When I get stressed, I bake. And watch Studio Ghibli films. This afternoon it was Kiki’s Delivery Service and dark chocolate chip cookies (vegan, naturally!), and now I am perfectly calm! Maybe they can do the same for you…

Ingredients

3oz dairy free spread (Vitalite is great)
3oz soft brown sugar
6oz/indiscriminate amount of dark chocolate (Sainsbury’s Dark Cooking Chocolate is fine)
Indiscriminate amount of golden syrup
7oz plain flour
Pinch of baking power
Dark chocolate chips (Silver Spoon do ones w/out milk too)

Method

Pre-heat oven to 150°C. Grease a baking sheet.

Beat the spread and sugar well together.

Melt the chocolate using your preferred method – I stick it in a saucepan with a bit of marge and golden syrup and stir well to stop it burning to the pan, but you can do it the proper way by boiling water and melting the chocolate in a glass bowl on the water – and stir the chocolate into the butter/sugar mix.

Sift the flour, cocoa and baking power altogether. Add it in a bit at a time and stir.

About 3/4 way through adding the flour, squeeze/spoon in as much golden syrup as you like before your teeth start to hurt. Stir in the chocolate chips.

Add the rest of the flour, and mix.

Spoon the mix onto the baking sheet – a dessert spoon is about right – and leave enough room for some spreading. Spreadage?

Put the cookie dough laden baking sheet into the oven.

Eat the excess cookie dough, while watching your favourite scene from a Studio Ghibli moviefilm.

Bake for about ten minutes, then turn the oven off and leave the cookies to continue baking/heating a little while. (This depends on how big/thick you made the cookies.)

Take the cookies out and leave them to cool/harden.

ENJOY!

This dress was purchased in the name of burlesque.

Let me explain.

The Cheek of It! School of Burlesque and Cabaret have been a client of mine for a while now, and I felt that I couldn’t really talk about how amazing the courses are for increased self confidence without actually taking part in one. So here I am, on the Showtime course, and it is terrifying!

It’s our third class on Monday (tomorrow), the one where we get to grips with striptease, so I needed a dress which I can open at the front. I’m also quite choosy about the materials I wear; basically, cotton or nothing. One quick trip to Primark later, and I found this dress – which I didn’t even try on until I got home and found it fit perfectly, and flatters, and even the boob pockets (something I usually avoid) are great thanks to the bow detailing.

I also picked up some new undies (any excuse, right? Although, showing them off to a room full of ladies is a pretty good one, I think!) and a pair of elbow length satin gloves from John Lewis.

In our second week lesson, we had to bring in a prop and a track and do a mini performance of about five moves. Thanks to my hectic schedule (I usually work every day), I had to make mine up in my head as I listed to Doin’ Time over and over and over again. I took in my bowler hat, and I thought I had a reasonable routine worked out, but when it came to it, I went into some kind of trance and my body just took over!

It was a bit difficult not to start pulling my usual shapes, but I went through the basic burlesque moves – the wiggle, the grind and the bump. It’s a tragic truth that, thanks to my ballroom dancing background (it’s true!) and years of drubstepdrumandbass dancing, I can’t shimmy. When I move my shoulders, my boobs just don’t wobble. My boyfriend has tried to teach me, my bellydancing friend has tried to teach me, Lady Cheek herself has tried to teach me, and still, I look like a confused robot with a balance malfunction. If we weren’t doing a group performance, I think I would try out robot burlesque!

I will report back about whether I feel any more confident in my body after tomorrow!

Recently, I’ve been out and about quite a lot, to the point that I didn’t see Pie for two days in a row and my Mum asked if we really lived together! Well, we do, so when I did have some time home at lunch I made Imam Bayildi for treats. The story behind this dish is that it was presented to an imam, who swooned when he tasted the rich dish…or when he found out how much expensive olive oil had been used to create it!

People seem to have this idea that vegan food can never measure up to meat, can never be as filling as meat and cheese, and can never taste as good as meat and cheese. When I first looked at this, I asked ‘What are we going to eat with it?’ It just doesn’t seem like enough for a full meal, but it is so rich, and so filling, that you don’t even need a slice or two of bread with it, except to mop up the topping and the vast amounts of olive oil!

This recipe is taken from Easy Vegan and slightly modified by me.

Imam Bayildi

Ingredients

150 ml virgin olive oil
3 medium aubergines
salt and pepper

For the stuffing:

2 onions, finely chopped
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 teaspoon ground cumin
450g tomatoes (tinned, fresh, whatever you like)
1 courgette, diced (optional)
1 tblsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp sugar
3 tblsp parsley
1 tblsp tomato puree diluted with 150ml hot water

Method

Preheat the over to 190°C Gas 5.

