge puddings to donate. Yes, I know it was only a day after I made the vow, so it's not like I could really forget straight away, but still!

Day 4: Be kind to yourself - do something that makes you laugh out loud
I've been laughing alot already this weekend because I've had my uni friends down to visit. We call ourselves the 'Fillets' (long story) and it was our Festive Fillet Christmas meet up. It's one of those groups where it's difficult to get the whole group together because we are spread out across the country and everyone has clashing diaries. So we usually end up meeting only a few times a year - but when we do, it is EXACTLY the same and like we've never been apart. And we just spend the whole time yakking about really random things and cracking up over really stupid things.

So that's the first week wrapped up. It has most definitely lifted my spirits up (though I've got to admit that I'm being swept up by the whole Christmas affair now, haha) and I'm excited to continue these kindness acts. Let's see what week 2 brings...!

Psst, it's not to late to join in either. Download your Kindness Advent Calendar from Helen's blog now!

Time to spread #ChristmasKindness with a #KindnessAdventCalendar

2016-12-01T19:44:00.004+00:00

Happy 1st of December! So last week, I saw a tweet about a Kindness Advent Calendar created by a lovely lady called Helen, who writes a blog called Make Today Happy. It's a simple yet genius idea to get into the spirit of Christmas and spread a little festive cheer each day in the run up to Christmas. Instead of scoffing a choc every day for the next 25 days, you do a random act of kindness instead. Helen has created this calendar here, which you can download here for free.

Of course, you don't necessarily have to follow this exactly to a T - you can swap around the acts, or throw in your own ones - the point is all about just doing one little kind thing each day. Today's one is 'share this Kindness Advent Calendar to encourage others to practice kindness this month' - so today I've shared it with my family, friends and work - and naturally I thought I'd share here in the hope that you might like to take part too :-) Helen also has a Spreading a Little Kindness Facebook page and is on Twitter as @HelenCGreenUK with hashtags #KindnessAdventCalendar #ChristmasKindness and if you take a look, you'll see how much love is being shared about this. She's already had well over 100,000 downloads already as well - that thought alone of so many people having the intention of being kind is just awesome. And even if you end up doing just one act of kindness - it's still one more than zero ;-) So what are you waiting for? Get involved - download the calendar, share it and keep spreading the kindness!

How to Make Doughnut Muffins...

2016-09-17T22:49:00.000+01:00

...the Hungry Jenny way...

Ooh, sugary doughnut goodness...

Now, these have been on my 'to make' list for quite some time. And this week, I finally got around to it for two reasons.

Reason 1. Watching people attempting to make churros on the Great British Bake Off in this week's episode. (Well, seeing clips of it as I kept flicking over to watch the Paralympics instead.)
Reason 2. I had a block of butter about to go out of date that needed using up.

Yes, my prompts for baking are a bit trivial sometimes.

It's also been a long time since I've created a recipe (hence the radio silence here, sorry folks). And so in true Hungry Jenny fashion, this came through in a haphazardy-yet-kind-of-logical way.

The logical part is the following ratio (which I discovered a few years ago.)

Flour - 2 parts
Liquid - 2 parts
Eggs - 1 part
Butter - 1 part
Sugar - 1 part

I intended to follow this of course, which I did - sort of.

The Butter
I usually use the eggs as the starting point for a recipe because I always take each egg as 75g. But in this case, I wanted to use up my almost-out-of-date butter. This meant the butter part had to be 150g and therefore my 1 part.

The Egg
1 egg for me = 75g. So to make up 150g to follow the 1 part, I went for 2 eggs. Simple.

The Sugar
In theory, with this being 1 part too, this should have been 150g. But I wanted to knock out a little bit so put in 125g instead. (I reckon I could have got away with doing just 100g but I was too chicken to try.)

The Flour
Back to following the ratio here. 2 parts = 300g. No adjustments.

The Liquid
I decided to use milk, because I figured oil AND butter might be a bit too eugh. And my milk was also about to go out of date the next day. (I really need to consume my food in a more timely manner.) This was meant to be 2 parts (ie 300ml) also, but as I poured out the milk, I realised I only had 250ml. Oops.

Oh well, too late.

I was feeling pretty apprehensive about whether these would come out ok. As in, whether these would even taste like decent muffins at all, let alone being doughnut-like.

