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Rachel’s

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On Tuesday, I handed in my final year project report and today, the poster and website to go with it! After months of work it feels weird that it’s all done (and scary, it’s worth quite a lot of my degree!). You’d think I’d be out celebrating but no, I’ve got more coursework due in tomorrow!  I’ve literally had no time recently to buy/use/review anything exciting but a few weeks ago I was sent a load of products from Rachel’s to try out, so even if I didn’t have time to shop, I did have time to eat!
There was way too much for me to eat on my own so the girls I live with helped me out and we’re all in agreement, we love Rachel’s! I’m not going to review each product separately as there’s only so much you can say about yogurt but we were really surprised by lots of the flavours. I wasn’t at all sure about the coconut yogurts but they actually have a perfect balance of coconut and fruit so are really tasty. The breakfast yogurts are good for mornings when you are in a rush and they are also quite filling because of the granola.

The big tubs are a good size for sharing but seeing as we had so much, and I had a cake craving, I decided to attempt to make yogurt cupcakes. They turned out quite well but I haven’t got any photos because I didn’t ice them (no time!) so they didn’t look like anything special. I used the Apple and Elderflower yogurt which gave the cakes a sweet, delicate flavour. I reckon they are also much better for you than normal cake as there is hardly any butter and the yogurt is low fat. You could use any of the yogurt flavours (I might try some blackcurrant ones with the leftover blackcurrant yogurt next, I love the colour!) and some of them are fat free so would be even healthier! Here’s the recipe in case you want to try them….
Ingredients

  • 250g self raising flour
  • 200g caster sugar
  • 225ml Rachel’s Apple and Elderflower Yoghurt
  • 50 g butter
  • 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

Method

  • Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. Mix the butter and sugar to a breadcrumb consistency. Beat in the yogurt. Then fold in the flour and bicarbonate of soda. Split into cupcake cases and bake for around 15 minutes. (I ended up with loads of cakes – 11 normal sized ones and about 12 mini ones).


Out of all the products I was sent, my favourite would have to be the rice puddings. They are the nicest, creamiest, non homemade rice puddings I’ve ever had in the world!

Rachel’s products are all made using locally sourced organic ingredients and are available in supermarkets throughout the country.

Valentine’s Day Yumminess!

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We don’t usually do much for Valentine’s Day other than cook a nice meal – the past few years that hasn’t even been on Valentine’s Day itself what with us being in uni in different places!  Here are a few things I’ve found which would be perfect for Valentine’s Day……

1. Guylian chocolates – how can you not love these!

2. Fudges hampers.  There are a few different sizes with different things inside.  I’ve tried some of the crackers and biscuits before and they are really good so I think these would be a great idea for foodies.

3. The Mercers Chocolate Sauce & Salted Caramel Sauce.  These taste amazing and are just £2 each!

4. Firefly Love Potion – makes a change from the usual Valentine’s Day champagne!  This tastes nice on its own but can also be mixed for cocktails.

5. Olives et Al’s Chilli Harissa.  This is nice and garlicky and tastes really good with lamb.

6. Jamie Oliver’s chocolate bars.  I like the packaging and they’re fair trade as well.

Swizzels Matlow

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I know there are people who don’t like talking about Christmas until December, let alone buying presents before then.  I’m not one of those people – I love Christmas!!!  If I see a good Christmas present for someone, I’ll buy it no matter what time of year it is and I properly start looking for presents around September/October time.

I’ve come across these tubes from Swizzels Matlow which I think are perfect little gifts so I thought I’d share them with you.  They are just like the tubes you see everywhere around Christmas time which contain mini chocolate bars with one small difference – they contain sweets instead.  You can get three different tubes, Drumsticks, Refreshers, Love Hearts.  For just £1.49 for 120g you can’t really go wrong!

Choccy Munchy Seeds with Chilli & Ginger

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A few months ago I tried the new Choccy Munchy Seeds with Apricot and absolutely loved them so was happy to find out that there is another new flavour – Belgian Dark Chocolate with Chilli and Ginger.

