What's Cooking?!........

It’s hard to believe it has been 6 months since my last blog post! Seriously… where has this year gone?! However with that being said it’s not really surprising when I think about what has been happening over the last 6 months!

When we started the year all cozied up and warm sipping Champagne by the fire at my parent’s house in Scotland we knew that 2015 had some big changes in store for us, and for the first time ever at New Year I was a little apprehensive about the coming year, rather than my usual optimism of fresh starts and new opportunities.

Over the previous few years Scott had been away from home for work more and more and so finally we accepted that the only way to stop that from happening and to have him at home more was to move from Vancouver Island over to the Mainland which would completely cut down on his travel time and absences from home. It wasn’t an easy decision, especially for me, as it meant moving to a new city where we literally knew no one and starting over. My last big move had been from Scotland to Canada and one that at the age of 25 I perhaps hadn’t fully thought through. I moved to follow my heart but didn’t appreciate how hard it would be over time being so far away from my family and friends, especially as we all got older and had our own families. So we thought long and hard and by the time we had gone through all of the pros and cons we realised now was the time to make the move especially since Ben was starting Kindergarten in September. So our house was put on the market in March, we spent some time on the mainland finding an area that we loved to move to and everything was a go! After that life just seemed non-stop! We sold our house, bought a house, said our goodbyes, attempted to enjoy the summer while homeless for six weeks (although found an amazing place to stay!), had my Mum & Dad over (thank goodness – what a help!) and finally moved in to our new home just before Ben started school!!

Cookbook Review ~ The Wellness Kitchen by Paulette Lambert

The start of a New Year is always the time when resolutions are made to eat better, exercise more and generally lead a healthier life so it was the perfect time for me to put The Wellness Kitchen: Fresh, Flavorful Recipes for a Healthier You by Paulette Lambert to the test.

The Wellness Kitchen is a cookbook designed to show you how you can transform your body with simple, easy steps and wholesome flavourful foods. Paulette Lambert is a registered dietitian with 32 years of experience that includes appearances on ABC’s Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition and The Dr. Oz Show. It is not a diet book containing specific restrictions, fads or concepts that are “of the moment”. Rather this book is about presenting the reader with “the latest scientific knowledge regarding nutrition and health” and making healthy eating a very easy, accessible way of life that anyone can achieve.

The book is divided into three parts. The first part is information about health, how to use the book for you in particular as well as general nutrition guidelines and a handy section on pantry basics and a 21-Day Food Plan for Health and Weight Loss. The third part is Caloric Meal Plans.

Part 2 of the book features the Recipes with chapters dedicated to Breakfast, Appetizers, Quick and Easy Main Dishes and A Little Sweet to name a few. With more than 100 recipes included there is plenty of choice that will tempt your taste buds and help to improve your health. With so many recipes to choose from it was hard to pick but in the end I tested 4 recipes.

Cookbook Review ~ The Hairy Dieters: How to Love Food and Lose Weight

After the excesses of Christmas, a celebratory weekend in Seattle and then 3 weeks on holiday back home in Scotland I needed to lose some weight so I ordered this book with the hope it would inspire and encourage me with some new recipe ideas. The Hairy Dieters: How to Love Food and Lose Weight isn't a new cookbook (it was originally published in 2012) but from what I have read it has received a lot of praise so I was keen to give it a go.

For those of you unfamiliar with 'The Hairy Dieters' they are more commonly known as 'The Hairy Bikers' or Si King and Dave Myers. Over the years they have become national treasures in the UK, and have 12 cookbooks as well as several accompanying television series behind them. These guys know what they are doing and love food. Of course that love of food led to a large weight gain between the two so they decided it was time to watch their waistlines and work on losing some weight. The result was a combined loss of 6 stone (84lbs) and a cookbook dedicated to healthy recipes that will help everyone lose some weight while still loving food.

Now I realise that for a lot of you a review of a diet book may not be too interesting, however to me this really isn't a diet book. On first glance when I looked through the book, my initial thought was 'this is how I cook anyway'. It is simply good recipes where you use sensible choices to cut calories and control your portion size.

There are 10 chapters dedicated to recipes including 'One-Pan Dishes'; 'Grills and Roasts'; 'Pies'; 'Pasta & Rice' and me favourite, 'Fakeaways'. There is also a very useful chapter on Menus for your First Week to help you get started with you weight loss plan.