But by some miracle, they worked! Yeh of course they are not actually doughnuts and don't have that exact kind of texture but there is a definite resemblance there. I think I'd need to work on the placement of the jam (and maybe add more next time) so that it is more in the middle of the muffin, but as a first go, it's not too shabby, right?

Doughnut Muffins

Print-friendly recipe

Makes 12 muffins:

150g unsalted butter, softened
125g sugar + 2 tbsp for topping
2 large eggs
250ml milk
300g self-raising flour
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cinnamon + 1/2 tsp for topping
125g strawberry jam
A little oil for topping

1) Preheat the oven to 190 degrees C. Mix the 2 tbsp sugar and 1/2 tsp cinnamon together in a small bowl and set aside.
2) In another bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.
3) Beat in the egg and milk.
4) In a large mixing bowl, sift in the flour, nutmeg and 1/2 tsp cinnamon.
5) Tip the butter mixture into the flour mixture, and fold in until just mixed.
6) Spoon the mixture into a lined muffin tray to fill 1/4 of each hole.
7) Add a small dollop of jam into the centre of each, and then spoon the rest of the cake mixture on top to cover the jam.
8) Bake for about 20 minutes or until you can pull a toothpick out clean.
9) When the muffins are fresh out the oven, brush the top of each one with some oil, then sprinkle/rub the sugar and cinnamon mixture atop each one.

Mm, doughnut muffins...

You might be intrigued to learn how to do other random things the Hungry Jenny Way

The salad that just takes the pizz(a)

2016-03-23T23:01:00.000+00:00

Ok.

I'm not the biggest fan of salads, though I am not completely against the idea of eating leafy things every now and again.

But this is just ridiculous!
The thing is, it's not even a salad. It's meant to be a pizza - which you can just about make out, if you can divert your eyes from the major forestry of rocket happening on the top.

I went for lunch with friends at Prezzo (a chain italian restaurant in the UK). It was one of those Sundays where you're a bit tired and weary, but in great need of some carby grub. The waiter service of the Prezzo in Chi is usually pretty slow which we didn't really care about at first as we weren't exactly in a rush, and just wanted to relax and chat.

By the time the waiter came over to take our order though, I realised that I still hadn't got round to picking what I wanted. But rather than shooing him away, for fear of him not returning for a long while, I told everyone else to go ahead and order first, with me ordering last.

Of course, by this point, I was feeling so hungry that I just couldn't really take in what was on the menu and when the waiter got to me, I panicked and just blindly picked something - a prawn and salmon pizza. Mm, yes, good.

Forgive my confusion then, when this chopping board of greenery approached. Eh, that's my pizza?

As you can see, my pizza was literally covered in rocket. Now I am partial to a bit of rocket saladry, but surely this wasn't really the intended portion?

Not wanting to be deterred from the meal, I transferred the forest into a bowl (which then got shared out as a bonus side salad for my friends), found the actual pizza underneath and cut a slice to eat.

That's when the heat kicked in. Hm, odd, I thought, I don't remember seeing spice on the menu…

As I continued to eat, my tongue started to sting and protest even more. I put down my fork and inspected the pizza - and sure enough, there were crushed chilli, right there in the saucy base of the pizza.

This would be ok of course, if I could handle spice. But I can't. Not at all. So unfortunately, this meant that I ended up leaving about three-quarters of my meal, because it was just too spicy. Damn my low spice tolerance!

Later, when I got home, I looked up the pizza description on the restaurant menu again out of curiosity:

King prawns and oak-roasted salmon, red onion, broccoli, cherry tomatoes, crushed chillies, béchamel sauce, pesto and mozzarella. Finished with lemon dressed rocket

Chillies? Check. Rocket forest? If that's what they mean by 'finished with', then yes, that really finished that pizza right off.

But anyhow, yes, it was all there in black and white. Clearly, I didn't even make it past the first comma! Moral of the story? Read the damn menu properly next time, Hungry Jenny!

The cheesecake that looks so wrong (but tastes so right)

2016-03-13T22:04:00.001+00:00

I know, it's been a while.

Hence this dismal looking excuse for a cheesecake.

Yeah, it came out having a bit of a bad face day.

It was SUPPOSED to look a bit more like this…

So quite an epic fail on that front though really, as you can see!

Now, this beautiful slice was from a devilish cheesecake that was baked as a birthday treat for me by my good friend Lucy about 5 years ago. It was SO good. A chocolate brownie base, and vanilla cream cheese topping. Need I say more? Mmm…

(Woah, I just salivated at the memory of that.)

