My Worst Nightmare

Airport food. Yuk. Everytime I go to the airport, I seem to have the same conversation with myself.. why oh why does it appear to be impossible for the retailers to provide good quality, healthy food? Its a nutritionist’s nightmare. I mean, its not as if they are in the middle of nowhere far from any glimmer of civilisation is it? OK, so there is a Pret in some of them, and I found a Yo Sushi in one of Heathrow’s Terminal in December 2007, but why is it that the majority of other places (dare I call them restaurants) serve up food that is so diabolical its crazy.

This time, flummoxed with choice, I ordered a tuna nicoise salad, and got a dish of soaking wet salad leaves (with nice brown bits), lumps of nasty tinned tuna, olives that were so tasteless I wondered whether they were olives at all and a grey boiled egg whose origin I really didn’t want to think about. All for the bargain price of £9. Daylight robbery.

Tuna Nicoise - How it should look!

Coming back was worse. The ‘restaurant area’/canteen was devoid of any custom and all the food was so congealed it was food poisoning in waiting, so I decided to go to the coffee shop/pub/sandwich bar option, and had a ham, cheese and tomato panini, which was only just edible – amazing how toasting something can make it passable, when you’re desperate to eat. Luckily they stocked Innocent’s juicy water so at least I got some vitamins out of that meal.

Looks marginally better than my one!

It just upsets me that in this day and age when there is so much coverage from the government on healthy eating and its not that difficult to cater with better ingredients, that there are still companies who obviously don’t care about anything except the bottom line. We are sitting ducks in airports, there is so little choice and when hungry, you are forced to eat the least worst thing in order to quell that hunger. The thing is in preparation for going on a trip I’m usually in a rush and forget to eat substantially, and all the waiting around makes me peckish… and that’s if the flight isn’t at a strange time. And to top it off they always charge ridiculous prices for this non-food. Grrr.

The food you get is generally sandwich or starch-based, often high saturated fat & high sugar; so it will make blood sugar levels go out of kilter. Because you’re off on holiday, or excited you may not drink enough fluid; and if you have have kids then tempers are more likely to be frayed and the trip gets started off on the wrong foot. Or you become lethargic, tired and generally grumpy until you reach your destination and can relax – or if you’re away with work as I can be, its hard to get your brain focused because of the poor nutrition that you are subjected to in the airports.

I don’t know the answer, its a tough one. Would lobbying the companies make the food more healthy? I don’t know, as there are such massive economics at play. But I’m not asking them to change the wheel, only to provide their customers with food that is worthy of the highly inflated costs that they charge. I would like to see the larger restaurants and brands to use quality ingredients, and consider the level of saturated fats, sugar and starch that they have in their food offerings at the very least. Surely its not too much to ask?!

If Jamie Oliver can challenge the catering system with regards to schools, why should other areas not be challenged too? Airports, motorway service stations, train stations are all culprits… its only fair that when we are paying through the nose for food we have to buy because we have no other choice, that we actually get something which will provide a little something towards our health rather than paying for food that is detrimental to it.

Pancake Day!

If you’re like me, and luuurve pancakes, then today is the day to throw all good intentions out of the window and re-live your childhood for one night only. I really don’t know why pancakes are so special for me, but there is just something about that rolled up moist disc of flour, eggs and water/milk that just makes me go weak at the knees. Its probably as they hold really strong childhood memories for me; my mum allowing me to help her make them, the way each side cooks differently, and the sharpness of the lemon being cut through with oodles of sugar and not to mention the softness of the middle constrasted with the crispy edges…

Pancakes are part of many cultures, I assume it’s because they are so easy to make and so versatile with regards to fillings/toppings. There are a multitude of ways to cook them, even within the UK there are differences between England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. The US prefer theirs thicker and more dense, the French like them larger and thinner, some countries use yeast, others just basic batter.

