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September 8, 2018

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recipe card, slow cooker

lentil and butternut squash curry

Here for the lentil and butternut squash curry? When is it ever that easy with us?

A few posts ago Paul was given the chance to answer a few random questions from our readers. Because we’re so unspeakably arrogant, let’s roll the dice again! This time, me, James, will be answering. Prefer Paul? You’re wrong – he’s the Lidl James.

That’s not true, he’s better than I could ever dream of being.

What was your first impression of each other?

Great question – our first real time together saw us falling asleep next to each other within twenty minutes of meeting. My conversation will do that. That or my exhaustive anal technique. Anyway, I’d been holding in an almighty fart and I waited until he fell asleep to blurt it out. There was a moment or two of silence then an almighty laugh from Paul, and we never looked back, save for me to check I hadn’t shit myself. I knew then he was a keeper, because anyone who can laugh through the tears caused by my skin-peeling wind is for me. I just asked Paul for his first impression of me and it was simply ‘handsome’. Pfft. I thought Paul would love me more if I turned up looking like a Poundland Triga movie – I turned up in a Newcastle United top, grey trackies and a pair of trainers so clean you could imagine they’d been bleached. Clearly my Chloe Mafia brrrrap-brrrrap swagger won him over.

Do your ‘offline’ friends/family/colleagues know about your online presence/following?

We try and keep offline and online fairly separate. We’ve built up slight caricatures of ourselves for the blog and it can be difficult looking someone in the eye to talk about exciting work stuff when you know they’ve just read a blistering account of the time you accidentally fisted someone on a night out in Hartlepool. I mean, you don’t want anyone knowing you’ve been to Hartlepool, for Christ’s sakes. People are always astonished that the quiet one in the office has over 350,000 followers hanging on his every word. That’s why they call me Jim Jones and stare at me nervously as I’m making squash. We do find ourselves immediately caveating any trip to the website with a warning about the language, content, poor photography and swearing. My parents like to know exactly how much money the blog makes us so when I invariably die early due to a torn rectum, they’ll be able to cash in and bugger off to Alicante for a few months. Ghouls.

What advice would you give your 15 year old self?

Learn to drive as soon as you can. Noshing off lorry drivers for a quick trip up the A69 is never a safe idea. Stop worrying. Jason from Glasgow is going to make you unable to poo without crying for a week, practice first. Don’t grow that fucking awful Enya haircut two years from now. Don’t then dye it blonde so you look like a meth-addled Myra Hindley. Start on the grand plan earlier and you’ll have a house even sooner. Always double-douche. Don’t wank yourself silly over Fred Durst, save some juice for later – he turns into a mega-DILF with age.

If you were prime minister for a day, what would you change?

Mass deportation – straight into the sea, mind – of anyone who starts a sentence with:

  • I’m not being funny but…
  • I’m not a racist but…
  • The thing is, yeah…
  • …I turned around and said…

Coupled with the immediate destruction of anyone who shares ‘97% of people won’t share this’ drivel, anyone who doesn’t immediately acknowledge me letting them in on the motorway and anyone who walks more than two abreast on a path. Oh, and the reintroduction of gloryholes.

If you were only allowed to pick one country for the rest of your holidays where would you go?

Germany. Partly because of happy memories, partly because of shenanigans to come, and mostly because it’s an amazing country full of history and culture. Plus fuck it, I can sneak out on a train to all the countries around it. Want to play properly? Canada. I want to live there – a giant farm by a lake, nothing around me than the corpses of the people I pick up on Grindr. As long as I can still download Dr Who and Paul can still get his subscription boxes, we’ll be fine.

Do you read every post and all replies on your FB page?

Yep! We don’t always reply to them – usually if they’re bad mannered, illogical or lazy. I also make a point of refusing to answer anyone who has bilge in their profile picture. If they look like they’ve ever so much contemplated buying a LIFE LAUGH LOVE wall decal, they can go.

Which female celebrity would be your straight crush?

Not even a straight crush – she remains my number one absolute dream. Gillian Anderson. Sophisticated, beautiful, hilarious, strong and incredibly compassionate. I always wanted to be Scully rather than Mulder, not least because I can run in a set of heels and look great with red hair.

Are you readers as well as writers ? Who is your favourite author and why?

Paul reads fussy books about architecture. They all smell of foist and damp and have words like aggregate and tensile in them. The only way they’d send me to sleep quicker would be if he smashed me in the face with it like Little Mo and her Christmas dinner. (sidenote: I used to have such a crush on Trevor, you know – isn’t that awful?) I like Stephen King. I used to caveat that with an apology because he’s so mainstream but you know what, fuck that – he’s an excellent writer and his books are brilliantly entertaining. He can’t finish to save his life, but nor can I without someone working my balls. His best is The Stand, although I bloody hated Frannie. Stuck up cow. The miniseres is an absolute hoot though – I often do my best Mother Abigail voice to Paul as he approaches climax – makes him last a bit longer to think of me as a nonagenarian corn farmer.

How much weight have you both lost?

One or two pounds.

Image result for winking emoji

Are you still in love with each other?