Anyway, Lucy shared the recipe with me, and I finally got around to trying it, as I was due to make a dessert to contribute to a lunch with my capoeira ladies.

The recipe was for 12 servings, but there was only going to be 5 of us. Now although I probably think that I could demolish more than one slice of cheesecake, I didn't want to risk giving my friends cheesecake overdose. So I decided to halve the recipe. Six servings then. Perfect.

It was all going well until I poured the brownie mixture into the tin - and realised that I completed overlooked the need to use a smaller tin.

Oops. Too late.

Oh well, I thought, a thin base is fine, I'm sure the cheesecake topping will still be a decent height, as it'll rise a little once baked...

WRONG. So wrong.

What made it even more tragic was the unwelcome appearance of those crater-looking spots. This was from the brownie randomly rising up in places, presumably to make its presence known.

The lack of height though was the most disappointing. Obviously if I had made it in a smaller tin, it would have looked more like an actual cheesecake.

But hey - throw some chocolate on it, and it suddenly didn't look so bad.

Best of all, it still tasted SO good, even if I do say so myself. I feel like I need to try this recipe out again though, just to try and get the look right...

Other cheesecake-related adventures here?

Merry Cookie-mas!

2015-12-25T10:30:00.000+00:00

Now I must admit, I cannot take the full credit for this wondrous cookie creation.

Last night, I was sous-chef to my sister Hungrier Jemma, who had grand plans to make lots of gingerbread goodies for the family today. This picture here is just one small batch of it!

Now I'm not very patient when it comes to icing, using icing pens/pipes and all of that. Precision is not my strong suit. But Jemma was in her element with the icing pipe, creating these wonderful Santas…

Pretty cool, huh?

I managed to pipe one of the beards, but then resigned to just pipe the outline of the clothes on the santas instead, leaving the beard to the expert skill of my sister. I just don't have the attention span for it!

The level of decoration I tend to do on my cookies is a bit of melted chocolate - which normally slops on in a bit of a haphazard way. (Well, it's the 'homemade' look, see.)

I did actually create a lovely large batch of gingerbread men for my workmates, complete with chocolate Smartie buttons. Though my chocolate facial features were questionable - one of my workmates inspected the one he picked up and asked 'Is he meant to be smiling..?' Yes, some were a bit lopsided or accidentally snarling but the jolly sentiment was there, alright!

Merry Cookie Christmas everyone!

CHARGEing it up for Eva!

2015-10-04T17:06:00.004+01:00

This time next week, I'll hopefully be chomping on a steak and not lying in a ditch somewhere...

Context?

Next Sunday 11th October, I’ll be running the Chi Half Marathon to raise awareness and hopefully £2,000 for the CHARGE Family Support Group. Chances are, you’ve probably never heard of CHARGE. Neither had I – until my niece Eva was born last year with this complex and rare genetic condition.

CHARGE syndrome affects 1 in 10,000 births worldwide, and babies born with this often have complex heart problems, breathing issues, hearing and/or vision loss and other factors affecting their senses which impact on their development and communication.

Eva is deaf, visually impaired and has had a tracheostomy, which means she has a tube in her neck to enable her to breathe safely. She also has a permanent feeding tube in her stomach and various other issues.

Due to Eva's condition, my sister Jemma and her husband Steven have to watch her 24/7, which as you can imagine can be extremely exhausting and tough. Despite these issues though, Eva is a very happy baby with an incredibly strong spirit – it’s always amazing to see her progression whenever I go to visit them!

Here's my beautiful niece Eva!

I live about 5 and a half hours away from them, so don't get to see them as often as I'd like - and I wanted to do something to help and show my support. So why not a half marathon, eh?

The last time I actually did any running was about 5 years ago, when I did a 25km run for FareShare. With the Chi Half being a few km short of this, it should be a doddle, right?

Erm, NO. Last time, I had no real training plan, and ended up with a bad sprain on my thigh, a few weeks before a race day. I decided to run anyway - and ended up running out of water, running out of music, going the wrong way, hitting the wall, feeling super weak - all the time making my thigh strain much worse.

So, this time around, wanting to make my niece and her parents proud, I've been more sensible about my training. I've been experimenting and tracking different pre- and post-run foods and drink, doing regular core strength exercises on non-running days, and more importantly, listening to my body to avoid over-doing it.

