Mini Chicken and Ham Picnic Pasties

Copyright Caroline Makes dot Net

These mini pasties are a good way to use up leftover cooked chicken, are easy to make (especially if you use shop-bought pastry) and are a nice alternative to sandwiches to take on a picnic or in your lunchbox.

I had some shortcrust pastry in the freezer, and these pie moulds from Lakeland I bought ages ago in the sale and had never gotten around to using.

You get three different size moulds in the box:

I cooked some chicken (you could also use ready cooked) and mixed it with some chopped ham from a tin, a handful of fresh parsley and a little crème fraiche (I would have added onion but my husband doesn't really like it). You can also add peas, mushroom or sweetcorn (cooked) if you like.

Rolling out the pastry, I decided to open out the pie mould and cut around it to get circles of the right size.

I placed the circle inside the mould, put filling in one half and squeezed it shut - this makes it so easy to get the lovely fluted edge you see on Cornish pasties.

I glazed them with milk and baked them in the oven at 180C for about 20-25 mins.

 

Let me know if you try different variants on the filling!

I'm sharing these with Cook Once, Eat Twice, hosted by Corina at Searching for Spice.

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Barbecue Spicy Fish Tacos with Mango Salsa

This is something a little bit different to do on the barbecue - it's still fairly easy to do, and tastes absolutely delicious. Not everyone wants a lot of heavy meat at a barbecue and this is a brilliant way to serve fish.

The recipe is from a book called Jamie Oliver's Food Tube presents The BBQ Book - I thought initially it was written by Jamie Oliver but it's actually someone called DJ BBQ, an American DJ and barbecue chef who gives his recipes names like 'kick ass fish tacos'.

I left the guacamole and the red cabbage out of this recipe as I don't like it. You need to make the mango salsa separately and make the Mexican rub for the fish first, though it's very quick - what took longest was finding all the spices in the cupboard!

Here's what to do:
For the Mexican rub:

Mix 1tbsp brown sugar, 1 tbsp. sea salt, 1 tbsp. ground cumin, 1 tbsp. chilli powder, 1 tsp onion granules, 1 tsp garlic granules, 1 tsp cayenne pepper, 1 tsp smoked paprika.

It's a good idea to make the mango salsa before you start barbecuing as well. Mix a diced ripe mango with half a red onion, chopped, half a cucumber (which I left out as I don't like cucumber), a handful of fresh coriander leaves, the juice of 1 lime and a sprinkling of sea salt.

 

I had a long piece of cod in the freezer from when it was reduced in the supermarket; you can use any kind of (ideally chunky) white fish for this recipe. I rubbed the Mexican rub over the fish (any extra will keep) and put the fish on some tin foil. It didn't take long on the barbecue (we have a Weber gas barbecue) and when it was ready, I flaked the fish and used it to fill some soft flour tortillas and added the mango salsa on top. Delicious!

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Review: Fontainebleau hotel, South Beach, Miami

 

Copyright Caroline Makes dot Net

I have to admit that the Fontainebleau wasn’t my first choice hotel. When we decided to go on honeymoon to the Galapagos Islands and realised we couldn’t fly direct to Ecuador from the UK and our options were Lima in Peru or Miami, it seemed a no-brainer to spend the first few days of our honeymoon relaxing in a luxury hotel in Florida. My husband loves visiting the States and I knew a few days there would help us wind down after the hectic run-up to the wedding.

  

He had a voucher from Virgin Holidays that he’d received as a bonus for working on a particularly big project so I went onto the Virgin website and found they offered 11 hotels in Miami. As it was our honeymoon I decided to sort by ranking and price and did some research on the three hotels that came out top, and decided I wanted to stay at the W South Beach.

 

But repeated problems with Virgin’s booking system meant I couldn’t be sure of getting the type of room I wanted. Nothing on Virgin’s website in terms of the room descriptions tallied with what the W had on its own website, so I couldn’t be sure that by selecting a suite with an ocean view on a high floor I wouldn’t end up with a room with a garden view on the lower floor.

 

Eventually I gave up – having reported the problem to Virgin three times and told it had been fixed but to no avail – and chose a different hotel. The Fontainebleau had been my second choice and actually the room rates were a lot more reasonable – still expensive, but we could spend a lot less than at the W and still get a suite that sounded amazing.