My pancakes are truly traditional English ones – they are similar to the french crepe – but they aren’t lacey in appearance like a crepe and do not rise, there are bubbles that appear during cooking which gives these dark brown spots across the surface. We use the same batter as you would for a Yorkshire Pudding, but its just cooked in a different way. The batter is very thin and is a pale creamy colour, we pour a thin layer of batter over the base of a frying pan sizzling with butter, on a moderately high heat.  and it is left to cook on the first side before flipping over to finish off.

Top Tip:

Always discard the first pancake… the frying pan isn’t often warm enough and the pancake might look slightly strange, alternatively (as I used to) give away the first pancake to your brother or sister so you get to eat a good one (when you’ve fed everyone else, of course). Also always use butter, not oil – to be honest, if you’ve got a good non-stick pan, you might even get away with not using any fat. And I wouldn’t recommend using anything more than a small knob of butter as there is nothing worse in my book then a greasy pancake. You’re only using the oil to ensure the pancake doesn’t stick, nothing else.

If you are wheat intolerant, luckily, for you there are some fantastic gluten-free flours out there – my favourite is from Dove’s Farm (available at all good supermarkets) and then of course, if you like your pancakes more like the American ones then you can use Buckwheat flour, which is also gluten-free but has a slightly nutty taste and the mixture will have a slight speckled look due to the fibrous nature. And remember, Buckwheat is NOT related to wheat. It is a psuedo-cereal that is a plant rather than a grass (cereal).

Toppings:

What to put inside a pancake is always a great debate. I was having this discussion with friends at the weekend as I’m a pure lemon and sugar girl and savoury pancakes, for me, are an absolute waste of batter. I love the simplicity of the tastes and the texture. And yes, I know its about as nutritious as a cardboard box, but for one night only, I’ll make an exception! The only deviation I have from that is when I visit the Italian Pizzeria Bel Sit near my parents house.  I have been going there since I was 5 or 6 and when I was about 10, chef devised a pancake based dessert just for me… pancake with vanilla icecream and grand marnier. To my joy, twenty years later, they are still serving it as a special dessert!

If you are watching what you eat, and want to avoid the sweet stuff, then the great thing about pancakes is that you can fill them with anything. In an ideal world you would always add some protein to them to ensure that the glucose from the flour doesn’t send your blood sugar into a tail-spin, and if you wanted to be ultra healthy, you could wrap a pancake around some steamed asparagus or make a steamed or stir-fried veggie wrap. Fresh fruit with nuts or seeds and a little drizzle of plain natural yoghurt with cinnamon would also be really tasty. Pancakes don’t have to be unhealthy, full of sweet stuff like chocolate, syrup, cream and ice cream. If you use wholegrain flour/or buckwheat flour and have fillings that aren’t riddled with sugar (and bad stuff) then you are unlikely to go wrong… I just love to use this as an excuse to have a bad day!

Oh and of course, make your own batter – its so easy, worst case scenario and you don’t have any kitchen equipment, all you really need is a jug, bowl and a fork. Food mixers are not essential here. A sieve might be though??!!

Here’s a fail-safe recipe for batter, that doesn’t even need scales:

Take a mug for your measure and measure out the ingredients in equal amounts, starting with the eggs:

1 mug eggs

1 mug plain flour

1 mug (organic) milk

• Put the flour into a bowl and make a well.
• Whisk the eggs up with a fork and slowly add them to the flour until all the liquid has soaked in.
• Slowly pour the milk into the mixture working it into the batter before you pour more in (this avoids the proliferation of lumps)
• Once all the milk is in the mixture, heat a knob of butter in a frying pan.
• When it starts to brown, pour the first pancake in – I will usually pour enough to just about cover the base of the pan and move the remaining liquid into the corners by tilting the pan.
• When you see the base of the pancake start to bubble and lift, check the underside of the pancake, if you can see a slight browning then flip it over and cook for another 30secs/1 min. You will know when it is done as it wil become harder and will move around the pan easily.
• When its done, pop onto a plate for the ravenous recipient to devour in their own way and start with the next batch.