More than ever. Paul gets such a rough time of it from this blog because I’m the writer for 99% of the articles, but he’s learned to roll with the punches now (quite right, I keep them on his kidneys). Thing is, I can’t imagine my life without him in it – from all the tiny things we do together to the big stuff like holidays and tag-teaming plumbers. He’s been the first person I speak to in the morning for over ten years and the last person I speak to before sleep. He still laughs at my jokes, he still puts up with my nonsense. I woke him up in a crisis the other day because I’d diagnosed a rough patch of skin in my armpit as lymphoma. He pointed out we’d changed the washing powder and it was just a reaction to that, calmed me down and spooned me until my blanket of back hair made him sneeze. He makes my coffee in the morning and my tea in the evening. Even now, four thousand days later, we still think of nonsense to send one another to cheer each other’s days up. I sent him a picture of Enya in a clock the other day and he laughed like a drain. Love comes in many ways, but they all come from him. My life without him in it is as unimaginable to me as the inky blackness of death or a world without bees and I promise you, reader, that not a single day goes by where I don’t remember how much I love him and tell him how special he is to me. The thought that one day all this will end and one will be torn from the other breaks my heart in two but makes me keen to make every day special.

I just wish he wasn’t such a swivel-eyed gypsy-stock bastard, though.

Have either of you ever done that thing where several men are doing each other from behind simultaneously?

No. Definitely haven’t been part of a group of eight either. I say part, I mean the sponge.

That was fun! Might do one last burst on the next blog post. But until then, it’s time for our lentil and butternut squash curry!

lentil and butternut squash curry

lentil and butternut squash curry

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lentil butternut squash curry

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Cook

Total

Yield 8 servings

One of our 'dumpbag' specialities which despite it's name isn't part of our behind-the-scenes XTube package. No, just bag these up whenever you like, freeze them and when you're ready to cook them just get them out and tip them in the slow cooker. It really is that easy! This takes no time at all and tastes pretty damn fine. 

Ingredients

  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 1 tbsp curry powder
  • 1 tin chopped tomatoes
  • 300g butternut squash, diced
  • 400g red lentils
  • 1 carrot, sliced
  • 1 tin light coconut milk (14 syns)

Instructions

  • called a dump bag because you dump all the stuff in a freezer bag and freeze it until you need it, then...
  • dump all of the ingredients into a slow cooker along with 1 litre of water and cook for 6-8 hours on low
  • that's literally it - add a splash of hot sauce too, if you fancy punishing that hole of yours

Notes

  • not really much to say about this one! it's ready in no time at all and tastes gorgeous!
  • after a slow cooker? Amazon have a great selection, and if you order through our link we get a few pennies commission!

Courses slow cooker

Cuisine twochubbycubs

Want more slow cooker wonders? Of course you do!

J

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September 5, 2018

Posted under

breakfast, recipe card

fancy as f**k turkey and avocado toast

How else could I make turkey and avocado toast exciting? Give it a title that’ll make sure it’ll get stuck in your spam filter at work and possibly get you hauled in front of HR for inappropriate Internet usage.

In my first job that exact scenario happened. In my defence I had no idea that we weren’t allowed to use the Internet when it was quiet, and we certainly weren’t supposed to be on gay interest sites. Not porn, no, outintheuk.com – but even so, loading forum threads about fisting and how to change the taste of your man-milk probably wasn’t wise. Oops.

Anyway, no chit-chat tonight, please. This is a super quick breakfast and therefore, it’ll be a super-quick recipe.

turkey and avocado toast

turkey and avocado toast

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fancy as f**k turkey and avocado toast

Prep

Total

Yield 1 bellyful

It's quick, it's easy, it's simple, it's trendy (probably). All I know is that the youth are all over them avocado things and we're so 'with it' we had to go along. HASHTAG YOLO FELLOWKIDS

Ingredients

  • 50g sourdough bread (6 syns)
  • half an avocado, mashed (7 syns)
  • squeeze of lime, pinch of salt
  • cooked turkey slices or fresh turkey

Instructions

  • really? come on now
  • I'll give you a clue: you don't put the avocado inside you other than via your gob
  • although, everyone likes a moo-moo oozing green

Notes

  • use any bread you like - even your HeB if you want. We used sourdough because it's our favourite!
  • yes, avocados are 14 syns each but do you really think they're less healthy than an unlimited amount of Mullerlights? Do you? Syn it if you want. We don't, but have for the recipe

Now come on, how easy was that? Just admit it, you want to have yourself a slice of this, climb on a penny farthing and open a moustache shop, don’t you? When we were last in London we saw a shop selling penny farthings and frankly, I’ve never wanted to throw a firebomb more. I mean come on. There’s being a tit and there’s being an awful tit. A megatit.

Want more breakfast recipes to spill down your blurter? Of course.

J

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September 2, 2018

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recipe card, steak

grilled steak gyros: the best Greek you’ll swallow today

Grilled steak gyros. On Slimming World, if you don’t mind. I love Greek food, whether it’s these gyros, dolmades or some hot bronzed DILF demanding he makes me his woman. I’ll cope, papi. Lift my dress up out of the dirt, though. I’m going to warn you for a second: the next paragraphs contain some graphic raunch references. Scroll straight to the pictures if you’re the type of person who clutches at her pearls when she

But first, indulge me for a moment, would you? I want to talk about men’s bodies. Now you might think I’m going for the obvious route of leering, given I spend 45% of my time with my neck canted at 75 degrees trying to grab a quick look at the package of those chavs who wear grey trackie bottoms. I swear, I’m like an owl when I walk past Sports Direct in the morning. An owl with a very pale face.

Lots (rightly) gets made about women and how they struggle with body confidence, but let’s hear it for the lads, eh? The amount of posts I see in our facebook group where men are down on their looks depresses the hell out of me.