 

And it was amazing – one of the biggest hotel rooms I’ve ever been in. We had a large living room, kitchen (literally with oven, hob, fridge and dishwasher – but who cooks in a hotel like this?!), separate bedroom and large bathroom. It was only on the second day there that we opened a door to what we thought was a cupboard, near the entrance to the suite, and found it was a second toilet!

 

living room and kitchen at the back

 

living room and door onto one of the balconies (the bedroom also had a balcony)

bedroom

 

There was a large balcony and our view was of both the hotel pool below and the beach off to the side – I could happily have lounged there all day. That was the only drawback – when we chose the room (a Sorrento Ocean View One Bedroom Suite) from looking at the hotel’s website, the balcony showed two lounger-style chairs where we could lay back and put our feet up. When we arrived we just found regular chairs, which was disappointing as I’d been looking forward to reclining (my husband isn’t a pool person and I knew he’d prefer to stay in the air-conditioned room so I wanted to lounge on the balcony). I called down to reception and asked about the lounger chairs only to be told they didn’t have any. It was a shame as otherwise our room looked exactly like the one in the picture and I found this a bit misleading.

 

Discovering there was a computer in the room with internet access for us to use was great – though there is a resort fee you have to pay per day of $28.45 per room, which includes wifi, gym access, chairs on the beach, local calls and a daily newspaper – none of which we used apart from the wifi.

 

view from Sorrento 5th floor pool

 

We stayed in the Sorrento tower – the hotel is absolutely massive and they give you a map of where everything is when you arrive. Most of the restaurants (yes, there are several) are in the area off the central lobby so we didn’t have to do too much walking around but it was still quite a trek to get down to the main pool. I kept seeing a small sign in Sorrento saying there was a pool on the 5^th floor but didn’t go for the first couple of days, then I decided to check it out. There was a good sized swimming pool, with a pile of towels and a water dispenser, and lounger chairs overlooking the beach. You’re high above the main pool but can’t actually see it from here so it’s a good way to avoid the hustle and bustle if you’re not into that. In fact for the two hours I was there I had the pool entirely to myself, it was bliss!

 

view from our room

 

The main pool actually has multiple swimming pools; a large one that was surrounded by lounger chairs, then I remember counting at least four other small pools (one adults-only) and a Jacuzzi – but looking at the hotel’s website they say they have ten pools! Chairs are spread across the gardens so if you don’t want to be poolside there is plenty of space elsewhere – and the hotel is on the beach, just separated by a gate and a path, where you can go and swim in the ocean or sit on a lounger chair on the sand.

the beach

 

If you’re rich and famous – or just rich – there are cabanas for rent around the pool, which come with ceiling fans, mini fridge, butler service and wide screen TV. There are curtains you can draw for privacy but if you’re in one of these, you probably want to show off! I heard one guy tell his friend by the pool that he had asked how much they cost and that they were $750 – I think that might have been per day!

 

poolside

 

We spotted one extra large cabana that was in the centre of a small round pool, with four flat screen TVs; according to the website it accomdates up to 12 people and is a cinch at $1,000. It sounds crazy money and it is, but if you split it between 12 people it’s only about $80 per person – but I still don’t think I’d pay $80 to sit on a chair by a pool, even if there is a TV! And I’m not sure what the butler service entails but when I was by the main pool (in one of the free loungers) there were waiters going up and down taking food and drink orders and bringing it to your seat.

 

extra large cabana

 

I never saw the ‘supreme cabana’ which accommodates six, and costs anywhere from $550 plus rental fee (whatever that is) and tax mid week, or $1500 plus tax on a Saturday with a food and drink minimum spend on top. Maybe this is where Puff Daddy relaxes when he’s at the Fontainebleau.

 

The hotel itself is opulent – there are three chandeliers in the main lobby designed by the Chinese artist Ai Wei Wei which are apparently worth $1 million – each. The hotel was popular with the ‘Rat Pack’ when it opened in the 1950s and there are photos of Frank Sinatra lining the walls.

 

$1 million Ai Wei Wei chandlier

 

The hotel has an amazing nine different places to eat, ranging from takeaway snacks to fine dining:

Hakkasan (modern Cantonese – the original one in London has a Michelin star)

Scarpetta (upmarket Italian)

Stripsteak by Michael Mina (expensive steak and seafood)

La Cote (poolside/beachside dining)

Pizza & Burger summer pop-up which opened the day we left, I think temporarily taking the place of Michael Mina 74 (upmarket American cuisine and shellfish)

Vida (American brasserie)

Blade (sushi)

Chez Bon Bon (café/patisserie)

Fresh (snacks and ice cream)

 

My husband doesn’t eat Chinese food or sushi but loves steak so we ate at Stripsteak, Vida and Chez Bon Bon, and also ordered room service a couple of times. I’ll review Stripsteak separately as of course it’s open to people who are not staying in the hotel and is a highly rated restaurant in itself, but I’ll briefly talk about the others here.

