iamafeeder.net

Gizmo dares you to try this soup.

I’ve always preferred the word ‘autumn’ to ‘fall’. It’s such a beautifully romantic word and rolls off the tongue with a sense of majesty which, for me, is exactly what the changing season deserves. ‘Fall,’ whilst apt (what do the leaves do? Duh) is just a little too short-syllabled, a little too basic for my tastes. No matter what you want to call it, with summer long gone and the cold months setting in (especially in London which had an unseasonably late summer and has now snapped to frosty attention), this season calls for root vegetables, warmth and comfort. And so to the humble pumpkin and this soup – warmth, comfort and deliciousness, all in one bowl. Perfection.

(more…)

The other week I had a slight health scare. Y’see, the medication I’m on has the potential to shut down your immune system (scary stuff, I know) so if you start feeling unwell or have a raging sore throat, you’re advised to go and see your doctor immediately or you could be dead within a week. After a wonderful weekend in Brighton celebrating a birthday, I woke up with a horribly sore throat and a slight fever. As I’m sure you can imagine, I panicked.

Waiting to see whether or not you need to go to hospital urgently is not the best way to start a Monday. I was supposed to be working in the city right at that moment and instead I was at home, waiting for the email. It finally came, “go to the hospital” and I was off, fighting through the mid-morning crowds at Waterloo. The first nurse couldn’t find a vein. “Do you have problems giving blood?” He asked, my answer a curt shake of the head and a tense, “no. Not ever.” The second nurse had a quick look at me and plunged the needle into my right arm, drawing blood immediately. They sent me home where I waited for the results whilst trying to work. A few hours later they came back: I wasn’t dying.

(more…)

Food has always been incredibly central for my family. Every major event has been told over a dinner or a lunch, every holiday celebrated with a spread that was enough to feed a small army, though there were usually only four of us at the dinner table.

Life for my mother consisted of an early start to feed my father, my brother & I, a mad dash into school where we’d be dropped off and collected by car every day, a small snack to help us through homework, a martini or other cocktail for my father when he returned home, and dinner on the table every evening by 7pm (sometimes on little tables in the TV room, if we were lucky). Every single day growing up, this was the way we operated. It was routine; it was synonymous with family.

(more…)

Sadly not my photo!

As you read this I’ve landed in Hong Kong and am at my grandmother’s place to begin my adventure. In the meantime, as promised, here is a brand new feature for I Am A Feeder: Momma Lee’s Naughty Corner! Yep, I love her, you love her, and Momma Lee will be sharing anecdotes, recipes and answering your questions periodically. I just hope she doesn’t say anything too embarrassing… if you have a question you’d like Momma Lee to answer, please send me an email with Momma Lee’s Naughty Corner in the subject field – foodie related or life related – she’ll answer them all! Hope you enjoy and update you on my Odyssey soon!

Momma Lee’s Naughty Corner
….too old for ecstasy, too young for lawn bowls*……
(*esoteric and quintessentially British Empire type game of rolling balls over immaculate lawns whilst others take afternoon tea and look on: like curling, without the ice and the mops.)

Well hello my dahlings! I am Momma Lee. Goodness gracious me, not entirely sure how I got here; but I suppose it’s through Baby Lee’s occasional references to my hyuk-hyukking in the corner as she typed her little socks off about her sundry exploits in the kitchen. That has somehow sparked a curiosity amongst some of her readership as to the identity of this invisible guffawer. This then, is my come-uppance: instead of writing 200 lines of “I will not laugh in the kitchen”, I am to sit in my Naughty Corner and become, literally, a Yummy Mummy – and talk to you once in a while about food and cookery. It is after all, my passion as much as it is my daughter’s: she inherited it from me and from ancestors who all loved food, and had food stories to tell. I will share some of those stories and family recipes with you each time I appear in my corner.

(more…)

Pho-A-Licious, originally uploaded by jaxies.

Wow. So I have a couple of things to apologise for. Firstly, I am SO sorry about the quality of these photos. Suffice to say I was having some serious issues with my camera that evening. I don’t even remember why, I was just having issues. Secondly, I’ve been pretty quiet, eh? Sorry about that! Things have been a little crazy over the past few days and I haven’t cooked anything new and/or significant. I’m a working girl now, my time is not my own! Well, sometimes.

The good news is that I’ve got a few recipes I’m in the process of developing and they look like they’re going to be REALLY good. I’ve just kinda got to figure them out, test them, perfect them and then I can blog about them. But for now you’ll have to make do with another write-up because that’s all I’ve got on the back-burner!

Oh, also, whilst I remember, my very good friend Alex and I are talking about doing some guest posting. Alex is one of the cleverest, nicest and coolest people I know, not only because he is side-splittingly funny, but also because he’s a damn good cook and a Vegan at that. He also has beautiful tattoos all over his arms. There’s no relation to food behind that – I just like his ink. In the meantime you should check out his Tumblr to see what he’s been eating and making. He and his beautiful girlfriend Catriona often invite me over for an evening of Vegan Tasties and I’m always well fed. In fact, thanks to them, I could quite happily be Vegan… that is if I didn’t like meat so much. Watch this space for a guest post from Alex very soon.

Well then. The meat of this post. Vietnamese pho. I cannot tell you how much I love Vietnamese pho. I had been craving this for weeks before I finally sat down to a steaming bowl. I’d even been dreaming about it. Why is it so great? Let me count the ways.

(more…)