Eating Out: REVOLUTION - CHESTER

Chester is one of the places I always look forward to visiting when we go up to North Wales. It's just a lovely place, nice city centre with those english houses and nice shops. 
You can take a walk on the city walls and by the river (which is especially nice when it's a bit warmer or at least sunny). 

So on our last trip to Chester a few weeks ago, we found ourselves there on a monday, and monday means it's mega monday at Rev's. 
Rev's or Revolution is a chain of Bars, their main "dish" is supposed to be Vodka, I've never had Vodka there to be completely honest with you, but their food is absolutely amazing, you don't need alcohol do go with it! They have however found a way to include Vodka in their food menu aswell, you can find a list of their creations here. I haven't tried any but I'd imagine they are just as nice as the other food and certainly  something special if you happen to be a vodka lover.

But let's talk about the food now shall we.

Let me just say why you should go to Revolution on a Monday, well Monday means it's Mega Monday at Revolution which means ALL the food is 50 % off! (2 pounds extra for a steak). Their food isn't usually that expensive I wouldn't say, but if you get the chance to go there on a Monday, I'd definitely recommend doing it, you can try out so many lovely things!

We weren't going for a big meal since we were going out with the parents aswell after, but we thought since it was monday we'd pop into Rev's and see what took our fancy. Well it's not that easy really, because everything on the menu sounds really lovely and well, we had to tell the waitress about four times that we needed "a few more minutes, sorry". But in the end we agreed on two things to share, and I believe it is worth taking a bit longer to make a decision for it to be the right one in the end. Especially when it comes to food!

Foodography by Geraint Photography

As a starter to share we had these lovely Chicken Satay Skewers, satay are basically skewers served with a lovely only slightly spicy beanut(butter) sauce. My mum loves them and has them whenever she can, I shall definitely try and make my own soon as they are really lovely.
However, the Rev's ones were amazing, the sauce was perfect and the chicken really tender. I can only recommend trying these out!

Foodography by Geraint Photography

As a main to share we had the Caramelised Onion and Goat's Cheese Pizza, and wow! I just had to have this after I saw it on the menu, and I hadn't seen it on there before and I don't know, whenever I see something with Goat's Cheese I just have to have it! and when there's Caramelised Onions involved you just can't go wrong!
It was just as wow as I imagined it would be, probably even more to be completely honest. I've had a Pizza at Rev's before and they are just amazing really, you might not expect an amazing Pizza in a place that serves burgers aswell, but let me tell you these are amazing, italians would agree with me I'm sure. They add their own touch to it which makes it even better. I'd definitely have this Pizza again, and you know what, maybe I will.

weird picture of me eating Pizza!

So I hope you enjoyed my little review, since I am writing this a while after our visit, I can tell you now that we have been to Rev's in Cardiff the other day and there will be a post about that coming up in a few days time. 

There are Revolution Bars almost everywhere in the UK, you can find them on their website to see if there's one near you. Find the Chester one here.


Magdalena.


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the foodography in this post has kindly been taken by Geraint Photography

Best Basics #2 PIZZA SAUCE

There's nothing better than a lovely homemade pizza. It's one of the easiest and most fun dishes to make by yourself, with your family or friends. Kids love it and yes, adults love it just as much, it's always great to be able to add your personal touches to your food. It just makes us enjoy it more.

The two most important parts to Pizza are the dough and the sauce. There's no good Pizza without a lovely dough and a lovely sauce. You can add as many great ingredients it will always come down to how good the sauce and the dough are.

I have always loved tomato sauce and I found that to make a lovely Pizza you have to put a little bit of thought into the sauce too. Everyone thinks well let's just buy some sauce in the Supermarket because yeah that's easier and good I guess but as I said, it always comes down to the sauce and you'll want the base to be tasty for the whole meal to be amazing. right?

So I have created this Pizza Sauce which is really easy still but it's got some lovely fresh ingredients in it and some special things to it that make it even more tasteful and interesting.