I know there’s loads of pressure on women to look good – of course there is – but do you ever notice the male stereotype that always gets bandied around? Big arms, but not too big. No loose skin. No belly, and if there is a belly, it’s hidden behind a bar or a bench (look at every Slimming World magazine!). Strong jaw with white teeth and a perfectly preened beard. It’s all so…bland and safe and boring. But I see men chasing this false ideal body and it’s such a waste.

One thing I’ve learned since I stopped giving a toss about my body and well, showing it off in various places which I’m not talking about here, is that there’s a jar for every lid. Literally, in my case. Plenty of folks out there will like you for you – your ‘problem zone’ is someone else’s splash-patch. Belly cascading out in front of you like a balloon of mottled trex? That’s someone’s pillow, that is. Bingo wings? Somewhere to dab your knob off after sex.

Paul and I are creepy – we always smile nicely at big lads – well Paul smiles, I leer lasciviously and lick my lips at them like the Childcatcher. What can I say, I’m a sucker for men in Jacamo outlet shirts. We like to think that it makes a bloke happy to get some attention, though we pick our targets. We might dilate at the thought of a roadworker with a mean streak, a broken nose and gnarled rough hands, but I don’t like having to pick my teeth off the floor after a blowjob. No, we pick those men with dumpy wee bellies, office-haircuts and (sorry ladies) wives fussing about in the supermarket. We’re homowreckers.

What am I trying to say with all of this? Men, if you’re out there, don’t be hung up about your looks. No need to try and aspire to some muscle god – the best looking men are those who are confident in their bodies and who wear it well without giving a monkey’s jot what they look like. Confidence: 100% sexy. And here’s the thing – if you have a partner or a husband or even just a buddy who is down on his looks, take a moment to tell him how fabulous he is.

Oh, and give him our numbers. We’re as indiscriminate as amyl-scented nerve gas.

I know that’s a very pat solution to a complicated confidence issue but honestly. Men. Get over yourselves.

The gyros, then…

steak gyros

Looks like your clopper, that does.

steak gyros

Looks like your gash, that does.

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grilled steak gyros

Prep

Cook

Total

Yield 6 servings

Have yourself a Shirley Valentine moment and just imagine some hairy, Greek studmuffin sliding this in front of you, and then sliding himself in to you. Yeah, you like that, don't you?

Ingredients

  • 6 Tesco folded flatbreads (30 syns)
  • 2 sirloin steaks
  • 1 onion, sliced into 1cm thick rings
  • 2 tbsp olive oil (12 syns)
  • 3 cloves of garlic, minced
  • 1 tsp dried oregano
  • ½ tsp paprika
  • 125g fat-free greek style yoghurt
  • 1 green pepper, deseeded and cut into thin rings
  • 12 cherry tomatoes, halved
  • 4 small handfuls of rocket

Instructions

  • in a large bowl, mix together the oil, garlic, oregano and paprika - pour one tbsp of the mix into a separate bowl with the yoghurt and mix well - that will make your sauce
  • add the onion and green pepper to the oil mix and toss, then gently remove with a slotted spoon
  • chuck in the steak and rub in as much of the marinade as is left
  • cook the steak to your liking, then remove from the pan and slice
  • add the onion and green pepper to the same pan and cook for a few minutes until starting to brown and caramelise
  • remove from the pan and finally add the flatbreads and cook for a minute or two each side, then remove from the pan
  • fold out the flatbreads and top each with a bit of rocket, then the steak slices, followed by the tomatoes and a drizzle of sauce
  • eat

Notes

  • this makes six gyros - one is enough for one person if you're having something with it like chips! if it's for fewer than six people just use one flatbread for each person and stuff more filling in - we won't tell
  • if the syn values of those flatbreads are giving you the willies you could use pitta breads instead if you really wanted to, or even a wrap if you're pious
  • we actually forgot to sear our flatbreads in the pan - you shouldn't, it makes them taste nicer!
  • any steak will do for this - it doesn't need to be fancy. We used sirloin from Muscle Food
  • a griddle pan is excellent for this to get the nice charmarks, or even better a Tefal Optigrill which is what we used - just press the 'steak' button
  • slice the onions quickly with a Mandolin slicer - just watch your fingers if you're a clumsy twat like me and always use the guard
  • same with garlic - use a microplane grater to mince it in seconds!
  • don't be tempted to leave out the oil - it makes it so much nicer!
  • don't like rocket? Any leafy salad will do

Cuisine greek

Want more in your wrap? Sure:

Yum!

Remember lads: tits out!

J

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August 29, 2018

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recipe card, taster ideas

mixed bean salad – perfect for taster night!

Let’s not delay. Taster night is looming large and you need something quick to put together but classy enough to make it look as though you care what the Witch’s Council thinks of you. This is smashing, actually – get everything cut to the same size and you’re halfway there.

In the interests of keeping things super quick and easy, here’s the recipe!

mixed bean salad

mixed bean salad

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mixed bean salad - perfect for taster nights!

Prep

Total

Yield 8 portions

Mixed bean salad. It isn't sexy, it isn't going to blow your socks off and christ, they aren't going to be talking about it for years to come. But sometimes you need a simple salad of undigestable beans to get those scales moving!

