I love the Wagamama Cookbook

I have now attempted (with quite some success!) two more of the Wagamama recipes from the cook book and wish to add them to my review. Firstly I made the poached cod with shiitake mushrooms.

I made little mistake first of all and missed out the butter entirely but remembered before cooking it and stuck some in quickly. It was considerably less photogenic afterwards but was worth it to see the butter melt around the cod when it came out.

When cooked it was truly delicious!

The next thing I made were the Ebi Gyoza prawn dumplings. They were really fun and simple to do as well as tasty. Unfortunately I didn't have the ingredients for the Ebi Gyoza sauce so I used sweet chilli instead and it worked like a dream. I truly love the food from Wagamama's as well as being able to recreate it at home. Their cook book is detailed, accurate and easy to follow and I love love love it.

2017 Monthly Motif Reading Challenge



I'm taking part in the 2017 Monthly Motif Reading Challenge!

Every month, I'm pledging to read a book that related to a theme set by the blog girlxoxo.com. It's a good way to diversify my reading and get social with other bloggers out there, since my baby blog is a little lonely right now.

Here's the first month's challenge:

JANUARY – Diversify Your Reading
Kick the reading year off right and shake things up. Read a book with a character (or written by an author) of a race, religion, or sexual orientation other than your own.

For January's theme, I really want to read Pantomime by Laura Lam!

Here's the cover and a brief synopsis:

In a land of lost wonders, the past is stirring once more . . .
Gene's life resembles a debutante's dream. Yet she hides a secret that would see her shunned by the nobility. Gene is both male and female. Then she displays unwanted magical abilities - last seen in mysterious beings from an almost-forgotten age. Matters escalate further when her parents plan a devastating betrayal, so she flees home, dressed as a boy.
The city beyond contains glowing glass relics from a lost civilization. They call to her, but she wants freedom not mysteries. So, reinvented as 'Micah Grey', Gene joins the circus. As an aerialist, she discovers the joy of flight - but the circus has a dark side. She's also plagued by visions foretelling danger. A storm is howling in from the past, but will she heed its roar?


In January I'll post a review post of this book and choose my book of next month as well. Anyone else who's doing the challenge let me know what you've picked and why! I'd truly love to hear from some other bloggers.

Three of my Newest Cookbook Reviews

Wagamama Cookbook ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

This cook book is amazing! Great for anyone who enjoys Japanese food or Wagamama's food from visiting their restaurants. I've made a few dishes from this and found that they are fast, easy and well explained. There is a glossary at the front of the book, to explain terms such as menma, which I previously hadn't known, but refers to canned bamboo shoots. I made some of the vegetable Korokke for the friend who loaned me this amazing book. I was proud of both ramen dishes I made, a chicken ramen and a BBQ honey pork ramen (this one's a favourite!). Without further ado, here are some foody pictures:

Persepolis ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

This is an interesting book on Persian cooking I received as a proof copy. I enjoyed making the recipes I have and am looking forward to cooking from this book for a long time. Some really beautiful recipes here as well. I enjoyed the soups as well as the mini moussaka mushrooms. It's inspired me to try new foods and recipes from places I've never been. They are also very good for if you are on a budget. Many of the ingredients are spices, which I had in my cupboard, or herbs which I grow myself. In the recipe for the mini moussaka mushrooms Sally Butcher encourages 'cupboard love' and the switching of fresh tomatoes for tinned if they're more readily available to you. As a student I definitely appreciate this. My love of Sally's soups has even motivated me to go out and buy my own hand blender so I can make more of them (without continuously borrowing my flatmates kitchen utensils!). I also have a new desire to visit the Persepolis shop in Peckham soon.

A Girl Called Jack ★ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Haven't been the biggest fan of Jack's cook book so far. I made a seasonal greens pesto pasta and it was not my cup of tea so have been put off trying anything else. It was very strongly lemony and incredibly sour. I threw most of it out. I may try more of her recipes, after all that was only one out of 100 in the book, but from what I've made I can't give this a good review.

 

Bonus! MY BAKING ADVENTURES!!

