Traverse 15~A bloggers conference and event.

I recently attended the Traverse 15 bloggers event which was hosted over three days at Kingston, a lovely market town south west of London. Traverse 15’s main focus was on travel blogging; however some food and lifestyle blogger friends and I decided to attend this event to broaden our horizons.

Friday Day 1

After checking into Hotel Antoinette, a short walk away from Kingston town, I met a bunch of friends for lunch to catch up with our news. After lunch, we decided to check out the town and did a spot of prop shopping before going back to the hotel to get refreshed and prepare for the evening activities.

Kingston is an amazing place by day with it has a large shopping centre and nearby historic places to visit. By night it turns into a gastronomical delight with its array of lovely restaurants lined by the riverside. We decided to have dinner at the Comptoir Libanais a magnificent Lebanese restaurant. The restaurant is beautifully decorated with stunning Middle Eastern props; there is also a selection of Middle Eastern groceries and spices for sale at the restaurant.

We decided to try a selection of dishes from the meze, so that we could sample a variety of different dishes. I must say the choices of vegetarian dishes on offer were excellent and I really enjoyed everything I tried.

After dinner we all made our way to All Saints Church for our first Traverse 15 welcome party and networking event. As we sipped chilled glasses of prosecco, we enjoyed meeting and chatting to new friends; this was going to be an excellent start to a fab weekend.

Saturday Day 2

Our venue for day two was Kingston University Business School. Registration started at 8.30 and it was a full day of work shops, lectures, panels and debates. We were initially concerned as to what we would learn from this travel conference; however our concerns were soon wiped out. In between the workshops and sessions we enjoyed cupcakes, coffee, lunch and drinks which kept us charged up throughout the day. The conference was very interesting and we gained a lot of knowledge from SEO to pitching to working with brands, accounting, photography and monetisation. It looks like future Traverse events will definitely be attended by food bloggers.

The day ended with a final recap of the day’s sessions and a very unique bar service, where drinks were ordered through tweeting! What a super end to a fantastic and educational day. Tired after the long day, we made our way back to the hotel to refresh before dinner and the Saturday night party at Kingston University Student Union. Sadly dinner at Little Italy in Kingston was rather disappointing and did not match the amazing experience at Comptoir Libanais the night before. However the Traverse 15 after party made up for it. It took me back years to my student days, drinking, loud music and fun!!!!

Sunday Day 3

Sunday morning was a day of experiences. Kingstonfirst had organised a wonderful selection of experiences in and around Kingston. These ranged from cookery classes to boat rides to Hampton Court, to beauty treatments and also historic guided tour walks. Sadly the weather did not work in our favour as it rained all morning and I was so glad that I had chosen to do the Thai cookery class at Busaba Eathai restaurant.

My friend Heidi and I made our way to the restaurant where we were greeted by Hesh, the senior Chef, at Busaba Eathai. After fuelling with hot piping coffee we donned our chef coats so that we could experience Thai cooking in a real working kitchen. 

This proved to be one of the best cooking masterclasses I have participated in. Being able to cook in a real working restaurant kitchen was a dream come true. I felt like areal celebrity chef in my white chefs coat!!  Hesh was an amazing teacher; the dishes we cooked with him were Pad Thai, Som Tam, Smoked Chilli Mushrooms, Thai Fish cakes and the Thai Calamari. The food we cooked for our lunch was packed with flavour and was so tasty it left a lasting memory on out taste buds.

After such an exciting cookery experience and elaborate lunch, it was time to enjoy a little bit of pampering and what better way to end a lovely weekend than to have a beauty treatment.  Heidi and I made our way to John Lewis Clarins department where we were greeted by our beauticians who pampered us with facial skin treatments and a mini back and neck massage. We left with a detailed personal beauty plans and samples of Clarins products so that we could continue to use the beauty regime our beauticians had prepared for us. It was a lovely relaxing way to end a really exciting, informative and fun filled weekend.

The organisers of Traverse 15 and Kingstonfirst did a fantastic job to make the weekend so successful. I am looking forward to next year’s event with great anticipation.

Event Roundup ~ Lets cook for Mothersday.

Thankyou to everyone for sending in such lovely entries in appreciation for Mothersday. 