The course itself is fairly cross-country (the route description keeps mentioning 'steep ascents and descents'..!), which is what I'm most nervous about - but definitely feel mentally stronger and ready for it than last time. And of course, the prospect of a juicy steak at the end will be be most appealing.

The greatest motivator of course, has been knowing that it's all in aid of my niece Eva - and others like her with CHARGE syndrome, plus their families. The CHARGE Family Support Group are a small charity, entirely run by volunteers and they have been a great support to Jemma and Steven, helping them to feel less alone in this challenging situation. I can only begin to imagine how tough it must be for them (and other families in this situation), but they are such a strong family unit when you see them together, which is so inspiring to experience.

And so, I would love your help in raising funds and awareness, so that the CHARGE FSG can continue to be there for people with CHARGE and help bring these families together more.

If you'd like to support my run for Eva, please visit my fundraising page. But if this post helps to raise awareness of this rare condition to at least one more person, that can only be a good thing!

Thanks for your support!

Read more about the CHARGE Family Support Group here.

Attack of the Ninja Cookies!

2015-05-27T07:47:00.002+01:00

FIIIIIGHT!

Well it's been about 8 months since my last post. Um, sorry about that. The truth is, I got attacked by these blasted Ninja Cookies…

It started with just one at first - he seemed friendly enough, just walking along casually. As we passed each other, he gave me a bit of a funny look but carried on walking. I didn't think anything of it.

Then the following few weeks, it happened again - the same spot, the same funny glance. Hm. Starting to feel a bit edgy.

So during the next month, I decided to walk a different way.

But this time, another one walked by (or was it the same one..?). And rather than a funny glance, it was a bit of a smirk.

Over the coming months, I kept changing route - but no matter where I went, another one would appear, walk by and give me some sort of weird look.

What the hell was going on?!

The turning point came when I arrived home one day, and there was an ENTIRE BUNCH of them in the garden, all sparring with each other. Ok, officially panicked now.

Luckily, that day I had arranged for my capoeirista friends to come over. A quick SOS and a short while later, I had them hiding behind the parked cars opposite my house.

All of a sudden, we charged out towards the ninjas, each attempting to pin one down. Some successfully so, others unfortunately failed. Eventually though, we managed to knock the unlucky ninjas unconscious and stacked them on top of each other.

"Right guys", I said to my friends, "We only have a short time before these ninjas wake up. So we have got no choice but to devour them all most immediately. Are you ready?"

I didn't really need to ask...

It's over now, it's ok and we're all safe. But goodness knows when this might happen again. Make them if you dare.

Ninja Coconut Cookies

Print-friendly recipe

Makes 16 ninjas:
(You can find the cookie cutters online - just search for 'Ninjabread men cookie cutters'!)

250g plain flour
125g desiccated coconut
125g white sugar
250g unsalted butter, softened
A little bit of cold water

250g ready-made/ready-rolled white icing
Coloured icing pens of your choice
A little bit of hot water

1) Sift the flour into a large mixing bowl, with the coconut and sugar.
2) Add in the softened butter and start to knead into a dough. (Add a little water if needed.)
3) Wrap in clingfilm and leave to rest in the fridge for about 30 minutes.
4) Remove the dough from the fridge and roll out onto a lightly floured surface.
5) Stamp out 16 ninja shapes! Transfer to a non-stick baking tray.
6) Preheat the oven to 150 degrees C. In the meantime, stick the tray in the fridge again to chill the ninjas.
7) Bake for about 15 minutes or until lightly golden. They will still be a little soft when done, as they will continue to firm up a little as they cool. Allow to cool completely.
8) Roll out the white icing. Use your ninja cutters again to stamp out 16 white 'dogi' trousers.
9) Use a pastry brush to brush a little hot water onto the legs of your ninja cookies, then carefully add their icing trousers, pressing down lightly.
10) Grab your icing pens and ice on some belts!

And remember, keep your wits about you...

Say NO to Takeaway: Do Your Own Thai Makeaway instead!

2014-10-04T14:15:00.000+01:00

I live alone and I must admit, sometimes when I get home from work, I wish that dinner was already on the table waiting for me. But never would I ever pick up the phone to get takeout. (Ok, ok, maybe the odd fish and chips as a special treat)

Now I'm no stranger to making takeaway alternatives at home. So when I was invited to try out Sainsbury's 'Makeaway' range, I thought it'd be a good opportunity to try out some new takeaway alternative recipes on some friends, to show them how easy and cheap it can be.

