Banana and pecan cake with cream cheese and white chocolate frosting. I have eaten an unnatural amount of this cake over the past two days. I may have to stop making it to avoid becoming a fatty.

I used the pointy edges of a cake scraper to create the concentric circle design on the top and switched to the blunt edge to smooth out the sides. I tend to use a single cake tin when I make this cake – usually out of sheer laziness because I hate lining tins. But this time I opted for disposable circular foils, which resulted in a quicker bake and a softer crumb. I also wet the greaseproof paper with water, squeezed out all of the moisture and laid it straight onto the foil tin to avoid greasing the pan and the need for scissors. This makes the whole process much quicker – less work, more time to decorate and more time to eat.

I made an amazing chocolate cake with a peanut butter frosting last week. So good.  And oh so fattening.

I’ve made the chocolate part of the cake a couple of times but this was the first time I combined it with a peanut butter frosting. The unusual thing about this recipe is that the fat comes from mayonnaise rather than butter or oil, which means it has a really long shelf life and it remains moist and tender-crumbed.

I borrowed the recipe for the frosting from a new friend of mine who owns a fantastic bakery in Tooting called Deelicious! Nazish’s Kitchen. It’s creamy without having that cloying feeling that often comes with eating regular peanut butter from a jar.

Will definitely be making this again. But before that I’m going to make my signature cake – Banana cake with a white chocolate, cream cheese and vanilla frosting.

This product is freaking me out:

Weird, cushiony hands to cradle your baby and help her to sleep. ‘Nuff said.

I have fallen in love with this Shakespeare quote since having my baby daughter:

She is most certainly fierce at three in the morning.

I wrote a children’s book about an alien who sees with his ears and hears with his eyes. Yes indeed it does sound odd but it highlights a selection of key areas from the school curriculum, such as parts of the body, opposites and numbers, making it a great addition to a teacher’s kit. Besides it’s a hit with my 4-year-old niece and she knows everything.

Here’s to getting it onto a few bookshelves. And here is a quick image of the main characters, Gerber and Bertie:

I used an image program called Gimp to colour in the illustrations, which took forever because I’m pretty much an amateur with that sort of stuff. However, it looks pretty good…pat on the back Mrs Akbar.

Swollen ankles, a persistently full bladder and a face the size of China – pregnancy is no mean feat. However, the plus point of course is that you get to eat slightly more and bask in the knowledge that you have a better reason to indulge in that extra slice of pie than just your sweet tooth – “It’s not for me…it’s for the baby. It needs sugar”.

It takes a while to get to that point though; the point where you don’t feel guilty for eating another slice of toast and feasting on a little more pasta than you’re used to. When my midwife told me that the headaches I was getting in my first trimester were probably down to a lack of food and that I had to eat more carbohydrate throughout the day I was dumbfounded. Continue Reading »

Here’s  a piece I wrote for The Guardian:

I know it’s unfashionable to stick up for school meals but as a British Asian growing up in a household where kebabs and curry were the norm and shepherd’s pie and rice pudding were alien entities, I have very fond memories of my school dinners.

Everything we ate at home was jazzed up Pakistani-style – even omelettes had dried chilli, coriander seeds and turmeric in them. It was eating at school that taught us about traditional English food; the good and the bad. It was exciting to have buttery mash and a pie for lunch instead of a fiery dopiaza, and fun to eat jelly and ice cream for dessert instead of sipping milky cardamom-infused tea. School meals were the definition of exotic. I didn’t want a chapati and lentils; I wanted lancashire hotpot. It may not have been sensitively prepared by artisan chefs, but it had gravy in it. Continue Reading »

My mum has a degree in psychology and used to teach mature Asian women who had come to the UK from Pakistan how to read and write English.

She has six children, three grandkids and her favourite topic of conversation is God and the benefits of prayer. She has taught me everything I know about being kind, good and honest to the people I meet.

However, despite her qualifications she can still get it wrong when it comes to basic vocabulary. Here’s a list of some of  the unusual words that she says that still make me laugh whenever I hear them:

• Rendezvous = randyboo
• Chest of drawers = chester-drawers
• Flapjacks = flapajackas
• Spaghetti bolognese = sabgetti bolongay Continue Reading »

My husband is a chilli lover. This means I can never get away with making a simple stew, a baked potato or a cheese sandwich without him putting his own spin on things.

Last week we had spaghetti bolognese for dinner and I watched him top it with a tablespoon of jalapeno peppers and sliced white onion. He also sprinkles Bombay mix on bowls of penne pasta and delights in throwing crushed chillies into my boiled rice while my back is turned. We’ve had many disagreements over his favourite jar of chilli sauce, which he pours over anything from shepherd’s pie and lasagne to quiches and dumplings. Continue Reading »

What’s the one thing that’s been hammered into me since I started learning about SEO content writing? Make sure you write something new, fresh and unique every day that people want to read about.

What have I been avoiding for years? Starting a blog that actually showcases that fresh and unique content.  But today is different – I’ve opted to embrace wordpress beyond the four walls of the office and decided to write something for myself.

Here’s hoping I can keep up with it.