Ginger like a biscuit

love photography ,art and anything that draws my attention. As an addition i am a massive lover of food. I post pictures of my Fav eats and places to go as well as some of my photography.

[noosh101-blog]

Okan- Brixton

Another brixton village post!!

this time i was out looking for a good spot of din dins with my fam and we really were not looking for something too heavy so walking around the village long enough we came across Okan , which seemed to be a Japanese/Korean noodle bar!

The menu is very minimal with only a few starters and mains but in my opinion the restaurants with the least on their menus are usually the best.

We chose the kimchi, aubergine and edamame as our starters, all very small but perfect amount . The aubergine was definitely my favorite as it was so clean and fresh with its ginger and so sauce flavours !

for the mains we chose our own , with the choice of two noodle udon and yakisoba and also the filling which had a wide choice from tofu, beef ,pork belly to squid! i personally have udon noodles a lot so had yakisoba with squid.

For drink they have a whole menu , and i chose the sparkling elderflower drink which i did not also expect it to be home made as when it came it was so refreshing with bits of ginger and not too sweet like you would have  from a processed drink.

I was really not expecting the dish to be so big and so tasty! the place was buzzing so i really should of guessed it was going to be good but not to this extent! 

i managed to eat the beastly dish in one sitting and felt expectantly satisfied , not feeling too greased up, like i normally would after eating at yo sushi or any other chain.

prices for the noodles and main meals were at an average of 7.95 and considering the size of the dishes it was definitely worth it!

Again i think what makes this place successful is the independence it has , not being  chain and incredibly small so it always is busy!

i rate this place 8/10 and recommend it to anyone wanting a great Japense /Korean culinary exoperience. 

[noosh101-blog]

Duck egg- Brixton

so I've been living in Brixton for about half a year and never even stepped foot into the heat of brixton in search for a good breakfast place!

Anywaay so after many drunken nights out ,including one serious hangover on a monday morning, me and a friend decided to go out and find a good place to have brekkie in Brixton town!

after a short stroll onto electric lane we found a small , cute little duck egg colored cafe with the title Duck egg.

The cute interior was enough for us to go 'aww how sweet' with its lovely art and wooden furniture.

Looking at the menu , it showed items from a full english breakfast to eggs benedict and prices from a cheap 5 pounds to maximum 9 pounds!

What i loved the most about this place, making it so incredibaly unique is that you can choose a hen egg or a duck egg with any of your dishes therefore relating to the cafes title!

I chose the eggs benedict with two duck eggs for my main and i say this with no joke it was not a mistake my friends! The eggs,bacon and toast were accompanied by a hashbrown and a fried tomato , really filling that hungover hunger spot. 

The only down side to this family owned cafe is that it is cash only but tbh it is so worth it and the food really is so tasty!!!

I rate the food ,decor and price of this place 9/10 due to just how amazing i think it is!!! 

[noosh101-blog]

woooo! so i don't know if any of you readers out there have heard of Bubba gump shrimp co but it is an American restaurant chain, themed on the Forest gump film.

I first discovered this chain in Florida when i was about 10 and fell in love ever since! literally every time i go to America i HAVE to go there.

The menu consists of basically shrimp, fried shrimp, coconut shrimp and yes more shrimp, but they have a series of other things on the menu .

Anyway so i heard about a year ago that there was going to be the first Bubba gump to open out of America and yes it was to open right in my home town of London! 

I don't think i can express my excitement so once it opened in October i planned to visit it asap! 

SO i was very nervous after hearing bad reviews online that it wouldn't be as good as America but i marched myself to the Trocadero in Lecieter square were Bubba Gump is situated . 

We waited about 10 minuted to be seated , as you cannot book but soon we were taken to our little booth ,with the interior being identical to what i can remember the American version being like. the menu was also the same, with a little pricey dishes but it was going to be worth it!

