fantabulous sugar cookies, literally

Posted on by
Reply

vanilla & almond sugar cookies

It’s no secret that I have an affinity for the word “fantabulous”.

I know it’s not a real word, & I’m not trying to suggest that other people get on board with my blatant disregard for the english language.

What I am saying is, that this is a word that reminds me of my sister Amyra. She & I have a deep-seeded love for Eddie Izzard & his comic marveling. So when I miss her, I use it more often.

I also felt that the word was appropriate for today. I’ve decided my future will be fantabulous!

Ok. Truth time.

Our future at Hotel Ploes has come to a rather abrupt end. There is no ill will held by either parties as nothing was actually done wrong, however, they have decided to close down the kitchen & all its production. Kitchens take a lot of work & when it was fully understood how many changes would need to be made & how much work was involved, it was decided that they weren’t up to the task.

We part on peaceful & pleasant terms though.

I did myself a little comfort baking last night. You know, just to soften the blow. Sugar cookies have a way of softening blows. Whilst doing this baking I was half missing my sister, terribly, & half contemplating the future & what I reckoned it held for me. I decided that no matter what would happen, it should in fact be fantabulous.

Hence the cookies. I’m starting the new chapter of my life with a sweet & positive attitude. A vanilla & almond flavored attitude.

Continue reading →

thin & crispy pizza crust

Posted on by
Reply

pizza dough recipe: gluten free, egg free, dairy free, sugar freeI use instagram to procrastinate.

When I just don’t feel like doing something, i sit & troll through peoples pictures until I miraculously find the motivation needed to do the thing I was avoiding doing in the first place.

Today it just so happens I was trying to avoid thinking about food.

Not that I wasn’t hungry or didn’t want to eat. It’s just, well, I had fresh basil from the garden, a bulb of garlic, some delicious tomato sauce & a huge block of parmesan…. & the only things to put all these wonderful ingredients on were this disgusting gluten-free spaghetti, or rice.

No motivation I tell you.

It just seemed like such a waste!

Back to instagram…

I follow this cake designer who goes by the name of The Sugared Saffron. Turns out, she made home-made pizza for her kids & they loved it. What I loved, was the picture.

It looked glorious.

It’s been a while since I had pizza. I was sold on the picture she posted immediately.

That’s how this recipe came about.

The only way to have pizza, was to make my own gluten-free pizza crust. I’m very happy with this recipe. It rolls out thin, the edges get super crispy, the middle has a slight chew, it kind of reminds me of a whole-grain crust since it has flaxseed in it. It was just, delicious!

I’m not ashamed to say that I’ve eaten two pizzas. Well, one & a half… I shared with Mel because I’m a good fiance.

Here it is. My pizza dough.

It’s gluten-free. Dairy free. Egg free. & sugar free. It would be vegan too if it wasn’t for the honey. So close!

I haven’t included a recipe for the toppings, I kind of just threw everything on there in a big heap. My mouth was watering too much to keep track of what was going on. My apologies. Next time.

Continue reading →

an enticing menu

Posted on by
Reply

It’s official. Hotel Ploes has opened up Cafe Ploes for business as of 08:00am yesterday morning!

It was an action packed first day full of prep work just trying to get the kitchen ready for dinner in the evening.

I’m happy to report that we had two people over for dinner!

As of tonight, there is an expected dinner party of 8, and hopefully a few walk-ins too.

On the off chance of enticing more people to join us for breakfast, brunch, dinner or cocktails, I’ve posted up the Cafe Plous menu which is available for all to see.

Take a gander & maybe…. book yourself a room over at the luxury boutique hotel so that you can come & enjoy the food, booze & view with us.

Picture 1

matcha macarons

Posted on by
2

matcha green tea macarons with a dark chocolate ganache

I’m not obsessed I’m not obsessed I’m not obsessed I’m not obsessed.

Ok, I’m obsessed.

Well, maybe that’s only a half truth.

I mentioned yesterday that macarons are on the menu for Hotel Ploes. It’s because of that reason that I created these ones. The hotel is trying to design packaging for the Italian cookies since we’re going to be selling them in boxes. Due to that, I have an extremely good excuse for posting up another macaron recipe.

There will be lots of recipes going up for these as it so happens since I’ll constantly be changing them up to keep things interesting & “fresh”.

Today’s recipe was inspired by the contents in my fridge. The last of my matcha green tea powder was hiding in the back & it was about time it was put to some good use.

I changed it up a bit though. To date, I’ve been flavoring the filling of the macarons. Today, I decided to flavor the macaron shell instead.

See, I can keep things interesting.

I’ll whip up another batch for the hotel in a week once the new packaging is in & show off what these little beauties look like when they’re ready to go.

Continue reading →

welcome to Palazzo Ploes

Posted on by
Reply

I think I’ve mentioned briefly in my cinnamon roll post that my boss was asking me to look into recipes. What I failed to mention though was that my boss, was a new boss.

Here’s the news we’ve been holding on to for a little over a month now….

Mel & I got hired as a cooking-duo over at a little boutique hotel in Syros called Palazzo Ploes. It’s a gorgeous place with an incredible view & glorious artwork. I don’t know how we got so lucky, but somehow, we did.

I’ve got the breakfast shift taking care of all items breakfast, brunch & sweet.. & Mel will be terrorizing the kitchen in the evening taking care of dinner, snacks & cocktails.

Palazzo Ploes kitchen (image taken from their website)(this is a partial view of the kitchen, I took the image directly from the hotel website)

I think it would be safe to say that we’ve been very blessed in this.

One of the coolest things on going is that we’ve been working closely in the kitchen with a chef by the name of Antonia Clare Grant, who’s been Michelin trained on a couple of occasions. She’s been in charge of designing the bulk of the menu & teaching us the tips & tricks to expand our range. Mel has been putting in his two-cents as often as he can to leave his mark on the menu & he’ll also be in charge of creating some new & exciting cocktails for us.

I, of course, have been left in charge of dreaming up the desserts. Not to mention, there may even be a little side business going on where we’ll be doing boxes of my macarons for the guests.

Aaaaaaand, we were also shipped off to Mykonos (literally) last week to learn the ins & outs of cocktail making from a wonderful guy named Babis who works over at Passo Doble.

It’s all pretty exciting!

So here we are. Two very lucky individuals getting to have our cake & eat it too! I’ll be trying to keep a diary of the on-goings in the kitchen. New recipes, daily specials, how we’re progressing, etc… I think it will help us keep on top of things & hopefully generate some excitement over the hotel.