London Nomad Girl

London – Arts & Entertainment – Landmarks

I was another of the lucky Qypers visiting the event for #Qypeoween. And I tell you something, London Dungeon just have to adopt evening opening hours – perhaps they could do it around Halloween? I say this because although I’ve been in the day before, this tour allowed us to visit the area when it was dark outside and everything was all quietier, darker and you’re just waiting for someone to leap out of the shadows at you. I’m a tad obsessed with all things Halloween, which means that I had high expectations. However, the dungeon definitely fufilled these expectations and I loved the Halloween add-on at the beginning. For me the scariest part was definitely the Mirror Maze – there’s just something about mirrors in the dark and the maze had the eery feeling, where you think you’ve glimpsed something, but you’re not quite sure. I later found out that this is the most haunted room in the dungeon – as Most Haunted discovered when they held a seance in the dungeon. Having heard that…I’ll probably be even more jumpy when I return. So will I return? Definitely this might have been my fourth time in the dungeons but the ever-changing exhibits and characters bringing something new to the role mean that it’s been different enough everytime I’ve been.

Check out my review of The London Dungeon – I am EmKonstantine – on Qype

Brunei

Brunei National Dish – Ambuyet (impossible to purchase in the UK)

Brunei’s national dish is ambuyet which is basically sap made from the sago palm tree. I might be put palm products for life after Angola, but as it turns out you can’t actually buy the ingredients for ambuyet anywhere in the UK. I’ve come across a few people doing this challenge and it seems that they’ve all had the same issue and gone with one of Brunei’s other popular dishes – korma or rending curry. Now I’m not really a korma-kinda-girl, I like my curries as hot as possible. But I also know that I need to complete this challenge so I opted for one of Sainsbury’s takeaway kormas.

Belize and Brazil

Belize National Dish – Belizean rice and beans with fish stew

Brazil National Dish – Feijoada (not chosen), rice and beans (not chosen), Churrasco (not chosen), brigadeiro

Another double whammy. It’s coming up to the end of February though and it seems that there are a lot of countries beginning with B. I really liked Belize’s dish – the rice made with coconut milk was really tasty and the sauce that the fish was cooked in complemented it really well. I used cod but the recipe kept talking about using the lemon or vinegar to disguise the taste of the fish – so I’m not sure what the fish in Belize is like.

 
Brazil has lots of national dishes but my friend’s from Brazil and every year, for his birthday, he puts on this incredible Brazilian barbecue with delicious meat drenched in salt and lime and dipped in cassava. I’ve had some incredible meats there and have a bit of a reputation for being obsessed with his chicken hearts. You know when you just know that you’re going to ruin an incredible food by attempting to replicate it? Well I knew I’d never been able to make any meat dish taste that good, so I opted to stick to dessert instead. Sadly I also ruined the dessert, when it came to roling it, it seems that I didn’t let it set long enough and ended up with chocolate all over my hands.

The photograph of the Belizean stew is from Caribbean American Foods; annoyingly I lost the picture of this dish, but I’m delighted to say it’s a dead-ringer.

Bosnia and Belgium

Bosnia National Dish: Burek (not chosen), Cevapi, Bosanski Lonac (not chosen)

Belgium National Dish: Pommes frites, Moules Bruxellois (not chosen)

Not really two countries that you’d expect to see together, but Belgium’s national dish of pommes frites goes with anything. Belgium is the first country in this challenge that I’ve actually been to – which is pretty bad really considering that we’re what, 30 countries in. I’ve been to both Bruges and Brussels and while I largely lived on chocolate and beer I did try the national dish of pommes frites, slathered in mayonnaise of course. I cooked cevapi for Bosnia, a dish that was really easy to make and as a lot of these dishes seem to involve eating late at night this can only be a good thing.

Bangladesh

National dish - biryani, rice and fish (not chosen)

I know that I said I was going to start making more recipes for myself, but Bangladesh has to be an exception. You see one of the national dishes of this country is biryani and that’s Nathan’s *signature* dish. Honestly, the biryani he makes is better than any I’ve ever had in a restaurant. I can’t describe how good it is. I’ll share a picture with you, but I can’t possibly tell you the recipe as that’s top-secret! Though I will tell you that it’s one dish that can only be made in bulk, which means that we have enough left to last well into March.

Belarus

National Dish – Latkes

This was exactly what I needed tonight. I’m feeling slightly hungover from a friend’s birthday and forgot to get any meat out when I crashed home late last night. Luckily I had planned latkes sometime during the week, so whilst I sat down and finally finished the work that’s prevented me from cooking all week, Nathan made me some lovely latkes. Although they’re Belarus’s national dish they’re typically eaten to celebrate Chanukah all over the world. In order to be traditional, Nathan made two plain ones and then a third one which he added chilli and chopped coriander to. That one was my favourite.  

Bahrain

National Dish – Muhammar

Finally a country I’ve visited! Well not officially – I had a six hour stop over at Bahrain airport on my way to India and I loved it. In those six hours, I spent way too much money on perfumes at this pretty Arabian perfume shop and then had an authentic Bahraini meal at a restaurant overlooking the runaway. I’m glad I didn’t order muhammar whilst I was there as it may have ruined the fantastic time I had, which ended in me getting my first ever upgrade to first class!

This was another dish made by me from Nathan – I’ll try to resume cooking duties next week, and Nathan admits that he may have overdone it as the dish should have been served as a side with fish, but instead Nathan served me up a whole plate, which was a little too perfumey for my liking. 

Bahamas

National Dish – Cracked conch with peas and rice

I’m so busy this week that I feel guilty as I’ve got Nathan cooking all my dishes for me.  Cracked conch is the national dish for the Bahamas and annoyingly there weren’t any other options. Conch meat doesn’t seem to be available anywhere in the UK. I scoured a few oriental supermarkets and even looked at restaurant menus to see if I could have it cooked for me instead, but to no avail. I finally found out via Google that both scallops and crayfish are good alternatives and because I’m a little scared of crayfish I decided to make it with scallops – the pigeon peas are official though!

Azerbaijan

National Dish – Yarpag Dolmasi (Not Chosen), Plov

This is almost identical to the Afghani Qabili Pilau, but yet the ingredients are cooked in a broth rather than fried. I’ve certainly gone through a lot of rice while doing this challenge! 

Antigua and Barbuda

National Dish – Fungee and Pepperpot

 Last Saturday, I got home fairly late after a few drinks and Nathan proceeded to cook me up fungee and pepperpot stew. It certainly isn’t your usual pub fodder and I’m afraid that we may have massively overestimated the amount of spinach that went in, but nevertheless here’s the proof.