Good Food Show - Scotland - here we come

Just finishing the packing up to go up to Glasgow to exhibit at the Good Food Show there. We have a very excited small team of Scottish consultants as this is the first time we've done a show up there so here goes! Come and say hello if you're going!!

Gift packs launched!

We've been busy hard at work over the last month, just finished the gift pack launches which have gone down very well indeed! It's been the first time we've collaborated with another company. One of the gift packs includes a great pack of truffles from Booja Booja, a chocolate company we really admire - ethical in values and great tasting products! You can see more from the gift pack range on our buy our products section.
On a seperate note, the new products are going down a storm!! The Jumpin Jack Chilli Jam has probably been our most successful new product to date!
On a last note - we've now launched a new business pack that means you can start your own My Secret Kitchen business for as little as £99 now. So if you've been thinking about it, then now is the time!!

We hope you enjoy them..

Hello all!!

After one of the most challenging times of our lives, the next round of My Secret Kitchen comes out. With Clare having Meningitis right in the middle of launch time, it's been a tough month, but we hope you thinkthe new ones are worth it.
We've brought back the ever popular Fig Pudding Pickle, it's always one of our top sellers on the run up to Xmas.
The Jumping Jack chilli jam has had a wonderful reaction from the team of consultants who believe this will be one of our biggest sellers ever - nothing else like it out there and you can really taste the big swig of bourban in every jar!
The Mochaccino biscotti mix gives you the opportunity of making something that many people are unsure of, and yet the results can be amazing! We've managed to get the balance and blend of the dark and white chocolate and expresso coffee just right... try it and see for yourself...
Let us al know what you think!!

New Products launched tomorrow.

A quick post script from the last post - Clare didn't have swine flu, it was misdiagnosed and turned out to be bacterial meningitis, so we've had a bit of a tough time of it recently! This means that although we will be officially launching the new products tomorrow, they won't be rady for official sale until the 15th Sept! If you have a tasting booked they will be available for sampling as from the end of the week, so it's not all bad news. I can also tell you that nearly all of the consultants who have tried the new products have done of them as potentially the best ever product!! Hang on, they're nearly there...

Official news from My Secret Kitchen

Well... it's official... My Secret Kitchen products do NOT stop Swine Flu! Clare has had a terrible dose of it which has meant a delay of a few bits and pieces, if you're waiting for a consultant info pack, bear with us, they are on their way! New products are still on course for Sept 1st though so keep watching this space....

Just round the corner!

Well, the new products are just round the corner and will be launched at the beginning of September. I obviously can't tell you what they're going to be but there will be a return of one of the favourites and two new absolutely wonderful ones.... one which I think will turn out to be our number one seller!
We're also completely revamping our gift box selection, we'll have something for everyone in the run up to Xmas. So... do you normally just giver that bottle of wine to your clients? Dad gets a pair of slippers, Mum gets some smelly perfume that just puts in just that little bit too much? Look out in September, you could make them an awful lot happier!

Keeping up to date!

Oh dear oh dear...not keeping up to date!!! So many things going on and so little time! We've been busy working with a well respected wine company to start looking at including this into our tastings. Wine is a funny old thing. A little bit of education goes a long way, if we can help people understand a bit more about wine especially when it comes to pairing with food, well, we think it would make tastings even more enjoyable. So for a few select consultants, they wil be trying a new promotion incorporating wine in August. If it goes well we will then launch it nationally in November. You can contact us if you'd like to know a little bit more...
More consultants are joining us and things are looking helathy. If you're thinking about it, now is a good time. Christmas, believe it or not, starts for us in September, if you can get up and running over the next few weeks it sets you up for the onslaught of sales in the run up to the festivities!

We came, we saw, we conquered!

A lovely weekend was had by myself and Su Davies, our top consultant of 2008 in Chicago. Su won the trip for the most sales for our first full year and the reward was a weekend in Chicago to visit the Restaurant Show, one of the largest food shows in the world. We managed to get in some good sightseeing as well as having a meal at Moto (http://www.moto.com/) which was pretty amazing. Moto takes food, deconstructs it and then builds it back back up again in a weird way. Picture attached is an edible cuban cigar, we even ate the ash!

So, I think Su had an amazing time, the 2009 winners will be gunning for the cookery class in Tuscany!

Inspired Dinners are here!

We are bursting with excitement now we can finally launch the 'Inspired Dinners' range with you!
We have listened to foodies looking for easy, fabulous entertaining solutions of their own creation; we have thought about how we can give you a high end, valuable product to market, and we have seen the economy shift us away from dining out as friendships and 'home-ships' become more important. And this is our fabulous, valuable, food and friend loving solution.....
Inspired Dinners: Italian Bistro Inspired Dinners: Eastern CanteenOur ‘Inspired Dinner Boxes' are designed to make dining at home a more amazing experience. Five of our products with recipes & instructions to create seasonal menus using 5 additional ingredients (and a few storecupboard items) Plus the extras to embellish and decorate the table to make the occasion special It's an easy and convenient way of creating restaurant-quality food and a restaurant-style atmosphere, without a restaurant-sized bill!

Multinational My Secret Kitchen

Morning all!

