Little Pink Kitchen

Not much craic round here, but at least that means there is space on the grid for Mr P's amazing handiwork. He is the toddler's hero.

Happy Halloween. And Happy Diwali. I am taking much solace in the concept of light in the darkness 🎇

Just a quick message to let you know that the Little Pink Kitchen is closed for the next two weeks.

Infertility saved the cruellest blow of all for our last ever IVF embryo transfer, and just a few short weeks after the joy of a positive pregnancy test, I am currently enduring the utter hell in my own body that is miscarriage.

I know that far too many of you understand exactly what I am going through, and I am so sorry about that. It is a pain like no other.

See you all at the end of October x

Soup szn is here 🍲

Leek and potato, from the Little Pink Kitchen archives. I think it might be my all time favourite? What's yours? 🥔

1. I do hope you enjoy this picture of me many, many years ago on my very first day of St Multose Junior Infants, Kinsale. No, I don't know what I'm doing with my hands either, but it is a vay seasonal picture.
2. I really hope that those of you who find the back to school pictures are doing OK. When you are deep in the fertility struggle, it is the worst of them all.
3. I would like some sort of award for causing this nice weather. It was me drinking that glass of rosé on Monday that caused it. Panic not, I'm not going to go buy another, lest I jinx it.
4. There is a real risk that all future offerings from the Little Pink Kitchen will be soup. For the toddler seems to actually eat any vegetable if presented in soup format? Make it make sense. It'll be butter chicken soup before we know it.
5. I have located a beer. Happy Friday, all 💃💃💃

Sneaky lil lunch for two while the toddler is at nursery. Actually had a whole conversation although on the way home peak excitement was reached when we discovered an earlier dropped toy car on the side of the Sandown Road 😂

The new lunch menu at is incredible value. 10/10 recommend 🤸

Dinner a deux.

Onion and celery softened. Quarter of a teaspoon each of cayenne and paprika. Teaspoon of cumin. Two cloves of garlic. Half a bottle of passata. Tin of mixed beans. Simmer while you cook some couscous.

Topped with yoghurt, toasted almonds and coriander because I'm pretty chill about normal toddler fussy eating, but I simply cannot tolerate a child that hates my most beloved herb 🙈🙈🙈

A little dip with the book club girls to lift the spirits tonight.

Obligatory coffee and chats after, which is always the real treat. I made a frittata and you can totally find the recipe for that on my actual blog. Like it is indeed 2011. Not even a substack or anything 😂

1. I am currently so obsessed with the Olympics on social media that I ordered a chocolate muffin in Nero yesterday. Not sure if it was 11/10 but it scratched an itch.
2. Of course I don't have a picture because every single one of my senses is involved when I eat out with my toddler and photography is not one of those senses. I'm still laughing at this picture of our anniversary dinner at Il Pirata. I used to be an award winning food photographer who got invited to fun places and followed for hot new takes. LOL.
3. I don't want to show off, but after sixteen whole years of marriage, we have finally cracked 'splitting the housework' and I have had to accept that basically I am a massive control freak? A hard life lesson, but at least I don't have to clean out the manky shower drain any more, so I'll take it.
4. I chanced upon a bottle of cuticle oil this week, and have actually applied some to my actual cuticles. I expect some sort of special commendation when I next go to get them painted, please and thank you.
5. It's Friday. I've had a wine in the garden already. Hope you are having a lovely one, whatever you are up to x

💫 Sixteen years 💫

💫 Guru Purnima today, a Hindu festival to celebrate our teachers.

I'm so glad my daily practice is part of my life; I'm so grateful to for giving me what I need from it for the last 13 years.

My favourite picture, from my most intense study trip, featuring the tiniest yet mightiest teacher of all 💫

1. It's nearly 5pm. The dog is doing a dance in front of me that would put Michael Flatley to shame. If he keeps this up, I'll have to insure his legs. Or just give him his sodding dinner.
2. An unexpected perk of getting back to catering 'properly' is how immaculately clean my kitchen is. I (almost literally) dusted off the old cleaning schedule and let me tell you my kitchen kickboards are now SHINING. I only found one loose pea as well, sort of wedged between the fridge and a cupboard. Just call me Hyacinth.
3. This is me in lovely Di**le. Yes, I have worn this dress a million times but I brought it all the way back from India and sure isn't it grand? Let's normalise wearing things we love as much as we can get away with. Bonus of not even needing any sucky in pants and I could accommodate as many portions of sticky toffee pudding as I wanted in there. Win win, all round.
4. We went to the for some fish and chips last night. It was GLORIOUS and I can say no more on the matter. Smoked haddock, side of curry sauce, pot of tea, plz. They even have some bonus diggers outside at the minute which we all know is the only entertainment you ever need with a toddler so everyone was happy.
5. It's minutes past five. I best feed the dog. And if you are calling round to pick up some food, please just say nice things about my kickboards.