Ordering the food we had a fairly chatty waitress but not as IN YOUR FACE as the waitor we experienced in the US, who pretty much interrogated about the Forest Gump film .

we order the famous shrimp heaven cones, which contain cones of different types of shrimp, cold plain shrimp,coconut shrimp (my favorite) ,breaded shrimp and also tempura style shrimp. Apart from this we had recommendations from the waitress who said to get the fried chicken, mac N cheese , rice dish and chips. 

Everything lived up to my expectations and it was almost better than what i remember it being in America! The shrimp was top notch with this amazing crunch you got when you bit into them, the chicken also had this amazing breaded coating ! accompanied with our food we had these amazing mango sparkler drink which really was soo good! i had trouble saving the drink until my food came , always a challenge for me hahah.

I recommend this restaurant all the way, it is such a fun atmosphere , with that all American feel to it. So if your looking for some fun and great American style food go to Bubba Gump in London!

Rating 8/10 

[noosh101-blog]

ahhhh i know i know im proper obsessed with sushi...  so get used to seeing more and more rolls !! 

My father decided to take me to dinner and we fancied a spot of sushi so we popped to the nearest and newest sushi place in Chiswick.

The restaurant is named Chisou and is located in a small alleyway in the south end of Chiswick.... sounding slightly dodgey but your in Chiswick ..the most you'll see is a chav stealing some starburst from pound land.

The decor was beautiful inside with this asian fusion feel to eat. 

The menu was pricey as aaaaaanyyything and this is my one main negative point as what we ordered all together was 80 quid !!! ... yes that sushi platter was 20 pounds alone which is the same price as one person at one of the sushi buffet all you can eat! I cant deny the food and sushi was great standard but for the amount you get and for that price its just abit unsatisfactory.. i want to go and get so full that i can roll out of there ! But anyway the place was a good experience and if you want to go for good Japanese in chiswick i would reccomend it .

Rating 6/10

[noosh101-blog]

Sushi Cafe

As you know i have an unhealthy obsession with Sushi and sushi buffets so when i moved to south London i left all my fave Buffets up in north London. 

After finding out from my friend there was an equivalent sushi buffet to North Finchely in Battersea, only 15 minutes away from me , i quickly rushed over to Sushi Cafe to try it out.

the very small and traditional looking sushi taverna was buzzing from the moment we got there, picking saturday night probably explained it. Thankfully we had booked our table so we were promptly seated, so i suggest you do this if your planning on coming here.

We asked for the Buffet menu, which claimed that it was all you can eat for 14.99 ,a whole pound cheaper than sushi mania and sushi Japan!

Ordering from a selection of the items, it was mostly identical to sushi Japans menu, with my favourite spicy salmon rolls, they even tasted exactly the same !!! I was thrilled!

Overall they have top quality sushi and great selection of hot foods, even some thai including satay chicken!! very very happy that i found this place and definitely shall be returning!

Rating 8/10

[noosh101-blog]

STUDENT DAY AT CASSART!

Today was student day at Cassart in london,a yearly event which happens offering students a 50 pound goodie bag when you buy 10 pounds worth of equipment . 

As i have been last year a set of my flatmates from halls decided to wake up early and go. 

Bought some books to make up the ten pounds and i received the goodie bag, inside was the art tools worth 50 quid and an extra of loads of flyers and vouchers.

The first voucher we decided to take advantage of was a Chipotle 2-4-1 and i myself was a virgin to Chipotle so was very excited to give it a try!

i was very hungry so i got myself a chicken and a steak burrito, choosing my spice and type of rice . The burritos were MASSIVE and was struggling to finish one. eating the steak one first and saving the chicken one for later, i think they were both good as one another but i would suggest adding guacamole and maybe choose the mild salsa instead of the very spicy option. If you can handle spice then by all means that option is for you but i can normally handle it and it was on the uncomfortable side for me. overall thumbs up to Chipotle i will return to get a salad bowl :)

The second offer we got was a free FRAE, which is basically a frozen yoghurt with an option of two toppings. I had never been here before and normally go to Snog so therefore was keen to try! Giving in the voucher i was able to choose between peanut butter or caramel flavour yog with two toppings so i got peanut butter with strawberries and blueberries! This was a good combo as the peanut butter was so sweet i needed the fruit to balance it ooot. Final verdict was that it was a great treat as a freebie but i would not pay 3 pounds for that hahaha i think go to Snog of Samba Swirl there the real Gods of the froyo world.

