Lauren

Salmon 5-spice Stir-fry

09.03.2010 by Lauren Category Dinner 1 Comment →

I am jumping from one extreme to the other on this blog recently, from slow cooking to super-fast cooking. I love cooking and baking, but my love for it is somewhat diminished on a Tuesday evening after a long day at work.

This is when I like things super-fast, I always have stir-fry vegetables in my fridge for those nights when the temptation will be so strong that you might just phone a takeaway instead. The funny thing is that preparing a stir-fry often means dinner will be on the table much faster than waiting for the delivery guy!
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Wholewheat Hot Cross Buns

08.03.2010 by Lauren Category Bread, Breakfast, Snack, Sweets 8 Comments →

If you are new to my blog you may want to subscribe to the CoffeeMuffins RSS Feed or follow me on twitter. Enjoy!

It’s a long time till Good Friday, but these are too good to wait for! I have a special love of fruit bread, especially those spiced with cinnamon, so hot cross buns have always been a favourite of mine.

The supermarkets have been selling Hot Cross Buns since after Valentines Day, but I am yet to buy a single one. I made a promise to try to make more things myself. At Christmas I refused to buy mince pies and instead made my own – and I would never buy them again now. Why should it be any different for Hot Cross Buns?

Slow Cooked Beef Bourguignon

06.03.2010 by Lauren Category Dinner, Slow Cooking 6 Comments →

One of the problems when you are first trying a new slow cooker recipe is the anticipation. You have picked from hundreds of recipes online or in cook books, you have hunted out all the ingredients, entrusted them to the large pot and placed the lid on top. Yet at this point you have to wait, often for 8 hours.

If I am in the unfortunate position to be home while I am slow cooking, I’ll spend too much time peering through the condensation.

An ongoing internal dialogue as to whether I should lift up the lid, only for a moment, just to check.

They say lifting the lid on a slow cooker adds 30 minutes to the cooking time, I say lifting the lid on a slow-cooker is tantamount to opening Christmas presents and resealing before putting them back under the tree.

It ruins the surprise.

When you do eventually lift the lid off it can all to easily be a disappointment after being built up for so long. This recipe, however, will be no disappointment.
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No Knead Bread – Fresh from the Oven

28.02.2010 by Lauren Category Bread 4 Comments →

Wow I am really not getting any better at the Fresh from the Oven challenge, am I? I wake up on reveal day (at noon, guess I am still getting over the jetlag) having had the intention of getting up and having the bread in the oven by that time.

This months challenge was brought to us from Claire at Things We Make. She chose a No Knead bread, which is cooked in a Dutch Oven, so in my case my new Le Creuset Casserole dish.

Slow Cooked Chicken Pilaf with Sun-dried Tomatoes

28.02.2010 by Lauren Category Dinner, Slow Cooking 4 Comments →

Being on holiday is wonderful, your bed gets made for you, there is no cleaning to do, and you don’t have to make your own meals. Unfortunately I kind of enjoy making my own food!

After a week when the only vegetables I saw were between a burger and a bun it was necessary to get some vegetables and healthy food into me. Lunch today was a large salad, not unlike this Tomato and Red Pepper Salad, the crisp fresh lettuce leaves were a world away from the pale limp ones I found inside any burger.

Atlanta

27.02.2010 by Lauren Category Breakfast, General 2 Comments →

I am finally home, and after almost a week away there is only one thing I want. A home cooked meal, and maybe if you’ll give me a second option – some sleep!

Atlanta was wonderful and I met so many great people, including Nancy a fellow food blogger from The Dogs Eat the Crumbs. As some of you may know I am an almost anonymous blogger, so it was lovely to meet another food blogger – to be able to talk about what we do.

Celeriac Mash

23.02.2010 by Lauren Category Sides No Comments →

This week posts may be few and far between, I am on holiday! No this isn’t a pre-recorded message, but I have found myself with enough free time to pull this recipe from my “To Be Blogged” pile.