(That was the plan anyway.)

Sweet Chilli Prawn Rolls

These little prawn bad boys only take about 15 minutes to bake in the oven. They are packed out with prawns (surprise!), bean sprouts, carrot, ginger, lime and coriander, all mixed with sweet chilli dipping sauce. It can be a little fiddly to wrap them up in the filo sheets, but after the first couple, you'll get the hang of it in no time. Just imagine that you're wrapping up a portion of fish and chips and you'll be fine. Serve these warm with extra dipping sauce. Be warned though, they will disappear quickly!

See full recipe for Sweet Chilli Prawn Rolls

Turkey Udon Pad Thai

Udon are my favourite type of noodles, although admittedly, the 'quick-to-cook' ones you get from your bog-standard supermarket are nowhere near as good as the ones you can get from a Chinese supermarket. In any case, it does save you precious minutes (and an extra pan) when whipping this dish up, as you don't need to pre-cook the noodles separately beforehand. This recipe also uses a packet Pad Thai sauce, whereas normally I like to make my own sauces from scratch, just because you know exactly what you're eating. It was secretly pleasing though to be able to just pour the sauce in straight from the packet at the end ;-) It went down very well with my friends also and they were impressed that it didn't take long to make.

See full recipe for Turkey Udon Pad Thai

Thai Green Beef Burgers

Now this last dish here I didn't make for my friends, but was for my lunch the next day. I have not really tried Thai green curry before because I fear it will be too hot for my spice intolerable palate, so thought I'd coax myself into trying green curry paste in a Thai Green Beef Burger instead. The result? Yes my eyes were streaming a little by the end, even though there was only 1 tbsp of paste per burger, but it was super tasty! It probably didn't help that I added a dollop of sweet chilli sauce onto the burger just before eating also, whoops!

See full recipe for Thai Green Beef Burgers

It did encourage me to try making a Thai green curry though (which I'll post about another day as that's a whole other story I need to tell you about!).

But back to my friends. They were making plenty of yummy noises whilst eating my prawn rolls and pad thai, so I asked them if it would encourage them to try making stuff like this themselves instead of ordering a takeaway next time. "Hm, maybe," said one, with a mouthful of noodles, "But I think I'll just come round to yours instead so you can make it again!"

Well, I'll count that as a partial success then I guess?!

If you liked this, you might want to try making these other takeaway alternatives too.

Five Ways to Use Coriander

2014-09-14T20:06:00.002+01:00

So when life gives you lemons, you make lemonade, they say.

But what if you get a massive wodge of coriander?

Don't worry, I wasn't actually served a dinner plate's worth of fresh coriander.

I usually buy fresh fruit and veg from my local market. They don't normally sell herbs, so when I spotted some fresh coriander the other week, I immediately bought some, without realising how large one lone bunch actually was.

Now coriander is one of my favourite herbs and when I buy one of those normal little packets you get from the supermarket, it usually isn't enough. But this one from the market was just ridiculous!

Of course, I didn't want to end up wasting too much of it (and hell yes I managed to use it all!). But I didn't want to get overly coriander-fatigued either and simply use it up within freezable batches of just one or two dishes. So here's five different ways of using up coriander, should you ever find yourself in such a situation...

Bacon, Tomato and Coriander Omelette

This omelette is perfect if you want something a bit different for breakfast, or are after a light dish. As you can probably tell from the image, my omelette flipping abilities aren't great, but as long as you can slide it out the pan and it tastes good, who cares, eh?

See full recipe for Bacon, Tomato and Coriander Omelette

Lemon and Coriander Rice

This works particularly well with basmati rice, if you want to make a simple rice salad, where you can then also add some chickpeas and sweetcorn too for instance. Otherwise try this as an easy way to jazz up plain old steamed rice.

See full recipe for Lemon and Coriander Rice

Coriander Beef

This is a beefy mince dish which is marinaded in oyster sauce and sesame oil, before being joined with fresh tomatoes, sweetcorn and onion. The fresh coriander is stirred through right at the end, so that it doesn't wilt too much. Best served with steamed white rice.