Here is the roundup:

An InLinkz Link-up

Black Chickpeas and New Potato Curry

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Black Chick Peas and New Potato Curry

by Nayna Kanabar April-2-2015

Chick Peas and Potatoes cooked in a spicy and tangy sauce.

Ingredients:

• 400g Pre cooked black chickpeas
• 8 White Baby new potatoes
• 1 teaspoon Salt
• 1 teaspoon Chilli powder
• 1/2 teaspoon Turmeric Powder
• 1/2 teaspoon Coriander powder
• 1/2 teaspoon Cumin powder
• 1 teaspoon Lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon Jaggery
• 1/4 teaspoon Mustard seeds
• 1 tablespoon Olive oil
• 3 tablespoons Passata (sieved tomatoes)
• 100 ml  water
• 1 tablespoon Fresh Coriander finely chopped

Method:

1. Wash the new potatoes and keeping the skin on cut them into small pieces.2. Open the 400 g tin of cooked black chickpeas and drain the brine out.3. In a sauce pan add the oil and heat it up on medium heat, when the oil is hot add the mustard seeds and wait for them to splutter.4. Add to the pan the passata, followed by the salt, chilli powder, turmeric powder,coriander and cumin powder and saute the mixture until all the spices infuse into the passata.5. Add the potatoes and 100 ml water and cook the potatoes for 7-8 minutes until almost cooked.6. Add the chickpeas, lemon juice and jaggery and cook the curry for a further 7-8 minutes until potatoes are fully cooked and the gravy has thickened. You can add a little more water if the curry appears dry.7. Turn off the heat and transfer the curry to a serving dish and garnish with the fresh coriander NB-If you are not able to get jaggery add 1/2 teaspoon of palm sugar or brown sugar. I used precooked tinned chickpeas in my curry, you can used the dry variety  which can be soaked overnight and cooked the next day in a pressure cooker.

Details

Prep time: 5 mins Cook time: 15 mins Total time: 20 mins Yield: serves 2

I have had lots of questions as to where to purchase these black chickpeas. They are available precooked in tins in any Asian aisle of major supermarkets or Indian grocery stores.You can also purchase the dried version which would need to be soaked over night and cooked in a pressure cooker to get best results.

Giveaway ~ Oxo Grate and Slice Set

The OXO Good Grips Complete Grate & Slice Set has everything you need for a variety of grating and slicing tasks. The grater comes with a coarse and medium grating surfaces, and straight and julienne slicing surfaces. The grater is compact and versatile and can be used over bowls or plates for quick jobs, or placed on top of the lid.Each grating surface is colour coordinated and the handle on the container provides a secure, comfortable grip and non-slip feet keeping the container steady while grating or slicing. The container also doubles up as a storage for the discs keeping everything stored neatly.

OXO have been really generous and have agreed to giveaway one of these amazing grate and slice set to one simplyfood reader. 

How To Enter:

• Simply complete the Rafflecopter widget below to verify your entries
• Entries can be via blog comment, Facebook, Twitter etc
• This competition is open to UK residents only over the age of 18 .Please read the rules below.
• Leaving a blog comment is mandatory and failure to do so will void any other entries.
• Closing date - 30th April 2015 12.00 am

How Rafflecopter works:

• You will need to complete the mandatory entry first – usually making a blog comment. You can do this by clicking on leave a comment at the bottom of the post and leaving your reply in the comment box.Please note your comment will not show immediately as it needs to be moderated however rest assured it will appear on the site, so carry on with rest of entries.
• Login to Rafflecopter – click to see what the question is. Make a comment answering the question on the blog.
• Go back to Rafflecopter and click the green button to tell me you have made a comment, this will unlock all the other options. All entries are checked to see that the mandatory question is answered, if its not all bonus entries will become void. 
• Rafflecopter will tweet, like and follow on your behalf.
• For information on how to find the URL of your tweet click here. 
• For bonus entries you can return to this page and enter the daily bonus entries. 
• If you are still unsure as to how Rafflecopter works please do check out this short video.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Announcing Event ~Lets Cook for Easter

April brings the celebration of the festival of Easter, with the long weekend its the perfect time to get together and cook up a feast for your family and friends. In this event I am inviting all foodies out there to ccok and link up your Vegetarian Easter dishes.(Eggs Allowed)


To Participate:

1.Prepare a dish vegetarian dish  (eggs allowed) please link your dish using the linky below by entering your Dish Name and Post URL
2.Please link this event announcement with your entry, this is mandatory.
3.Use of logo is  not mandatory but it helps to spread the word if you can post it..
4. Multiple entries are allowed, archived are only allowed if reposted and updated with this event link.
4. In the event of problem using linky you can email me the entry at simplysensationalfood@gmail.com

Please use this format
Your Name:
Recipe Name
Recipe URL
Image no larger than 300 pixels.