[noosh101-blog]

DIM SUM!!!! so more asian cuisine!!

Due to it being my Bro's bday on the 1st mi padre decided to take us to lunch to celebrate! As my brother isn't the best at picking a restaurant it was MY job to do so .. and so as i had not been to have dim sum in like a decade , i thought it was best to go to Royal China.

Royal China is a chain around London and actually a few around the world, but due to its popularity may even from CHINA come to London especially!

I have been to this chain for many years and never fails to satisfy. The speciality that Royal China holds is their DIM SUM! its top notch good shit, no joke it is the best thing evaaaa!! 

Anyway cutting to the chase, this time at the restaurant we made the wrong decision on going on a saturday at lunch about 2 pm when it was like the tube at rush hour !! 

What the problem was that you couldn't advance book a table and just had to turn up and pick a number, like at a  . This was odd as i never had to do this and it was NEVER this packed, the staff seemed very flustered and stressed trying to get tables and tickets to all the customers.i found it very unprofessional and cant understand why they cant just use a booking service!

Hungry and wanting dim sum we carried on with the procedure and picked a number , about 30 mins later we asked about the whereabouts of our table and the lady on the front desk started having a massive go at my dad that she said our tables name about 20 mins beforehand and we apparently lied about not hearing our table when i stood there waiting and i know for a fact she DID NOT call out our number.

The situation was so out of hand and completely disappointing that they hired such cold and horrible staff! finally however the manager overheard the situation and immediately ordered a table to be set up and we were sat down in about 3 minutes!! Anyway that was the only set down, we ordered asap once we had sat down and our food arrived within 10 minutes.

the photo unfortunately dons't do the food justice as we ate as soon as the food came due to our hunger! the amount we ordered was unhealthy but many of my favourites such as Cheungfung, steamed buns, Glutinous rice in Lotus leaves and of course DUMPLINGS! i recommend all of those and many more on the dim sum menu. I encourage you , if you go to the restaurant to try not order from the normal menu as its overly priced standard chinese food and the dim sum really is the best!

So yes go there but i just hope the staff gets changed as its really bringing this 5* restaurant down.

Rating 6/10 .... due to poor service

[noosh101-blog]

So today i went to Nandos with my friend, and yes i know like everrrryone in the UK knows of Nandos but i just had to talk about it !

i recommend you all getting the loyalty card, today i went after checking the app if i could get anything free and i could! i managed to get a quater chicken and as i only got some creamy mash which is yum yum yum, my meal came to a cheap price of 2.25!!

ahaha ok so that wasnt much to talk about really but ye just wanted to make you guys jelly of my chickkiiiiin!

[noosh101-blog]

My dad and i are obsessed with asian cuisine and when it comes to Thai theres one place we go to . 

Thai and Co. is based in North finchely (London) and is a top quality Thai restaurant. 

We decided to go one evening as i had been out many times that week and unfortunately caught the 'Freshers flu'... of course not from excessive drinking... but annyway we arrived and ordered our special favourites that would help our colds.

For starters we ordered the Satay chicken ang the prawn toast. What we LOVE about this restaurant and their food is the quality and how home made it is .. unlike quite alot of cheapy Thai places , were their food is from frozen, Thai and co. have their own twist on the dishes ,with new tastes that your not used to.

Starters over we order some hot and spicy currys to blow that nayyyssssty colds away. I ordered my usual of Thai green curry which was exceptionally hawt and my Dad got the coconut soup. Out of the two i think mine had more spice and flavour as the coconut soup is a bit bland. They have a huge variety of other dishes of course including Phad Thai and Panang soup, everything is delicious and top qual!