 

A HalfBad Series Review

The HalfBad series by Sally Green quickly became one of my favourite series. A not-so-typical coming of age with an unusual take on witches and their gifts, this book rocked my world from beginning to end. To start, Nathan is the spiky little hedgehog main character we all adore. The language is straightforward, to the point and incredibly hard hitting. It's so easy to believe and sweeps you off your feat! It's a fluid story with a cast that are just as fluid, as well as a message against racism and hate crimes at it's core, using white and black witchcraft as a method of communicating exactly how bad people can treat those different to themselves while justifying it as "the right thing to do". Ultimately a heart-wrenching and tragic ending but such a beautiful flight of a story that you can't afford to miss it.

Volunteering in South Africa

My deepest, sincerest apologies for the long awaited update. Not only have I been caught up in my work and studies, I've also spent a month abroad in South Africa volunteering on a game reserve! I wanted to share an experience of a life time with you, as well as share my main book buddies for the trip!

My two ever-present's for the trip are these:

Stuarts' Field Guide to Mammals of South Africa is irreplaceable when on game drives round reserves or even just spotting stray wildlife around Southern Africa. Whereas in zoos everything has a name tag, out on the reserve it's much harder to know what type of antelope you've spotted or whether there's African Pangolins indigenous to the area. Stuarts' field guide was a bit pricey to buy in the airport (as expected) but proved to be a valuable resource. I used many of the images in here to paint from when my photos of the animals had come out in blurs. It also helped me distinguish which type of rhino I saw when I bribed Alex, one of the rangers, into tracking them for me (he received a packet of wine gum sweets for his troubles). A nicely well illustrated guide and a helluva lot handier than a travel guide for species identification!

The next book was one I used a lot in drives, one of the rangers, named Denzley was a real bird enthusiast and took great pleasure in helping me identify birds and pointing out pages and chapters in the following Birds of Southern Africa book. The first bird I identified was the cape glossy starling, a beautiful blue bird that really shines in the sun. In fact many of the birds are amazing exotic colours so it's really good to be able to keep track of them in something like this!



Chilbolton Common Botany Trip

I recently visited Chilbolton Common, which is a SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest) in Hampshire to look at the various flora and fauna. The river Test, which cuts through the common, did not disappoint, and while kick sampling, we found several varieties of larvae and nymph as well as freshwater shrimp. The real interest to me was the plant life to be found all around the river itself and the meadows where cows graze. The weather was dreary, and there were not as many butterfly's around, but a few were spotted in the distance, and one closer up that was much easier to recognise. Here are a couple of things I spotted:

Little egret (Egretta garzetta)

Tortoise shell butterfly (Aglais urticae)

Freshwater shrimp (genus: Gammarus)

Mayfly and Mayfly nymph (order: Ephemeroptera)

Dragonfly nymph (suborder: Anisoptera)

Stonefly nymph (order: Plecoptera)

Cocksfoot Grass (Dactylis glomerata)
Timothy Grass (Phleum pratense)
Crested Dog's-tail Grass (Cynosurus cristatus)
Quaking Grass (Briza media)
Sedges (family:Cyperaceae)
Mouse-ear chickweed (Cerastium fontanum)
Water Forget-me-nots (Myosotis scorpioides)
Pyramidal Orchid (Anacamptis pyramidalis)
Yellow Flag Iris (Iris pseudacorus L)
Jew's ear fungus (Auricularia auricula-judae)
Veronica (Veronica anagallis-aquatica and arvensis)

Field Horsetail (Equisetum arvense)
Sorrel (Rumex acetosa)

The plants were identified using the Collins British Common Wild Flower Guide by David Streeter (ISBN:978-0-00-745125-8). It's a handy little book and well worth it if you have an interest in botany and wild flowers.

I had a good time, despite the abysmal weather, and was completely amazed at the ammount of variety that can be found in a small meadow.

YA Picks (Part 2)

Haze - Paula Weston ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

The plot thickens! This is the second book in the Rephaim series by Paula Weston. You can find my review of Shadows, the first book in the series here. Gaby can still not remember her life as a half fallen angel, save for the gory dream about hellions, but now she knows more about it. Throughout the book Gaby gets drawn further and further into the world of the Rephaim, both those in the sactuary and the gang of outcasts to whom Rafa and her twin brother Jude belonged to. Jason, still apart from both groups, tells us more about his acquaintances. This book is like a series of small battles ultimately leading up to the main war. It builds and builds in jumps and Weston's characters seem to jump from the page more and more with each one. I've already taken the next book in the series, Shimmer, off the shelves in my local library to get reading.

