Every winter my body seems to go crazy – trying to hoard ALL of the sugary carbs. So this year I have made a concerted effort to eat more vegetables. This chickpeas, spinach, cauliflower, and couscous dish was just the ticket (and has no animal products too). The original recipe called for raisins, which I detest, so I threw in a handful of dried cranberries instead. Yum.
A handful of almonds, preferably sliced 2 cups of cooked cauliflower florets A can of chickpeas 1 cup of spinach 4 cloves of garlic A handful of dried cranberries 1 small onion, diced 2 spring onions, diced 3 tablespoons of garam masala Olive oil 3 cups of couscous
1. In a large skillet sauté onion in a glug of olive oil over medium-low heat until tender. Add garlic, sauté until fragrant. Add more olive oil and mix in garam masala. Cook for 2-3 minutes.
2. Add cranberries, cauliflower, chickpeas, and spinach. Cook on a low heat stirring often until heated through and spinach wilts, and the cranberries are plump. Season well with salt and pepper.
3. Prepare couscous as you normally would. Fluff up cooked couscous and mix into the chickpeas mixture along with the spring onion and almonds. Serve and enjoy! It’s just as good the next day, when the flavours have time to really soak into the couscous.
Last night was one of the most memorable nights of my life. Reasons include:
1. Being asked to work on an interior design project for a bar.
2. Seeing Stephen Fry in said bar.
3. Annnnnd SNOW!
Indulge me for a bit, I’m from New Zealand and we don’t get urban snow like this. It was one of the most magical things I’ve ever seen – cars, trees and houses all dusted with the white stuff.
The Barbican. We went to see a movie and when we came out the Barbican looked like this.
The lake is all iced up!
This song has haunted me for months – there’s been much googling of “Say that you want me,” to no avail. It definitely brings back some memories, like driving for hours with my friends in the dark nights of 2004, my little iPod mini hooked up to the stereo. Black sand beaches, highway ghosts, abandoned power stations.
Some snaps from last weekend – celebrating Chinese New Year in London. The best pasts were easting dim sum in Camden on Saturday (spicy cucumber; I could eat that forever), then heading to Chinatown on Sunday for the mass throw-down of fun snaps. Bang, bang bang. Xīn nián kuài lè!
I can’t wait till Spring, when the dirt will thaw and we can plant things in a our postage stamp of a garden. In the meantime, I feel like I need to surround myself with more living things inside. The right ratio? At least 3 plants per human per room, perhaps. Or maybe we should turn our downstairs bathroom into a veritable jungle.
This clip of an ant megalopolis blows my mind. An ant colony was pumped full of concrete* for three days, left to set, then excavated. It turns out ants are prolific and thoughtful architects, creating a system of highways and connected hubs – there’s even areas for waste disposal. Visually, it reminds me a little of the city structure in Mission Impossible, because of the way everything is connected. What do you think?
* The colony had been abandoned for a while before pouring began, so please don’t worry about the possibility of cruel concrete encapsulated ant deaths.
Isson is an Australian sunglass brand, founded by Catherine Federici. I first read about Isson in DumboFeather, and have always admired their avant-garde styles. Recently, when doing some picture research on Bauhaus, I came across these wonderfully styled shots:
The Bauhaus collection was shot by Cybele Malinowski, and based around the idea of four eccentric characters who may have attended the school of Bauhaus in 1934. Read more about the different personas here. My favourite is the Alberta Albers image – I think it’s a combinaion of the turban, the chunky jewellery, and the vivacity of that little pug face.
As for the sunglasses – I would love to buy a pair of steam punk inspired Marthas – in tortoiseshell. Nice work, Isson.
“Negativity is the enemy to creativity. So if you want more ideas flowing, happiness in the doing, happiness in the doing, happiness in the doing. I love, capital L-O-V-E, building a thing that ultimately has to feel correct before it’s finished, and that feeling correct is like a drug. It’s like a thing that kicks you and makes you feel so good, You almost pass out. You fall off your feet.”