My Pizza Sauce

1 can (250 g) tomatoes
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
1 tbsp honey
2 gloves of garlic
1 twig of rosemary

to make the sauce, chop the garlic intorough pieces. 

heat up the oil in a pan and
add the garlic and the rosemary.
leave it for fry for about 1 minute then
add the balsamic vinegar and the honey
and lower the temperature.
after about 3 minutes add the tomatoes and
cover the pan and leave to simmer for about
10 minutes.
before using it, take out the rosemary and puree
the sauce (even when you've used pureed tomatoes.)
to make sure it's all smooth and lovely.
add some salt to taste.

Magdalena.

my Twitter: https://twitter.com/lullabyforpies

my Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LullabyForPies

Best Basics #1 PIZZA DOUGH

This Pizza Dough was inspired by Jamie Oliver, I pretty much always use his recipe and it's brilliant, all I've done is adjusted the recipe a little bit mainly because I never make that much. But still, all the credit goes to Mr. Oliver who is one of my biggest role models.

I have done some Pizza variations on here before but now I wanted share some of the basics with you, and after all dough is what makes Pizza a Pizza.

Here are some lovely ideas of what to make with your dough. Do you fancy a simple traditional Pizza Pizza or maybe a Snack Calzone?

Also you could simply make some pizza bread with some garlic or just some lovely little italian rolls. it's a really simple dough and you can make so many things with it. so give it a try.

There's this lovely story I always think of when I think about Pizza dough, it's about a group of people who had to leave their home because of the Trojan War, they were on this ship trying to find a place for them to stay but they just never found a place because all they kept looking for was a place like home.

But there was this prophecy saying that they would find a new home at the place where they would eat the table.

They came to Italy then and they were served food on flatbread because that was what they did because they could afford proper plates, but they didn't eat the bread.

Well but our group of people didn't know that and they ate the bread too. That made the locals laugh and ask "were you guys so hungry you ate the table too?"

And that's when they're prophecy was fulfilled and Pizza was invented!

My Pizza Dough
for two
250 g all purpose flour
7 g sachet of dried yeast
200 ml lukewarm water
1 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp olive oil
salt

To start preparing the dough sieve the flour on your
worktop and make a well in the middle (see
below) and add the salt to the flour.
mix together the water, yeast, sugar and olive
oil and carefully pour into the well.
take a fork and carefully work the flour into the
liquid. once it's all mixed you can knead the dough.
add some more flour if needed and make a smooth
dough. put it in a bowl with flour, cover with a 
tea towel, put it somewhere warm-ish (like room
temperature I guess) and leave to rest for at least 1 hour.

then you can roll it out or do whatever you want
with it. as long as you enjoy it! :)

I will be posting a pizza sauce recipe soon aswell, so look out for that, I'll be posting about updates here:

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xx

Eating Out: PRET A MANGER - BRISTOL

hey everyone, so as you might have noticed I am back in the UK and unfortunately for my blog I have been quite busy these last two-ish weeks and my camera decided to die aswell so it all got a little difficult. but luckily I have my lovely photographer here so who was there to help me out with his camera and his talent (have a little look here).

However I do apologise for the photos in this post since they were taken with my phone which takes rubbish pictures because we went for food even though we weren't planning on it and therefore didn't have a camera with us. but I still felt the need to document everything for you.

I also want to kind of introduce a little new category to my blog, it's called OnTheGo as you can see. I want to show you the places I like to go to for food aswell as some places I discover and review them a little bit for you and tell you what I really like about them and sometimes what I didn't like as much. 

So PRET A MANGER is probably nothing new to all of you who live in the UK or have been to visit, it's a place where you can get fast and super fresh food with great ingredients, such as sandwiches, wraps, salads, sushi, baguettes and many many more.

They prepare all their food fresh in the shops kitchen which makes it so special to me. And also they are very careful about what ingredients to use choosing local farmers etc over all things imported. read more about Pret on their website here.

So when we were in Britstol this thursday we went to their shop in Cabot Circus. We both had a Hot Wrap. I had the Falafel & Halloumi one and my boyfriend had the Beef Samosa one. 

I've had one of their Hot Wraps before and they are just amazing. Wonderful taste and something that will definitely warm your heart and stomach on a cold-ish day.

The Falafel & Halloumi one sounded really interesting and since I love both Falafel and Halloumi (a grilled cheese) there was no doubt I'd have this one! the grilled red peppers gave it a lovely sweet taste and the Falafel and the cheese worked amazingly together! I'll definitely be having this again if I get a chance.