Sarah

It's been a hot minute since late night chopping and simmering and washing up. Back in my happy place, I guess 🥰

Butter chicken is on sale for next week, if you feel like you are missing out (you should). It's a tray of butter chicken, some crispy potatoes and everyone's favourite mango salad. You come pick it up and BOOM 💥, weekend dinner sorted 💥

Order on the website for next weekend. The rest of you, I'll see ya tomorrow 🤸

💫 BUTTER. CHICKEN. IS. BACK 💫

For all you fans of a Friday night treat of a dinner being made for you, the Friday night feast is BACK.

A tray of butter chicken or paneer, some spiced potatoes and a chopped mango salad. All you need to do is crack open the fizzy pop and whack it in the oven.

💫 Order from www.littlepinkkitchen.co.uk
💫 Collection from East Belfast this Friday between 4 and 7
💫 Each portion is enough for two
💫 Everything comes in oven friendly dishes
💫 There are no gluten containing ingredients

I know half the country has vanished, but I'll hopefully see some of you on Friday 🤸

1. I am in Di**le with my sister for a wedding tomorrow. It is so very, very beautiful. On the way here, we stopped at the Barack Obama plaza services and. Well. Quite the sight. Also a chance to stock up on Southern Cadbury so do call in if you are in the area.

2. Mr P ordered a new phone battery for this week and it looks like a Twilight mint. Does anyone else remember them? You got them with the bill after your bang bang chicken in The Grouse, and they were glorious. Bring em back, I say.

3. I am wearing my midlife crisis denim jumpsuit a lot because weather and it is perfect EXCEPT for when you are doing outdoorsy person things and need a wee. And it was supposed to be a new moon last weekend, not a full one. Sorry lads.

4. Do you the way I've barely mentioned the fact I was in India this year? Well, the voice on my Google maps unexpectedly has an Indian twang. It must have updated when I was out there or something. I almost feepmoile taking her for a dosa. Except I'm in Di**le, so maybe a spice bag instead?

5. We've had a swim, had a hotel room coffee, availed of the facilities. Time to go for a drink.

Have a good one lads!

Sarah x

Picked up some yellow-stickered mince while getting milk earlier.

Made moussaka for maybe the first time? Everyone loved it and an excuse to use the 🍆🍆🍆 emoji so double fun tonight 😂

🌱 Coming up with loads of salad ideas for customers who are having parties soon and it really is my favourite 🥰

🤸 Email [email protected] if you need something for your next gathering that will freshen up everything 💫

Nectarine. Fancy mozzarella. Basil. Toasted almonds.

Eating like it's actually summer, if nothing else 🌱

1. You asked. I listened. Here are five of the most bizarre things that have run through my head this week. A childhood picture, because they are always hilarious.

2. While I was 'away' I noticed that everybody and their cat was at Taylor Swift and I wasn't sure if I had actually heard any of her stuff because I listen to 'tragic old person who once had an asymmetric heaircut and a pair of those H&M squins that were so skinny you got friction burns' favourite 6music. I decided to recitify this on a dog walk this week and do you know what? I get it. It totally reminds me of the kind of music that soundtracked, like, Dawson's Creek or the OC or something when you were all teenaged and hormonal and thought your parents hated you.

3. I'm not entirely sure I can consider myself a full 'swiftie'. I mean, its only been three days and I barely have enough free time at the minute to shave my legs never mind make sodding bracelets, so I'll leave that to the yoof. And maybe listen to some Jamie XX.

4. This peanut butter needs to be on the grid. LOLz at that phrase, people usually reserve it for like a rig out at a wedding or something but this peanut butter is EVEN better than that. I obviously buy (too much of) my own, but if want to send any my way, I'll happily don the matching activewear sets and smoothie bowls of the peanut butter influencer. Except we all know that isn't true. So I'll just sit here in my M&S jeans, eating it out of the jar with a spoon. It really is THAT good.

5. It is Friday. I am working tomorrow and a bit boring on the old booze front these days in an extremely vain attempt to have some energy for when I wake up in the morning, but I might go mad and pour a glass of white. I'll be asleep on the sofa by 9.

Have a good one, all. It is so lovely to be back,

Sarah x

Big lunches all round yesterday (I mean, swipe for the 'small' chicken stack) which meant that this was all that needed to be done for dinner.

Twas a dream come true for the toddler, not going to lie 😂 Is the childcare bill or the strawberry bill higher? TBC.

🥔 Crisped up some potatoes, carrots and cashews then glazed them with soy, honey and a LOT of garlic 🧄

🧀 Whipped up some feta with sesame oil, coriander and spring onion 🧅

Salty cheese for a beloved DIP and crispy potatoes meant even the toddler was happy to overlook the green therein.

Which was good, because this was delicious and I am 💯% making again 🤸

Oh god. I did That Thing. That Thing where you aim for perfect so do sodding NOTHING.

That thing where I did not say one thing on here for a while because, well I was having some sort of post-India life crisis (turns out that when not accompanied by a toddler, I had a lot more time for navel gazing. I mean, who would have thunk?) Don’t worry, I was still stalking you all.

And then I must have been hanging out in some sort of Victorian workhouse because I managed to get pneumonia? Like, actually. Which is pretty brutal, what with the whole ‘not really being able to breathe and needing to sleep so much your Mother has to come and take your child because you simply cannot be responsible for another human’s life’ sort of a vibe. 