Ingredients

  • tin of butter beans
  • tin of kidney beans
  • tin of black eyed beans
  • small tin of sweetcorn
  • one cucumber - take the seeds out with a spoon and chop
  • one large red pepper - deseeded, chopped fine
  • one large onion - chopped fine
  • one pinch of dill, salt, pepper
  • one tablespoon of olive oil (6 syns)
  • juice of a lemon

Instructions

  • do you want to hazard a guess, Sherlock?
  • chop everything up the same size, rinse your beans (dirty bugger), add everything into a giant bowl, stir
  • this is perfect for sitting in the fridge for a couple of days or taking to a taster night

Notes

Courses salad

Cuisine twochubbycubs

Want more salad ideas? But of course you do, and we’re always happy to oblige you on that front, see.

Enjoy!

J

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August 26, 2018

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recipe card

no regrets: proper pizza bianca

Here for the pizza bianca but upset by the lack of Rickaaaay jokes? Understandable.

Now, we’ve been stuck for things to write about lately so we thought we’d throw the blog open to some random questions. Our readers came up with…well, see below. Paul is going to be answering for a change – try not to split your bean from buttering it so much.

National Express or MEGABUS?

Coaches are universally crap – you cannot have a good experience on one. That’s a fact. Saying that, I had the best nights’ sleep I’ve ever had on a Megabus from Portsmouth to Newcastle when I was canoodling with James, so that’d be the winner (plus can’t really get vexed for a quid, can you?). He ruined it a bit when he shot his bolt over the back of the seat into the darkness (half-empty bus, it was fine) – what can I say, we were in love at the time.

Are you the giver or the taker?

Giver! But only because of laziness. I can’t be arsed with all the prep that goes into being the garage. Plus, I’ve wrecked my arse with years of Dulcolax abuse trying to chase that Slimmer of the Week basket of fermenting fruit. James is both and it’s to his eternal chagrin that the tunnel never opens.

Have either of you ever been with a woman?

Nah. It has literally never, ever crossed my mind to even consider it. James often says he has but I’m not too sure, he recoils at bras in Asda but that could be down to bad memories from his sports bra at school.

Top 5 celebrities you would invite to your dinner party (dead or alive – *doesn’t have to include Pete burns 😂*) 

  1. Jeremy Corbyn – a genuinely decent bloke, plus I reckon he’s got some right filthy stories about Diane Abbott
  2. Michael Barrymore – pre-current miserable state, though. Only if he was peppy/coked-up like in the Strike it Lucky days. I’d definitely be a top, middle AND a bottom in that situation.
  3. Bianca Del Rio – for sheer hilarity
  4. Debbie McGee – she’s genuinely a dead funny, dippy person in real life and a right scream – and we could get to the bottom of those dog rumours
  5. Tracy Chapman – my favourite singer. She can sing us a lovely tune at the end when we’re all pissed up.

SERIOUS INTERJECTION FROM JAMES:

TRACY CHAPMAN IS NOT A GOOD SINGER. I’D RATHER LISTEN TO AN AUTO-TUNED FANNY-FART THAN THAT WHINGEING BAG.

Favourite sexual position?

Whatever means I don’t get a sore back or muscle cramp and takes the least amount of effort.

Would you rather penis sized nipples or nipple sized penis

What kind of bloody question is this?!?!

Do you ever feel like jacking this page in ?

Nah! Sometimes you do think that life would be easier without having to deal with people arguing over nowt in the group but honestly, we have so much fun with it I couldn’t imagine life without it. Plus the blog pays for James’ cigars, booze and expensive jacket collection. I make do with a crust of bread and a glass of water for dipping.

Would you like to have kids and be daddies?

Nah. I love kids and they love me and I like looking after them for short periods, but once they start screaming/crying/whinging/shitting then the fun ends and you can have them straight back, thank-you-very-much. We’re both altogether too selfish for kids. A disposable income warms your heart and gives you more love than a snotty ball of grass-stained kids ever could. Sorry not sorry. James is terrible with babies anyway – he handles them like you might handle a pan full of hot oil as someone reversed a car at you.

Someone suggested we do a swirl (saw it on Modern Family) where we both yankee-doodle into a cup and then neither of us would know who the dad is. Which is a nonsense, because if he grew up to be a barely literate socially awkward raging homo, he’d be my child. If he grew up to be a barely literate socially awkward raging homo with a sassy mouth, he’d be James’. Either way, he’d be doomed to a life of cry-wanks and endless health anxiety.

What’s the most outrageous fetish either of you have ever tried?

As a young ‘un I was having a ‘fling’ with an older man that’d satisfy my cider and Golden Virginia needs. Out of the blue he asked me to fart on him and pulled out a tin of Aldi beans. It was so surreal. Did absolutely nothing for me at all except made me gip, but I got money out of it sooooooo.

Whereas James pooed on someone for £200. OR DID HE *WAVY MYSTERIOUS LINES*

Any near death experiences?

I accidentally cut through the cable of a hedge trimmer when I was about 13 (sorry dad) when I was pissing about with it. Called 999 because I panicked so much and got a telling off for it because I wasn’t actually dying or in any danger. Other than that – nah.

James – I nearly drowned twice on holiday. Once I’ve documented in here where my mum and dad gave us a ropey pedalo, put us in a river in a deep gorge and sent us on our merry way, where we promptly capsized and were rescued by two German tourists as my parents lounged on the beach in a fug of Lambert and Butler smoke. Second time – and you’ll spot a theme – we were on a giant loch in Scotland. Other kids had nice canoes or fun toys, we had an bright yellow inflatable boat my dad had found on the beach. Anyway my sister and I paddled merrily out in the middle of this loch only to find the reason the boat had been left was because of a slow leak. We set about drowning and were only saved by another family who dashed in to pull us ashore.

