My Secret Kitchen

Dress it up!

2011-07-12T11:56:00.003+01:00

What a great promo we have for July!

A collection of our dressings:-

Thai Dressing with Kaffir Lime

Miso Dressing with Ginger and

Mango Mojita Dessert Sauce

Special promotion of £14 if you come to one of our tastings. You can also add a Thai dressing to your order for only £4. It's good

Make sure you follow us on Twitter - mysecretkitchen to keep with all the gossip

The May Promotion

2011-05-04T07:32:00.003+01:00

Before we tell you about the latest promotion we can't thank you all enough!! We've had record months for people joining us as consultants in the last two months!

Anyway - onto to May - and the big news is that our Italian Bistro kit is back for one month only to help create a wonderful Italian experience in your own home. With five fabulous My Secret Kitchen products, a beautiful recipe book with easy to follow recipes and table decorations, this box will help you host a fantastic dinner party for 6 and still have some tasty treats leftover.
This normally retailed at £35 but in May this will be available for £28. Contact us for a tasting!!

New reason to be a consultant and an extremely gooy offer

2011-03-19T07:44:00.003Z

If you haven't subscribed to our newsletter then shame on you .... ;)
The new one is now out and poacked full of goodies and recipes so please subscribe and you won't miss out. This month we have a special offer announced for April - send £25 at a tasting and receive our deliciously gooey and richly decedant ultimate chocolate brownie mix free. Mmmmm it's good.
We've also announced that up until Easter we're trialling a reduced version of our business kit. So it's only £49 to join as a My Secret kitchen consultant. What's stopping you!!

New press release now published

2011-02-10T22:04:00.002Z

Hi all,

Just to say that the new products have now been officially released and are going down a storm!
Make sure you've subscribed to the newsletter as there's one coming out over the next few days and includes an incredible recipe for Green Goddess dressing. This WILL be your favourite dressing for years to come! Anyway .. what are you waiting for? Go and book a tasting! ;)

Top ten Food trends for 2011

2011-01-07T12:03:00.002Z

We're busy at work on the new products for a February launch. In the meantime we thought you'd be interested in reading about our predictions for this year in the top ten food trends for 2011!
You can find these at www.responsesource.com/releases/rel_display.php?relid=61744

Exhibition time...Yippeeeee!!

2010-10-20T14:45:00.002+01:00

We're currently packing up all our goodies and will be exhibiting at the Glasgow Good Food Show this weekend. If you get chance come along and see us, we'd love to chat. We'll be showing off some of our new products as well as talking about our new consultant promotion. Join us and do your first tasting before Xmas and we'll give you a hamper pack free as a thank you.
See you soon, off to the land of the snow!!

Dark Chocolate and Lime Pickle - the perfect combination or a culinary disaster?

2010-09-16T09:13:00.002+01:00

The new products are here!! With the strangest one we've ever launched - Dark Chocolate and Lime Pickle Truffle Pot. I guess we're going to have quite a bit of press interest with this one and I'm guessing most of them are thinking that this is a gimmick. OK, it's a good bit of PR for us BUT it really works. Bizarre!

Announcing our new magazine!

2010-09-02T12:05:00.002+01:00

We received delivery of our new magazine this morning! As we've grown, we wanted to give something to people at tastings that was more about us and contained some great recipes and ideas along with a summary of all the goodies we have to offer. So "Menu" magazine has been born. Email us on info@mysecretkitchen.co.uk if you'd like a copy and we'll get one sent out to you straight away

Award finalists!

2010-08-19T12:37:00.002+01:00

Well well well! We've had the honour of being nominated for "company of the year" by a website called mumandworking and have now got through to the finals! Wonderful news for us and if you'd like to "like" this news we'd appreciate it! Just go to www.mumandworking.co.uk/awards/company/ and click like next to our name. Thanks!
On the business side of things we've just signed up for the two BBC Good Food show at Birmingham and Glasgow so we'd love to see you at one of these.
Just round the corner are the new products which will be launched around the middle of September. Suffice to say we've officially come out with the weirdest combination we've ever done. But it works SO well!! Watch this space!!

Join us in June!

2010-06-06T18:35:00.002+01:00

"Join" and "June" sound very nice together so we decided to do a wonderfully special promotion for those who are interested in the business for this month. So if you join us in June we'll be giving you a free hamper and a set of gift supplies! Make a call on 0845 094 5319 and have an informal chat to see if you're right for us and more importantly if we're right for you.

