The cure to my bottomless appetite?

I am amazed. Three days of being a veggie and I'm converted.

No, not really! I'll admit, I've been so busy experimenting with new dishes that I haven't thought about whether I miss meat yet or not. Though one of my workmates cruelly sent me an image of a barbecue-glazed rack of ribs earlier today. Now that was uncalled for. But seriously, what is surprising me is that my hunger pangs after lunch don't appear so quickly. Instead of gulping down a cheap-and-cheerful ham-and-various-salad-filled sarnies, I'm having to be a bit more creative with my lunch options.

Ok, so my first attempt at a veggie packed-lunch, a Mexican bean salad, did not start well when I failed miserably to hard boil the eggs properly. Yes, really. (In my defence, I have been perfectly capable of boiling eggs in the past without reducing them to a watery mush, but I seem to have lost the knack of it since)

I stocked up on loads of dried herbs (they are very cheap at Lidl by the way!) and since I've using them, I realised how much of a difference it can make to your food. That makes me sound a bit silly, I know - I mean, dur, that's what herbs are for. But what I mean is all the different combinations of foods put together in general that I never would have thought of before. Like lemon juice on crunchy green beans, mm.

I love that this is making me look up new recipes and encouraging me to experiment more. None of the recipes so far are particularly extravagant because let's face it, I eat better than I can cook! I'm not a bad cook, but a 'comfortable' one - just making what I know.

It's probably what got me stuck in a rut with my lunchtime sarnies at work - and other than fruit to snack on during the day, I still felt like I needed more food to keep me going! But my new veggie lunches are keeping me full for at least an hour longer than before - that's a new record for me ;-) Continue reading this post..

The Ten Commandments of Veggie Jenny

1. Thou shalt not eat meat, fowl or fish of any kind.
2. Thou shalt not consume meat-flavoured products (such as beef-flavoured instant noodles!)
3. Thou shalt not exclude the consumption of eggs, milk and milk products.
4. Thou shalt not eat 'fake' meat substitutes, unless in a restaurant where no other vegetarian option is available.
5. Thou shalt not 'play safe' with home dinners by making a veggie stir fry every day.

6. Thou shalt not resort to frozen ready-meals and will always cook fresh veggie dishes at home.
7. Thou shalt not whine about being meat-free...well, at least not more than once a day.
8. Thou shalt not fail to find alternative sources of protein, iron, zinc and other important nutrients that are usually found in non-vegetarian foods.
9. Thou shalt not resent going Veggie Jenny if presented with a menu that has limited options for vegetarians.
10. Thou shalt not break any of these ten commandments until 25th December 2008.

Let the challenge of Veggie Jenny commence!
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The Last Steak

For my last dinner before my veggie ban starts, I thought of no other place to 'celebrate' than with a steak at one of my favourite restaurants, Smith & Western's. I've had many a good steak (and chicken and burger) there.

Yes, it's a loud place, with a bit too much clanging around with all the Birthday Busters (a massive ice-cream with a flaming candle brought over by enthusiastic singing from the staff, complete with triangle) and it is heavily country-and-western themed. But the atmosphere is always so great and I have never been dissatisfied with the food. I've got a couple of cowboy hats out of it too!

I'm not going to be eating meat for a month (so many people have asked me why now and I'm starting to wonder...) and I wanted my last supper to be something great:

One of the best dishes on the menu (I think so anyway!) - an Ocean steak: 10-ounce sirloin with 3 sizable king prawns. I like my steaks to be non-fussy - not plain as such, but not coated in dressing or melted cheese and stuff. I want to be able to taste my steak! Though actually, I really like their Ranch steak, which has melted cheese with caramelised onions and mushrooms on top.

It's only been in recent months that I've realised how good it is to have a steak medium rare. I used to have it just medium but with medium rare, you get that extra juiciness and less risk of it being overly chewy.

Oh God, I can taste it now and ache at the thought that I can't have this for at least FOUR weeks now. I was floating between happy and sad as I ate my steak, but this tipped one way drastically when I finished it...