Not all bad though. My parents were so relieved and wracked with guilt that they let us play with the bleach under the sink for the rest of the night. Good times were had by all.

That’ll do it for the Q&A for now. James’ turn next. We’ve got a friggin’ no regrets pizza to post – remember, our no regrets series is food that is high in syns but bloody worth it.

pizza bianca

pizza bianca

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no regrets pizza bianca

Prep

Cook

Total

Yield 2 10" pizzas

Pizza bianca - it's topped with ginger and when you shut it in the oven, it screams because the silver puffa jacket catches ahad. You can reduce the syns of course by changing up the topping but really, it's the dough that is the star of the show here. Enjoy!

Each 10" pizza is 45 syns, but worth every bite!

Ingredients

for the dough

  • 250g plain flour (40 syns)
  • 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil, divided (12 syns)
  • 180ml lukewarm water
  • 1 tsp dried active yeast
  • 1½ tsp salt

for the pizza

  • 225g grated mozzarella (38½ syns)
  • 180g ricotta (2x HeA)
  • 1 clove garlic minced
  • pinch red pepper flakes
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • fresh basil leaves
  • 60g grated parmesan (2x HeA)

Instructions

  • pour the water into your mixing bowl and sprinkle over the yeast - give it a few minutes until it's dissolved
  • mix in the flour and salt until you get floury, shaggy dough - or do what we did and chuck it all in a stand mixer with a kneading hook
  • knead for a good five minutes by slapping it out and pushing it with the ball of your hand - come on, you've seen sleb chefs do this, you know how it is
  • chuck back into the bowl, drizzle over 1 tbsp of the olive oil and cover with cling film and leave it for an hour or so in a warm place until it's risen
  • slap the dough out divide into two balls (or keep as one if you want one enormous pizza)
  • stretch or roll into pizzas as thick or as thin as you like
  •  preheat the oven to as hot as it'll go (no joke)
  • sprinkle over the mozzarella over the pizza bases,
  • mix together the ricotta, chilli flakes and garlic and dollop onto the pizzas 
  • spread out the basil leaves and sprinkle with the parmesan
  • slide onto a baking sheet and bake in the oven for 10-15 minutes until golden and bubbling
  • leave to cool for a few minutes, slice and serve!

Notes

Courses pizza

Cuisine twochubbycubs

Wanting a pizza the action (sorry) but worried your consultant will punch you on the boob if you eat something like this? Well ignore that feeling of doubt, you’re better than that. But if you must compromise, we have some great pizza recipes!

Yes!

J

(PS: I really did, easy money)

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August 23, 2018

Posted under

desserts, recipe card, taster ideas

melon basket of joy – perfect for Slimming World taster nights

The melon basket has arrived!

You know what it’s like, taster night rolls around and you get the usual eighty seven texts gently reminding you to bring something along. The dilemma is clear: do you nip over to the Co-op and get a bunch of grapes, do you make something super fancy knowing it’ll be ignored whilst everyone paws over the Weetabix and cat-litter cakes, or do you do as we always do and pretend you’re working / on holiday / on the game / in hospital getting your worn-out knees replaced? I know, but I can’t stand watching other people eat or other people judging me on my choices.

I’ve touched upon the fact I hate witnessing buffets at the best of times, but it reminded me of one sight I saw in Disney a few years ago. I say Disney, we were actually in a Sizzlers at the time, which for those not familiar with Sizzlers simply imagine a Little Chef stocked entirely with what they found behind the bins at Lidl. I’ve never known shigella (hi Paul!) be given as a topping choice on a salad before. Anyway, we were sat visibly blanching at the amount of flies on our breakfast when this absolute unit of a bloke stood up / was helped up. He rolled towards the buffet, loaded his plate to the point where he’d have struggled to get a sprig of cress on top, and then made to slow-shuffle back to his station. We were transfixed – by this time in our honeymoon we had exhausted all conversations and the realisation of spending eternity together was lying heavy in our thoughts so a distraction was welcome – and we watched as he conveyed his food pile back as though it was a newborn baby.

Then: a loud crack, a rumbling noise, a plaintive cry and the splatter of food hitting the deck. He’d loaded his plate so full and so high that it had snapped like the strut of an Italian motorway bridge. I’m sure it was months of sub-standard dishwashing that weakened the plate but the poor bastard looked utterly bereft, with a whole restuarant of folks immediately judging him. Which was rich, given they had one collective set of teeth between them, but nevertheless. I always remember his wee crumpled face – he looked like Dr Robotnik when you defeat him at the end of Sonic 2.

Oh and it’s Robotnik, not Eggman, you can fuck off with that nonsense.

I believe he was given a voucher for a free meal, and he won my respect for not picking the best of the dropped meal off the floor and eating it, which is what I would have done in our house. The three-second rule has been extended to three days here: I ate a wine gum the other day that I’m not entirely sure the cat didn’t bring in from outside on the back of her tail. Ah well.

Want more American nonsense? We put all of our honeymoon stories in a book, you know, and it’s as cheap as I am in my Primark knickers. You can download it here!

Anyway, that was a sidetrack and a half, wasn’t it? But that’s our blog all over – side-tracks and cheap ugly shoes. Let’s do the melon basket.

melon basket

melon basket

melon basket

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taster night idea: the melon basket

Prep

Total

Yield 1 basket

I've got a bloody nerve calling this a recipe, haven't I? But listen, we're all about taking things easy here at Chubby Towers, and this is ridiculously easy to make but it looks damn good! Plus all the extra fruit can be turned into smoothies which of course you'll syn, rather than enjoying like a normal person. Right? Hello?