 

our first day - it rained all day (still hot!)

 

We were pretty tired when we arrived after a long flight from London, and ordered room service at 8pm (though to us it was actually about 2am). They add a 20% service charge and $4.50 delivery charge so it's not cheap but the food itself isn't badly priced - I had chicken tenders with fries and barbecue sauce for $15 which was a huge portion, I had to leave half of it. My husband had a burger and fries for $20 which he enjoyed, and we both ordered dessert as it was the first proper meal of our honeymoon and luckily it was quality rather than quantity.

chicken tenders

bow tie brownie

 

 

He had a bow tie brownie - we weren't sure why it was called that until we realised one of the hotel pools is shaped like a bow tie. It came with a piece of chocolate printed with bow ties and chocolate sauce and he said it was very good- I didn't actually get to try it! I had the key lime pie which came cut into pieces already, decorated with pieces of orange and some mango gelee - a sort of thick sauce dotted onto the plate. it was absolutely delicious and beautifully presented. We only drank water and yet the bill came to over $80! 

 

key lime pie

 

We also decided to treat ourselves to room service breakfast the next morning as we were hungry when we woke up (or rather when we got up, I woke at 4am due to jet lag!) and didn't know how long it would take us to walk around the hotel to find the various places we could have breakfast.

room service breakfast

My husband opted for a breakfast plate with two eggs cooked any way (he had scrambled) with a choice of pork or chicken sausage, bacon or ham, and he had three decent sized pork sausages. It also came with toast and potato hash which turned out to be boiled potatoes mashed up and then fried into a patty, which he didn't particularly like. I had eggs benedict again with bacon - though it wasn't the crispy kind I was expecting and I still think the best poached eggs I've ever had were at the Dana hotel in Chicago, but it was very good - the hollandaise sauce was in a jug for me to add myself, and the whipped cream to go with my husband's hot chocolate was also served in a separate bowl. There's something rather decadent about having room service breakfast so we really enjoyed it, even though that was another $80!

 

Nutella brioche

 

I’d rather have a small breakfast then a nice lunch, whereas my husband could happily eat a huge breakfast and skip lunch, so we compromised on our second day when luckily the weather was glorious - about 32C, much more what I'd been expecting! We went to Chez Bon Bon, a small café/patisserie in the main lobby, which only has two tables - I later saw people with Chez Bon Bon boxes eating by the pool so maybe that's the idea! I had a cup of tea (aah, tea) and a Nutella brioche which was amazing though not the healthiest breakfast! My husband had a chocolate croissant which he said was very good.

 

Chez Bon Bon

 

We went back to Chez Bon Bon for breakfast the following day and I had a peach Danish, which was good but I should have had the Nutella brioche again!

 

Later by the pool I had a mint and watermelon lemonade which was delicious (though it cost $10!).

 

cheers!

 

We didn't want much for lunch but were a bit hungry so went back to Chez Bon Bon and got a croquet monsieur (basically a cheese and ham toasted sandwich) which we shared - it was really good. We then had some leftover cake to eat which you will understand when you read my review of Stripsteak!

 

croque monsieur

 

We didn't spent much time sightseeing in Miami as we were just there to relax for a few days but did go on a boat trip to see Millionaire's Row, ie where the super rich and famous live. We went with the Island Queen - we got a taxi to the Bayside Marketplace where the boat goes from and found there were lots of shops and places to eat and drink, so we would have come back here to eat if our trip had been longer. The celebrity houses were quite interesting to see - this one belongs to the guy who invented Viagra - but the commentary wasn't great. It was in English then Spanish and was rapid and quite monotonous, like it had been learnt by heart by someone who didn't really care and was just doing the job to pay the bills - which I suppose is fair enough but we went on an architectural boat trip in Chicago narrated by someone who seemed to have a real passion for architecture, and this tour just fell a bit flat, though it was still a nice thing to do.