I scored these two very shiny and pretty cookbooks for a fiver at Oxfam Dalston:
Heston’s Fantastical Feasts by Heston Blumenthal, and Creole by Babette de Rozières. I bought the Blumenthal book mostly because it has instructions on how to make lickable wallpaper, a la Willy Wonka. But I am more excited about the Creole book, described as a “colourful and sumptuous celebration of West Indian Creole cooking”.
Just a bit of a preview before adding the to the towering pile of books next to my bed – aren’t the pictures luscious? Can’t wait to make some of the sweet dishes from the Creole book, like coconut flans with caramel, and try some traditional Guadeloupean ti’punch – a white rum and lime mix.
Poor Lana is having a bit of a worrisome time with the press at the moment, especially after her lackluster SNL performance. (LDR, nervous or not, please stop touching your hair!)
But doesn’t she look a treat in this stark cover photo for the Russian edition of Interview Magazine? Big hair, heavy eyes, and a playful nod to bee stung lips. File this under classic.
I’ve been hearing for years that Anthony Bourdain is a bit of a badass, and then a copy of Kitchen Confidential showed up in my Christmas stocking. Funnily enough the parts I’m enjoying thus far, are those moments from a softer time:
My brother and I were reasonably happy here. The beaches were warm, there were lizards to hunt down and exterminate with readily available pétards, firecrackers, which one could buy legally (!) over-the-counter. There was a forest within walking distance where an actual hermit lived, and my brother and I spent hours there, spying on him from the underbrush. By now I could read comic books in French and, of course, I was eating – really eating. Murky brown soupe de poisson, tomato salad, moules marinières, poulet basquaise (we were only a few miles from the Basque country). We made day trips to Cap Ferret, a wild, deserted and breathtakingly magnificent Atlantic beach with big rolling waves, taking along baguettes and saucissons and wheels of cheese, wine and Evian (bottled water was at that time unheard of back home).
A few miles west was Lac Cazeaux, a fresh-water lake where my brother and I could rent pédalo watercraft. We ate gaufres, delicious hot waffles, covered in whipped cream and powdered sugar. The two hot songs of that summer on the Cazeaux jukebox were Whiter Shade Of Pale by Procol Harum and These Boots Were Made For Walkin’ by Nancy Sinatra. The French played those two songs over and over again, the music punctuated by the sonic booms from French air force jets that would swoop over the lake on their way to a nearby bombing range.
There’s something about food & music isn’t there? The two seem inexplicably linked. Laura Vincent of Hungry & Frozen always lovingly lists her current sounds, and Turntable Kitchen matches recipes with records. How does Tame Impala with creamy couscous sound? I think they’ll even post you out a pack of ingredients with a song to match.
Music while dining matters too. I read an interesting article on the sometimes inspired, sometimes insipid music choices of restaurants and pubs and how they shape the experience.
Likewise, last night’s Mexican feast at Thor and Liv’s place probably would have had an entirely different atmosphere if we weren’t stuffing our faces to the sweet tunes of Mariachi El Bronx. (By the way, thinly sliced green apple, dressed with fresh lime and Swedish black salt is incredible. Think of that if you listen to the Mariachi song.)
What do you like to listen to when you’re eating, cooking, or dreaming of food?
Last weekend Thom and I headed to Maltby Street in SE1. Tucked away from the tourists of Borough, and far from the puppy mêlée at Broadway Market, it has a reputation as a place to make a food pilgrimage. It’s for serious foodies. Of course, that ruled us out as the target market, but we still enjoyed ducking in and out of the railway-arches-cum-food-warehouses.
There was all manner of things to buy: crumbly cheeses, oatcakes, beer made from New Zealand hops, and fresh shellfish – still wriggling about in their polystyrene coffins. My favourite was the Colombian drinking chocolate, shaved from solid bars, and stirred into warm milk. I also really liked the remanents of industry lying about too – stacks of wood, old radiators, and piles of tiles. It was certainly interesting, so if you’re game for a different Saturday morning scene, head south to Maltby Street.
Hello! My name is Amber Parkin. I'm a New Zealander living in London. I'm a writer obsessed with fondue, chesterfield sofas, vintage dresses, foxes, and 35mm.
