Julia Parsons the founder of the UKFBA (UK Food Bloggers Association) has set up a link called Just Giving to raise money for Breast Cancer Care. Please click on the link on our page for more details about how to help with the Strawberry Tea Campaign and to donate money directly. This cause is very close to our hearts, as you will know if you attended our charity supperclub and from previous blog posts.

Saira x

The veggie and herb gardens are now flourishing for the summer so plenty of home produce!!  There is nothing like the smell of lemon thyme wafting around the garden on a sunny day. Holding out for that glorious weather for the 10th! We have a few places left so please e-mail us to book x

We had another successful and lively supper last Saturday. It was the start of our summer menu and fortunately the weather remained dry and warm so we could start off in the garden. We have been potting up courgette plants as well as peppers and growing some lovely tomatoes and strawberries ready to use in our own cooking and for the supperclubs and private parties. Ma Rani is retiring from teaching this year and she has a whole green house at her school full of plants and fresh produce so it is all slowly but surely being transferred to the home garden!

There were more vegetable dishes on the table this time  – although the Mutton Masala went down very well. Guests started with Spinach and Paneer Samosa washed down with a glass or two of bubbly. The samosa are cooked as the guests arrive to ensure freshness to the flavour – and they are very much homemade!

Preparing the dough the night before

Filled with Spinach and Paneer...

Making samosa can be incredibly fiddly the smaller you make them. Never make the dough too thin as the idea is to really fill the cases. Once ready for frying they don’t need more than a few minutes in the oil. Perfect to have with drinks or as a snack! I love Samosa and there is nothing quite like the taste of a homemade batch.

And sealed ready for frying.

It was great to be able to start using barbeque for some of the cooking, we cooked the stuffed mushrooms, chicken tikka and lamb kebabs on it over a medium heat with the lid on

Preparing the portabello mushrooms

The mushrooms were then cooked over the barbeque for about 7 minutes

And ready to serve

Chicken Tikka Kebabs

We had a real mix of people sitting around the table. A young couple, one of whom worked in the medical profession and her partner worked for a big named company by date (he whispered the name to me so I’m not going to divulge!) and was the songwriter and bass guitarist for an up and coming band by night! The other couple were property developers and our singleton for the evening was a theatre director and record producer with her own label! The conversation flowed (nothing to do with the booze!) from travel to politics, theatre to film, Paul McCartney to Stevie Wonder and why with age Mick Jagger has got better on stage than in the 1960’s. Ma Rani and I served up our dishes from 8.15pm until 10.30pm and the time flew by. We seemed even busier in the kitchen than usual!

Enjoying drinks in the garden. How very civilised!

Served alongside the Spicy Mutton Masala came Green Beans in a Spicy Bean Sauce and Razma & Mirchi Sabji (Red Kidney Beans and Green Peppers) and Lemon Rice which all went down very well. We moved away from traditional Roti and served Maki Roti instead – made with corn.

Maki Roti

Grabbing my plate of food in between courses!

Lindsey and Pete ~ happy and full guests!

We learnt that evening that Pete was in a band. He writes the songs and plays the bass guitar – we both have a love for The Beatles and Paul McCartney! They are playing this Wednesday evening at the WaterRats Theatre Bar on Grays Inn Road in London (nearest station Kings Cross). Look out for THE HEARTRATES  http://www.myspace.com/theheartrates. I’ll be following their progress on Joginder’s blog – who knows theatre bar today – Shea Stadium tomorrow!

We had a really great evening and because we are now using the garden for part of the evening the kitchen is more accessible for anyone who wants to come and have a nose and say hi! Our next Supperclub is on Saturday 10th July and this will be mainly an outdoor affair (depending on the weather again!) with the barbeque and a precursor to the World Cup Final the next evening. So come wearing your colours and share you footballing (or indeed sporting stories), bring your own booze and enjoy our mixture of dishes and we promise you may have to roll home! Please e-mail us to make a booking and we look forward to seeing you!

Let clean up tomorrow...

We are really looking forward to next Saturday and once again apologise to  those of you who wanted to book but were unable to do so. It is the way the supper club works. We work on a ‘first come first served basis’. We have no idea why people book up weeks in advance but they do and we are always disappointed that we have to turn down bookings. It must be because of our authentic Punjabi food and you will not taste the likes of it in any restaurant. This Saturday will be really exciting as we try out our summer dishes.

Enough chatter as I am off to prepare the ‘paneer’ for the samosas – it’s only 10.30 pm!!

I meant to start earlier but our dear cat was obviously poorly and we needed to gether  to the vet. Not quite sure what is the matter with her but we hope to find out on friday at a cost of £132 – of which £99 was for a blood test for a cat!!!

We are putting together different menus for this summer specifically for our charity supperclubs. I will post a list on the website soon and if your favourite charity happens to be on there then please do book your place! In the meantime I really hope the weather improves for this weekend!!

Rachel and Ben are in the UK and we are celebrating their wedding  day  15 months later!  This is their first time together in the UK since the wedding and so it seemed a good excuse to eat, drink and be merry!!

I may be an ‘Indian Ma’ who has a passion for home cooked Punjabi food but having lived in ‘my home country’  for the last 45 years I do cook meals ‘from around the world ‘!

I think I am a real ‘foodie’. My husband , 3 children and I have travelled extensively and I think we all have a ‘ taste for food that is good’. This is not the  same as ‘ food that is made to tastes good’.

Sadly I had to deal with this tonight at a Gastro Pub that we have been going to for over a year. Have not visited it for nearly a month but my goodness what a downhill turn for the food.

Not going to name it as I hope it is  a one-off!

However, I am really disappointed that a main meal costing £15 was inedible  and at no stage did anyone say sorry other than not charge me for it!

Gosh what a busy day on Monday! Shopping turned out be a more eventful session than I imagined in the evening. Not sure why but the usual car parking in Kingsbury was full – some sort of flooding! Parked on the main road and paid a horrendous amount into the meter but happy to have bought all that I need.

After feeding ‘the boys’ it was so nice to have the rest of the evening to get my ‘masalas’ ready for the ‘Sag/Murg’ and the ‘ Sabji’.

It was lovely to have the time on Tuesday to actually cook the  dishes as well as the accompaniments and deliver them to our guest by 5.30 pm for the party to begin at 7.30 pm!

I must remember to have a memory card in my camera for photos!!

The colourful and unusual array of produce we use. Can you guess what it is yet……?

From the same family?

One of my favourite films when I was very young was Mother India (the first Indian film to be nominated for an Oscar). At the age of 3 I could be found in my parents lanscaped garden digging up the best of the plants trying to find this vegetable. There is a scene in the film where ‘Mother India’ is digging for vegetables in the river and for some reason I thought it would be quite fun to ‘try it at home’. I still watch it but tend to focus more on the spectacle of the wedding rather than the poverty of digging for vegetables!

Look out for Joginder’s Supperclub focusing on vegetarian food. We will be holding it during the summer!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SAIRA

Instead of a Birthday cake, the new ice cream maker  was tried out on the family.  The overall opinion on the texture of the homemade ice cream was excellent but quite rightly I need to work on the flavour!!

Thankfully the ‘Mango Ice’ ( sorbet)  that Beje used to make in the 60’s was full of flavor and packed a punch. It is on the summer menu.