All hail the DSA

2010-05-04T17:49:00.002+01:00

Hi all!

We're getting ready to go to the annual Direct Sellling Association annual conference this week. For those that don't know, we are not members as of yet due to advice we were given by the chairman of the DSA. He commented that it would be worthwhile to follow the guidelines of the DSA and then when we are a certain size to officially join. We're probably now at that point and have been following the guidelines of the DSA so it's about time to join, hence the trip to the conference to discuss further. The guidlines have been easy to follow mainly due to the fact that most of them are based on good ethics and we have always been proud of our ethics and treatment of consultants, suppliers and customers, without these we wouldn't be here! SO thank you to all the above for making us what we are now!

Thumbs up to the new products

2010-04-23T10:08:00.002+01:00

Well, we've had a few standing ovations for the Smoked Rapeseed Oil and the Mango Mojito Dessert sauce!
So much so that we've decided to enter them into the Great Taste Awards for this year so fingers crossed, let's hope we have as much success as we had with the Maple Caramel Sauce (3 gold stars) and the Balsamic Reduction (2 gold stars)
We've just announced the promotion for May which is a goody!! We have a whole host of new recipes for our cheese ball mixes and we'll also be giving one free if you spend over £15 at a tasting and if you soend £30 then you get the collection! Cheeseballs are great as most people haven't heard of the idea before. When they try them at a tasting there's normally quite a few surprised faces out there!
So if you haven't booked a tasting yet then May is the perfect time for it - just contact your nearest consultant or ping us an e-mail at office@mysecretkitchen.co.uk

All change!

2010-04-02T15:23:00.002+01:00

Hi All,

So we've gone live with the new look and feel website and we hope you like it. Lots of changes to keep it as modern as our products and I love the new videos dotted around the site. The new products have officially been launched and includes our first ever single ingredient item, the smoked oil. The oil and the Mango Mojito dessert sauce have been voted as real winners by our consultants so we hope you like them too. Feel free to leave comments with what you think!

The Mother-in-Law approves

2010-03-14T19:40:00.002Z

Evening all!
Well... We just tried out the new products on the mother-in-law for Mothers Day (it's ok, she got a card too...) We have official approval of the new launches so we are now good to go! We've been looking at revamping the labels as well. It's an interesting debate.... we're still quite new to most people but have been in business for 2 1/2 years, so we're thinking let's freshen things up a bit, but to most people the business is still so new. So why spend quite a bit of money on a revamp if it doesn't require it? Feel free to voice your opinion!

Round the corner

2010-03-09T19:55:00.002Z

Hello all!
Well... we're just round the corner from the new products being launched! All the photography has just been completed and the website is being changed as we speak. The magic date is April the 1st. We've got some pretty special new products for you, one being the freshest tasting product you'll ever try!
The Booja-Booja truffles promotion finishes at the end of the month. If you haven't tried them book a tasting because they are absolutely gorgeous!!!!

Good Food Show - Scotland - here we come

2009-10-29T09:45:00.002Z

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!

2009-10-21T11:48:00.003+01:00

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..

2009-09-03T07:16:00.003+01:00

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.

2009-08-30T11:16:00.002+01:00

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

2009-08-17T20:44:00.003+01:00

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!

2009-08-06T08:46:00.002+01:00

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!

2009-07-20T19:40:00.002+01:00

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!

2009-05-20T08:01:00.004+01:00

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!

2009-05-04T08:31:00.001+01:00

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

2009-04-25T11:36:00.002+01:00

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!

2009-03-31T21:44:00.002+01:00

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...

2009-03-15T21:24:00.002Z

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...

2009-03-09T21:56:00.002Z

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

2009-03-05T08:55:00.002Z

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...

2009-02-20T08:54:00.003Z

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....

2009-02-11T21:36:00.002Z

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...

2009-01-24T21:35:00.002Z

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!

That's it. We've finished for Christmas..

2008-12-22T16:25:00.002Z

What an incredible last couple of months, smashing all previous records in terms of sales and finding many new consultants who have now joined us too! Thank you to everyone who have joined us as a consultant, hosted a tasting or enjoyed being at a tasting through the year. We've had the time of our lives and judging from the feedback, many of you have had an enjoyable experience too. 2009 promises to be a really exciting year for us, so please feel free to get in contact with us, we promise you a lot of fun in return.

