Top Ten Gin Recipes

It's no secret, we love gin. Not just a cheeky G&T on a sunny day, mind. LOVE IT. We'd put it in every single meal if we could. Actually, every course of every meal.

The juniper flavours in gin make it great for savoury dishes. Use it in your risotto and you'll be forever convinced that it works. Have you used gin as a marinade yet? We did, and our gin and tonic kebabs are the tasty, tasty proof.

Cake, meet gin, gin meet cake. Two of our favourite things, baked together in glorious harmony. Our hazelnut cake has a brilliantly purple sloe gin glaze  Gin and tonic cake has all of the flavour, none of the booze.

Take cream, dark chocolate, rose and gin, make a ganache. Eat all the gin chocolate yourself.

Now to dessert. Our Hendrick's sorbet is the best thing you can make with a cucumber (see also: GC&T). While you've got the Hendrick's out, make jelly! Glow in the dark jelly, in fact. If you don't have the blacklight to hand, there's always sloe gin jelly. Eat that one with the lights on, please.

Erm, that's ten. I ran out of space to tell you about damson and sloe gin, eyeball jellies or the molecular gin and tonic. Oh dear. Might I suggest that you pour yourself a gin rickey and peruse Nick's favourite gin cocktails?

Need something to soak up all that gin? Check out the rest of our top ten recipe posts!

Sluttishly Savoury: Baked Coconut Chicken

This baked chicken dish is the perfect summer comfort food. It's easy to make but it feels like you've actually made an effort. The creamy rice is laced with chilli and it sort of 'hugs' the chicken as it bakes and the skin crisps, soaking up all of the coconut milk and juices along the way. If you're having a tough day and need cheering up, make this the second you get back from work and it'll do the trick.

Baked coconut chicken (serves 2, but scales easily)
Preparation time: 1 hour
Cooking time: 40-50 minutes

You'll need:

• 4 large chicken thighs on the bone (skin on, trust me)
• 1 tin coconut milk
• 4 birdseye chillies
• 25g grated ginger
• 2 cloves garlic
• 2 tsp cumin seeds
• 1 tsp garam masala
• 1/2 tsp ground fenugreek
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• 150g rice
• 100ml water

For the spiced red onion garnish (optional, but it's tasty and will give your dinner a bit of colour):

• 1 small red onion, finely sliced
• 1 finely chopped red chilli
• 1 tsp chopped mint
• Pinch of salt 
• 2 tbsp lemon juice

Make it!

1. Pop chicken thighs in a large, deep baking tray, making sure there's still lots of room around the edges.
2. Mix the coconut milk, chillies, ginger and garlic together and pour around and over the chicken. Leave in the fridge for at least an hour (you could do this overnight or before you went to work in the morning, but the coconut milk works its magic surprisingly quickly, so you can still make this if you get back from work late).
3. When you're ready to cook, preheat your oven to 180C/ 350F /Gas Mark 4 and let your chicken come up to room temperature. Mix up your spices in the meantime.
4. Smear your spice mix all over the chicken and then cover with foil and pop in the oven for about 30 minutes.
5. When the chicken is almost done add your rice to the coconut milk in the gaps around the chicken. Mix the rice and coconut milk and then add a little water if needed. You want to make sure the rice is just covered with liquid.
6. Put back in the oven uncovered and let the rice cook while the chicken skins crisps. Check after about ten minutes, you might need to stir and add a little more water. The chicken won't dry out, it will be moist from the coconut milk, but you need to make sure you don't burn the rice as it cooks.
7. Mix up the ingredients for your spiced red onion garnish if you're using.
8. After about 20 minutes your rice should be perfectly fluffy and your chicken skin's super crispy. Serve with the red onions on top.

Photograph by Caleigh. She's an excellent recipe tester.

Design Porn: Mini Moderns Margate

While my love of design is usually kept strictly in the Victorian to Art Deco eras (COLOURS! Glass! Colours AND GLASS! And dark, dark wood.) I have a massive soft spot for Mini Moderns, not least because the Moderns, Mark and Keith, live in my neck of the woods in Camberwell - remember those brilliant mugs? I think there's one set left if you ask them nicely - and because they make beautiful things that are filled with inspiration and fun.

At the weekend, I popped along to their Open Studios at the Camberwell Arts Festival,  and came across Margate. Ah, lovely Margate...is something probably only Tracey Emin said up until recently, but when the Turner Contemporary Gallery opened in 2011, things smartened up a bit. (Apologies in advance to any incensed lovers of Margate).

