Every Supermarket Should Look Like This

In the words of my auntie Pouneh: “every supermarket should look like this.” I’m well aware of how expensive these stores can be but I still love scanning their isles and oohing and aaahing over everything. Here’s an inside look at a European bio organic supermarket:

No chemicals! No spray!
Passionfruit, pomegranate and prickly pear – that children, is A L L I T E R A T I O N.

Better be orgasmic for those prices!
No more bent-back-over-the-stove-top-homemade-muesli-labouring for me!  
Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food. (Hippocrates)

2015 ended on a BANG: chickpea chocolate cake

I spent New Year’s eve and day at the Charles residence and it was magical. Seriously. Never in a trillion years would I have ever imagined that I’d be in Japan, not skyrise-Tokyo-Japan but the tiniest village in the middle of nowhere Japan where there are bears, snakes and BOARS celebrating the New Year by eating legit FRENCH food from the best French chef in the world. Never. How do these things happen?! God, from the bottom of my heart, thank you!

First, cheese souffle. Next, French onion soup with homemade bread. Then, salad, two kinds. After, goat’s cheese, broccoli, pine-nut and raisin tart. Last but not least, Chef Olivier ended on a BANG with chickpea and chocolate cake; super délicieux!

Chickpea salad:
Chickpeas from a can (drained and rinsed)
Cherry tomatoes (quartered)
Italian parsley (torn)
Dressed in a little olive oil, salt and pepper.

Green salad:
Lettuce (cut med-small with scissors)
Avocado (diced)
Raw walnuts
Dressed in a little olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper.

Chickpea chocolate cake (From Nigella Lawson)
1 tin garbanzo beans
0.6 cups orange juice
4 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup sugar (or honey)
0.6 cups unsweetened cocoa
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda

Blend the garbanzo beans until smooth in a blender or food processor, and mix in all the rest of the ingredients until blended.

Bake at 350 degrees for 50 minutes.

On NY day, we ate fresh eggs on fresh bread, walked in snow, had Japanese nabe for lunch and more cake.

New Year’s Resolution nombre un: eat more French food.

review no31 hugo&leo french bakery

The headline of this piece should really be: Persian breakfasts made possible for Kiwi girl by French baker in rural Japan.

One of Japan’s biggest problems is its lack of brown bread. I’m serious. It’s devastating. That artificial crap (sorry, but it really is) sold at the supermarket must die! This is where Hugo&Leo, the loveliest french bakery (with a legit french baker + yogi!) comes to the rescue. Situated in the serene Nishiawakura Village of Okayama, their delicious bread has been my saviour. So what makes Hugo&Leo so special? Well, apart from the most welcoming owners, their ingredients are simple, locally sourced and where possible, organic. Their tasty menu boasts a variety of breads including wholemeal fig and walnut, rye, walnut and prune and millet corn bread. Are you salivating yet? I’m day dreaming about fig and goat cheese bruschettas to be honest. Anyways… in addition to good bread (and by good I mean spectacular), sweet treats such as croissants, muffins and cakes are also on offer. And if all that ain’t enough to lure you in, be sure to try their vegetarian quiches and pizzettes.

Hugo&Leo operates on Wednesdays and Saturdays from 10am-5pm but try to drop by early as they’re super popular! I’m hella lucky that their place is a mere 10 minutes away but if you have to travel a long while to get there, trust me, it’ll  be worth it. Dine in or out (the view is just gorgeous) and make a day of it! X

For more info head to their super informative website here.