What an amazing Good Food Show!

2008-11-17T15:45:00.001Z

Hi all,

Just got back from the BBC Good Food Show in London and what a show! 191 of you have requested tastings and 65 have requested information to become a consultant! What was ever better was that we had many people interested in the business opportunity i the places where we currently have no coverage. So, we're busy compiling all the info at the moment and will be in touch over the next few days...
Thanks to all for making it the best show we've ever had.

Gift Packs for Xmas

2008-10-31T14:44:00.002Z

We've had a record month in October with people gearing up for the Christmas rush. The new products are selling fantastically, new consultants are streaming in and all is wonderful in the My Secret Kitchen world!
Probably the biggest succes has been the introduction of the new gift boxes. We've introduced a whole new range of packs that seem to really appeal to a lot of foodies out there. The chocolate infusions gift pack seems to be the biggest seller, although the cheese and wine pack - where you choose your favourite bottle to add to our gift box - is capturing the imagination well. More at http://www.mysecretkitchen.co.uk/products/gift_packs.html

We're hard at work planning for the BBC Good Food show at Olympia between the 14th-16th November, so if you're into your food and based in the South or East of England make sure you come and see us!

Busy ,busy, busy!

2008-10-14T08:58:00.002+01:00

I've just realised that it's been a couple of weeks since a ramble. With the new launch of the Autumn/Winter products we have been snowed under, which is wonderful.People keep asking us how the credit crunch is affecting us and very simply it hasn't. We've had our record sales this week and the business keeps improving. I guess it's because we are such a new and different company, but also how many people are actually going to scrimp down to the "I'm not going to buy quality food" level? Furniture? Cars? Extension? Yes, I can understand that, but not good food. In fact, people need smaller treats to compensate for not getting the big things! We've also noticed a bigger increase in the number of people looking for that second income and contacting us about becoming a consultant. So my answer to those credit crunch questions is really - it's going great thanks!
It's Small Business Week this week and Emma Jones at www.enterprisenation.com has been submitting our business as a good model for home workers - so an offical thanks from us to you Emma - go on her website, it's inspiring!
Lastly I have to tellyou of our lucky escape.... A year ago we were approached by a TV production company who wanted to use our products in a new TV programme. We had just started as a business and the prospect of our products appearing on TV were just amazing. We finally turned it down after meeting the producers and what an escape!! The programme is one of the most talked about ones at the moment..... Natural Born Sellers... we made the right decision!

Extreme Leftover Makeover...

2008-09-24T15:13:00.001+01:00

Well.. the challenge was set down and we chose an e-mail from Cheryl:-

In my fridge, you can currently find :

half a white cabbage, carrots, leeks
leftover boiled potatoes and roast chicken
olives, cooked rice, red & green pepper
cooked green beans, tomatoes, cucumber

Any ideas ?!!!

Clare had a go and this is what she came up with:

For a quick mid-week lunch, make a Mediterranean Frittata with some of the potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, olives and add 2 whole eggs and 1 tablespoon of My Secret Kitchen Tapenade with Smoked Garlic per person. Add some grated cheese or fresh herbs if you have them and black pepper. Served with our new Wholegrain Beer Bread it will keep you going until dinner!

For an easy family meal with something for everyone, serve wheat or corn tortillas with a selection of fillings - make a Red Pepper Slaw by shredding the white cabbage with the red and green peppers and make a dressing with My Secret Kitchen Red Pepper Cheese Ball mix using a blend of sour cream and mayonnaise. Jazz up the rice by combining it with some of the chopped cucumber and carrot and add My Secret Kitchen Miso Dressing with Ginger to taste. Serve the fillings alongside some of the cooked chicken. If the family are looking for something hot, pre-make the wraps and cook enchilada style by placing in an ovenproof dish, spoon over My Secret Kitchen Sunset Salsa, cover with foil and back for 15 – 20 minutes and serve with sour cream.

Finally, for a surprise dinner for some-one special, sauté the potatoes until crispy and golden; steam the carrots and leeks adding a little butter and a dash of My Secret Kitchen Lemon & Chipotle Spiced Sea Salt, and warm the chicken with My Secret Kitchen Red Wine and Port finishing Sauce.

Well.... they're here!!

