Inspiration & Creation

One of the most frequent questions I am asked is where do we get our inspiration from for our products and recipes. Phil likes to recount how he will put together food trends information with our insider knowledge of the industry for our internal brainstorming sessions to create a list of potential new products. And then how I will sneak off into the kitchen and ignore everything we have talked about to create something completely different!

Creativity thrives in all walks of life and how great it is that we get to work with something edible and so fun!

Take our Consultant Awards Recipe Challenge – we just love reading our consultant's innovative ways of using My Secret Kitchen products from how to spice up a slimmer’s recipe with Nacho Fiesta Cheese Ball Mix (Vicky Gatenby) and secretly spiced roast vegetables (Sarah Price). These are just some of the recipes we received and look out for the published recipes from our top 3 winners - Hazel Kerr's Salmon en Croute with Wild Garlic, Susie Medcalf's Maple Caramel & Pecan Roulade and overall winner, Anne Hale's Moqueca Soup.

Our Hibiscus & Rose Reduction was a particular favourite for some inventive recipes, Becky Boast's Raspberry & Rose Sorbet and Georgie Lovell's Hibiscus & Rose Jelly Tartlets - just a couple of ways to use our sweet and tantalisingly tasty syrup which just happens to feature in a rather fabulous host  promotion in August! :-)

Becky Boast's Raspberry & Rose Sorbet

Georgie Lovell's Hibiscus & Rose Jelly Tartlets

Recipe development is often simply what I feel like making and sharing at that particular moment. Left to my own devices I have no doubt that my diet would be atrocious - it is the desire to share good food with our children, family, friends and of course our customers that really motivates me.

Flavour inspiration can come from many sources. The obvious choices for inspiring creativity are being outside in this gorgeous weather and being aware of nature around you. Music is a huge part of our household and there is always time for a favourite song to be cooked into a recipe and a spot of kitchen dancing. Exercise too – the solitary kind – is my drug of choice. It gives my mind the freedom to wander whilst beating my body into submission!

Maybe surprisingly I don’t watch many TV cookery programmes and my magazine subscriptions have dwindled to just a few travel and home publications. However, strolling up and down supermarket aisles is a must to keep on top of what is ‘out there’ and I can spend hours hunting for a new ingredient to try.

Ultimately, trusting that your own unique ideas are always there to be discovered and unearthed is a good philosophy. The worst thing you can do is overthink it or compare your culinary work to others and don’t take yourself too seriously – believe me, laughter has saved many a situation in the My Secret Kitchen story!

I guess the key to creativity is finding your own inspiration sources and making time for them regularly in your life. I know I am a better mother, wife and business person when I have given priority to the things I need and love in my life. So thank-you for your recipe inspiration too - being the best you to inspire the best in others is the sweetest prize of all.

Sugar & Spice

Cinnamon, Apricot & White Chocolate Whirls

Blueberry Honeycomb Loaf

 

Slow Roasted Tomatoes with Spiced Sea Salt & Smoked Oil

Sugar and spice and all things nice! We're revelling in the delights of all things spicy in our kitchen this week and by spicy we mean amazing tastes and flavours - not just chilli! Inspired by our host promotion this month, which is a collection of Secret Vanilla Pudding Spices (with cinnamon and roasted cassia), Secret Honeycomb Spices (with honeycomb, bee pollen and green anise) and our very special Spiced Sea Salt grinder (with lemon oil and chipotle), here are my three favourite recipes. All these recipes have our signature 'easy-peasy' philosophy with My Secret Kitchen products providing that extra touch  and are perfect for laid back week-end cooking. Enjoy!
Clare
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Mayday Mayday!

A little late in the month you may say, but I've good reason to be shouting for mayday help in my kitchen this week. We are packing our bags ready for an American adventure - 3 weeks travelling across the USA, visting friends and generally eating our way across the country. So like all holiday makers, I'm eeking out the storecupboard and left overs trying to create satisfying meals with whatever we have left to spare another trip to the supermarket.

In particular, our White Wine and Porcini Finishing Sauce has come to the rescue giving a welcome lift to some left over chicken, a tasty twist on mashed potato and an odd concoction of frozen spinach, puy lentils and some coley portions (perhaps never to be repeated again).