Ingredients

  • one large watermelon
  • one big pack of raspberries
  • one big pack of strawberries
  • one big big girl in a big big world (it's not a big big thing if you leave me)
  • one pack of pomegranate seeds
  • one lemon
  • chopped mint

Of course, you can use any fruit you like in here. Soft, hard, Barrymore.

Instructions

  • the trickiest bit is cutting the watermelon - cut a small disc off the bottom so it lies flat
  • then cut two 'almost' quarters from the top, leaving a strip down the middle - then cut through that so you make a handle
  • it's hard to explain but come on, look at the pictures and work it out - this isn't The Crystal Maze love, you have all the time in the world to figure it out - but you want to make sure you leave a thick enough handle to support the weight of the fruit
  • use a melon baller to scoop some melon balls out of the flesh you've cut away
  • scrape out the melon so you have a pleasing bowl
  • slice up the rest of the fruit into a bowl, add the melon balls, chopped mint and the juice of a lemon
  • tumble it gently to mix it up, then tip it into your basket and serve

Notes

Courses breakfast

Cuisine taster night

Easy as all outdoors. Want some more taster night ideas? Fine! Here you go!

Get them down you!

J

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Posted on

August 20, 2018

Posted under

pasta, recipe card, soup

spinach, pea and ham thick soup

I’ve tried so hard to make this soup look faintly attractive in the photos, but I can’t. It’s green slop, but it’s so tasty – pea and ham thick soup that looks like something from the sink trap. Anyway, it’ll do the job for days when you want something quick and easy to satisfy your hole and the postman has already been. I say that with an air of familiarity – our postman is delicious. I know it doesn’t do to judge people on looks but goodness me, he has legs I could spin around on and a face that just screams ‘I’ll apologise after’. Here’s me looking forlornly out of the window once he’s passed by.

If you’re a fan of sporadic updates, non-food related shenanigans and overly-saturated photos of bear cubs so past their prime we should be dancing on a rescue advert somewhere, then why not join us on Instagram?

The pea and ham thick soup, then:

pea and ham thick soup

pea and ham thick soup

pea and ham thick soup

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syn free pea and ham thick soup

Prep

Cook

Total

Yield 6 bowls

This syn free pea and ham thick soup - there's no way of making it sound attractive - comes straight from Jamie Oliver himself. I know he's divisive but I have a lot of time for him - anyone who can make decent food through such a heavy mist of spittle is a winner in my books. This soup is so easy to make - chuck it in a blender, throw it in a pan, spin it out the window, dance like no-one's watching. Keeps well in the fridge.

Ingredients

  • 1 bunch of spring onions
  • 350g frozen peas
  • 300g frozen chopped spinach
  • 100g ham
  • big handful of fresh mint
  • 300g dried pasta, any old shite will do
  • 50g feta cheese (use your HEA)
  • 1600ml of chicken stock

Instructions

  • chop the spring onions
  • throw the peas, mint, spring onion, ham, frozen spinach and 400ml of chicken stock in a blender and blend the buggery out of it - add a pinch of salt and pepper
  • pour into a pan and add 1200ml of chicken stock
  • smash up your pasta - hit it with a rolling pin - and tip it in - let everything bubble for about twenty minutes until the pasta is cooked
  • serve with the feta crumbled in
  • lots of black pepper and salt, natch

Notes

  • this recipe came from Jamie's book all about his family and their expensive house and wholewheat pasta and Cath Kidson tableware. If you fancy replicating the experience with your B&M saucepans and Charles and Diana pinny, you can order his book from here
  • actually fair play to him, it's a great book - tonnes of recipes easily adapted for SW
  • it won't surprise you but we have a fancy blender that could blend anything, you can get one, or just use a stick blender - you don't need to spend lots of money to do our recipe!
  • we let ours bubble away for a good two hours (accidentally, I fell asleep watching Murder She Wrote) and it was lovely and thick - don't be frightened to cook it for longer!

Courses soup

Cuisine twochubbycubs

Fancy, right? Want some more soup that you could smash your face in? Of course, we’ve got loads that are syn free!

Yum!

J

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Posted on

August 17, 2018

Posted under

desserts, recipe card

no regrets: custard cream blondies

I’ve been inspired to post the recipe for these custard cream blondies because I’m sick to my back teeth of seeing cakes that look like someone’s foot in stage 3 of active decay. Why would you eat that? Goodness me. A little bit of what you fancy does you good and whilst yeah, these cost a load of syns, sometimes you need to actually live your life instead of chasing stickers in a book. Plus, CHRIST ALMIGHTY, they’re delicious. So, in an unusual bit of brevity, let’s get straight to the recipe!

custard cream blondies

custard cream blondies

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no regrets: custard cream blondies

Prep

Cook

Total

Yield 20

Why a blondie and not a brownie? BECAUSE YOU'RE A SICKENING RACIST. No, blondies tend to have more vanilla, brownies usually have chocolate in them. So just calm yer tits, Tommeh Robinson.

I found this recipe on reddit via a blog called krishthebaker - have a look on their website, but put a towel down. You'll be snail-trailing around the biscuits. I've seen it before in the BBC Good Food magazine too, but frankly, I'm not saying thanks to them because I'm sick of getting TV licence letters despite being a good boy all paid up.

The biscuits then, if you please.