I can however only really review my wrap since I only got a bite of my boyfriends one because he liked it so much, but that's a good sign aswell right? can't really go wrong with coconut dressing can you?!

Find out more about the Falafel & Halloumi Hot Wrap here and about the Beef Samosa Hot Wrap here.

To go with the spicy theme (on slightly spicy though I have to say, we're both not into really spicy food anyway) we had some of the Pure Pret Ginger Beer. 

I love Ginger Ale anyway and this one is made only with good ingredients, no nasties and nothing that shouldn't be in there. so you don't feel guilty having it at all.

Find out what's in it and all about it on the pret website here.

Altogether this was a really nice meal, some may class this as a snack but I actually think it is definitely enough for a lunch like we had. it's warming and amazing and I love knowing that it's all got good things in it. I will most definitely be going to Pret a few more times while I'm over in the UK and I will review the things for you aswell. for now, you can have a look at their current menu on their website here and click on all the lovely things and find out what's in them. I always get hungry when I read it all!

Let me know if you've been to Pret and what your favourite thing on the menu is! I'd love to try some more things!

Magdalena.

#31 QUICK MEAL: LIGHT SALMON + COURGETTE RICE

Salmon is something very tasty and very healthy at the same time. I love to have it from time to time and especially with rice and courgette works really well with it too.

This meal is really light and healthy too, it won't weigh you down it will just make you feel more alive I promise you that. Salmon is a fat fish but it has good fats in it who will be great for your body because they have loads of vitamins and good fatty acids.

The courgette gives the whole thing a little lovely texture and freshness too. It's all fresh ingredients and it's really quick to make. it might sound fancy but it really is something quick you can easily make after a long day of uni, school or work. 
You won't even need more than one pan for it! I'll explain to you how that is possible...

Salmon + Courgette Rice
for one

100 g salmon fillet
1/2 mug of rice
1/2 courgette grated
butter
salt
lemon juice

Cook the rice as usual (heat a bit of butter in a pan,
add the rice and 1 1/2 times the amount of water,
lower the temperature to 2-1 and put on the lid)

marinate the salmon with a bit of lemon juice.
after about 7 minutes of cooking the rice,
take a piece of baking paper and put it on top
of the rice in the pan. sit the salmon on top
and put on the lid again.
leave it like that for another 7-ish minutes
until the rice and the salmon are done.

grate the courgette, take the salmon out of the pan
and rest it on a plate. mix the rice with the courgette
and serve the salmon on a bed of courgette rice.

voila!

Magdalena.

Away Days #6: BUSY IN BRITAIN

So I promised you all loads of posts while I am in the UK and well, there will be! I really do promise! because I have loads of ideas and already taken so many pictures together with my lovely photographer (who you can find here) but there has just been so much going on, including my camera breaking yesterday so I need to find a way to get all the pictures off it. luckily though there are some pictures on my photographers camera which I am hoping to share with you all soon.

I am now back in Cardiff after a lovely long weekend up in North Wales with parties and a lot of lovely lovely food! 

So I will definitely be working on some posts over then next few days, I'm off to Bristol tomorrow for a lovely gig and most definitely good food aswell! I can't wait.

if you want to stay up to date about what I'm doing in the UK and what I'm eating and where; you can follow me on facebook here where I will be (and have been) posting pictures and everything, so take a look everyone.

and until my next post, have a good time and enjoy your food!


xx

Away Days #5: OFF TO THE UK

hey everyone,

so as some of you may know I'm off to the UK tomorrow for a whole month (yay!) and I really can't wait to get there. it's been three months since the last time and I just miss everything soooo much.

So as I mentioned in my post here I will of course be blogging over there aswell and I'm hoping to try out some really lovely recipes and new restaurants aswell which I am going to review for all of you. 

I will also update you about what I'm doing over there and all those traveling things. I just really can't wait and maybe there are some things about it that interest you, I'll be staying in Cardiff for most of the time but there are some other places I'm going to aswell, so keep coming back here for stuff about me traveling and if you want more regular updates follow me on twitter here and like my facebook page here.
I will be posting pictures and everything aswell.

so I hope you all are looking forward to it. I sure am. have a lovely monday everyone!


xx