recipe – Wine and Wasabi

Swipe Right on Bananas this Quarantine Season (there’s recipes!)｜Wine and Wasabi™

Bananas are cheap and easily available even during the lockdown. They can be had raw or cooked. They are easy to work with and are brilliant fresh or frozen, ripe or rotten. Learn how to make the best use of them, using as few ingredients as possible and as little time as possible, while still managing to make something interesting out of it.

This is the first of a series we’ve planned that feature one versatile, inexpensive ingredient and provide short, quick and simple recipes (with stories, always stories around it) featuring it as the main ingredient, that we think will hopefully help you get more creative in the kitchen and help you beat the lockdown blues. Scroll down if you wish to skip straight to the recipes!

I remember clearly how much I hated bananas. If I took one to school I’d remind the banana how much I hated it after every bite. Friends found it amusing but it was a very serious affair. The issue was on my end so I had to let the fruit in question know respectfully that it tasted like ass.

Perhaps it was the sickly sweet smell that wafted through the air if they were kept on the table, not strong enough to demand immediate attention but there to distract you if you were just close enough. Or it could have been the colour, yellow wasn’t among my favourites, and this yellow went through far too many changes in intensity for me to be enamoured. It was an imposter, this fruit. So many other nicer fruits were always a dull or bright version of their outsides but this one was white, even as it pretended to be otherwise. Could a kid really be expected to trust a banana?

Honey Cake, Or the Importance of Eating in Earnest｜Wine and Wasabi

Have you ever felt like you’re stuck in a rut and even when you’re doing what you love, it’s all a little too monotonous and no longer as exciting as it was when you started? This winter, I received a book which had recipes surrounding the memories of the author’s life. I made a piece of cake, the kind that takes you back to your first baking memories. It’s important because it reminded me of why I like to cook and brought back the feeling of unadulterated excitement and joy, the kind I hadn’t felt in a long time while making something. It’s the perfect surprise to myself and I am better for it, inspired and prepared for the future!

Have you ever felt like you’re stuck in a rut and even when you’re doing what you love, it’s all a little too monotonous and no longer as exciting as it was when you started?

I bake and cook for a living. It’s what I want to do for the rest of my life. But I also want to make new memories around food, discover and learn about other cultures, and grow. Working in a kitchen, making the same recipes doesn’t really allow for that.

Not as often and as much as I’d like, anyway.

My customers are amazing people who give me the chance to be an integral part of their special days and I am grateful for that – that something I do on occasion makes someone smile. It’s a special feeling, and any chef you will ever meet gets off on it, specially the pastry people.

However, there are a few things that are set in stone when it comes to us apparently:

Wine and Wasabi (and Cocktails) – A Start

So finally, after years of just thinking and planning, I’m putting myself and my first post out there, as a cocktail recipe. It’ll be short and simple, and a cocktail to make and celebrate with to ring in the new year, new beginnings or anything new really, just like this space and is meant to be a hopeful, no-nonsense but still exceptional tasting start.

Secret Origins

Food and everything around it has been on my mind for a while now, almost as long as time itself, as far as I am concerned. While W&W is relatively new, a vague shape was always there, slowly trying to come to life in me. From when I was in culinary school endless walks around a cold London and a need to keep myself entertained gave me opportunity to think about what I wanted to do with my passion, time, and life.

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It came from being around a passionate, encouraging, positive, and talented milieu which opened my eyes to endless possibilities and exposure to the world at large.

On returning home inspired, I wanted to start this blog immediately, but couldn’t. What my partner and mum (who shall also be contributors here) thought was procrastination was simply a tiny voice in my heart and head that just wasn’t convinced. Nothing I came up with seemed like it was good enough. Something or other seemed off and I couldn’t commit.

I wanted everything to be perfect. For that, I needed to wait for the perfect first post, or the inspiration of it to strike like a bolt of lightning. I’m a romantic and dramatic. It was my version of a quest for a unicorn. I had committed to myself that I’d find it, and I’m nothing if not stubborn.