This is going to be incredibly tougher than I thought. Immediately after I finished, I thought, I'm not allowed to eat meat tomorrow - and felt panicked. What am I going to eat for lunch?? Not that I have anything exciting for lunch at work anyway, but it's the routine thing too. I usually just make a sandwich for work but I don't want veggie sarnies every day. (Hm, this isn't a good sign).

I'll figure something out. It'll be fine...It's not like I don't want to do this - I'm actually really looking forward to trying new dishes and cooking differently at home. But having this gorgeous steak tonight has reminded me how much I actually love it.

Goodbye Smith & Western's, I'm sorry but I cannot bear to even look at you during my meat ban. I work near the restaurant too and often get a whiff of it through the windows. I think I might cry when that next happens. I hope you will welcome me back with open arms when I come running back.

How long do you think I'll last?

Continue reading this post..

Not Yet Fluent in Vegetarianism

My veggie housemate Beth asked me an all-important meat ban question the other day:

"So where will you be getting your protein from?"

Er, chicken? I thought. Oh yeah, that's meat too...oh dear...

She quickly reeled off some options: beans, pulses, tofu, eggs, cheese, nuts and seeds...so earlier this week, I went off to Tesco's with a vague shopping list of 'canned stuff'. I'll be getting fresh foods at the market as usual every week of course, but I wanted to stock up on heavy stuff since my housemate Grace was driving. I've carted a sack of rice home on my bike once but I don't think I could cope with a load of knobbly cans in my back!

We headed to the aisle with all the beans and things and suddenly I became overwhelmed. I just didn't know what to get - I love kidney beans but have never really bought other types of beans before. Mung, cannellini, flageolet, haricot, aduki, pinto...I haven't even heard of half of them. So I decided to get one of each. My kitchen cupboard now looks like a scary fortress with all of those cans stacked high.

I've been looking up random recipes here and there because I don't want to end up being stuck for ideas and resorting to a veggie stir-fry every day or something. It might even lead me to using the oven more...which does scare me a little. I'm a wok girl at heart and have always been a bit afraid of the dark depths of ovens - you just don't know what's going to come out of there.

If at all possible, I want to avoid 'fake meat' substitutes - I don't want to have Quorn burgers and sausages, fake turkey mince and the like. As well as my concerns about what is put in them to make them taste like meat, I want my veggie month to be completely non-meat flavoured, so as not to satisfy the inevitable meat cravings I'll have over the next four weeks.

(Oh no, that means I can't eat McCoy's flame-grilled steak crisps...*deflates*)

So I did a search online to find other veggie subsitutes: tofu - yep, I can live with that; seitan - eh? tempah - what? It's like I'm about to learn a whole new language of food...

Earlier today, I asked a couple of my colleagues (veggie man Iain, and food-cooking crazy Megan) for ideas. Megan's eyes opened wide with excitement and babbled something at me that was indecipherable.

"Parma-what?"

"Parmigiana melanzane!!" She shrieked (ok, I'm exaggerating, she didn't shout that loud).

In the end, I got her to email it to me because I just couldn't understand. From the recipe, it sounds like an aubergine lasagne type dish which sounds...interesting. (I'm not the biggest fan of aubergine or lasagne, but hey, I'll try anything.)

It's really exciting picking up all of these different recipes though as I love taking time in the kitchen to cook. Though I do have a habit of choosing quick recipes because I'm always starving after work.

So with promises of cookbooks and recipes being sent my way to beef me up, veggie-style, there will be no chance of me wilting away munching on carrots in the corner, rocking away muttering, "Steak, steak..."

Three days to go...
Continue reading this post..

Come Dine With...Suze

Last night, my friends and I had our first Come Dine With Me evening! It's an idea we've had brewing for a while but never got round to starting. Then recently, out of the blue, we each received a pleasant email:

Suddenly, talk of glittery numbers, paper scrolls with menu choices, rifling around the host's house and drunken reviews in the taxi ride home was hot on the agenda.

And yes, we even received our menu the morning of the dinner party:

How delightful!