See full recipe for Coriander Beef

Hummus

One of the easier ways to use up a larger amount of fresh coriander because you can freeze the hummus in small batches if you need to. Oh, and don't worry if you don't have a food processor to make this either. All you need is some extra elbow grease.

See full recipe for Hummus

Lemon and Coriander Yogurt Cake

Finally, I had to of course find some way of baking coriander into a cake. A few years back, I did an Orange and Rosemary Yogurt cake that turned out pretty well, so I figured that a lemon and coriander version would work just fine. And most thankfully it did!

See full recipe for Lemon and Coriander Yogurt Cake

One more extra tip - whilst coriander doesn't freeze particular well, try filling up an ice cube tray with the any leftover leaves and a bit of water. You can then pop them out individually into hot dishes, as and when you fancy a bit of coriander.

So hopefully that has given you some ideas to try the next time you find yourself with some coriander to use up. Enjoy!

Restaurant to try: @Blacksmiths_Pub Donnington, Chichester

2014-08-22T16:00:00.000+01:00

Woah, good food alert.

Me and my friends have a little dinner club night out to a different restaurant once a month - a nice way to catch up on a regular basis, as well as having a good excuse to try some new food. We secretly rate the restaurants afterwards with a score out of 10 and everything*. All for a bit of fun ;-)

We've been doing this for the last two years now and it's just occurred to me that I've never written about any of 'em. It's not that they've all been rubbish experiences or anything like that. They just didn't seem worth writing about.

But yes. The Blacksmiths Arms is definitely a good'un.

It's a pub in Donnington just outside of Chichester which re-opened a couple of months ago after a complete renovation. One of my friends had been there a few weeks before for lunch and recommended that we try it out for our next dinner outing. And so we went.

It's slightly confusing where you walk in, as it is a short hallway, with an open doorway to the left and directly ahead of you is other doorway which shows the side of the bar. (Well to me that's confusing but I'm easily confused.)

I wandered towards the bar (because there were staff there, not because of the prospect of drink!) to ask for our table. As I turned back to check the girls were following, they had disappeared! But they had just made a sidestep through the other door instead. With the low beam ceilings as well, it all seemed a bit Alice in Wonderland. (Like I say, I'm easily confused.)

The dining room itself is lovely - light, warm and homely, and not pretentious. The tables are actually quite close together but at the same time you don't feel like you're sitting on top of another dining party. Probably because there's a lot of natural light from the big windows where you can look out onto their massive gardens (spot the chickens pecking around at the back!).

Everything on the menu looked really good. And I mean everything. The three of us were umming, ahhing and debating for ages. For starters, I went for the Asian tiger prawns, which came with a sweet lime and ginger dip and cucumber, carrot and cashew salad. For the main, I had pan-fried salmon with chorizo, slow-roasted tomatoes and white truffle mash (top of post).

As you can see, this is definitely a place where you eat with your eyes! I love it when you have food presented so beautifully to you, it really makes a difference. All of us were eating slowly, trying to savour everything, not wanting the food to end! I didn't have a dessert myself, but my friends were singing the praises of the local cheese board.

The service seemed to slow down towards the end of the evening, but maybe that was because they were pretty busy by then. We were so relaxed though that we weren't too bothered. It gave us a chance to eye up the dishes on other tables at least - next time I'm definitely going to try a steak!

The Blacksmiths
Selsey Road
Donnington
Chichester
PO20 7PR
01243 785578
www.the-blacksmiths.co.uk

* Psst. Our combined rating was 29.5/30 :-)

Other restaurants you might be interested to try

Hungry-Jenny-Faux-Pas: How McDonalds Took My Dignity

2014-04-14T18:20:00.000+01:00

It all started when my good friend Samji text me this photo:

Instantly, I turned into an excited young teenager:

"OMG! Lol. Maccy Ds? G2G get 1! BRB."

And so I did, quite literally, the next day - venture into McDonalds and order a Big Mac meal, with a side of two Happy Meal toys:

No shame was felt as I gleefully took the photo and Whatspped it over to Samji:

"Snap! Haha."
"Cool. U collecting them all as well?"
"Yeh! I've GOT to!"

And that's where it started to go downhill.

I don't even like McDonalds but suddenly I felt compelled to collect ALL the toys.

It's the Super Mario thing - whenever I see something Super Mario related, I get ridiculously excited. (I don't have Super Mario bed sheets or live in a big mushroom house or anything like that though, I'm not completely obsessed.)