If you want a good curry this is the place to come in north London anyway .

Rating 9/10

[noosh101-blog]

I don't just go out to eat, i also love to cook and bake !

Another little fact about me im lactose-intolerant so i cant always eat food that contain high quantities of milk. Pancakes dont contain a lot of milk but still one day i decided to make pancakes without milk .

I dont really like to follow any recipes so i placed a handful of oats, egg,spoonful of sugar and a splash of 'fake cream' which is basically a cream alternative without milk. 

Whisking it all together i then placed a sprinkle of cinnamon as a final touch and fried it in the pan until cooked. This was not going to lie my first time making pancakes and the first few went VERY wrong , most looked like countries on the globe but anyway the last one worked well!

To top the pancakes i just cut half a banana and then topped the bananas with a lactose free white chocolate.

[noosh101-blog]

Five Guys Burgers and Fries

Thats a name of a fast food chain in America which only recently started showing up all around the UK.

FIve guys opened ,i believe in october of 2013 and ever since then i was intrigued about the store. Throughout the year i heard more and more about five guys and how good it was!

Traveling to Manchester i decided to take the plunge and go to the Five Guys in the Trafford centre.

Looking at the menu and choosing my burger was so simple as there isn't a massive variety of fillings but for me one who cannot eat cheese drew to the Avocado and bacon burger. When choosing toppings you have a huuuuuge variety and are all free ,being the fatso i am chose ALL THE WAY option which means you have all the toppings.  I also got the cajun fries on the side. while i waited i got a refillable drink cup which means you can choose from about 100 different drinks and flavours. This was the coolest thing ever for me as i feel most fast food chains lack flavours in their drinks. You feel like a kid in a candy shop mixing any flavours you want!

i got my order in a brown bag and inside wrapped in foil, which is really cool and original, making the experience even mire fun!

now to the most important part the actual taste of the burger! opening the foil the fresh looking double pattied burger was almost too big to fit in my mouth! once my jaw almost dislocated tasting the burger, i was hit by a taste of so many flavours that i was almost knocked out by the glory!

Honest to god this is the best fast food burger chain i have been to in the uk! although comparing it to McDonald's it is definitely on the pricer side as burgers are around 8 pounds but 100 percent worth it!

 Sound to good to be true? Better head to Five Guys to find out!!

Rating 8/10

[noosh101-blog]

Im going to share my biggest and best secrets IN THE WORLD!

ok not really but this is my recipe for my famous Slutty brownies. For those who dont know what that means a slutty brownie is a cookie/oreo/brownie combined! sound amazing? because it dam well is!!! 

Anyway i bake my plain cookies from scratch normally but as this is a more complicated procedure , in a way its a black market recipe when it comes to cooking....

Ingredients

1 packet of Betty Crocker cookie mix (can be white or milk chocolate, should be the one in the cardboard box, and serves 16 not 8 as this wont be enough!)

2 packet of Oreos

1 packet of Betty Crocker brownie mix also in the cardboard box

So first you should preheat the oven to about 190/200 degrees 

make the cookie mix and place this on the bottom of a greased , deep baking tray, patting down the cookie so its spread thinly all of the bottom of the tray.

next bit is the funnest bit for me , open the Oreo packet and place them in rows covering the top of the cookie. Don't worry if the Oreos have spaces in between them thats how its meant to look!

Anyway last bit mix up the brownie mix and pour it on top of the cookie and Oreo tower until its all covered and you cant see any Oreo or cookie. once thats done pop it into the oven for 40 mins and take it out, it should be slightly raw/gooey in the middle but don't worry you need this as once it cools this goes reeeeally chewy and amaaazing!!! Just keep in mind the longer you leave it the drier it gets so best not burnt!!!

