Let's cook, but first a bit about me...

Hello! I am Karli, born and raised in South Africa and today I live in London, UK with my husband. I have been cooking since I can remember. I had a teeny tiny pot and pan, and weekends I will spend as being my mother’s sous chef. My dad, a true South African farmer has always made sure there is a lovely piece of meat grilling away on the braai (barbeque, but different 😊 ). And my gran was a top-notch baker: freshly baked bread in the mornings, pancakes on Sunday nights, and tens of tins filled with a variety of freshly baked cookies at Christmas. Today and every day I am thankful to be part of a family where food is a celebration of life and love. I had the privilege to be part of food from the seed to the harvest to the plate on the dinner table. This also sparked my interest in cookbooks. I find them fascinating and read cookbooks like story books, because if you read carefully there is the most wonderful stories associated with food.

For my birthday in 2010 a dear friend gave me my very first Jamie Oliver cookbook: The Return of the Naked Chef. I was in heaven. At least once a day I would read through the book and choose two or three recipes to cook in the same week. I would also mark recipes to say “half the chickpeas” “10 minutes more in the oven” “less sugar” “more sugar” and so on. This continued with every book I’ve ever owned. Then in 2015 I got to know about Jonathan Baker (Instagram: @jonathan.baker) who writes about cooking his way through his “ever growing collection of cookbooks” by choosing a cookbook of the month, tries a few recipes, takes pictures and post those with a small review on what he thought of the recipe and outcome. And in June 2016, and with Jonathan’s blessing I started blogging about my experience on Instagram (@karlicooks), and I have been loving every single moment. BUT, there is so much more I learn from this experience like little tricks I’ve picked up or figured out along the way, good and bad equipment, utensils and where to find rare ingredients.

I want my blog to be a place where you can read a story, see what type of recipes are in a cookbook before you spend the £££, what equipment is used most of the time, how easy it is the find the ingredients commonly used, and so on…

Welcome to my blog, let’s get cooking.