Breakfast at Le Chalet

Christmas spirit is something that can be easily lost when you work in a hospital, so I make extra effort to go and find it. The issue is, I'm not a big fan of the cold. I end up wrapped inside massive coats clutching hot drinks constantly. 

Le Chalet was the perfect place to get some festive cheer, a Ski-Lodge themed pop up restaurant on the 5th floor of Selfridges and so I booked a birthday breakfast for P.  Travelling up a private elevator (which apparently used to be used by Mr Selfridges to transport his wife and later his other dalliances to his offices) you'll find a beautiful, fairy light covered walkway leading into the restaurant. 

We were shown to our seats and quickly ordered some choctails. Alcoholic hot chocolates, could you dream of better breakfast drinks? P ordered the choc-work orange which tasted like a melted Terry's chocolate orange with a kick, and I ordered the Hazelnut, which had a much more subtle nutty flavour! Have a look at the crystallised orange peel on the top, the attention to detail!

 The restaurant was designed brilliantly, from the blankets draped over chairs to keep you warm and the twinkling lights to the open kitchen which filled the place with the smell of cooking food. Our waiter - who you can see in the background of the picture below was wonderful.  Extremely polite and gave excellent recommendations when we were struggling which drinks to pick.

We quickly moved onto the food, and started with a Blue Cheese Fondue. Deliciously salty, it came with a serving of garlicy bread and was demolished in about 5 minutes. This was my favourite dish by far.

We then shared a plate of woodland mushrooms and a ducks egg. Almost cooked to perfection, the salt did start to become a bit too much, but nevertheless the plate was spotless when we finished.

Dessert came in the form of a waffle, topped with caramelised bananas. I've only recently started eating bananas, and I'm still on the fence as to whether or not I actually like them, but dressed in caramel I most certainly do. 

They say breakfast is your most important meal of the day and I can't think of a better way to enjoy it! Le Chalet is running until mid January hurry up and book a table, with its massive windows looking out onto the roofs of Mayfair, it's a meal I won't forget in a hurry. You'll find them here.

Carrot Cake Cupcakes

I love a good carrot cake so I’ve tried a few and while I don’t really want to oversell this, I think I’ve found the best recipe of the batch. A deliciously moist sponge with the perfect amount of spice interspersed with chunks of walnuts and pecans to add some depth to the texture.  I based my recipe on the one from the hummingbird bakery, but adjusted it slightly to make them spicier. Pecans and walnuts for extra flavor, and cupcakes because what could be better than your own mini cake. 

Just look at that perfect dome! 

To make your own you do need a whole host of ingredients; 300ml of vegetable oil, 3 eggs, 300grams of brown sugar, 300grams self raising flour, 1/2tsp of salt, 1tsp cinnamon, 1tsp of ginger, 1tsp of nutmeg, 1/2tsp of ground cloves, 1tsp vanilla essence. 300grams grated carrots, 75gr chopped pecans, 75 grams of chopped walnuts.  I managed to get 20 cupcakes out of this recipe.

Once you’ve gotten all of that together, you want to whisk together the eggs, sugar and oil until you have something that looks like this:

Make sure you’ve got plenty of air mixed in; it helps with the fluffiness of the cupcakes later on. Add all your dry ingredients to this, gently folding them into the mix. The batter will start to thicken up and be much nicer on the eyes. Finally, add your vanilla essence and you’re done.

Pour your mix into muffin trays filling them 2/3 of the way.  These rise beautifully so don’t over do it, bake for exactly 22 minutes at 170 degrees and finally you’ll be left with these. PS. Ignore the ones in the middle on the far right and left they were misbehaving.

Personally I think these are best straight from the oven, with a cup of tea. If you manage to have any left over by the time they’re cooled, cream cheese icing on top is pretty much the perfect pairing.

Check out these beauties : ) I took them to work the next day and they were demolished by 11am.

Tom's Deli

Brunch is possibly my favourite meal of the day. It's the epitome of a lazy day for me; a nice lie in, and then hop over to somewhere delicious to have someone else make me food. 

A little while ago, the other half and I decided to go to Tom's Deli in Notting Hill. To me this place is like an alice in wonderland grotto for food. Sweets, coffee, salad bar, you name it; plus it has stars hanging from the ceiling so it gets a thumbs up from me.  It's always full, so we got there early and managed to find a seat in a dark back corner. By the time we left the queue was halfway down the street. 

I got avocado, poached eggs and salsa on toast, and  he got the veggie breakfast. Both cooked to perfection, and utterly divine.  I scoffed down all of mine and probably half of his. 

lollipops the size of my head!
If you'd like to visit you can find Tom's at: 
Tom's Deli
226 Westbourne Grove
London
W11 2RH
020 7221 8818