After bookmarking a lot of recipes I managed to narrow things down and tested 5 recipes.....

Cookbook Review ~ Homemade Summer by Yvette van Boven

I love it when you get a new book that perhaps you would have maybe overlooked or missed out on. Whenever I manage to go to my favourite book shop ever – Books for Cooks in Notting Hill – I always find such a book, which is the beauty of that shop (and of course any other good book shops!). Homemade Summer by Yvette van Boven is one of those books and this one came courtesy of my Sister-in-law and Brother which they got for me from Books for Cooks as my Birthday present. Having never heard of the book, the author and her other published books (Homemade and Homemade Winter) I was over the moon to get this book and to be introduced to her.

Yvette van Boven is not only an acclaimed cookbook author, but a freelance food stylist, recipe developer and an illustrator (as well as the recipes she also did all of the illustrations for the book!). On top of that she also runs a restaurant and catering service in Amsterdam and spends her time living between Paris and Amsterdam. Talk about a busy lady!

The book is packed with 250 pages of recipes, photographs, drawings and lovely little personal stories. There are 6 chapters in total devoted to recipes including 'Breakfast, Brunch & Lunch', 'Cakes & Sweet Things for Tea Time' and 'Main Courses'.

The Tested Recipes:

Banana Crumble Muffins

Quinoa Patties with Feta, Zucchini and Corn

Yogurt Dip with Mint

Buttery Corn Risotto

Cake with Raspberries, Blueberries and Coconut

Italian Chicken Stew

Grilled Goat Cheese Polenta

Cooking the Books ~ August

Yesterday I stopped by a shop to buy some wine. While there the local radio was playing with the weather forecast so I stopped to listen....cloud and showers was the forecast for the next week. I told the cashier that I was hoping for better weather as I had family visiting from Scotland and was hoping they would have sun for the last few days. We chatted for a bit while the transaction went through and then as I thanked her and went to leave she said to me "Enjoy your time with your family - it is precious time" to which I responded "I couldn't agree more, it really is". We said good bye and I left......

That is why I haven't really been on my blog and while I am so late on posting my cookbook review choice for August (and still have to post one from July)! That being said I got Homemade Summer by Yvette Van Boven as a Birthday present from my Brother and Sister-in-law and having never heard of it I'm so excited to cook from it and review it before Summer comes to an end.

Wherever you are and whatever you are doing I hope you are all having a great Summer. I'll get this review up as soon as I've stopped having so much fun with my family ;)

*You can now read this review! To read it click here.

Cooking the Books....Again!

After a much longer than intended absence from 'Cooking the Books', I'm back at it with the intention of cooking from 1 or 2 books a month. A picture of the book(s) will be posted on the right sidebar at the start of each month so you can see which book(s) I'll be cooking from and reviewing for that month. As always if you have that particular book I would love for you to join along with me, cooking whichever recipes you like the sound or look of and letting me know how you get on!

Up first and I have picked one of my newest cookbooks to be added to my collection which is Bill Granger Easy. After the busyness and overindulgence of Christmas and New Year this seemed like the perfect choice especially since it has so many recipes that I am desperate to try! Since I'm late on starting this month (with being in Scotland) I'll only be doing 1 book but will do 2 for February. As always at the end of the month I'll post my review of the book and will also include a recipe for one of my favourite dishes that I tried!

So what are you waiting for? This is a great way to start really using your books and putting them to the test and hopefully getting lots of delicious meals in return!

To see this review click here.

Cookbook Challenge Oct. 2012 ~ 31 Days; 10 Books & 1 Challenge!

The Challenge – To cook at least one meal a day from a cookbook of choice for the month of October. The recipes must be followed exactly so as to properly test them and the budget must be no more (and hopefully less!) than an ordinary month.

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That's right folks, for the month of October I am challenging myself to cook at least one meal a day using a cookbook! Now while that might not sound like a challenge for a lot of you, for someone who owns over 1000 cookbooks and rarely cooks from them, this is a challenge for me! Inspired by the bloggers challenge 'Random Recipes' hosted by Dom over at the lovely Belleau Kitchen, I have stepped things up a few notches so that I am not making one recipe a month from a random book, but rather one a day!