Upon arrival, we settled down to the faint sound of High School Musical 2 in the background, and were greeted with our dips and nibbles:

I'm very jealous of the plate! I'd love to have things like that (which I could just go out and buy of course, but never think to do so). The smell of chicken was wafting out of the kitchen and our noses took us to the table shortly after Suze dished up the main course:

The chicken was perfect! Piping hot, moist and the cheese was not too overpowering. The first thing I wonder whenever I cut into oven-roasted or grilled chicken is whether it is going to be dry or not. But mm, this was delicious! The parma ham was the icing on the er, chicken. Yum!

I love great presentation when it comes to food and it is one of the reasons why I got snap-happy in the first place with all my food pics and this dessert tops my collection of beautifully-presented food:

The individually-named ginger cookies has upped a game that has only just begun! I couldn't finish the chocolate as I can't handle too much sweet but it turned out we weren't expected to be able to finish the pot anyway. (Although Grace managed to, good effort!)

So, the plates were empty and the verdicts were in:

39...so the bar has been set...

I can't wait for our next Come Dine With Me evening now - it was so nice to eat dinner around a table with friends and having posh chats. Well, not entirely posh since our conversations ranged from show-jumping to wondering how pineapples grow. And I probably lowered the height of sophistication we had going on when I absentmindedly filled up my glass with Archer's, to the horror of the hostess. For some reason, I thought it was one of those large alcopop bottles, but um, no, it was the spirit. I did wonder why everyone went quiet and then burst into hysterics.

Whoops.

Read more Hungry Jenny Come Dine With Me

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The Breakfast in B&B

So when you book a room for the night somewhere, what do you consider? The price? Location? Facilities?

Well, yes, I look at all of these in great detail, but the most important factor to me of course is the breakfast! You have no idea how much I try to find out what the breakfast is going to be like, by looking up reviews on Trip Advisor and researching elsewhere online. And if they don't serve breakfast? You guessed it, instant rejection! I know, it's ridiculous, but with the price of some hotels, I think a decent breakfast should be a big part of a hotel's offer.

The best breakfasts I've had were at B&Bs, rather than hotels - not surprising really! This is the one I had last week at Hunter's Lodge (with lashings of toast, a banana and yoghurt - I stopped at cereal because I really did get full for once!):


Last year I was in Brockenhurst for my birthday and had a memorable New Forest Breakfast at The Cottage Lodge:

All of the food comes from the forest and they even point you in the direction of where to go and find the ingredients if you wish to take it home with you!

Most hotels (well the ones I tend to single out when choosing) offer a buffet breakfast. Now, with that in mind, you think, hey, if the hotel turns out to be rubbish, at least I can get my money's worth with the food - well, that's my line of thinking anyway!

I remember feeling quite upset that I wouldn't be able to take full advantage of the full hot and cold buffet at Premier Inn last November, during a weekend of Aikido in Stafford. Obviously, because we were training for two whole days, it would not have been a good idea to start the morning with a ridiculously hearty breakfast. I didn't have my camera on me at the time, but I felt like a diabetic in a chocolate shop when I saw the spread of food along the tables - all available for me to eat, but not a good idea to do so.

However, I made up for lost food when I ate at the Holiday Express Inn in Warrington, the first morning of Creamfields in August. With a weekend ahead of dancing-all-hours and living off cheap non-perishable supermarket goods, I needed to fuel up:

Even when I booked a cheap B&B in Victoria (which turned out to be a bit skanky really), I was pleasantly surprised by the light, yet fulfilling brekkie:

It certainly made up for the weird plane-toilet-sized bathroom, where the shower floor was the same level as the rest of the bathroom, and sprayed water everywhere! What was that all about?

But by far the worst was at the Travelodge that I stayed in Bournemouth for a Sigur Ros gig - even though the 'hot' items were stored under (initially impressive-looking) silver chafing dishes, everything was stone cold. And this after coming down to eat 10 minutes after breakfast was first being served! I was deeply disappointed. I know it's a Travelodge, but still.