The gallery commissioned a series of pieces for their shop: aprons, oven gloves, and tea towels. It's all just been released on the Mini Moderns site too as part of the Hinterland collection. That whole collection is beautiful: the other place named heavily is Dungenesse, an area they love anyway, having just renovated a Victorian (YAY!) railway carriage. It is ridiculously sexual. Regardez les pictures.

This tea towel is available in indigo (top) and lido - the rope spelling out the name is brilliant. It's £8.

The oven gloves are £20,  and the aprons - Margate anchors  and Margate gulls - are also £20.

If you're heading to the Design Festival later this summer, Mini Moderns are taking over the Southbank Centre Festival Terrace shop (home to a rather embarrassing number of Sluttery "Oh...my wallet just...fell open. Yes, twice, alright stop interrogating me" incidents) for the whole of September to revisit their REMIX project. 

That was where the Moderns chaps gave their take on classic Southbank Centre patterns, and showed up some quite beautiful stuff, so it's really exciting to be doing it again with new colourways and new product lines - and new patterns. And basically things that I can look at and go "Yes please" like the C-60 wallpaper.

Sluttishly Savoury: Apple Raita

It has reached that time of year when I urgently need my food to cool me down from within. While pondering this the other day, it occurred to me that raita is EXACTLY what I need, possibly for every single meal from now until September.

This Indian condiment tempers the heat of curries and spicy snacks with its blend of yoghurt, cucumber and mint. I add apple to mine for extra crunch and sweetness, and I chop everything roughly so that it's more of a scoopy sauce than a dippy one. Uh-huh, scoopy sauce is a real culinary term. Shush.

Apple Raita (makes one giant bowlful) 
Preparation time: 5 minutes
You will need:

• ½ a cucumber, peeled and roughly diced
• 1 large red apple, peeled, cored and roughly diced
• 1 spring onion, sliced
• 1 small green chilli, deseeded and finely chopped (optional)
• 500g natural yoghurt
• A large handful of fresh mint, roughly chopped
• ½ tsp ground cumin
• ½ tsp ground coriander
• Salt and pepper to taste

Make it! 

1. Squeeze the moisture out of the diced cucumber using a wad of kitchen roll, or a clean tea towel.
2. Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl, and season to taste. 
3. Serve with spicy, dippy food like pakoras and bhajis, or simply shovel it into your gaping maw using naan bread or poppadums. 

Dream Dress: Tennis Whites

I've gone Wimbledon crazy. By this I mean that I'm glued to my sofa with a punnet of strawberries and don't plan on moving until July. I'm also loving all of the white outfits and incredibly tanned limbs flying across the court - have you seen Sharapova's legs? She's got thighs of steel. I've decided the easier option is to look for some brilliant white dresses. Don't wear any of them to a summer wedding. Don't be that girl.

Let's raid ASOS first, because they're always excellent and are back up online after their fire this weekend. This cowl dress is available in their petite range and standard range and it's £35. Let's all marvel at her brilliant hair.

I really like this mesh insert dress. It's also £35. It's such a sexy shape. I'd love to go to summery parties in this. Take note: she might look like she is going to a wedding. She is NOT. She might be going to a very chic Christening.

I absolutely love this broderie dress. It's adorable. But then ASOS went and put some really ugly straps across the back of it. Honestly, I'm tempted to buy the dress and cut them out. If you fancy doing the same, it's £48. Her brilliant platform heels are £60.

This is the only Coast dress that doesn't get too 'weddingy'. It's definitely slightly off white, but let's not quibble, it'll make your cleavage look amazing. It's £124.

This silk kaftan dress is a really beautiful option. If someone could explain to me why it's £299 I'd appreciate it. Hopefully someone at Karen Millen is giving themselves a good talking to as I type.

Topshop's leaf applique dress is so pretty. It's got a very low back so there's no way you'll be able to wear a bra with it. At £90 it's a little overpriced but the detailing is beautiful. The model is clearly pissed off about the price, there's no other reason for her to have such a mardy look on her face.

This daisy shift dress really needs no accessory except for a really great tan.

I really like the bright embroidery on the yoke of this dress. It's in the sale at Warehouse and it's now just £30. The back is a pleasing low v-neck that's not too low for a bra. Loads of love about this dress, I'm gutted it doesn't have pockets.

Oh, nice work, Mango. This shift dress looks so chic. It's in the sale so it's just £21.99. Or opt for the gorgeous Fever shift dress pictured at the top of the post. Just make sure you avoid red wine, at least until Wimbledon is over.