Shimmer - Paula Weston  ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

Shimmer is unputdownable. By the third book in the series I'm well and truly commited to seeing this out. Unfortunately everything I have to say about the book will be a spoiler if you haven't already read the first two. In this book the main conflict is that Rafa and Taya are kidnapped by deamons and it's up to Gaby to get them back. The ending is a cliffhanger. I HATE CLIFFHANGERS. AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!! I need to know more about how the majoy reveal at the end is going to affect things. This book has me tied in knots.

Loneliness of distant beings - Kate Ling ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

Seren is the most apathetic main character I have ever read. I mean that in a good way. She has what is considered a very outside view on her own situation and if she's a bit suicidal because of it, I don't balme her.

Seren lives on a space ship on a mission to intercept a signal hundreds of years away. She was born on the ship, she'll live her entire life on the ship, and she'll die on the ship, never seeing the planet her people came from nor the planet they're destined to meet. If that wasn't bad enough, all graduates from their school are assigned a 'life partner' and have a two year compulsory service doing menial jobs around the ship before they can choose their own career. Her partner is abysmal and she's slowly falling in love with someone else, despite him also being promised to someone.

Seren has very limited choices, until she has them all. She yearns for the warmth of the nearest sun on her face and the feeling of loving a life partner. She doesn't want a life on a barren ship and a future of artificial insemination. When their ship aproaches a habitable planet, that's when hopes change and dreams become realised.

This story has such an interesting concept and I can see the logic behind the way the people on the ship work, but Seren has such an interesting interpretation of what it is to live the logic. At the end of the day, no one wants to live acording to how people tell them. What's really interesting (to me anyway) is Erza's character development. Ling paints an interesting mosaic of characters, each with their own lives and goals. Very well written.

And I Darken - Kiersten White ★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆

This wasn't my cup of tea, but there were some parts that I liked a lot. The story follows Lada Dracul, wild-child, badass and warrior. Lada, despite being a girl, becomes important to her father Vlad, through her brash ways and fierce nature. When Vlad has to make peace with the sultan of another nation, he has no choice but to leave his children there too, for the sultan made an offer to teach the both of them far better than they ever could have been taught at home. Lada's brother Rafa, fits right in, making friends with the enemy troops and feeling connected to their religion from his first prayers with them. Lada does not. Lada hates the sultan, his people, and even her own father for leaving her there. When Lada and Rafa make friends with the third son of the sultan, and the very same third son has to rise to the occasion and take his father's place, Lada and Rafa must be behind him. But danger awaits them. For there are still members of the sultan's palace that would wish Lada's family a much less comfortable life.

All in all, the plot is quite compelling and I can't really see why I slipped up with this book. Lada is a great main character and has a lot of spunk to her. I felt connected to Rafa as well, even as he is a more sensitive character and not usually one I would favour. There was one moment that hooked me, and it was a piece of dialogue between Lada and the sultan's son. He asks to be her friend. She insults him. He exclaims that he's the sultan's son and shouldn't be insulted like this. Lada says she doesn't care. He's her friend but she's not a very good one. Very cheeky, I thought, and right up my ally.

Unfortunately there was a lot of unnessecary traveling scenes and things I didn't feel had any relevence to the main story arc. There weren't any side characters that I wanted to know about and aside from the main arc I was completely uninvested in the novel. I didn't  make it to the end of this book unfortunately. The reason this has two stars is because of that one section of dialogue and the character portrail but otherwise it wasn't for me.

Goodbye Stranger - Rebecca Stead ★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆

I liked 'Goodbye Stranger'. It has a nice easy reading flow and a is a good coming of age story. My favourite character arc has to be about the girl who skips school on valentines day. It's heartfelt and painfully beautiful as a story of a friendship that is manipulative and the value of apologies. The main story arc focuses on Bridge, a girl that spent a year out of school after a horrible traffic accident left her in the hospital. She can't stop thinking about a comment one of the nurses made while she was ill. The nurse told her that she must have been put there for a reason and that's why she survived the accident.

Bridge and her two best friends Emily and Tabitha go through the ups and downs of friendship and love together. Sherm, a boy from Bridge's club at school, wants to get to know her better, but is slightly jaded by his grandfather walking out on his family.

It's a sweet story but at the end of the day I don't think I can say it's any more than just nice.