So you see, I go to great lengths to find the best breakfast offer available when booking a hotel. I simply cannot function without a good breakfast - I mean, come on, I haven't eaten all night and Hungry Jenny needs to be fed in the morning! Continue reading this post..

You don't know cheesy chips until you've tried this...

I can't remember how this all came up but my old college buddy Jo and I have finally achieved our goal for this year - to sample the poutine at the Maple Leaf pub in Covent Garden!

It's been on my 'Things I'd Like to Eat This Week' list for weeks (and still is actually cos it was YUM). There have been occasions where I was in the area but unable to get to it. I've been back home where Jo lives, yet she was ironically away in Canada...

But yesterday, finally, we were both in London at the same time and seized the chance to head to the Canadian-themed pub, the country that poutine originates from. We got out the menus, though I'm not sure why we bothered to look really, since we'd already decided about 2 months ago!

Jo had a serious food critic face on when the dish came out, ready to evaluate intensely - though it was funny that we both whipped our cameras out to take photos - me, obviously food-obsessed; Jo, her obsession a bit more centralised on this dish.

Queen of Poutine, Jo has tasted (what is officially) the best poutine in Canada...

...so expectations and emotions were high. I had nothing to compare it to (apart from bog-standard cheesy chips of course but seriously, no contest). We dug in, Jo expertly and elegantly and me, a bit messier trying to get to grips with the strings of cheese.

The funny thing is, I'm not a big fan of chips, or cheese for that matter, but the combination of chips, cheese AND gravy is divine! It was lovely beef gravy (darnit, I can't have this during Veggie Jenny then) and soaked the chips without making them too soggy.

The reason why the cheese looks different is that the proper poutine uses cheese curds but it tasted great to me and Jo seemed impressed too. Good thing as well, seeing as we had hyped up this moment for a long time - there's nothing worse than having a build-up to a meal and ending up disappointed!

And the best thing was that I didn't feel horribly stodgy afterwards, like you tend to do after a bit of junk food - in fact, I had a lovely warm feeling in my stomach.

So thanks for introducing this to me Jo - and next time, we will eat again in a place that has a moose!

Me, Jo, and Charlotte the bear

Continue reading this post..

The Last Bite is Always the Saddest

No, I'm not looking down disapprovingly at my food - I was feeling very sad that my meal was nearly over (and also struggling to pick up the last part with my fork).

It's a common feeling I have at the end of any meal I find particularly delicious:

This is a chicken and asparagus pie from Jongleurs in Southampton. It took me a while to get a photo of it because it was very dim and the best I could get was the slightly blurry picture above. But thankfully by the time I got around to eating it, the pie was still lovely and hot and although covered in gravy, the pastry was not soggy at all but gorgeously crusty!

I've had the steak pie before here too (yes, I'm quite a big fan of pies) and I've just realised that this will probably be my last meat-filled pie for a while as I'm due to become Veggie Jenny in about a week...

I'm starting to wonder how I'm going to cope... Continue reading this post..

Couldn't be ASKed

I was in Southampton for a London Elektricity gig and planned to get a bite to eat at ASK beforehand. I don't know the area very well and am bad at navigating anyway, but it's in a leisure complex that I've seen from the station many times before, so figured it would be easy to find. Plus, I was with Matt who has a good sense of direction.

Well, none of this helped when we ended up walking around the area for at least half an hour, knowing the complex was close by, but for some reason, we just couldn't get to it! We even managed to wander into a multi-storey car park, where we stumbled in and out various doors with no exit.

Eventually, we found the complex and anxiously saw a packed ASK through the windows. An hour's wait to be seated? I'm not sure why we didn't think to book. By then, we were too hungry to care about our mammoth mission to eat at ASK and headed next door to Frankie and Benny's, ordered the largest pizza on the menu....

...and promptly wiped the plate clean!

Continue reading this post..