Heat half the olive oil in a large frying pan, add 3 pieces of the aubergine and shallow-fry for about 10-15 minutes, turning them over until light golden on both sides. (This is sometimes difficult to judge, but since you bake them later anyway, err on the side of taking them out a bit early.) Remove and rest on paper towels. Repeat with the remaining 3 pieces. Arrange them side by side in a shallow ovenproof dish and season well with salt and pepper.

To make the stuffing, heat the remaining olive oil in a saucepan, add the onions and sauté gently until they start to color. Add the garlic, cumin and diced courgette, fry for 2-3 minutes, then add tomatoes, oregano, and sugar. Pour in 165ml water and season with salt and pepper. Cover and cook for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Stir in the parsley, then divide the stuffing and pile it up along the aubergines. Pour the diluted tomato paste/puree into the dish and cook in the preheated oven for about 45 minutes, basting the aubergines once during cooking.

I’m not sure if I mentioned it before…but I went to New York City last month (and it already seems so long ago!) and since I haven’t done a proper post about it yet (other than what I ate there) I thought I would round up my favouritest things which we did in New York City.

Hunt Vicious Creatures

We discovered this dramatic specimen in the American Museum of Natural History as we took a self-guided Night at the Museum tour!

People Watch

As we were there over Easter, we thought we’d check out the Easter Day Parade. It’s not really much of a Parade! People make enormous, colourful bonnets, and then wander down 5th Avenue wearing them, while everyone else wanders between then snapping photos. Even the animals get involved!

Hang Out On Top Of The World

Our New York Pass covered both the Empire State Building, and the Top of the Rock but we only made it up the one! Luckily enough, we got there in time to see the sun go down, and all the office lights flicker on! It was magical, and also freezing.

Grab a Slice

I love pizza. The day they invent a cupcake pizza, I will be in heaven. In the meantime, grabbing a slice anywhere, and everywhere, at roughly $4 a go, was almost unbelievable. This is Two Boots, a cajun inspired pizza place with totally quirky deco and shops all over the City.

Peek at History

This is the City Reliquary in Brooklyn; a place where everything counts as history. Statue of Liberty statues, old postcards, photos from the first kids’ barber in NYC, subway signs, bits of rock from each borough, and paint chips from the L train!

And a Sixth Bonus Thing!

Meet Yoda!

After going to the Creature Shop, we went to the Museum of the Moving Image and hung out with Yoda, lived a few music videos and played in sound! While it’s a little out of the way, and not on the New York Pass, this Museum is definitely worth checking out if you’re at all interested in visual communication. I even made a short stop-motion film where a wolf got hit by a car!

There are obviously hundreds and hundreds of things to do in NYC, but these were a few of my total favourites! Have you been to NYC? Are you going? I’d highly recommend getting the New York Pass if you’re going for more than a week! It saved us so much on queues, and also includes boat and bus tours, as well as FREE CHEESECAKE FROM JUNIORS when you spend over $10, walking tours and the Harry Potter Exhibition (which we did do, but no photos!)! !! !!!

Top – White Stuff/ Chinos – Primark/ Socks – American Apparel/ Flats – Rocket Dog (closest thing here) / Hair – MODEL’S OWN

In my last post, I mentioned how I’ve refurbished my wardrobe with White Stuff clothes and it’s true, here is the proof. Since it was sooo sunny today, I thought this would be perfectly suitable, but it was chilly and windy, so this wasn’t quite enough. Luckily, I had my White Stuff coat with me too. These socks are some of my favourite socks, ever, and I have them in the purple too. They have REINFORCED SOLES which means they last for hundreds and hundreds of years, and never wear through. I wish I’d taken an extra $100 to the States just to buy these in every colour, twice.

One of my clients meets me around Westbourne Park, and today I had to pick up a birthday present on Oxford Street, so I took the Central Line to Notting Hill Gate and walked down Portobello Road in the ‘sunshine’, poked around the antiques and ate a sugar waffle.

On Wednesday, Holly came up to visit on the same day as the second Funny Women heat, taking place at the Dogstar in Brixton, so I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to try out Franco Manca, a pizza place I had heard much of, but never eaten at.

Just in case you haven’t heard of why Franco Manca is so great, I’ll fill you in: sourdough pizza base. Need I say more? It was so fluffy & crisp, yet chewy, and delicious. The toppings could almost be an afterthought! I had grilled courgette though, and Holly had chorizo. She drank ‘No Logo’ craft beer, which was pleasant & light, & I had a white wine, which was wine-y.

Then we found a wine shop which let us drink on their barrel & had a Portuguese red which was very smooth & drinkable & I sat on an upturned open staple. Ah, the glamour.

This is me in top to toe White Stuff. I just discovered it, and they make clothes which actually fit me! It’s amazing! The dress is knee-length, and has pockets, so it’s perfect for events where I need to carry my phone around, and put banners up and down. Plus, it’s pretty. Oh, and cotton. I have sworn never to buy anything polyester, ever again. Just say no to constant static electric shocks!