 

 

For lunch on our last full day in the hotel we ate at Vida; my husband had a burger and I was torn between pizza and a pasta dish - shrimp penne with ricotta and summer squash. I wasn't sure what summer squash was so asked the waiter if it was zucchini (courgette) or a yellow squash like pumpkin and he said yellow squash. When it arrived, I had a plateful of what looked like zucchini (it was green, anyway, and I didn't like it) - I should have said something but it hadn't been immediately apparent so I'd already started eating and I'm very English and just left it! So it was basically a very plain overpriced pasta, I should have had the pizza!

pasta dish.... and what I left



Overall I absolutely loved the Fontainebleau. It's a big, anonymous hotel - I do like staying in small B&Bs but for the beginning of our honeymoon we wanted to be alone, in a huge suite with a balcony, eating lovely food and chilling out in style, which is exactly what we had. It was the perfect start to our honeymoon.

 

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Sailboat Happy Birthday Card with Silhouette Cutter

I was very lucky to be given a Silhouette Cameo by a friend earlier this year - she'd decided she didn't want it any more and offered it on Facebook, and as I love card making I jumped at the chance, even though I didn't really know what it was!

Silhouette America is a company that makes various die cutting machines but unlike my Sizzix Big Shot cutter which I wrote about here, they are electronic. And rather than using metal dies which you have to purchase, you can create your own designs, or download ones other people have designed, sometimes free of charge and sometimes not - though most only seem to cost 65p. That sounds a lot cheaper than spending £10 on a die, doesn't it? The part I haven't mentioned is that the Silhouette Cameo machine which I've got cost £250 - which is why I felt so lucky to receive it!

I thought I'd already blogged about something I'd made using the Silhouette but don't believe so. I got it out to use for another project, which I'm not going to write about yet as it's a birthday gift for a friend later this month, and while I was there I decided to do a few other things.

Once you have the software for the Silhouette loaded, it's really easy to go into the (small) library of free designs (though there is an extra free design every week) or into the store where you can look up any design or shape. I wanted a sailboat for my other project which cost me 65p to download, and since I'd done that I decided to use the same template again (you only pay once, to download it) to cut out a few more boats, and use one to make a card.

Here you can see the screen on my laptop, where I've placed and re-sized the different templates I'm using onto an A4 sheet. One thing I like is that you can copy and paste and cut out more than one diecut from the same template at the same time, which you can't do with the manual cutter (though the manual cutter is quicker!).

Here you can see the Silhouette Cameo machine - it looks like a printer but is narrower. You feed in the piece of card you want to cut, stuck onto the sticky backing paper which keeps it in the right place. When it's done you peel it off - you can see here one boat has been cut out; I reused this sheet the other way around for the designs above.

Some of the pieces I've cut out - the centres still need removing

It's great to be able to cut words in different fonts. You can write your own words which I have done and will blog about separately but it's trickier as you have to make sure all the letters are joined to each other!

For the other project I keep mentioning I had bought some sailing themed backing papers from Ebay - a pack called Sail Away by First Edition. I used one page from this, showing a wave design, as the backing paper on a large A5 card. I also cut a circle using the Silhouette and as the boat was patterned - a triangle design that reminded me of flags and therefore sailing - I mounted the boat on a plain blue circle.

 

I'd cut the words 'happy birthday' out of the same patterned flag paper but realised this wasn't going to show up on the patterned background, so I mounted it on blue paper and cut around that. I like the effect it gives - rather than flags it now looks to me a little more like rope which is also linked to the sailing theme.

 

 

I'm sharing this with Cardz for Guyz as their theme this week is methods of transport.

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Mary Berry's Lemon Drizzle Traybake Cake for Picnics

Copyright Caroline Makes dot Net

A couple of weeks ago my husband and I went to Castle Combe in Wiltshire, where there is a racing circuit. This was a special event where you could drive your own car around the track - it's not like some events where you can go as fast as you like and need a helmet and special race day insurance, as there is a pace car that sets the speed, no overtaking is allowed and you stay in the order you start in.

Once or twice we got up to 90mph in my husband's Aston Martin - we were there with the local branch of the Aston Martin Members Club - but we were following behind a lady who sometimes drove at 90mph and sometimes at 25mph. Which might have been understandable on the corners, but this was on the straight. She was very erratic which didn't make for a pleasant drive!