2008-09-17T14:55:00.003+01:00

At last! We've officially launched the new products and we've had an amazing reaction so far. We appear to have really caught the attention of lots of people, especially the unusual aspect of the chocolate infusions. But I'm certainly never again doing four regional sales meetings, moving our picking and packing operation to another company and launching six new products in the same week again!!

Have a good look on the website and book a tasting!! We've got the new gift packs coming out at the end of the week too!

What is sleep?

One step closer to winning....

2008-09-11T17:42:00.002+01:00

Hi all!

As usual we're beaming!! We had a lovely letter through the post this morning letting us know that we've been slected as one of six companies through to the national finals of the British Small Business Champions Awards 2008!
My comments were "yippee!", Clare just looked at the letter and said "great... new party dress time"
The champions will be announced at Claridges on Nov 21st. Fingers crossed....

A day in the life of one of our consultants

2008-09-03T13:11:00.003+01:00

Hi all! I thought it was time to hear from someone else rather than my strange ramblings. So Michelle, one of our consultants, has written a day in the life of a My Secret Kitchen consultant! Many thanks Michelle!!

Michelle Paice, A My Secret Kitchen Consultant and full-time mother of two boys under 4yrs
Typical Day -Thursday 28th August 2008.
Today is busier than most, have a booking for a tasting with Kirsty

7.00am- 8.00am Breakfast, kids ready and off to nursery.

8.30am- 9.30am Local supermarket for ingredient’s for my new product development and evening’s tasting. Made sure I had enough butter, eggs, and crackers for the tasting. I’ve taken it upon myself to do some development work of my own for My Secret Kitchen, which included a few versions of red wine and marsala sauces.

10.00am Received My Secret Kitchen samples, which arrived punctually, all ready to make and bake for the evening’s tasting. Oven on and ready to bake!

10.15am Beer Bread: Mixed a bottle of beer with the dry mix and poured into a greased tin, into the oven and timed for 40 minutes, this has got to be the quickest bread to mix and bake ever!

10.30am- 11.00am Next I emptied the ultimate chocolate brownie mix into a bowl, melt butter and mix in with three eggs, straight into a greased tin. Oven set and baked brownie for 30 minutes. Same with the lavender shortbread!

11.15am What wonderful smells were wafting around the kitchen, just so tempting, did I need all of the brownie’s for the evening’s tasting? I gulped one chunk down, just to check it tasted good, and had the gooey texture the guests all rave about every time. Oh as good as ever!! Chopped brownie up into squares, Kirsty expected 16 to 18 friends. Chopped beer bread into bite size pieces and shortbread into enough squares, with leftovers for family.

11.45am Coffee, sandwich and a spare hour to write the new recipe ideas.

12.45pm Picked up Jake and Sam from nursery

1.15pm – 2.30pm Jake and Sam nap on the way home, up to their beds which gave me chance to do the development work. Three recipes developed, cooked up and reduced down red wine, marsala wine and shallots, with seasonings and fresh thyme, and two versions of Marsala wine and porcini mushroom sauces. Bottles sterilised, filled and labelled, packed up ready for courier to collect.

2.30 Emailed Clare at My Secret Kitchen with the recipes, story and application ideas, explaining how the product can be used in recipes, to suggest to clients at tasting’s, what the product is, and the inspiration I had behind them.

2.45 Enough time before kids woke to mix the red pepper cheese ball mix with cream cheese and into a tub and chilled, ready for the tasting, the same with the choco berry cheese ball mix

3.00 Cucumber and carrots chopped into juliennes for dipping into the Thai and Miso dressing at the tasting. Cherry tomatoes prepared, hollowed out ready for the cheese ball mix to be rolled into balls and filled at Kirsty’s house

3.15pm-4.00pm Jake and Sam woke and had a drink and a piece of the delicious lavender shortbread. Set a game for Jake, Sam and I to play. Check my emails. Couple informative emails from My Secret Kitchen, one detailing the sales meeting’s and one explaining the Accelerated leadership course criteria, and preparation required. I qualified for the course by holding a number of tastings in two months, I attend the course in September and then try to book in eight tasting’s in eight weeks giving me the exposure to meet and recruit potential consultants. The preparation requires me to think about where you want your business to be in the future, which I thought about for the rest of the day.

4.15pm Courier arrived to collect the developed products for Clare and Phil to sample at My Secret Kitchen.