In this case though, since I had been exposed to this in its first week, I thought I might as well just get the remaining 6 toys as well…

(Ok, the mushroom above makes a really cool 'Power Up' noise and I wanted to see if the other toys made Super Mario noises too*).

Samji got me up to speed on how to go about collecting the toys in a dignified manner:

1. You don't have to buy a Happy Meal to get the toy, you can just purchase it separately.
2. There's usually a choice of 2 toys to choose from each week, so you can get 2 in one go if you want.
3. Just buy a drink if you don't want to fill yourself with the grease of McDonalds.

Ok, ok, I thought. So actually, I only need to go into McDonalds 3 more times to get the next 6 toys.

That's not so bad. I'll just go in and grab a cup of tea and 2 toys to go. No need to consume any of that crap, and aside from the slight embarrassment of asking for a Happy Meal toy with no child by your side, you can leave the establishment with your dignity intact.

FAIL.

I ended up going in 5 times and buying a fat loada food each time (I didn't take photos of all the food I ate cos I forgot - um, not cos I was slightly ashamed also).

In part of my (very weak) defence, there were a couple of instances where I was only able to buy one toy rather than two (so had no choice but to go in again, right?).

I'm now the (proud?) owner of these 8 cool toys, but at what cost? About £25 worth of foodal crap bought and what worked out as around 4,000 calories later? Ouch.

The silly thing is that I did keep thinking, hey, if you really wanted a collection of Super Mario figurines, you could just find a set online which is probably cheaper and without putting a load of crap in your body too. But I was too far gone. I wanted these Happy Meal ones. I had to get them. And I secretly indulged in the fatty goodness.

Damn you McDonalds.

*FYI No, the other toys don't make sounds.

Fancy a laugh at my other Hungry-Jenny-Faux-Pas?

Cinnamon Granola Muffins

2014-02-09T18:29:00.000+00:00

I found myself in a bit of a granola pickle last week.

Not literally of course - pickled granola sounds gross.

Recently I've got myself hooked on a variety of strawberry granola from Sainsburys, to the point where I don't really like to buy or try any other version. Yes, I know I could easily make my own granola and blah-blah-blah. But hey, we all get lazy right?

Anyway, back to the point - I went to the supermarket to stock up on my beloved strawberry granola and oh shock-of-horrors, they were out of stock.

*gasp*

Being melodramatic here, as there were plenty of other varieties to choose from. I stood there for a good five minutes mulling over which one to buy, all the while suppressing the urge to let out a tantrum childish scream of "But I wanna strawberry oneeee!" Eventually I picked up a red apple, raisin and apricot variety. Sounds nice, it'll do, I thought.

Sadly I was wrong. It tasted nice sure, but it was way too tough and chewy for my delicate teeth. Cor, I'm not going to have time to eat this in the mornings! I certainly had no intention of chucking it away, so I figured I should try and turn it into a more edible breakfast.

And thus, these Cinnamon Granola Muffins were born. As well as the granola, I used some additional dried fruit in the muffin mix also, but you could throw in extra granola in there instead, if you so please.

They are quite dense muffins, as they use wholewheat flour, but perfect for breakfast or a mid-morning snack. I didn't get a chance to test whether these freeze well (as if so, they would be perfect for a grab-and-go jobby), but I forgot to leave one by for this purpose and they all got gobbled up before I realised!

So you shall simply have to bake a batch and see for yourself...

Cinnamon Granola Muffins

Print-friendly recipe

Makes 12 muffins

150g + 50g granola of your choice
200ml orange juice concentrate
150ml olive oil
2 medium eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
100g brown sugar
200g wholewheat flour
3 tbsp baking powder
3 tsp cinnamon
50g dried mixed fruit

1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C. Put the 150g granola in a bowl, pour over the orange juice and set aside.
2. In a small jug, beat together the oil, eggs, vanilla and sugar. Add in the orange juiced granola.
3. In a mixing bowl, sift in the wholewheat flour. Mix in the baking powder, cinnamon and dried fruit.
4. Pour in the granola juiced mix into the mixing bowl and gently fold in, until just mixed.
5. Spoon the mixture into a lined 12-hole muffin tray. Sprinkle over the remaining 50g granola atop each muffin.
6. Bake for 20-25 mins until risen and golden brown.

More Hungry Jenny cakes here.

