Hints and Tips

Storing Ingredients
  • Place any left over lemon or lime slices in a glass of cold water, the fruit will remain plump and the water can be a refreshing drink.

Choosing Ingredients 
  • When choosing citrus fruits always opt for the heavier and hence juicer ones.

Preparing Ingredients
  • Roll citrus fruits over a hard surface to release their juices before using.

Using Ingredients
  • When cooking with herbs add soft herbs such as dill, mint, coriander and basil at the end just before serving, while add more woody herbs like oregano, thyme and rosemary towards the start.

Leftover Ingredients
  • Leftover orange, lemon, lime, banana or sponge cake – place the juice of an orange, lemon or lime in a saucepan, add 50 g caster sugar and bring to the boil, stirring until the sugar dissolves.  Wrap the stale cake in tin foil and place in a hot oven for 10 minutes, or until the cake is hot throughout.  Remove the cake from the oven, cut into slices, pour over the hot syrup and serve with some homemade ice cream.

Vital Kitchen Equipment
  • I left my MagiMix and KitchenAid in England and so I’ve had to start afresh without spending a fortune.  The solution?  Buy a handheld blender that comes with all the accessories.  Mine is a Russell Hobbs stick blender and is perfect.  I can whisk, beat, chop and blend all for about £45 and a small shelf in the kitchen.  I can also take it away with me on self-catering trips without taking up all the boot space.

  • The second key piece of kit is an electronic scale.  Being tiny I brought mine from home.  It is a light bit of kitchen equipment that you just can’t do without, whether you are a sweet or a savoury kind of person.  I once tried to estimate measurements for a caraway cake…lets just say it was carried-away by the dustmen...  While old school scales with free weights do look beautiful, they take up so much space and have a tendency to get stuck on something and gives you completely the wrong weight.  Whereas with an electronic scale you pop your saucepan, mixing bowl or jug on the scale, press the zero-ing function, then add your ingredient and wham-bam-thank-you-maam, it weighs it without the need for you to keep tapping the scale or to tip the ingredient from a measuring pan to the saucepan/bowl etc.  And best of all you can pop it in your overnight bag.  

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