In Bed With Jamie

I planned to get an early night tonight but I can't seem to put my new book down:

I've never been a fan of Jamie Oliver to be honest but for some reason, I've been drawn to this book like a Hungry Jenny to a beef pie. The hype around the book and his whole 'pass it on' saga and clever marketing probably helped to shove it in my face. And I swear every time I went to browse through it in bookshops in recent weeks, a faint waft of chicken floated out, making me desire the book even more. (Though when I was given it today as a surprise from boyfriend-who-took-the-hint Matt, I smelt it and realised that it's what fancy paper smells like, rather than being a scratch-and-sniff type wonder.)

I just can't get over how beautiful it is inside and every page I turn, I salivate a bit more and wish to try out the recipe immediately! That's a sign of a good cookbook.

Over the last couple of months, I've taken a real interest in wanting to experiment more with my home cooking - not so much trying out extravagant dishes, but just branch out to what I don't make at home. Which is exactly what is given here - no 'flash' recipes but simple dishes using everyday ingredients that won't blow the budget too much. Of course, I'll be buying ingredients that I have not really bought in the past but I think it's the perfect way to have a bit more fun with my cooking. I love taking time to make a good dinner but do get bored of cooking the same dishes over and over again.

I've been itching to do another one of Gordon Ramsay's Cookalongs but the recipes have not been budget-friendly at all! Last week, I wanted to try the main dish only of duck breast with port and cherry sauce. I don't particularly like cherry sauce so planned to substitute it for a honey-style sauce. But when I got to the supermarket and found that two duck breasts costs £8, I changed my mind! I was expecting it to be pricey but simply couldn't justify paying that much for one part of one meal. When I'm feeling less cash-poor, I'll definitely do it as I'd really like to try it.

This week, he is doing steak diane, which I'm still deciding whether to do or not. In the meantime though, I have a lovely new cookbook for inspiration and a wealth of pictures to drool over (of the food, not Jamie Oliver). One of my workmates says she has pretty much gone through all of the recipes already and I'm determined to do the same! Continue reading this post..

Char Sui Cheat

I openly admit that I use sauce out of a jar when making my delicious char sui chicken but I am not ashamed! And I’ve just been asked how to make it so here’s what I do:

Char-Sui Chicken Cheat

Print-friendly recipe

For 2:

4 chicken thighs or drumsticks (with skin is tastier!)
6 large tbsp pre-made char sui sauce (I use Lee Kum Kee brand below)
3 tbsp honey
4 large tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp groundnut oil

1) The night before, get a large bowl or tupperware box and pour in the char sui sauce, honey, soy sauce and oil. Mix it all up!
2) Put in your chicken pieces and give them a marinade bathing
3) Cover and put in the fridge overnight
4) Preheat oven to 190 degrees C
5) Place chicken skin-side down onto a foiled up oven tray – save any excess marinade
6) Roast for 20 minutes
7) Turn chicken over, pour any excess marinade onto the pieces and roast for 10 minutes
8) If they’re not done, turn the tray around and roast for another 5-7 mins until the juice runs clear when you stick a knife through
9) Serve with rice and fried lettuce

YUM!!!

I’m going to do this dish the non-pre-made sauce way very soon – but depending on how it turns out, I might not put the recipe up for that just yet…

Enjoy, let me know how it goes…

More chicken recipes here! Continue reading this post..

Say NO to Cold Beans

Stop giving me cold beans!

I dislike lukewarm food in general so I'm always disappointed when it happens but especially so with baked beans. It is one of my food peeves and it keeps happening recently, including my breakfast at a Travelodge this morning. I know, I know, it was a Travelodge, but come on - all of the 'hot' food items were kept under separate chafing-style dishes and we went down to eat 10 minutes after breakfast was first being served!

Baked beans should be piping hot, not stone cold or worse still, lukewarm. I should come with a label when I go out to eat - 'Check food is piping hot before serving Hungry Jenny'. Yes, baked beans can be eaten cold and I'm sure some people wouldn't moan about this like I do, but it does make me feel irrationally aggravated. Why, why, WHY, I always fume, as I shovel cold beans down, in an attempt to rid them from my memory (yet not let them go to waste).

It's just that initial cold slop feeling you get when you put that first forkful of those unassuming beans in your mouth. Instant disappointment. Continue reading this post..