Welll... we now have our first consultant from across the water.... Northern Ireland to be exact! Terri, one of our closer consultants to the office made the trip over there this week and Michelle has now joined us from near Belfast. OK, you can make a good argument about being multinational... (a) I'm talking about one nation rather than multi nations and (b) Northern Ireland is still part of the UK, but let us have our glory! Congratulations Terri and Michelle!
We'll be launching the new concept for the beginning of May. We believe we've found a wonderful gap that is the fit between the restaurant dining experience and the "meal for two from Waitrose" But much more as from next week.
Quite a few new consultants this week including a couple of very experienced direct selling consultants, so business continues to move forward very nicely!

The Value Packs are here!

Well... we had to do it..... We've launched a couple of new packs for those that are watching their pennies. Our cheese ball mixes sell so well that we've decided to put all three together for £10 saving £1.97 on the individual items. We also have a salt and pepper pack now for £11, still giving the £1 to Action against Hunger, our chosen charity that we would like to help. You can find more about what they do and where your contribution goes here - http://www.actionagainsthunger.org/

Eat Well, Be Happy...

We've just finished another wonderful One Life Live exhibition, meeting some great people who would like to be consultants. For those that expressed an interest we'll get to you this week, thanks for everyone's enthusiasm! We couldn't help noticing how one company's mission was to highlight the plight of the world's economy and push why you need to earn more money - that's right, scare people into joining your company!! We went the different approach and let people come to us because they loved food. And it worked.
We did meet a great man with a wizards hat on who listened to what we had to offer and gave his opinion. He finished with a wink and a "eat well and be happy" - what an amazing line! We will be adopting it. We later saw the same man with a big banner proclaiming "Free Hugs here" - We love the free hugs concept - if you don't know about it, go here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vr3x_RRJdd4

Chicago, Chicago...

Just got back from Chicago... one of our favourite cities and where we lived for six years so very fond memories!
The trip was set up for two reasons, one to check out all the details for the trip for Su Davies, our "consultant of the year" - as the winner of the award, Su is going to Chicago to one of the biggest food exhibitions in the world - The Restaurant Show (http://show.restaurant.org/NRA09/public/enter.aspx) Along with the show though we're planning all sorts of other avitivits including a meal at one of the top restaurants - we're umming and ahhing between Charlie Trotter or Tru at the moment - I think Tru is winning - just look at that menu (http://www.trurestaurant.com/files/Coll%203.9.pdf) Any advice is welcome...
The other reason for popping across the pond is to continue on the My Secret Kitchen USA plan.... things are coming together.... but some hard work ahead of us...

The real story behind the new products

So, the official announcement has been made... so how did we reach the decision to launch what we did?
We've been fascinated by the Szechuan pepper for a long time. The outer flesh of the fruit of the japanese prickly ash bush has an amazing effect when eaten whole. It's almost like eating a nettle but without the pain! It starts off aniseedy, then turns lemony and gives a numbing effect. When it's ground and blended with other spices it give out a fantastic flavour. Our lemon & chipotle sea salt sells very well, so here's the pepper to go with the salt!
Floral flavours have been gaining in popularity for a little while now so we've been playing with rose and hibiscus along with other flowers. The aim here was to do a sweet version of our infamous balsamic reduction. We also got to think about how we can get involved in alcoholic mixes. This was a combination of those ideas - we ended up with a georgous syrup with extracts of rose and hibiscus that when mixed with white wine, gives an aromatic rose. It's also great on any desserts to give a different flavour to the dish.
The peach pudding pickle is basically a Summer version of the highly popular fig pudding pickle. We twisted it with the addition of vanilla and a touch of chilli so that it can work equally well in savoury as well as sweet dishes.
The Fiesta Nacho cheese ball mix was a no brainer. Our most popular item is the red pepper cheese ball and we wanted to extend the range. The secret behind this mix is the preroasted spices which give a truly authentic and rich flavour.

The new gift boxes will be available shortly.
We'd love to hear your comments and thoughts!!

New Products.... and old ones out...

The new products have been announced to the consultants and have generated a LOT of excitement! Just two weeks to go. In the meantime we're sad to see Lavender Shortbread, Choc infusions and Fig Pudding Pickle going... but I reckon we may see some of them again. In the meantime wait for some cheesey, fruity little numbers around the corner....

The next exhibition is....

As usual, lots of things going on! We're busy planning our next exhibition at One Life Live in Olympia. We exhibited last year and it's a very different show to others we've done. All about living your dream, finding something different, something authentic, something that brings out the real you. We like that!! We had a number of consultants join us after meeting us at the show, so we're hopeful of the same results. If you fancy coming along drop us a line as we've got a few free tickets...!
New products next month.... all excited!!!

Keeping you up to date...

Oh dear... We did say that if we were going to introduce a blog, that we would keep it completely up to date on a weekly basis... mmm..
We've got over 100 requests for information about becoming a consultant outstanding so if you're one of them please bear with us! We're getting to you!
Many people have seen the opportunities of setting up their own business over the last couple of weeks and we've nearly covered the Uk now, still a few cities not covered yet - Bournemouth and Portsmouth, Liverpool and South Wales - so if you know anyone in those areas that may be interested please let us know!
We'll be exhibiting at One Live Life in March in Olympia, more on that to come. Mid March will also be the time when we'll be announcing the new Spring/Summer products. We're at the final stages of development and again another exciting range of foods will be coming out! So watch this space!
If you like our brownies then get yourself along to a tasting in February as we'll be giving away an Ultimate Borwnie Mix for any order of £25 or over.
And we'll try to be better at keeping up to date on the blog.... honest!