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I said I’d give you all an update on how Yoko’s Teppanyaki was on Saturday night and let me tell you, I wasn’t disappointed at all. It was everything I’d been told it was.

Basically it’s a Japanese restaurant. You and whoever is in the restaurant at the time sit around a griddle and your food gets cooked and served right in front of you. You get to see everything that you eat, from raw to cooked, it’s brilliant. You make a choice based on what meat you want from the menu and the rest of the meal stays the same no matter what meat you choose. Claire and I both chose the two meat option, Claire ordered chicken and salmon and I had king prawns and sirloin steak.

First to arrive was a small bowl of salad with a bowl of soup and a small selection of appetisers (fish cake, spring roll, chicken skewers) which was really nice but just got my taste buds watering even more and longing for the steak! Then the chef came over to our table and started preparing our meal. Now the thing about a Japanese meal is that you get a lot of food but it’s separated into lots of courses, the main meal i think has about four. The chef threw some brandy on the griddle and flames went up, I really wanted a picture of this for my project365 but my battery was low, darn. Once the chef had got all his ingredients together he cooked up some bean sprouts in some sauce which i can only assume is soy, salt and pepper, which were lovely if not a little spicy. They definitely had a little kick that’s for sure, just enough to get the side of my mouth, lol. While we were eating our bean sprouts the chef got to work laying some chicken breasts down to cook and the king prawns. James and I both chose a two meat option with steak and prawns, Lauren just had prawns for her meat and I was shocked at just how many she got, there was loads! I’m not jealous, honest. Claire also got her salmon at the same time, which considering Claire isn’t the biggest fish fan, she really enjoyed. So much so that we HAVE to go back, woo!

So while we were eating our first meats the chef was cooking up some egg fried rice which was a real treat to watch, he just stuck a basket of rice on the griddle, cracked 6 eggs on to cook and then mashed the two together, it was great and soooo tasty!

Then it was time for our second meat, I was feeling a bit frisky and ordered my sirloin rare. I’m a big big fan of steak and normally have it medium but decided to be a bit adventurous. It… was… stunning! The outside was hot but the inside was still cold. Sounds odd but I really, really liked it. I wouldn’t go as far as strongly recommending it because I know people are fussy when it comes to meat and blood but for those people having it medium, take the plunge, you might like it.

After all the hot food was done the chef cleaned the griddle and went, simple as that. We then had ice cream, woo.

Well, right now I’m here at RadiorRSP for the Ollie C Show, if you’re around tune in!!!

Has anyone else been watching the BBC series The truth about food? I’ve watched the last three episodes and it’s great. Basically the show proves or disproves popular theories about what, how, when and how much we eat and drink. As someone with more than a passive interest in food I’ve found it to be a really eye opening series and hope that everyone else would too. I highly recommend watching it

Has anyone else seen The Texas Chainsaw Massacre(2003 version)? I started watching it but stopped because it was too late and I was tired, it was also moving really slow. Is the 2003 version or the 1974 version better? I think I’ll have to watch both of them and see.

Today Claire and I went to The George in Wormald Green for lunch. We’ve been trying to go somewhere at least every two weeks for lunch or dinner as part of my new years resolution to get out and about more and so far it’s working. So we went to The George, in the off chance that there would be room as it always looks pretty busy and I must say that we’re both pretty impressed.

Claire had char-grilled 8oz steak burger in a bun topped with mozzarella, salad and chips and I had pan fried chicken breast on savoy cabbage, bacon and saute potatoes with a red wine jus. The atmosphere was great and it was refreshing to eat a restaurant that’s so relaxed.

I can definitely suggest The George for a great meal.

This is the first of hopefully more than one food blog entry and today I’m going to talk you through making a Chocolate Flake Cake.

Ingredients Needed:
Bases:

• 100g/4oz plain chocolate
• 100g/4oz butter
• 3 tablespoons golden syrup
• 100g/4oz icing sugar, sifted
• 175g/6oz cornflakes

Filling and decoration:

• 300ml/1/2pint whipping cream
• 225g/8oz(1/2lb) strawberries, halved
• 6-8 milk chocolate flakes

First off grease two 17.5cm/7inch shallow cake tins butter or margarine will do fine.

Place the chocolate in a pan with the butter and syrup and heat very gently until the chocolate has melted. Stir in the sugar and cornflakes and mix well. You could also at this point put some grated orange rind in to give chocolate orange but we didn’t bother. It doesn’t need it if you ask me.

Next, divide the mixture between the prepared tins, press lightly with a spoon and chill in the fridge until the chocolate has set again.

After the chocolate has set and you have two round chocolate cornflakes discs turn them out carefully onto a board. Whip the cream and pipe or spoon equally onto both bases. Hold onto your best looking strawberries for the top of the cake and put the rest onto one base. Place second base onto the base with your strawberries and cream on, decorate top with flakes and strawberries. As this has fresh cream in it is important to eat it within a maximum of two days of making. That’s assuming it lasts two hours.

You should end up with something like this:

Me and Claire have just got back from a fantastic meal at perk up in Ripon. If anyone local reads this or wants a far fetched meal then I suggest a trip down for supper. For an amush-bush Hugh made us a Fish and chips in miniature with his own made tartar sauce (An amuse-Bouche is a small creative “bite” served when guests are first seated). For starters I had grilled sardines on grilled ciabatta which were very tasty indeed, for mains I had pork loin on sage mash with a honey and pepper glaze, Claire didnt have a starter but for mains she had grilled chicken breast with tarragon mash and a tarragon cream sauce. Both dishes were superb. Then for dessert I had one of Hugh’s almost famous lemon posset (a favorite of mine whilst I was working there) with poached peach and Claire had dark and white chocolate brownies with hazelnut-freddo (a frozen cream with hazelnuts in, kind of like an iced parfait) and hot butter-scotch sauce. All in all it came to a very, very reasonable £47.30 including 4 classes of the house white. So a very satisfying night was had, I could get used to this dining out stuff, makes a change from cooking it.

So I have 3 days off and and tommorow I am going to go collect my keys for my house in Hull, can’t wait