Ingredients

  • 250g melted butter (90 syns)
  • 400g light soft brown sugar (80 syns)
  • 4 x eggs
  • 3 tsp vanilla extract
  • 80g caster sugar (16 syns)
  • 500g plain flour (90 syns)
  • 100g custard powder (18 syns)
  • 1 ½ tsp baking powder
  • 1 ½ tsp bicarb
  • 15 custard creams (crushed, like your consultant's dreams of buying a caravan on tick) (45 syns)
  • 4 tbsp of milk (0.5 syn, best to be accurate)

I make that 340 syns, give or take a crumb. So 17 syns a brownie. OOPS.

Instructions

  • turn that oven to 180 degrees
  • mix the butter and sugars until combined
  • add the eggs and vanilla and beat it to buggery
  • add the flour, custard powder, baking powder and bicarb - stir and mix - if it's looking a little dry, just add some milk
  • pour into a 13 by 9 inch brownie tin - greased, use a bit of butter, not like you're dieting
  • smooth the top with an offset spatula if you're classy, or use a butter knife if you still say Tescos instead of Tesco
  • scatter the crushed custard creams over the top and into your gob too
  • bake for about 25 to 30 minutes, if they're burning on top put some parchment over the top
  • allow to cool in the fridge, then cut up - I got twenty squidgy squares
  • serve to rapturous applause and congratulations

Notes

Courses biscuits

Cuisine twochubbycubs

Enjoying your night off? Want some more recipes that are terribly high in syns but actually taste good? Here!

Yum!

J

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August 15, 2018

Posted under

desserts

rhubarb and ice-cream – a dead easy dessert

Rhubarb and ice-cream, if you don’t mind. But first, we have a competition to announce, but you’re going to have to be QUICK.

Too blurry for you? Judgemental cow. We want recipes! But – and this is important – you must provide two high-quality photos like the ones we use in the blog. Have a scroll through our blog and you can see what I mean. I don’t want a pile of cat-sick served on your best Matalan Le Gusset plates, I don’t want photos of your crotchfruit in the background and if it looks like something that might adorn a tablecloth in a church hall and be pawed at by women with more hair on their knuckles than I have on my arse-cheeks, that’ll also be a no. Aim for food that would be served with love, not endured with reservations.

A few simple guidelines:

  • we don’t use Frylight or Quark, because we’re not insane and/or sponsored by Frylight – you can, but we will adapt your recipe accordingly;
  • please don’t be afraid to use your syns – we will always favour proper food over ‘let’s race to zero syns’ nonsense;
  • please have a cursory glance through our recipe page to see if we’ve already done it – you can find it here
  • please don’t fret if you’re not a strong writer – that’s my job, I’ll tart you up!

Every published recipe gets a new entry. And let’s be honest, you love an easy entry!

We also want stories! You know how we write about 600 words before each recipe? Let’s hear your side of things. Everyone has a story and if there’s one thing I’ve learned since moderating a group consisting mainly of women, aged 30-49, medium prolapse (thank you facebook stats), is that you love to gab. So do it! If you’ve got something important to say, this is your chance. Write it under a false name. Send it to me in crayon, I don’t care. One thing though: as mentioned above, please don’t feel as though you need to be crass to be funny. It takes a certain lack of wit to force as many gay sex puns into a story as I do, trust me, and you’re better than that.

Submit your entries by emailing cubs@twochubbycubs.co.uk – if you’re successful, and mind our bar for entries is low – you’ll be entered into a draw to win a box with £75 of stuff in it. It’ll be good stuff – nonsense, but good. The runner up prize will be £25 worth of something good from Amazon. Though let’s be honest, the main prize is the sheer thrill of knowing you’re making the world a better place.

Now, to sweeten the deal, here’s an incredibly easy dessert idea. It’s nothing flash, but nor are you, and we still love you.

rhubarb and ice-cream

rhubarb and ice-cream

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rhubarb and ice-cream with ginger nuts

Prep

Total

Yield 4 servings

Listen, are we even going to call this a recipe? Yes! Rhubarb and ice-cream with ginger nuts! People always want new ideas and this couldn't be simpler, and I like it because it's an interesting mix of textures, heat and tastes. 

Ingredients

  • 500g of rhubarb (2 syns when cooked, if you choose to syn it, which we don't)
  • 400ml of Halo Top vanilla (12 syns)
  • 4 ginger nuts (10 syns)

Split between four very large portions, this comes out at 5.5 syns, which is nothing for a good dessert!

Instructions

  • chop up your rhubarb, cook it with a tiny splash of water over a low heat until it has stewed - I like it sour, but feel free to put a few drops of honey in there (but don't forget you've got ice-cream going on top)
  • plate it up - hot rhubarb, cold ice-cream, crushed ginger nuts
  • easy!

Notes

Courses dessert

Cuisine twochubbycubs

Yum! Not fancying rhubarb and ice-cream with ginger nuts? Try these dessert ideas:

J

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Posted on

August 13, 2018

Posted under

recipe card, slow cooker

crunchy nacho chicken wraps: easy slow cooker meal!

Nacho chicken wraps will follow, but first an apology….ah balls to it, listen, we’re not going to apologise for not posting too often, because we always do it and then have to go away somewhere or get caught up in doing stuff and then we forget! But if Jurassic Park has taught us anything, it’s that Life Finds A Way and Bryce Dallas Howard might have a silly name, but she’s terrifically pretty.

Speaking of pretty, can I introduce you to my favourite ever photo of me?

Blog recipes, she wrote.