Top Notch Bangers 'n' Mash

I was in The Vestry for lunch again today. It's one of the more 'pleasant' restaurant/bars in Chichester as it doesn't get too crowded and the atmosphere is peaceful without seeming dead.

One of my best friends, Anita, is heading off to go travelling for three weeks and we thought we'd take advantage of the current 2 for £10 offer on main meals! I really want to try the pie there (and all the others in the world) but fear it may be a Slug and Lettuce moment with the pastry appearing on the top of the pie only, because of the way it's described on the menu. I can't handle another pie disappointment just yet.

So I went for good ol' bangers and mash and my goodness, I was pleased with my choice when it arrived:

It was steaming hot and the sausages were so juicy - I can taste it now as I look at the picture, mm! The gravy wasn't too rich at all, which I sometimes find because I'm not keen on red wine gravy in general. I think it was red wine gravy in the Slug pie too before which made it too rich for my buds. But this was lovely! And the sausages. The SAUSAGES! They were pork and leek and were just the perfect texture. I actually managed to eat them slowly to savour the taste instead of scoffing it all at once!

What was strange though was that I was also given a side dish of these roasted vegetables:

Neither Anita nor I had ordered them but when they arrived, we were just feeling too confused to question it! Anita had cod and chips which is what I had last Saturday for lunch so we knew it definitely could not have been the accompaniment to that!

But as I ate them with my bangers n mash, it just didn't 'go' at all! It was all a bit confusing, having these random roasted vegetables. We looked on the menu to see if it was a side order but it didn't seem to be on there. Anita reckons they just had some leftovers to get rid of! Well, they did taste rather nice anyway, though it did feel odd eating them in between bites of sausage!

I haven't eaten that often at The Vestry as I was put off by my very first experience eating there - I was with Anita again and it took ages for our food to come out even though it wasn't busy and my jacket potato arrived cold with lukewarm baked beans. The second time I ate there was when they brought out a special menu of all these different types of burgers - which had uber soggy bread and was very messy to eat!

But after today (and last Saturday's cod and chips!)? I want to try everything else on their menu now :-) Continue reading this post..

JENNY DOESN'T SHARE FOOD!

Have you seen that episode of Friends where Joey dumps a girl because she helps herself to his food during a dinner date?

Well, I wouldn't go as far as dumping someon, but I can certainly relate to Joey's thinking. Yes, I openly admit it, I can be very selfish over my food.

In my last blog about Zizzi, someone asked whether I had shared my apple crumble or eaten it by myself.

Share? When it comes to food, I'm sorry, but no. The thought does not even occur to me when I order! If I offer you my food, the best thing is to say no. Actually, that sounds quite harsh, I don't mind sharing crisps and things like that, but dinner? I'm afraid not. I just cannot bring myself to do it.

Don't get me wrong, I have actually been to a restaurant and shared a meal with someone before - a pizza here, an ice-cream sundae there. And I've never ordered a whole platter meant for sharing all to myself or anything like that!

I get oddly possessive over my food sometimes and feel strangely violated if someone decides to reach over and take something from my plate without asking. But I don't mind offering the odd spoonful to allow someone a taste of my food.

So there are fine boundaries when it comes to sharing food. Cross them if you dare. Continue reading this post..

A good excuse to eat out on a Monday night

There's an online offer at the moment at handbag.com where you can get 2 main meals for the price of 1 at Zizzi. I was due to meet up with my friend Lisa in London after work and thought it'd be the perfect excuse to suggest going for a bite to eat, rather than a quick drink like we usually do.

I'd never been to the Zizzi in Victoria before (proved by the fact that I tried to open a locked side door to get into the place, rather than the main double doors) but it's one of my favourite restaurants so I was looking forward to a nice meal.

