Invention, my dear friends, is 93% perspiration, 6% electricity, 4% evaporation, and 2% butterscotch ripple

With these iconic words ringing in my ears I set about to become the chocolate king I had always dreamed off.

I won’t lie; I have grand ambitions to be the next Willy Wonka.

So with these expectations of grandeur and the craving of chocolate goodness (which has been building up as I watch everyone around me gorge on mini eggs, crème eggs and a plethora of other chocolaty delights) I set out on Easter Sunday to make my own chocolate … sans recipe.
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Patient foods, farmers markets, and the culinary quickie

During the last few months I have come to appreciate the different types of food and cooking experiences that come with this sort of project. From long luxuriating cooking to chuck in the pan and on to the plate style.

So I thought I would share one patient food and one culinary quickie with you and as a little extra I have thrown in a quick eulogy about how amazing farmers markets are.

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Mammia Mia Pastaria

This week marked another craving… Pasta

Last year I probably had pasta three or four times a week, whereas so far this year I have had none. It has been nearly two months without the Italian shape-shifter, meaning I have missed out on around 28 pasta dishes and counting.

I was heading to my parents for the weekend, and knowing they had made pasta before and had a kitchen big enough to facilitate this sort of activity I decided this would be the weekend of pasta.

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Down the year of the rabbit hole….

So what happens on Wednesday lunch time when you’re sitting in the office eating your From Scratch salad, perusing food websites and emails for inspiration, and you get an email telling you the best place to go for a Chinese New Year feast? – Dim Sum in particular….

Most people in my situation would either ignore it or plan to exploit the loop-hole in the rules and use Chinese as one of their occasional dinner trips to satisfy their dim sum fix. In my over excited state I did neither.

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