The next time we got to do a few laps, the Lotus car club went first, and then just after we started, I wondered aloud why there was a Lotus at the front of the group of Astons. My husband said it had been part of the group in front but was so slow, they had all finished and it was now sat in front of our group, holding everyone up. The Lotus did a nice sedate 30mph all the way around the track for three laps. I'm not a speed freak and was gripping the side of my seat as we got up to 90mph earlier, s the fact that even I was frustrated and shouting at the car to hurry up - since nobody was allowed to overtake - was saying something!

As I knew it would be a long day out I had taken some food with us, and the day before baked this lemon drizzle cake from a Mary Berry recipe.

 

The recipe is available on the BBC Good Food website and is very easy to follow. You only have to mix a few ingredients...

 

Spread it in a tin and bake.....

Make a lemon and sugar syrup which you then drizzle over the cake while it is still warm

The drizzle meant the cake was incredibly moist and very lemony; I don't think I've ever made a simple lemon traybake before and I can't understand why not as it was so good!

 

I'm sharing this with Treat Petite, hosted by Stuart at Cakeyboi and Kat the Baking Explorer as 'anything goes' this month.

 

 

I'm also sending it to Tea Time Treats, hosted by Karen at Lavender and Lovage, as the theme is afternoon tea.

 

 

August is national afternoon tea week so I'm also sending this to Charlotte's Lively Kitchen as she hosts The Food Calendar linkup.

 



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Restaurant review: Oriel, Heathrow Airport

We had an amazing honeymoon in the Galapagos Islands via Miami and Quito, and I plan to review the different places we stayed and ate (and can't resist sharing a few of my photos!). To begin, here's how our journey began....

Flying with Virgin Atlantic to Miami we told the guy on the check in desk it was our honeymoon and when he wrote 'honeymooner' on our boarding card I got really excited, hoping we might get an upgrade... what we actually got was fast-track through security. Which was better than nothing but business class would have been nice- especially as we had paid twice the cost of an economy ticket to sit in premium economy and there was a screaming baby for the entire ten hour flight! Don't get me started with small babies on planes....

At least we had been able to begin our honeymoon in civilised style with an airport breakfast - it was a bit early for champagne but we still wanted to go somewhere nice.

Oriel, a French brasserie, looked posh and offered a full English which is what my husband wanted plus plenty of options for me.

He had the 'Anglais' full English for £8.95 plus an extra sausage for another £1.50; it came with two sausages anyway, bacon, blackpudding, mushrooms, tomato, eggs, fried potatoes and toast - he doesn't eat a few of those items but said it was a really good and filling breakfast.

 

I was tempted by the buttermilk pancakes but thought I might have that in America so went for the eggs benedict (which ironically I ended up having for my first breakfast in America anyway!). Two beautifully poached eggs on an English muffin with Wiltshire ham (this was something of a must having just got married in Wiltshire two days before) with hollandaise sauce. At £7.50 it wasn't badly priced - I'm used to airport breakfasts seeming quite overpriced - and this was extremely good, with fast and friendly service. I'd definitely eat here again next time I'm at terminal 3.

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Meal Planning Monday 2016 - Week 31

I can't believe it's August already, where did the year go? Actually most of it went on wedding planning I think!

I wasn't feeling well at the end of last week so took a day off sick; I was supposed to have two days annual leave on Tuesday and Wednesday this week so might have to cancel one of them as I have deadlines and already missed a day of work! So I will plan meals that I can have weather I am at home or not. I don't have any plans in the evenings this week which is good as I was rushing around so much and working late a lot over the last week or so. I just want some nice quiet evenings at home with my husband!

Monday
chicken kiev

Tuesday
Lunch : salad (having the same most days this week)
Dinner: griddled chicken with pepper sauce from Sainsburys leaflet

Wednesday - day off
Lunch: baked potato with tuna
Dinner: BBQ: ballistic BBQ chicken from Jamie Oliver book, homemade pitta breads and some chips for him and potato salad for me

Thursday
Dinner: my husband might go to his mum's. I'll have braised salmon with mustard and a Gruyere herb crust from the Saturday Kitchen cookbook, p.25. Or, I might just come home and bung some pasta in a pan.

Friday
Dinner: tacos and potato wedges

Saturday
Lunch: pitta bread pizzas with leftover pitta breads (hopefully)
Dinner: BBQ. sardines with herb sauce for me with a jacket potato and chicken and chorizo kebabs for us both plus burger for him

Sunday
Lunch: breakfast burritos
Dinner: pan-roasted chicken with crème fraiche spaetzle from Saturday Kitchen p14

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