The Funny Women heat was ace, I highly recommend going to one (or two!) My faves were Saskia Preston and Nicola Redman, but don’t tell anyone I said that! There are heats all through May & June – dates are here! You really might see the next big thing, so I reckon it’s worth the fiver entry just to be able to say ‘I saw her before she was famous…’

One of the things I loved, and could not get over, about New York City is how there are incredible sky scrapers right next to teeny tiny really old buildings. Even though everything is in straight lines, the buildings still seem to be just thrown together.

It’s also interesting how each neightbourhood, and borough, has its own identity, but the architecture of many of the buildings is still so similar. (I imagine knowing more about the history and development of New York would clear this up!)

Talking of buildings in New York City – here is a blog wherein James Gulliver Hancock draws every building in New York!

We stayed in Park Slope, Brooklyn, and every morning we headed to Daisey’s Diner for a full-on french toast (or pancakes, or ‘omelet’,) breakfast. There were a couple of days when we varied this routine; one morning we went to Egg in Williamsburg for eggs rothko (top right) which was melt-in-the-mouth delicious, and another day we went to Junior’s, a famous cheesecake place, and I couldn’t finish my pancakes!

I’m sure we ate some savoury food at some point, but I think my incredible sugar overload has affected my memory…Anyhow…After a long day at the American Museum of Natural History, I had a craving for scones, so I hit Yelp for ‘afternoon tea’ and up popped Alice’s Tea Cup! I had the ‘Nibble’, a mini afternoon tea, with sandwiches, scones & a choice of miniature biscuits or a cupcake. (Guess what I chose?) Then, while traipsing around Brooklyn, we came across the teeny tiny Bedford Baking Studio where I ate a Nutella ‘poof’ ball. Essentially, a giant blob of Nutella, wrapped in pastry, topped with chocolate chips & salted. My next big aim in life is to learn to make these!

(Yes, the Nutella poof ball is worth putting in twice!) After these ‘savoury’ meals, which we supposedly had, we had desert. And desert was good. The waffle is from a cart by Central Park called ‘Wafels and Dinges’, and one day we walked totally out of our way to get one (okay, I made us walk totally out of our way to get one), because they were ace. The cheesecake and COOKIE MONSTER SUNDAE are from Junior’s, which is famous for its cheesecake, as well it should be. It was so fluffy and light and creamy and just damn delicious. The original Junior’s is in Brooklyn, and there’s another near Times Square. Also, with the New York Pass, if you spend over $10 at Junior’s, you get a free slice of cheesecake, so, uh, we ate that a lot. A lot.

Cake! Of course, there was cake. So. Much. Cake. In the top left we have a ‘blondie’ from Sweet Corner, which was more like a hard biscuit type thing, filled with white chocolate, butterscotch pieces (and nuts, although the guy didn’t tell me there were nuts in it) but really yummy, and good coffee! Then, top right is Dulce de Leche cupcake from Crumbs which just had the biggest, most colourful, selection of cupcakes I have ever seen in one cupcake place, ever. And they were delicious. Bottom left is a red velvet from the Magnolia Bakery which (I may be about to commit cupcake blasphemy here) I didn’t really rate. The icing was a bit too sweet and bland and the cake was a bit heavy. However, I’d recommend the cupcake’s at Alice’s Tea Cup! Sweet, with a bit of a bite, fluffy, and perfect after scones!

I don’t know where this sudden navy kick I’m on is from, or even this block-colour thing, but all I can think about is pairing this London scene sweatshirt with my burgundy chinos, and wandering around New York City for hours!

We leave a week today (the flight from Heathrow is at 4.00, and we get to NYC at 8.00! I love going backwards in time, it’s my favourite) and our main plans are to eat, eat, walk, and eat some more. One thing I really want to do is take photos in all the major tourist spots in NYC (Time Square, the top of a tall building, the Statue of Liberty) then come back to London and take photos in the most similar spot (Picadilly Circus, the Shard, the…uh…Nelson’s Column?) and wouldn’t this jumper just be perfect for that?

Neverwhere is, in general, by Neil Gaiman, and began life as a TV series realised by Neil Gaiman and Lenny Henry. The TV series flopped dramatically, and the tale then became a novel, which went on to do rather well, as did Neil Gaiman. Somewhere along the way it also became a graphic novel, and now it is on the radio!

(This is pretty much the opposite of The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, which began life as a radio series, then became a book and is now a VERY BAD FILM WHICH IS BAD. Although I think Stephen Fry has said that DA would have loved the film, so what do I know. [It's bad.])

Moving swiftly on… you can listen to Neverwhere at the Radio 4 website, and this is very exciting for me.