Gluten Free: Chocolate and Rum Brigadeiros

Brigadeiros are the Brazilian version of truffles and they're far too easy to make. Named after Brigadier Eduardo Gomes — a much celebrated Brazilian hero — the sweets were sold during his presidential campaign in the 40s. The campaign was said to have had the slogan "Vote no brigadeiro, que é bonito e é solteiro",  which roughly translates as "Vote for the brigadier who's good-looking and single". He didn't win.

The rum isn't traditional but I had a tiny bottle of Rumbullion and thought I'd put it to good use, although it does increase the setting time. If rum isn't your thing, try our chilli and orange version or lemon and coconut. If you want a traditional sweet, just use cocoa powder and chocolate sprinkles, otherwise let your imagination go running.

Chocolate and Rum Brigadeiros (makes about 25, depending on how much mixture you've eaten while 'checking' if it's set)

Cooking time: 10 minutes
Setting time: Your mixture will need at least 3 hours setting time, probably overnight if you're using rum.
Assembly time: 15 minutes

You'll need:

• 1 tin condensed milk (usually these are 400 grams)
• 4 tbsp cocoa powder, sifted
• 1 tbsp butter
• 30ml dark rum
• Sprinkles of all colours and varieties - you can also use desiccated coconut or chopped nuts.

Make it!

1. Add the condensed milk, cocoa powder, rum and butter to a pan and stir constantly over a low heat. Don't stop stirring. No, really. Your mixture will burn if you do.
2. After about 10 minutes your mixture should have thickened to a consistency that makes stirring tricky, then you're done.
3. Transfer your mixture to a bowl and pop in the fridge until set. Lick the mixture off the spatula.
4. When your mixture is set, it's time to roll into balls. Spread some butter on your hands before you start - this stage gets messy and the mixture will stick to your hands. You'll probably ignore this stage for the first ball thinking 'how sticky can it be?' Go and wash your hands.
5. Roll the balls around the size of a ping pong ball and then carefully roll them about in your sprinkles of choice. If you're using lots of different sprinkles, it's handy to have them all in different bowls so you can get a bit of a production line going. 
6. Pop them back in the fridge until you're ready to eat them. Share them with people you like. Maybe.

Top tip: If you've got any mixture left because Wimbledon was starting it'll taste brilliant in a cake or dolloped on top of some ice cream.

Sluttishly Savoury: Coriander and Lime Fish Taco Bowls

When I see white fish on offer in a supermarket I make these.

Fish is good in a taco for two reasons. The first — bite-ability. You can gnaw through fish without the structural integrity giving way. Second— white fish loves bright citrus flavour. I've just thought of a third— it doesn't matter if the fish falls apart a little when cooking, because you end up piling it into a taco.

The tortilla bowls are made from moulding your tortillas into ovenproof bowls and baking them, not strictly necessary but how CUTE?!

Fish Taco Bowls (makes 6 bowls, enough for two hungry taco lovers)
Preparation Time: 20mins
Cooking Time: 15mins

You will need:

• 2 tsp cumin seeds
• 2 tsp coriander seeds
• 3 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
• a big handful of fresh coriander, roughly chopped
• 2 limes, zest and juice
• 4 white fish fillets (doesn't matter what kind - tilapia, cod, pollack, haddock etc)
• olive oil

Extras:

• 1 red onion, peeled and cut into thin rings
• quite a lot of rice vinegar (or white wine vinegar)
• 4 heaped tbsp crème fraîche
• tomato ketchup
• tabasco
• 6 flour tortillas (the small ones)
• sunflower oil
• 1 avocado, sliced

Make it!

1. Heat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas4.
2. Toast the cumin and coriander seeds in a dry pan for a couple of minutes until they smell nice and aromatic. 
3. In the processor, blitz the toasted spices, garlic, coriander, zest and juice of the limes with a large glug of olive oil and lots of salt and pepper. Pour the mix into a large sandwich bag, add the fish fillets, shake around a bit and leave in the fridge while you sort the rest.
4. Next, put your onion rings in a container and pour over enough vinegar to submerge them. Set aside.
5. Mix the crème fraîche with enough tommy k and tabasco until it tastes good.
6. For the tortilla bowls, grab 2 ovenproof bowls, rub a little sunflower oil on to one side of the tortillas, then fold them into the bowls (oil side down) and bake for 12 minutes until golden. Repeat with the other tacos. 
7. Now just fry (or grill) the fish for a couple of minutes on each side, drain the onion rings (keep the vinegar in your fridge - you can use it for dressings) and assemble the fish, crème fraîche avocado and pickled onion rings as you please. Or just lay the lot out on the table and let everyone freestyle.