Sunday 12 February 2012

Rolexes... the EDIBLE kind?

I know it's kind of unusual for me to feature a recipe on here, but it's something i'm keen to do more regularly.


let me first explain to those of you who don't know what a rolex is. it's a snack or light meal comprised of chapatti, vegetables and eggs. apparently it was originally known as 'roll eggs'  but when this is said quickly in a ugandan accent it sounds like rolex, and so the name has evolved.

you will need:

2 cups of plain flour
1 cup of water
1 teaspoon of salt
1 tablespoon of olive oil
some sunflower or other clear oil for frying

4-6 eggs
salt and pepper
shedded vegetables. these could be anything, though when i was in uganda it was cabbage and carrot.

start by making the chapattis. i just used a mug for the measurements. combine the flour, water, salt and olive oil, and knead into a smooth dough. this is easier if you split it in two. if you find that your dough is not completely smooth, start rolling and re-rolling, and it will improve. this recipe makes 2 good sized chapattis, so roll half the dough out and fold it into quarters, and then repeat, switching between the two portions.  try and keep them as round as possible, and approximately the same size as your frying pan. you will find that they sring back a lot as you roll, but persevere and they will get bigger and flatter. you want to roll them as thinly as possible, but not bigger than your pan.

once you have rolled both of your chapattis, prep your eggs. break 2 or 3 of them into a cup (preferably the same one you used for measuring your flour and water, less washing up), depending on how many eggs you are using, add your veggies, and season well. its hard to oversalt this, and they will taste bland if you don't put enough in. 


pour enough oil into the pan to completely cover the surface. put it on a high heat and wait until it is bubbling to add your first chapatti.(you can test it by just dipping the edge into the oil. if it sizzles straight away, it's hot enough) when it's hot, place the first chapatti in the pan, and turn it to evenly distrubute the heat. you can also press it out a little further at this point. lip your chapatti after about a minute. it should be golden brown and patchy where the layers have bubbled up. remove from the pan after about another 30 seconds. cook the other one in the same way, and remove to kitchen paper.

turn the heat down to medium. when you start cooking the eggs everything happens kind of at once, so make sure you've got a plate handy, and a knife and fork! when i make these i tend to make 2 chapattis and only one lot of eggs, and use the other chapatti at another time. if you want to make both of them now, you will need to have to cups of eggs and veg ready to go, or the first one will get cold while you prep the second one. pour your eggs into the pan, and shake the pan slightly, to spead them out. when you can see the white cooked layer of eggs all over the bottom of the pan, grab a chapatti, and place it bownest-side-down on top of the eggs. carefully slide a fish slice underneath, and flip the whole lot over. after only about a minute, slip it out of the pan and onto a plate, and roll it up, with the eggs inside and chapatti outside. you can put slices of tomato or other fillings in before you roll it up if you want to.

enjoy the fruits of your labour!

Sunday 5 February 2012

The IMATS Experience

Hey girls!

I went to IMATS yesterday and had the most amazing time, and i have so much to tell you all that i'm splitting the IMATS London posts into two, this one will be only about the actual experiene, and the other will be a huge haul of all the stuff i bought!

the event itsself is held over 2 days, and i chose to go on the saturday, which is the first day. i would reccomend going on a saturday for a few reasons, but mainly because lots of stalls were sold out of the best deals by the middle of saturday, and had no plans to re-stock, so i imagine that sunday shopping would be slim pickings! it was held int he grand hall in Alexandra Palace in north london, which is a beautiful building and had more than enough space to fit everything in.

When i first arrived i was completely overawed, and kind of nervous of even looking at stalls because there were so many people who all seemed very driven and knew what they wanted, whereas i just felt a bit lost!

i spent some time just looking around, and soon got used to competing for space at stalls. i sadly didn't get too many pictures of the actual makeup and stalls, i was far to distracted by the amazing demos happening all around me!
the event itsself was so much fun, which i kind of didn't expect it to be. i thought it would be quite fasat paced, stressful, driven shopping for bargains, but i found that i was actually going at a reasonably slow pace and taking time to really look at and appreciate everything. there were a couple of things i knew i wanted to get, mainly a compressor, and looking for that was a bit stressful but i bought one early on (and left it at the stall to be collected later) and then i was so pleased to just be able to shop for things that simply caught my eye, and of course some new airbase makeup to go with my compressor!


the nyx stall was SOOO tempting but the queue was HUGE. another tip is to check out what you want and then come back nearer to closing time. i returned to nyx later on and there wa no line at all, because the show was due to close in half an hour.


i would advise keeping your phone to hand too, especially if it has a web browser. maybe i'm just a bit cynical but i wanted to price check everything, and i found that some things were being advertised as 50% off when in reality they werent reduced at all. even if it doesn't have internet keep it close at hand even for the calculator, to keep your budget in check and to make sure that you're getting a good deal. on one stall (i wont say which) they had a deal on airbrush stuff where if you paid £200 you got the compressor and 2 mini sets of makeup, but if you paid £250 you got 4 mini sets with it. what they didn't tell you was that separately the mini sets were only £15, so if you bought the £200 set plus the other 2 minis separately, it would only have cost £230!
overall i had a great day, spent far too much money and got some great deals, i throughly reccomend it to everyone!

i'll leave you with some more photos of the amazing demos!
warwick davis was there having goblin makeup from harry potter being re-created on him. his kids were there too, and seemed to be having a wicked time playing with presthetics and wounds!


the wonderful EnKore at the crown brush stand creating and awsome airbrush look to be viewed with 3D glasses!

Friday 3 February 2012

IMATS Anyone?

hey girls! tommorrow i'm going to IMATS London for the first time, so i'm super excited! are any of you guys going? i was going to go with the wonderful Neve (check her out here) but unfortunately she can't make it, so i dont know who i'm going to be going with, i might end up going on my own, so if you see me, come and hang out!!

hope to see you there! xxx

And the winner is....

The number generalted by random.org was 6, which means that Holly is the winner! congrats!