I kept getting distracted by one of the 'specials' whilst we were looking at our menus, because it was a steak, which I'd never come across at Zizzi before. (And because I do love the ol' beefsteak) It didn't seem fair to choose something too much more expensive than Lisa's choice though since we were splitting the bill and forced myself to look at other options! I was a bit put off anyway, as it came with a mushroom sauce, which seemed a bit odd to me. Apologies to Lisa as she is a mushroom fanatic. I like mushrooms as much as the next person, but I didn't like the sound of that sauce on my steak!

I was intrigued to try a rigatoni dish, just to see what this type of pasta was like, as I've never heard of it before. The waitress described it as long and thin but they were actually rather large and thick - look at how gigantic they are!

Rigatoni Con Pollo e Funghi

It was quite messy to eat because there was so much sauce and I didn't feel very lady-like, hurriedly stopping every now and again to stop it dripping onto my chin. The chicken was yummy though, not dry at all. I realised afterwards that I'd been given a spoon to eat my mains with, which probably would have saved me alot of tomato drippage but never mind.

Of course, a Zizzi meal is never complete without a Mela Croccante - as a rule, I try to avoid ordering the same thing in restaurants as I like to try out different dishes - but Zizzi is an exception!

When I went to Prezzo's once (who also offer this dessert), I decided not to go with my 'safe' option and got a cheesecake:

It was lovely but it didn't give me that deliciously satisfying feeling that the apple crumble does - I regretted not ordering it!

In this case, I was a little disappointed with the Mela Croccante as it turned out to be extremely dry, to the point where I was unable to finish it (and I do not like to waste my food!). I didn't ask for the cream or ice-cream but it's what I usually do when I order this and it's always been fine on its own. So I was quite gutted that I didn't experience that warm feeling in my stomach afterwards of a good crumble.

Well, I've had my ups and downs with Zizzi but nothing so bad yet that will stop me from going there! Continue reading this post..

Not such a laugh at Giraffe

My sister and I decided to try Giraffe, which we came across in the middle of Milton Keynes shopping centre. We both fancied trying something different for lunch and the happy Nando's-style music and international menu enticed us in.

The atmosphere was lively and we opened our menus excitedly (Jemma loves food as much as I do). I love reading menus, especially new ones (and recipes for that matter). Take this one from Toby Carvery....

*cue Marks & Spencer's ad music*

- ah, it's like poetry sometimes...

Anyway, I digress! So we were both sat there with our heads in the menus - yet neither of us could decide. And I don't know if it was because there was too much to choose from - or that nothing was actually appealing to us.

In the end, I went for a full English brunch, which looked lovely when it arrived...

Unfortunately, as soon as I tucked in, I realised it was Bad. First of all, the beans were stone cold. Now when it comes to food, I think there's nothing worse than lukewarm food, but I HATE cold beans! So I moved onto the potato wedges, which tasted good, but again, were pretty cold.

Jemma saw the disappointment on my face, "Do you want to tell them?" I shook my head - I'd already started it and I was optimistic that the rest of my meal would be better.

Sadly not :-( The only thing that was piping hot was the sausage and the bits of scrambled egg that was beneath the toast. The rest, to my dismay, was pretty cold.

I remained hopeful and asked Jemma how her burger was, which arrived looking rather impressive:

"Um...it's ok, nothing special."

Oh dear. She passed me a bit of the burger to try. As I chewed it, the taste was strangely familiar. It took a few chews to work it out but...HEY. The beef actually tasted like it was from a MacDonald's burger. And that does not a good burger make.

I really doubt I'd go to this restaurant again now, which is a shame, as I think perhaps we just didn't choose the best things on the menu. I mean, they do promise that it's a place where a smile goes a long way. I guess not far enough, eh? Continue reading this post..

Did you get my card?

And so, the next phase of Hungry Jenny begins!

I finally got my business cards printed and ready for action - I'll be leaving them wherever I eat and then blogging about the food, the experience, or whatever else comes to mind about the place.

So if I've left a card and haven't blogged about you yet, come back in a couple of days! I do like to blog whilst it's still fresh in my mind but if I don't, it's probably because I'm eating something else.

So by no means a proper critical review of any sort, but just Hungry Jenny's thoughts.

Because all I think about is food :-)


Continue reading this post..