An InLinkz Link-up

Inito Restaurant Review

On Saturday a group of like minded food and lifestyle bloggers got together for a fab evening of food and drink at the Inito restaurant in Liverpool Street London , We were invited there by Nitin Dattani who is co founder of the place. 

Visiting Inito was like a culinary journey through the streets of India. The restaurant has been decorated with a "no frills" deco portraying an urban setting of an India dabba. Rustic wooden tables with benches and cushions, metal signs and corrugated iron and crates were tastefully placed to create an ambiance to give you a wonderful street food experience.

On arrival we were greeted and seated at our table by Bruce who is the brainchild of this amazing restaurant from the planning, setting the place up and for the amazing decor of the place. 

The menu has been created by Chef Saurav Nath, who has worked in Michelin star restaurants such as Benares and Gymkhana. We were told that we would be provided with a sampling menu, little were we to know that the evening was going to be a culinary marathon of amazing mouth watering  dish after dish.

As we awaited for everyone to arrive, we enjoyed refreshing salted and mango lassi's and as all food bloggers do, we started clicking photos of the place. Inito caters really well for vegetarians which made me very happy.

Soon our starters of Aloo chat, Masala dosa and Chicken lollipos arrived. The dosa were impressively crisp and the potato filling was delicately spiced and delicious. Chef Saurav was very kind and even shared his secret with me for the ultimate dosa batter and furthermore gave me a tubful to take home too. 








The vegetarians were also served Aloo Tikki chaat,  a spiced potato cake served with tamarind chutney, green coriander chutney and yoghurt chutney garnished with nylon sev.This was absolutely delicious and I could have stopped at a plateful of this only.

We next ventured onto a traditional street food Pani Puri which is served on every street corner in Mumbai. Small crispy puffed puris filled with a chickpea and potato filling and drenched with a spicy mint pani. In Mumbai it is commonly known for people to compete with each other who can consume more than 25-30 of this puffy snacks in one sitting!!!As each puri is popped into your mouth the street vendor makes you a new one, how he keeps account of how many you have eaten is a science of its own!!!

Next course was  Aloo papri chaat , a tangy potato and chickpea dish chaat served with lashings of tamarind and yoghurt chutney and garnished with crispy nylon sev a fried chickpea savory noodles. We also sampled  Bhel Puri another famous Indian street food made from puffed rice, masala peanuts, tamarind chutney and nylon sev. I found this a little spicy with slices of green chillies in it and had to gulp almost three cups glasses of water much to the surprise of my European friends!!

Already having devoured so much food , there was more to come yet as we were served Roti wraps, these were traditional Indian rotis filled with various different fillings. For the vegetarians there was the paneer wraps filled with delicious spicy paneer, spinach, kidney beans, tomatoes and lettuce drenched with a spicy sauce. The non vegetarians enjoyed a selection of prawn, chicken and lamb roti wraps.The Roti wraps were served with a platter of sauces.

At this point our stomachs were really feeling the tightness, but Chef Saurav was insistent that there was more to come. After a short break we were served succulent Paneer tikka and amazing Pav bhaji a freshly baked bun served with a vegetable ragout and garnished with delicately sliced onion salad.The non vegetarians enjoyed a patter of tandoori lamb, tandoori fish, garlicky prawns and chicken called Pav sliders.

With all these amazing food and flavors out taste buds were on fire. Never have I had such an amazing fusion of taste.The hospitality and service we received at Inito was superb and even when we said no more food now, Chef Saurav persuaded us to try the final main course before moving onto desserts!! 

The vegetarins were served Palak Paneer a wonderful spinach and cheese dish sauteed with cumin and garlic and Baigan aur mirch ka salan, aubergine and jalepeno sauteed in a peanut and onion sauce served with the most amazing vegetable biryani. I just wish I had had more room in my bursting stomach to eat the whole portion.The non vegetarians enjoyed Murgh Makhni a chicken dish cooked in a creamy tomato sauce and a lamb curry.The biryani was exquisite cooked in the traditional way in the oven with a dough covering to keep it succulent and moist making each grain of rice separate. It was served with a lovely cooling yoghurt raita.