The seeds are a really tasty snack.  They fill you up much better than a bar of chocolate and there’s not as much guilt as they are also healthier!  The chilli is not overpowering, it just gives the seeds a bit of heat.  The ginger bits are lovely and sweet – my only complaint would be that there’s not enough of it!

Choccy Munchy Seeds are available in 50g bags or 200g tubs, either from the website or from Harvey Nichols foodhalls.

The Chocolate Moon

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After Tuesdays post on the Christmas chocolate puddings, I’ve got into the Christmas spirit and have found another brilliant chocolate idea……

Has anyone heard of The Chocolate Moon?  They are a company which deliver luxury chocolates straight to your door and the chocolates look amazing!  The Chocolate Moon have come up with a fantastic Christmas gift – a YEARS SUPPLY OF CHOCOLATE!

Each box of chocolates is really well presented, looks luxurious and tastes scrumptious (well, I’ve only sampled one box but all of the chocolates look delicious so I’m sure they taste delicious too!).  A box of chocolates is sent to the recipient monthly and you can choose the twelve boxes from a wide range of truffles and chocolates on the website.

The year of chocolates costs £99 but there is the option to send a box every two months for £55 or double the amount of chocolate for £149.  I think this is a brilliant idea!

ChocOnChoc

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I know it might be too early for some of you to start thinking about Christmas but I always start Christmas shopping around now and I found these cute chocolates a few days ago so just had to mention them!

The 36g Christmas puddings are handmade from white and dark Belgian chocolate and even have some sparkly edible glitter on top!  The Christmas puddings come in packs of 4 and are perfect little stocking fillers.

Champagne Afternoon Tea

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On Friday, Nick took me to the Park Plaza in Cardiff for a Champagne Afternoon Tea which was a very late birthday present (my birthday was in November in case you are wondering)!  As part of the deal, we were allowed a few hours in The Laguna Health & Spa before we ate.  Instead of using the gym, we opted to use the pool area with a steam room and Jacuzzi .  The pool was quite different – it has a metal floor, not tiles like I’m used to – and the Jacuzzi and steam room were the perfect temperatures so we were nice and relaxed for our tea!

We had the Afternoon Tea in The Laguna Kitchen and Bar.  First we were given a glass of Champagne while we chose our teas and waited for our food to arrive.  The food, when it arrived, both looked and tasted delicious!  There was the perfect amount of everything so that although we were full, we weren’t completely stuffed at the end.

I won’t describe every last detail but here are some photos so you can see how pretty the food looked!

We had a fantastic afternoon and would love to go back again!

Posh Pick & Mix

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Posh Pick & Mix, surprisingly, sell pick & mix!  There are three different sized jars you can choose from which are filled with your choice of sweets.  With the smallest jar you can pick 4 different varieties of sweets and with the biggest you can choose 8.  There is a good range of sweets – boiled old fashioned sweets, chocolaty things, chewy sweets……

You can also customise your label so that if you are sending the sweets as a gift, the person will know who they are from.  I had a jar sent to me to give to my dad for Father’s Day but it is so well packed that I could have just had it sent straight to his house.  The jar also comes with a little metal scoop like you get in sweet shops which is a nice touch!

Guylian Mini Filled Eggs

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These Guylian Mini Filled Eggs are absolutely delicious!  There are three flavours; milk chocolate truffle, milk chocolate praline and dark chocolate praline.  I couldn’t pick a favourite, they are all melt-in-your-mouth scrumptious and at £3.69 for 185g they make a slightly different and luxurious Easter treat!

Choccy Munchy Seeds

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When I was offered some Choccy Munchy Seeds to review I was really not sure about them as I’m not generally a fan of seeds.  To be honest, I probably wouldn’t have said yes if there wasn’t ‘choccy’ in the name!

These seeds however are absolutely delicious.  Each packet contains a mixture of pumpkin and sunflower seeds coated with the perfect amount of chocolate and the little bits of apricot taste great as well.  They make a brilliant snack as they are surprisingly filling so stop you wanting to eat more.  You can buy Choccy Munch Seeds from Lakeland, Ocado, Waitrose and some Tesco stores.  I think they would be perfect for vending machines as they make a healthy but tasty alternative to chocolate bars and sweets!

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