A birthday wouldn't be complete without a proper birthday cake. And by proper birthday cake I understand a gateau type cake - and it needs to be moist and sweet. Usually they are a sponge cake type cake, dripped with punch, with layers and cream sandwiched in between. My cake, however was a poppy-seed cake, with coffee cream. Though, it's always been my favourite cake, it's the first time I made it, so I was a tad comprehensive. Luckily, everything turned out fine, the cake was fabulous, and I had a fantastic day, which makes gettign older more bearable ;-) Kidding, don't really care about that. The cake is quite time-consuming, but believe you me, it's well worth it! For the cake you need: 200grammes of ground poppy-seed 150 grammes of icing sugar 6 eggs 4 table spoons of bread crumbs 1 packet of vanillin sugar almond aroma butter or margarine to grease the baking tray Whisk the egss with sugar and vanillin sugar to a fluffy mixture. Add poppy seed,...

Today's recipe is inspired by my favourite meal at a Chinese restaurant we frequent. Actually, less and less often, as the service is going downhill there. Anyway, that served as motivation to try to replicate the meal I enjoy so much - sweet and sour chicken with soy noodles. I also decided to "lean" it a bit - the restaurant version of the dish has deep fried batter chicken, mine wasn't deep fried, nor did it have batter, but it was very enjoyable nonetheless! ;-) For the sauce I used: 1 large can of pineapple 1 cup honey 3 tbsps dark soy sauce 3 tsps ginger powder half a teaspoon of ground cinnamon 1-2 tbsps of tomato puree 2 tsps of lemon juice 1 tsp tamarind paste salt and pepper 1 tsp corn flour Preparation: Put the pineapple into a pan, pour in the syrup from the can, add honey, soy sauce, ginger powder, ground cinnamon, tomato puree, tamarind paste and lemon juice. Stir all ingredients and simmer until they blend. Season the sauce with salt ...

My husband surprised me yesterday bringing me a present, a cookbook based on a TV series that I've been watching recently. The programme is situated in a restaurant and generally features the so-called "trendy cooking", rather than traditional recipes, thus I was a bit surprised to find a recipe for tomato soup. When it comes to soups, it's not a secret that they are rather easy to prepare, yet I didn't quite expected a recipe that doesn't require either chicken or vegetable stock! I knew I had to alter the recipe a little, as following the proportions given in the book we would obtain water mixture with a faint tomato flavour - not exactly what we want :) To make the soup I used: 10 large, ripe tomatoes 1 litre of water 3 bay leaves 4-5 allspice berries a pinch of dried dill 1 tablespoon of dried vegetables 1 table spoon of butter salt and pepper to taste cream or yoghurt a handful of pasta (farfale or other) Put tomatoes into a bowl o...