CLICK ON THE PHOTO FOR A VIDEO DEMONSTRATION :)

[noosh101-blog]

15th of August= MY BIRTHDAYYYYYY !! wooo 

so ma bday i got taken to Stix N Sushi by my boyfrrund! I am a Huuuuuge fan of the sushi! so when he took me to this swanky restaurant in the middle of Covent Garden i was more than ecstatic! 

The chain is famous around the world , placed in the top cities, New york being another hotspot .

Looking through the menu your jaw drops at the prices but we knew it would all be worth it . We were right , when the food came we had ordered a selected menu for 80 pounds (pricey yes) but this included 16 topped rolls, 8 nigiri rolls, 12 california rolls and an assortment of yakitori skewers. 

All of the dishes were amaaaazing, the fish literally melted in your mouth and there were combinations of flavours i have never experienced during sushi.

If i was rich and had the salary of a footballer i would go to this place every day but as i am  a student i think ill have to leave it to special occasions.

Rating 10/10

[noosh101-blog]

Bit random of the lot but during my travels in Armenia ,i came accross this amazing grill house in the middle of the mountains between Sevan and Yerevan. Unfortunatley i cant give the exact location as ya know .. well its Armenia and half the people reading this probably dont even know where the heck it is! Anyway the shack was called Syria and it served a range of middle eastern dishes, mainly lebanese style armenian foods such as kebab and lechmajun. 

what i loved about it so much was the fact they gave every dish with some sort of alcohol , and being that they make all the alcohol there themselves at home ... we left the table quite tipsy!

The traditional Armenian BBQ we had there was also really tasty ! all in all Armenia is a cheap cheap place to go if you want good food although i would say go to yerevan if your looking for more of a Western Armenian cuisine.

[noosh101-blog]

In yerevan you can find pretty much any cuisine but i really wanted to find some good ,home made Lechmajun. 

For those who dont know Lechmajun is an Armenian Pizza ,made out of flat bread and a tomato and mince sauce on top! its actually so moorish and amazing for those pussies out there when it comes to weird foreign food, even YOU will love it!! 

so ye anyway we went with the fam on our first night arriving in Yerevan to this old cafe in the middle of the city, Unfortunately i cannot remember the exact name but i just remember each lechmajun was about 50p!! we had even got some wine to celebrate our arrival and i just remember how sweet it was! of course being so sweet meant i didn't realise how strong the drink was and soon after couldn't see straight!! 

All around Yerevan were these shacks that sold the lechmajun so i recommend going to any of them and purchasing some orgasmic armenian pizza :) .

[noosh101-blog]

July 15th so as i am Armenian i have a group of Armenian family friends that me and my brother have grown up with. Since we've all grown up a little and gone in separate directions in life , we al like to meet up once in a while to catch up! This time we wanted to go all out Hayastan (Armenian) style and get a kebab!

Traveling to Southgate , were two of them live , they suggested us to go to this new Turkish grill. 

Kervan Sofrasi was the name of the place and 6 Armenians hungry for some good food decided to order The New EXTRA  Kervan special.. not too sure what we would receive we took the plunge and what came was insane! a massive platter of all the meats i could think of on a bed of some traditional Turkish/Armenian rice what we call Pilav. 

This amount fed and almost destroyed us, walking away with a few food babies. I was so happy about how good quality the food was at and how much there was!

The platter was 24 quid and shared between 6 of us so the meal per person was at a low low price of 4 pounds!!! 

so i highly recommend going to Kervan if your in North London and looking for some good Kebab shishlik!

Rating 10/10

[noosh101-blog]

So July 8th. i went out to brunch in St.Johns wood with my two besties and we were really feeling like some good old Bacon and pancakes so we decided to try FEGO. This small cafeteria is i think a posh british Edds. 

Hungry as fak , i ordered their Pancakes and bacon with maple syrup and boy was it good! Three pancakes and two rashers of bacon with a pot of that mapley goodness really hit the spot! you really cannot go wrong with this beauty and for a expensive cafe this dish is at a cheap price of 5.25 , so even you students can enjoy it!

Rating 9/10