With that said however, this challenge isn't quite so random as I have picked out 9 books of choice (fairly randomly and without looking through them) in order to help with meal planning and shopping. The final book for the challenge - book number 10, was picked by you - the readers (through facebook). For those of you that missed it I selected 5 books from my 'library' and the one with the most votes was the lucky book to join the challenge, which turned out to be the Barefoot Contessa at Home by Ina Garten. The other 9 books were fairly randomly picked - I tried to do a real mix and choose books that I thought might be fairly familiar to people..... so here they are the 10 books I will be cooking from in October.....

Random Recipes # 18 - Something a little different

Sagging Bookshelves # 1 & 2
{unfortunately with the bed being in the way you can't see that there is another row underneath}

Having been absent from the last couple of Random Recipe Challenges I couldn't resist taking part in this one since this month the lovely Dom of Belleau Kitchen (and host of Random Recipes) challenged us to something quite different. Rather than cooking randomly from one of our books, the challenge was instead to photograph and share where we keep our books. Now I know most people have been posting theirs with lovely “normal” sized shelves located in different rooms throughout their homes but for me that's not quite the case......(and no I don't have any in my bathroom!!)

You see any guest walking into our house for the first time would quite rightly be forgiven for thinking they had taken a wrong turn when walking into the guest room. For this is not your usual guest room – instead it looks like as if by magic and in the blink of an eye you have some been transported to a different place altogether. Most accurately it looks like you have walked into a small but cozy book shop! The sight of all of the books is perhaps a little overwhelming but once I let everyone know they are actually all cookbooks the reaction turns to complete disbelief!

The walls on two sides are lined with bookshelves which are crammed beyond belief with hundreds and hundreds of cookbooks (631 at last count – give or take!) and if it wasn't for the bed taking up the rest of the room it really would not resemble a guest room at all. I can't imagine Martha Stewart putting her guests up in such accommodation!!!

Bookshelves 3 & 4

To me however it is my favourite room in the house (which is saying something considering I've put it before my kitchen!!). It is warm and cozy and at times when I get a spare moment I can think of nothing better to help me to relax than to come through and lie on the bed and read a cookbook or two – even more so if I have a glass of wine with me!

I've tried to organise them as best as I can and being the ridiculously over-the-top person I am when it comes to things like that they seem to be fairly organised....Celebrity chefs start the collection off then on to restaurant cookbooks; reference and technique books; home cooking and cookbooks published by magazines; desserts, chocolate and drinks then ending that one side of the wall is baking (phew!).

Next wall is all regional including Indian; Asian; Middle Eastern; Mexican; French; Spanish; Portugese; Greek; Italian (lots of Italian!) and British! The last two shelves on the smallest bookcase are specialty books including Meat; Soup; Fish and Vegetarian!!! The books on the very top shelves are there as I had run out of room on the other shelves so are a bit of a mixture! Wow – that's a lot of categories and I guess a lot of books!

The majority of the books were inherited but still I can't stop myself from buying new books throughout the year. In fact that last remaining space on the top of the smallest shelf which is meant for guests to put their bits and pieces on(!) is now home to the books that are the latest additions to my collection which I managed to cram into my suitcase after this last recent trip home to Scotland! Some are brand new, others are ones I bought last time I was back but didn't have room for. I still have about 50 or so books sitting in my bedroom shelves in Scotland so whenever I'm home I always try and bring a few back.....but then I can also never resist buying some new ones as well!! You would think I would learn especially since I actually don't have any space left for them but I'll always find somewhere and so I will always continue to buy more books!

So there you have it – my cookbook room filled with plenty of books to help you sleep at night (or alternatively just make you incredibly hungry right before you go to sleep!) I do have a small shelf of books in the living room next to the kitchen (open plan Canadian style house so the living room literally is right next to the kitchen!) which is where I try and put the books I'm using/ reviewing and basically just wanting some inspiration from! I say small shelf but it still holds 35 books which I am aware is probably what most people would have for their entire collection, but there you have it! Worst of all is that I still have close to the same amount of books packed away in boxes in storage....for those I need a bigger house! And don't even get me started on my magazine collection which just might happen to fill the bottom of the wardrobe in the spare room!!! Sorry guests!! 

The bookshelf in the living room.
{Maybe this challenge should have been called "Where's Nigella" since everyone seems to have her tucked away somewhere!}