A post shared by twochubbycubs (@twochubbycubs) on

I have the air of a seventies DJ that permanently has their hard-drive in the microwave ready to go at a moment’s notice.

I wish I could tell you that our nights have been so full of debauchery and sin that we haven’t had time for the blog, and whilst that’s partly true, the actual reason is so much more boring. We’ve been stuffing envelopes. Lots and lots and lots of envelopes. See after the success of the badges and our impending holiday which we really ought to pay for, we decided to branch out into fridge magnets – because what would put you off eating more than our faces floating into your vision whenever you fancied a Muller-Shite? So I set about designing some tasteful numbers…

http://twochubbycubs.co.uk/shop/

We thought we’d maybe sell 50 or so. We sold over 750. Which is fine, until you realise that you now need to package up 750 magnets, write out the envelopes and get them in the post. That took time, but naturally we decided to make it harder for ourselves by writing sauce on the envelopes. When the first lot landed with our lovely customers, everyone else wanted rudeness and filth on their flaps, and so…it snowballed. You’ve never lived until you’ve sat at 2am trying to think of a joke about a name like Mildred or drawing the eight-hundredth cock and balls of the day. One morning Paul found me face-down on a bed of padded envelopes with a roll of stamps pressed against my face. I still see Elizabeth’s rack when I shut my eyes.

Of course, with us at the wheel, this road-trip through Royal Mail based sauciness was always going to end in disaster. For one, we’ve had a couple of instances where the postman has scribbled out the ‘rude’ bits or put a big stamp over the cock and balls we’ve delicately drawn on the back. That’s fair enough, I suppose, though I imagine you’d need to be fairly joyless to take offence at ‘peel the flaps apart for instant pleasure‘ scrawled on the seal of the envelope. One such censorship annoyed me so much that we dispatched a second envelope to the customer with a giant, detailed knob drawn on the back – but I stuck cat ears on the top. Didn’t get through untampered with. Ho-hum.

But no, that’s not the worst that’s happened. We’ve been affixing random titles and names to people’s names – Right Dishonourable Jane Doe, Marge “Gammon Flaps” Simpson, Sarah “Unprotected Anal, Finish on the Tits” Jones, that sort of thing. Good clean fun. Anyway, things came to a head when we received a message from someone we had posted a badge to a lovely lady who we designated, entirely randomly I hasten to add, as Number One Arm-Wrestler.

Naturally, she only has one bloody arm. We didn’t know, and thank Christ she’s absolutely fine about it and a good sport and found it hilarious, but I can’t help but feel aghast by how badly it could have ended. Plastered all over the Sun, ‘CRUEL AND CALLOUS CUBS LEFT ME STUMPED’, for example. Thankfully, she knew our joke was ‘armless. Rinse and repeat. We’ve had to add an opt-out if you want a clean envelope button onto the page, though. Phew. Anyway, if you want a magnet, we’ve only got a few left! Make sure you mark the order if you don’t want filth. Otherwise it’ll come addressed to you with knobs drawn all over them, or, if you’re male, references to the size of your genitals with some soft focus shots of us inside. If that doesn’t tempt you, what could?

You can order them here, though the Cubs and Speed Police set are currently out of stock!

Now don’t worry, I’m not going to endlessly promote our magnets on here. That’ll be it until we need to pay for a new sling or something. It does give me a giddy thrill to imagine a magnet being slipped into a Slimmer of the Week basket and poor Sandra choking on her cat hair quiche, mind. Shall we do the crunchy nacho chicken wraps? Well why not. Buckle up, Buckaroo, because I’m going in dry.

crunchy cheese nacho chicken wraps

crunchy cheese nacho chicken wraps

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crunchy nacho chicken wraps

Prep

Cook

Total

Yield 8 wraps

The beauty with this recipe is that it's what we're affectionally calling a dump bag - you throw the raw ingredients into a freezer bag, pop it in the freezer and then, whenever you can't be arsed to cook, take it out and throw it in the slow cooker. It'll cook nicely through the day and be ready when you come back - and so easy to make! Then just stick it in a wrap with a few extra bits and you're done. The chicken also works well with rice!

This makes enough for eight wraps very easily indeed.

Ingredients

  • four chicken breasts
  • 1 small tin of sweetcorn
  • 1 small tin of black beans
  • the juice of two limes
  • one large red onion chopped
  • pinch of salt and pepper
  • two minced garlic cloves
  • 200ml of chicken stock

To make the wraps:

  • chopped lettuce
  • a pack of white Weight Watchers wraps, which are a HEB each - or you know, find some joy in your life and have a good wholemeal wrap like us instead, and don't syn it because haway
  • 25g of Doritos, crushed up into little wee chips (7.5 syns) (split between eight, just under a syn)
  • why not use your HEA on cheese? 30g of cheddar grated is your HEA, add that for extra cheesy sexiness
  •  

Instructions

  • pop everything for the chicken filling in a bag and freeze it until the night before you're ready to cook
  • throw it in a slow cooker for a few hours
  • give everything a right good mix and use two forks to pull the chicken apart - it'll just fall to bits, it's great
  • to make the wrap, throw some chopped lettuce into a wrap, top with chicken, Doritos and cheese, wrap it up and away you go, get it in you OR, if you're sassy, grill the wraps so everything melts together inside - oh my yes

Notes

A few pointers:

 

Courses slow cooker

Cuisine mexican

There you go – shove that in yer mush! Want more wrap ideas? Here you go:

And look at that: not a single ‘make a cake with a wrap’ load of bum!

Enjoy!

J