Cheese.

I've really been slacking with the posting here lately, haven't I?! There's some things going on in my real life at the moment that's kind of taking away from my blogging time, but hopefully it'll calm down soon and I can return to my normal blogging schedule (not that I have an actual blogging schedule - I'm horrible at keeping to schedules so I don't even try!). Since I hate strongly dislike it when bloggers post cryptic things without explanation on their blog, I'm going to assure you that I will explain soon. I'll probably even do a whole post on it, ooh.

Anyway, moving on. On Saturday my mother and I ventured up to the Birmingham NEC to go to the Good Food Show Winter. We've been to the summer one for the past few years because it's been at the same time, and in the same show, as the Gardener's World Live show. Since we've realised that we only really go for the food and not the gardens, we decided to go along to the winter show as well this year!

We ate SO MUCH FREE FOOD. It was amazing. From Italian meats to ice cream, yoghurt to quiches, pork pies to cheese, you name it, we ate it. Speaking of cheese, they'd had the World Cheese Awards there a couple of days before, and had all of the cheeses out on display.

I had never seen so much cheese in one place before and, let's be honest, probably never will again. I was impressed. Because yes, I apparently get impressed by cheese.

It was lovely to spend a day out with my mother (even if I did have to get up at 6am on my day off to get there, yeesh!). I'm so looking forward to going home for my birthday (two weeks today, eek!) and getting to spend a proper couple of days there, rather than just seeing my parents for a few hours at a time as I've been doing since I moved down here.

Salmon stir fry.

I've never done a recipe here before because I don't get much time to do proper cooking - I'm usually in work over dinner time, and I'm not hungry enough before work to make a full meal. But yesterday evening I made a really simple and delicious (and maybe almost a little healthy!) meal so I thought I'd share.

Salmon stir fry

You will need:
Salmon (generally one piece per person is enough. I used frozen salmon, but fresh is probably yummier)
Stir fry vegetables (I just used a bag of pre cut and mixed veg from Sainsbury's)
Sharwood's medium soft noodles
Soy sauce
Olive oil
Sweet chilli sauce (optional)

1. Start by cooking your salmon. Since mine was from frozen, I put it on foil, covered it with olive oil and some sweet chilli sauce (because I LOVE sweet chilli sauce like woah) and shoved it in the oven on around 200°C.

2. While that's cooking, start sorting out your stir fry. Since a stir fry doesn't take long, use your judgement as to when you start cooking it - I usually start with about 7 or 8 minutes before my salmon is ready.
Heat some olive oil in a frying pan or wok, then throw as much stir fry veg into the wok as you'd like.

3. After a minute or two, add the noodles.

4. After another minute, add lots of soy sauce (well, how much soy sauce you add is up to you. I like lots!)

5. Once both your stir fry and your salmon are ready, serve the salmon up on a bed of stir fry. Ta-da!

(I'd have had more stir fry had Dan not decided it looked delicious and he wanted some too, so I begrudgingly had to share!)

Date night.

It's half term this week, so to celebrate Dan completing half a term of being a real teacher, and because I had Friday evening and the whole of Saturday off, we went out for a meal and drinks in Frankie & Benny's, yay!

This is what I wore: (cue standard 'in-the-mirror' shot)

Not too dressy, but it was COLD out, and I've never been one for fashion over warmth. That's just crazy to me!

I love Frankie & Benny's. There's such a yummy selection of food, and the cocktails there are super strong and delicious too. I was planning on taking photos of all our courses, but after two glasses of the Long Beach Iced Tea (like Long Island Iced Tea, but with cranberry juice instead of Coke), um, I forgot!

On the bus I realised my lack of pictures, so I tried to take some, but the bus wouldn't stop moving. How inconsiderate.

Dan cooked me a full English breakfast in the morning, because he's super lovely like that :) We went for a walk in some fields afterwards, but I'll save that for another post (something for you guys to look forward to, haha).

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Last night I got to Skype with Sam, one of my best friends from my year in Colorado. We talked for over two hours, and it was so lovely to catch up. We hadn't spoken in far too long. I really miss that girl. Long distance friendships are tough.

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I'm guest posting over at Mary Rebecca's blog today, so you should check it out!

Not being orientated.

Today I got up at 6am and caught the train to Portsmouth, because I was told that my Holiday Inn orientation was today. But when I got there, I discovered that, as it turns out, it wasn't today. It had been rescheduled to last week but no one had told my manager or, you know, me. So I was in Portsmouth for no reason. Awesome.

I decided to make the trip worthwhile and grabbed myself a hot chocolate (since it was SUPER COLD) then did a bit of shopping in Gunwharf Quays. And then I came back to Eastleigh on the train and did a bit more shopping there. Which made me feel a lot better about getting up ridiculously early for nothing.

I picked up a notebook in Paperchase, Cath Kidston sticky notes (in case it wasn't a little bit obvious from my blog background, I love Cath Kidston designs) and a pack of 10 retractable Sharpie pens:

I also managed to get a pretty black and white star dress from the teen section (for age 13, if you can believe that. The age 14 was too big for me, wtf mate?) of New Look - for only £6 in a sale, bargain!

While I was in Eastleigh I noticed a sign in the McDonald's window advertising that the Big Tasty is back. Dan LOVES that burger and was super upset when they stopped doing it at the end of summer, so obviously that meant we had to have dinner at McDonald's this evening. I tried the Big Tasty as well, because for all Dan's rave reviews I'd never tried it. To be fair, it was a v. tasty burger. I just find McDonald's burgers a bit too sloppy and messy. Chicken McNuggets are a much safer option for a messy eater like me!

A meal in London

On Saturday, during that wonderful heatwave that I'm missing already, I went to London to celebrate my friend Emma's birthday with a meal in Jamie's Italian. SUCH good food, seriously.

The British countryside looks so lovely when it's sunny.
[taken from the train window]

These mushrooms were possibly the best thing I've ever eaten. There was a little pot of garlic mayo on the side and the whole thing was just OHMYGODAMAZING. I could happily have eaten this starter another 3 or 4 times over. Everyday for the rest of my life. It was that good.
If you ever go to Jamie's Italian and you love mushrooms: order the mushroom fritti. You will not regret it, my friends!

The brownie I had for dessert was quite sensational as well.

I was a little disappointed not to have more time to just sit and talk to my girl friends, since I hadn't seen them in months, but I suppose that's a good excuse to make sure I see them again soon!