All you need is love.... with a side of cooking and dash of baking

After 6 months of being away from my boyfriend, arriving in London was like something out of a movie; I practically had ‘All you need is LOVE’ in neon lights on my forehead. But a week in and I realise that I need more than love- I need food, and a theatre in which to prepare my divine delights. I had all the best intentions of keeping up with my blog while I’m here in London; I mean, I have fantastic internet access, endless inspiration, and most luxuriously, the time. The possibilities always seem so much better on paper, don’t they?

I must prepare you, for this may come as a horrible shock to some, but the normal British kitchen does not look like Heston Blumenthal’s experimental lab, or have the space and cosiness of Jamie’s, or the gleaming cleanliness of Nigella’s. The British kitchen is just another room in a house. Then you get the London kitchen; what back home we would call a ‘kitchenette’ or a bit of cupboard space with a counter on the top. And then, in all its glory, you have what I am experiencing: the London bachelor flat kitchen, fully equipped with 3 boys and nothing else.

Space-wise, it’s a far cry from my dream farm-style kitchen; you stand in the middle and turn either left or right to touch either wall. Handy in that you barely need a step to move from the fridge on the far right, to the sink on the far left (and believe me, I use the term ‘far’ exceptionally loosely here). Add in 3 boys trying to peer into your pots and you have redefined the whole concept of a ‘cosy’ kitchen. But space I can deal with, it’s easier to keep an eye on the stove after all. What has been challenging my sanity is the lack of (quite honestly just normal) kitchen stuff; the boys inherited their knife and fork set from the previous owners, so we have a very avant-garde wooden-style-looks-like-it-comes-from-a-camping-trip-in-the-80’s cutlery set. May I also mention that the delightful wooden handles never really dry, and I shudder to imagine what ‘flavours’ have been absorbed by them but according to the dread-locked housemate, “That’s part of the fun”. We have a generous assortment of plates and bowls and mugs, fair enough, but most certainly nothing that would meet my sister’s dinner party standards. We have one knife. I would like to call it a chopping knife or chef’s knife, but there is no way to dress it up. It’s supposed to be a hunting knife (at least it fits the camping theme we have going), but it hardly makes a ripe tomato shudder with its ridiculously blunt blade. So I spend my days attempting to dice butternut with an extremely menacing-looking gang knife that has the effect of the Mickey Mouse plastic safety knife I had when I was four.

The fridge that serves 5 people is the size of a bar fridge or wine cooler. There are pots and there are pans. They don’t really do what pots and pans are meant to. I can boil things, I can bake things, and I can grill things. This doesn’t sound too bad, but let’s not forget that I first need to spend an hour trying to cut, slice, or dice things, and find creative methods to opening a can as though I was stuck on a dessert island.

Then there was the dreaded day of the coconut. With the excitement of a child on Christmas Eve, I bought my very first fresh coconut. I also bought a tin of tomatoes for dinner. I got home to realise that said knife will literally break down in tears if I present it with a coconut. I then also realise that we have no can-opener. I sit. I fume. I throw the coconut at the can. No, I didn’t expect this to work, and I really didn’t expect it to bounce back. Google saves my life and teaches me how to open a coconut with a hammer; I now keep the hammer in the kitchen as possibly my handiest kitchen tool at present.

So please forgive me, I am slowly learning to work with these unique challenges, and the day I make something that looks photograph-worthy it will definitely be up on the blog. For now, I’m brushing up on my cooking knowledge after a long affair with Master Chef Season 4. Oh, and I have been taught to make pizza bases by an actual Italian; it’s a fool-proof method, and after countless attempts I can safely say that this one really works. The little Italian has even expressed her concern at my pizza getting better than hers, and thanks to my very willing guinea pig, James, I hope to make that a reality before I leave! For the easiest, simplest, and yummiest authentic Italian pizza dough, read my blog post here.

The kitchen, a space fest!

I actually had to stand outside and take a picture through the window for this one.

Is it a dagger? Is it a fake? No, it's the kitchen knife!

Handy how you can tell the frequency of use based on the shade of wood...