I was chatting to our Sue who often has the dilemma of feeding several teenagers and boyfriends who drop by at a moments notice and with fondness she recalled the evening where she served four different types of potato dish. Nobody seemed to mind, afterall, a full tummy is a happy tummy.  So as an ode to the potato and our White Wine & Porcini Finshing Sauce here are our recipes for Stuffed Baby Potatoes, and Twice Baked Sweet Potatoes. May they be your rescue remedy one day too,
Enjoy!
Clare
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Bake me I'm yours...

Please don't hate me, but I feel compelled to tell you that it is National Doughnut Week. Anyone who has experienced a warm just-from-the-fryer doughnut dripping in sticky glaze or a sugar encrusted churros dipped in hot chocolate will understand the fascination that doughnuts have around the world. 

From Saturday 11th May to Saturday 18th May, bakeries around the country are frying up a storm and selling doughnuts all for a good cause in the shape of The Children's Trust.  The Children's Trust is a national charity providing rehabilitation, care and education to children with acquired brain injury, multiple disabilities and complex health needs. National Doughnut Week has raised over £755,000 for children’s charities in the last 21 years; you can find local bakeries taking part in the fun here.

Whilst I have not made any doughnuts recently per se, my take on National Doughnut Week is to make a simpler version with puff pastry stuffed with our Fig Pudding Pickle and Secret Honeycomb Spices and then tied in a knot. Then warm from the oven it is brushed with a milk icing or glaze - rather like a yum yum but without the fry factor.

I call them Fig & Honey Dough-Knots.....(get it?) and with everyone slightly different from the next it just adds to their home-baked charm; find the recipe here

Fig & Honey Dough-Knots

If you have been a guest at one of my tastings you will have heard me say 'I'm not a baker' and I make no apology for repeating it at every tasting because it is the honest truth. Cakes as flat as pancakes and pastry like rock candy are in my repertoire. Hence the strong motivation from day one when we developed My Secret Kitchen to create mega easy and foolproof products and recipes, especially the bakery mixes.

And just because we are about to embark on a 3 week tour of USA, back to where it all began, here are my Smore's Honeycomb Brownies, find the recipe here

I rather like this photo as they look as if they have been sent from heaven and believe me on the rainy days we have had recently it sure feels that way as they come out of the oven - I recommend inviting friends to just pull a wedge of sticky marshmallow and brownie heaven and eat with your fingers.

So happy doughnut week everyone and happy fundraising to The Children's Trust, I can think of no better way to help spread a little love and care so mis-happy baking too.

Clare
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Kitchen Essentials - 3 things I couldn't live without....

My kitchen is my happy place and even more so in the past few days as I've been busy working on new products for My Secret Kitchen.  Its like re-connecting with the business all over again - an authentic food business that creates amazing foods to make meals more amazing.  Six years later and I still love the awesome challenge of creating new foods for our customers and consultants to fall in love with too.

They say staying in is the new going out which is great for someone who loves being in the kitchen but not so great if you don't. And that is the beauty of My Secret Kitchen products - adaptable for everyday and the wow factor for special occasions without spending hours cooking when we are all so time-poor.  Little luxuries are the name of the game and little gadgets can be big helpers too in the kitchen. So here are 3 essentials that I couldn't live without in my kitchen...

NUMBER 1 - Spatulas and Tasting Spoons (plus a few My Secret Kitchen products)

Next to the hob is my trusty pot of spatulas and tasting spoons to get every last luscious drop (or lick) of yumminess from the bowl and who could call themselves a good home cook if they don't sample what they are making along the way? Also my personal culinary team in the form of My Secret Kitchen Oak Smoked Rapeseed Oil, My Secret Kitchen Lemon & Chipotle Spiced Sea Salt, My Secret Kitchen Balsamic Reduction, My Secret Kitchen Secret Firecracker Chilli Spices and My Secret Kitchen Secret Wild Garlic Spices.