At this point we were all on serious food overload, and the mention of dessert had us almost wising we had left room for it. However as Indian hospitality goes, the host will will not let you leave without feeling you have done justice to every dish so along came the desserts not 1 not 2 but 4 different desserts. 

First came the Auguri Rasamalai, delicate cheese balls in a sweetened milk sauce, garnished with pistachios followed by warm Gulab Jamun a fried round doughnut type ball soaked in a cardamon sugar syrup.Following this we were presented with a Garam masala chocolate fondant with Horlicks ice cream and a citrus sauce and finally cooling Rose and cardamom kulfi. What an awesome gastronomical experience we had. 

We would all like to thanks Inito for inviting us for this amazing feast. I can't wait to return to Inito again with my family. Next time I will limit my self to 3-4 dishes to give them full justice. 

If you would like to visit Inito you can find them at:
Inito 
31 Bell Lane
E17LA

Tel: 0207 2477145I was invited to Inito for a meal, all views opinions and thoughts are of my personal experience. I was not asked to write a positive review. 

The bloggers who accompanied me to the restaurant are:

Manjiri Chitnis

http://sliceoffme.wordpress.com/

Sylvia Filoz

http://happiness-is-homemade.com/

Tina Chawla

http://www.thespicypear.com/

Fiona Macclean

http://www.london-unattached.com

Madeliene Morrow

http://fromthehealthyheart.com/

Andy Hatten

http://getawriggleon.com/

You can read all the other reviews here:

An InLinkz Link-up

Marbled Chocolate Cheesecake Muffins

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Marbled Chocolate Cheesecake Muffins

by Nayna Kanabar March-25-2015

Delectable cheesecake flavours in a delicious soft muffins.

Ingredients:

• 125 g Cream Cheese
• 150 g Plain Flour
• 175 g Caster Sugar
• 2 Eggs
• 1 teaspoon Vanilla extract
• 100 gCooks Dark Chocolate
• 50 g Butter
• 100 ml Buttermilk
• 1 teaspoon Bicarbonate of soda

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C and line a muffin pan with muffin cases.2. To make the cheesecake mixture, beat the cheese, 25 g flour, 50 g sugar, 1 egg and the vanilla extract. Mix together and keep aside.3.For the chocolate mixture, break the chocolate and place them into a heat proof bowl, add the butter and place the bowl over a pan of simmering water to melt the chocolate.Add the sugar and mix well. Remove the bowl from the heat and leave to cool.4.Sift the remaining flour and bicarbonate of soda on top of the melted chocolate in the bowl and add the egg and the buttermilk and mix well.5. Fill the muffin cases with alternate spoonfuls of the chocolate mixture , followed by the white cheesecake mixture. Using a cocktail stick swirl the mixture slightly.6. Bake the muffins in the preheated oven and bake for 25 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. Once baked remove the muffins from the oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Details

Prep time: 15 mins Cook time: 25 mins Total time: 40 mins Yield: 12 muffins

This post is in collaboration with Dr.Oetker, who want to inspire bakers to bake and to create recipes with their chocolate range. I have chosen this Marbled Cheesecake  muffin recipe which is from their selection of Chocolate recipes.
I have chosen this recipe over others as my family love both cheesecake and muffins and when I saw the recipe there was no better way to combine the two than in this delicious marbled chocolate cheesecake muffins.

Dr.Oetker are also inspiring everyone to get baking and enter their competition via twitter.
How can you enter??

Details:
 Dr. Oetker Twitter Competition

• Dr. Oetker is encouraging bakers to celebrate chocolate by making a yummy chocolate bake.
• Dr. Oetker believes that chocolate tastes even better when you share it, so they want to know who you’ll be sharing your chocolate bake with.
• To enter, just tweet @DrOetkerbakes a photo of a chocolate bake you've made and tell them who you'll be sharing it with, for the chance to win a deluxe hamper of chocolate products from Dr. Oetker using the hashtag #evenbetterbaking

I was sent a selection of Dr.Oetker chocolate products to create my chocolate recipe.