Other healthy baking recipes you might enjoy.

Hungry-Jenny-Faux-Pas: Attack of the Almond Cookie Ghosts

2014-02-01T13:47:00.001+00:00

I certainly didn't want my first post of 2014 to be a Hungry-Jenny-Faux-Pas. But this was something I just couldn't keep from you.

What with it being Chinese New Year yesterday, I had this grand notion that I'd get myself back in the blogging game and kick off the year by sharing with you some Chinese New Year almond cookies.

What I didn't anticipate however was that they would morph into these creepy-looking Almond Cookie Ghosts in the oven…

Aaaaargh!

The funny thing is, I made a batch of almond cookies just before Christmas, as a present for my brother-in-law which he seemed to enjoy. I mean, they did threaten to bubble dangerously out of control when I baked them, but somehow restrained themselves. They at least came out the oven as individual cookies.

I wanted to work on the texture and sweetness of the cookies though, and so decided to play around with the recipe a bit. I should really have known that something wasn't quite right when I ended up with a slightly stickier dough than expected.

Ah well, I thought, I'll leave it to chill in the fridge and it'll sort itself out. And of course, it didn't. As I rolled out the individual cookies, they still felt suspiciously sticky.

But no matter, I thought to myself again, I'll just bake them anyway. I mean, how bad could they be?

Ten minutes later, this happened...

Nooooo…! I probably shouldn't have left them unattended. But from the living room, they smelt so good, I figured they were doing ok...

After a period of chuckling to myself, followed by a short period of despair, I decided to taste it. And here's the surprise - they actually tasted really good! Nicely sweet, with a kind of fairy cake type texture.

So with that, I confronted the ghosts and sliced 'em up to take them into work. And they went down a treat!

"Oooop!"

Ha, take that, you silly Almond Cookie Ghost!

Fancy a laugh at my other Hungry-Jenny-Faux-Pas?

The Lost Appetite of Hungry Jenny

2013-11-02T14:43:00.004+00:00

Hello?

Are you getting this?

Oh, my sweet Hungry cakes, I don't know what's happened.

Look, I don't have alot of time, so listen up ok...

So it's been 6 months now since my last post. In the blogging world, that's like a century, right? You've probably moved onto other things. Don't worry, I understand.

But - I seem to have lost my appetite. No, not literally, I'm still Hungry, now don't you worry about that. But this past year, I just haven't been...feeling it. It's not you, it's me.

I still bake, but usually now just stuff I've already posted before, or, shock horror, from other recipe books. I can't seem to find the energy or headspace to come up with new stuff these days.

A major factor of this actually is work - as much as I love it, demands are getting bigger and I'm pretty much brain-fried by the time I get home. And the last thing I want to do when I get in, I'm sad to say, is switch back on my laptop. Not just for blogging, for anything. I barely even go on Twitter anymore.

It used to be a therapeutic thing. Both the creative side of baking/cooking and the writing. Actually, I lie. It still is a therapeutic thing. Even as I write now, I'm feeling such a nice sense of calm and I wonder why I don't still do this more regularly.

But using my laptop is a faff - this is the first time I've been able to use it within the last couple of months. It's old and tempermental. Sometimes it decides to work, sometimes it doesn't.

I'm sat here right now with the laptop plugged into my TV because the screen doesn't work. If I take the laptop mains out, it will all go. And sometimes my wireless connection doesn't work, and my internet cable thing isn't long enough to reach. Hence why I don't have alot of time.

I couldn't leave you folks without a little recipe to end the post on though. It was originally meant to be kind of like rocky road - but I'm not a fan of marshmallows or raisins in chocolate. So they're just Glorified Chocolate Digestives really!

Glorified Chocolate Digestives

Print-friendly recipe

Makes 12

150g digestive biscuits
200g dark chocolate, broken into chunks
100g unsalted butter
2 tbsp golden syrup

1. Put the digestive biscuits into a large plastic bowl (or a bag) and use the end of a rolling pin to bash them into crumbs.
2. Put a pan on a low heat, and melt the chocolate, butter and syrup. Turn off the heat.
3. Gently mix in the biscuit crumbs.
4. Spoon the mixture into a 12-hole cupcake tray and allow to cool for half an hour, before then sticking in the fridge for at least 4 hours to set.

Hope to see you guys again soon..!

Other chocolatey recipes you might enjoy.