And then, well, the quest for perfection meant I didn’t really post anything at all. I mean, not even any funny LOLz or anything. Although I promise there have been no further purchases of leather shorts. Although we all know around here that leather shorts=perfection so maybe I should have bought some in my quest for this illusive perfect. I could probably have made them a tax deductible expense and goodness knows they would be more wearable in this Northern Irish ‘Summer’ than pretty much any other type of short 🙈

Anyway it is the first day of a new month and it is a Monday and if I worked somewhere that meant I actually understood what a tax deductible expense actually was, I would be ALL BIZ about the fact that it is a new quarter. I might even be setting myself up for a ‘sprint’ or something. Perhaps involving Slack. Definitely involving Slack. 

Alas there is no Slack, just me, Sarah, saying hi and reminding you all that catering is what I do here in the Little Pink Kitchen. Trays of food you can stick in your own oven as an (vaguely) affordable way to feed a crowd. Platters of sandwiches. Canapés. I can even go retro Little Pink Kitchen and do salad boxes for your office lunches. For butter chicken fans, watch this space 👀

(And for the absolute legends who slide into the DMs, comment and email about the writing with such kind words it makes me a bit weepy, I’m figuring that out, too. But progress, not perfection, right? 🤍)

Everyone else posting sunsets and glasses of rosé and I am FREAKING OUT that shorts szn, however brief, means my type 1 diabetes is there for all and sundry to see.

Never not a learning curve, this game 🎯

I was 40 on Friday, and if my week of celebrations was a reflection of what is to come, everything is going to be just fine. There was sea swimming and glasses of white burgundy and poetry and cake and singing at work; the culmination of all of these on my birthday itself, with the toddler taken to my parent's and us boarding a plane to Bordeaux.

We land late on Friday, a comfortable bed in a budget hotel with no tiny alarm clock the ultimate treat. We wake naturally, and Mr P charms the reception staff into delivering us coffee.

We walk to Marche Des Capucins, a coffee and a croissant on the way to line the stomach. At the market, we marvel at families eating steak frites for breakfast. We see pineapples, cod cheeks, cookies; all for customers to carefully place in their pull along shopping trollies.

More walking, this time to the square in front of the National Opera building. A glass of rose, a pleasant half hour watching the walks of holidaymakers of all shapes and sizes; daysacks with packed lunches and bottles of water, celebratory groups in matching t-shirts.

Then, to Place Du Palais, the lunch menu of an alleyway restaurant luring us to a little table on the side of the street. We eat tuna with grapefruit and cauliflower with chorizo, and onglet and squid. There is minerally white wine from stoney soil, then there is an afternoon nap. The toddler is not with us after all.

More walking, and this time a beer in a square absolutely full of young bordelaise. A woman at the table beside us breastfeeds her week old baby, her and her partner entranced by this new life they have created.

We visit Galleries Lafayette, and look at rows and rows of clothes in muted tones. I buy a denim jumpsuit. This might be the beginning of a midlife crisis.

We jump on a boat to dinner, a glass of champagne to sip as the sun sets perfectly between the spires of the Notre Dame. A group gather to celebrate a birthday. They spend so long greeting each other with kisses I worry that their carefully chosen white will be warm. We eat snails and mushrooms and slabs of pork, and we raise a glass to birthdays, to dinner, to us 🤍

The words. The writing. Yes, so much has come from my father. But so much has come from reading. In certain seasons, devouring whole books like a hungry teenager whose legs could not be filled. In other seasons, poetry. A page every few days, before weary eyes close to sleep.

In the biggest, most recent, most memorable of all the seasons, stumbling across the poems of motherhood written by and reading her words with an eight week old in his very own purple baby grow, tears streaming my cheeks.

Tonight, in Belfast, hearing her read her own words, and them being as brilliant and as funny as as poignant as when I read those words in my own voice.

What a treat 💫

I'm working today, as normal. I rush home as quickly as I can. There is reheated Bolognese sauce, and giant shells of pasta, and hastily grated cheese.

Unusually for a Tuesday night, there is also a glass of prosecco. We clink a celebration of these two years; two flutes of fizz, one stout water glass smeared by red hands, three delighted faces. We sing Happy Birthday, and you shout CAKE in reply. Cake for pudding really is the only appropriate response. It is only your birthday once a year, after all.

As we load the dishwasher, a procession of cars, and diggers, and tractors, and transporters follows us to and from the kitchen. I wonder how this fits into the Montessori rotation. I guess it doesn't, but then again, neither do we. The prize vehicle is selected to bring upstairs, and the journey up is punctuated by showing us where in this tiny yellow car Daddy sits. And Mummy. And even Sid the beagle.

The car and the toddler are washed of Bolognese sauce. Teeth are brushed, pyjamas and nappies and stuffed elephants are collected. You sit on your daddy's knee, shouting 'TIGER! TEA!'

And so the first story of the evening is chosen. A sloppy kiss and a tight squeeze for Mummy. A wave and a night night. As I close the door, another story with Daddy has begun.

Happy birthday my darling boy. Two years of turning ordinary life into something really rather extraordinary. We love you so much ❤️