NUMBER 2 - A Beautiful Mixing Bowl

 

 

William Morris said have nothing in your homes that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful. My mixing bowl does both and regardless of what comes out of the oven after said mixing I get a zen-like satisfaction from using my beautiful 'Bixing Mowl' (family joke).

 

NUMBER 3 - Music Maestro Please

 

 

No kitchen is complete without a media area - aka the phone, DAB radio and ipod docking station. Dancing in he kitchen is optional but music is a must in our family and our time in the kitchen.  Its the unwritten rule that Planet Rock is on Saturday mornings and Radio 2 on Sunday mornings (who doesn't adore Steve Wright's Love Songs). During the week my ipod plays various playlists, this week Ellie Goulding, Paramore and Fall out Boy; maybe you just might be able to taste a little musical magic in our finished products?

This blog wouldn't be complete without a recipe or two so here's a work in progress - Maple Caramel Florentines with Apricots, presented pre-baking in a rather nice bowl....I'll let you know how they turn out....

Romancing Recipes

You know what they say about hearts and tummies. I'm sure we all have our favourite recipes for romance or when out to impress a new love. Beef Wellington was a favourite of mine back in the day, but I'll admit rather sheepishly that I don't think I have prepared it in the 10 years or so of married life. Funny how times change. It's my beloved's birthday this week and I love an excuse to spend hours in the kitchen on one special meal, so I've been reminiscing about recipes we've literally loved and lost.

Phil's Normandy Pork is quite possibly legendary with the ladies in his teenage haunt of Aylesbury so here is my homage to him - pork shoulder with caramelised apples, shallots and cooked with cider and a healthy dose of Jumping Jack Chilli Jam.....
(Find the recipe here)

A homage to romance - Phil's Normandy Pork with Jumping Jack Chilli Jam

 

I was interested to find out more recipes for romance, so from our own MSK Laura...

"My meal was always chicken in a cream sauce served with sauté potatoes - it was something my mum used to make & I loved. The My Secret Kitchen version includes a few of our fabulous staples that my cupboard would never be without - Oak Smoked Rapeseed Oil, Secret Wild Garlic Spices & Lemon & Chipotle Spiced Sea Salt, and an ingredient that really brings this dish to life & up to date: White Wine & Porcini Finishing Sauce. Voila the new & improved Creamy Chicken Stir Fry with White Wine & Porcini Finishing Sauce."

(Find the recipe here)

Creamy Chicken & Mushroom Stir Fry

 

 

And from another friend of MSK who shall remain nameless...

 

" I can't remember cooking to impress a man myself, in fact I was too scared I'd blow it that I had a friend cook for me & sneak the casserole in the back door! ( Unknown to my now husband!!!). I do remember impressing a friend when I was flush with the independence of my own earnings & I made a prawn salad which has inspired this lovely My Thai Prawn and Avocado Salad using our gorgeous and zingy Thai Dressing with Kaffir Lime"

(Find the recipe here)

My Thai Prawn & Avocado Salad

 

Do you have some romantic recipes and stories to share? We'd love to hear your own delights and disasters, in the meantime, happy reminiscing....

 

Clare

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Joyous Jack

 

Chilli jam and me go way back. Way back to the early days when Phil brought home a jar of black pepper jelly and suggested we do a similar chilli jelly for our new business 'My Secret Kitchen'.  I wasn't convinced. To me, this chilli jelly stuff was just sugar, water, chillies and not much else.

 

Fast forward a few years and we finally came up with our own take on chilli jam - our now infamous 'Jumping Jack Chilli Jam'.  It took me a while but our sweet sticky bourbon infused onion chutney with honey, molasses and a definite kick of red chillies is much more what you would expect from our kitchen. Its fabulous with sausages, terrific with breaded chicken dippers and fantastic with a simple ploughmans lunch.

 

I've chatted to a few of our consultants and clients this week on their favourite ways in which they enjoy our jam and hands down they all said just some good bread and cheese. So with this in mind, here are some simple recipes and ideas using our joyous Jumping Jack Chilli Jam...

 

Enjoy!

Croissants with Ham and Jam



Jumping Jack Ploughmans Loaf

Grilled Chicken Burger with Jumping Jack and Wild Garlic mayonnaise