4.45pm Started dinner. Spaghetti Bolognese, kids favourite, but tried it with a little My Secret Kitchen Tapenade with smoked Garlic. Sat down to eat as a family, delicious, if I do say so myself, and clean plates says the family all enjoyed it! The Tapenade added a great texture and smoked garlic depth to the Bolognese sauce. Another recipe idea I shared with the guests at the evening’s tasting.

6.00pm Ready for tasting and packed up the samples, literature, and crackers for dipping, and the set of retail samples and displays.

6.40pm Left the house, leaving Nick (My Husband) to babysit, only had to drive five minutes to Kirsty’s house.
Previously met Kirsty, when dropping off the host pack I’d put together with invitations and information she would need prior to the tasting.

6.45pm Once into her kitchen I was able to do the final preparations before all the guests arrived, whilst Kirsty organised the seating and glasses for drinks. I laid out the tasting menu’s, order forms and feedback sheets on each seat (all prep-printed yesterday). Kirsty left me an area to set up the retail products to show the guests and the literature on hosting a tasting, becoming a consultant and the press releases on the Company since it’s launch in June 2007.

7.15pm I laid out fifteen product samples onto plates and into ramekins ready to start the tasting. Strawberries washed, cherry tomatoes stuffed with red pepper cheese ball mix, and the tasty choco berry cheese ball mix rolled into one and placed into a ramekin for dipping.

7.30pm Ready to begin, when guests were arriving, Kirsty and I greeted them. Drinks offered.

7.45pm-10.30pm I began with introducing myself and thanking Kirsty for hosting the tasting. I have been with My Secret Kitchen for three months, and heard about them on a mother/working website, with it being the only food position on there, I gave it a go, having a food development background and being a ‘foodie’, I thought I’d be perfect! The history of My Secret Kitchen, set up by Clare and Phil Moran just over a year ago doing food tasting’s in people’s homes, and an explanation of the tasting menu, starting with lighter product, through to spicier and then the sweet and more decedent products to finish. I passed the products round one after the other and talked through the ingredients and recipe ideas, from everyday recipes, to more special and exotic ideas for dinner parties and buffets. It was great to see people’s faces and reactions as they enjoyed the foods on offer. Guests were getting involved with talking about the flavours and coming up with their own recipe ideas, and enjoying the evening, it was a great tasting! I took orders after everyone had tasted the range, and offered the host her gifts, and free products. Feedback forms were filled in, and the person’s name drawn out of a hat won a beer bread mix. I also took a booking for a further tasting on the night. A guest was interested in becoming a consultant, so I talked through what is involved and took details to send out and meet further to discuss. All that was left for the next day was to place the orders online! Few!

A sad goodbye to an old friend

2008-08-28T14:23:00.003+01:00

Hi All!

Well.... we're hoping you are as excited about the new products coming out next month as we are. The plan is still for the 15th September and although I'm sure everyone says this when they launch new products "we have an amazing new range of fantastic new ideas coming out!!!"
The sad news is that one of our original products has decided to gracefully retire. Our blueberry and acai drizzle will no longer be available from the 15th Sept. So if it's one of your favourites please put your orders in with us before then.
On a personal note, I no longer require any more e-mails about the photo in the Wiltshire Times that is on the news page (www.mysecretkitchen.co.uk/news) suggesting that it looks like Clare's dad with her rather than her husband.....

Extreme Leftover Makeover...

2008-08-13T13:10:00.000+01:00

Here's a challenge for you!

What is in your fridge right now? Challenge us to come up with leftover recipes; call us or email us and we will come up with an idea on how to use your leftovers – we will even send you a free product to make your limp leftovers luscious!

Press, press everywhere!!

2008-08-04T13:42:00.003+01:00

Following on from the wonderful news about winning the three gold star for our Maple Caramel Sauce, this morning Clare's been on BBC Radio Wiltshire and we've also had the Wiltshire Times arrange a photo session for tomorrow for Thursday's edition, which is all great for us. We also officially submitted the press release to the world and fingers crossed that we get some good results from that. We're still waiting for that first TV tasting... who's first??!!

Award Winners!!

2008-08-03T11:38:00.003+01:00

Well, we can now tell you... My Secret Kitchen has won two gold awards at the Great Taste Awards, the Oscars of the food industry!
Our Balsamic Reduction won the 2 star Gold Award and the Maple Caramel Sauce won the highest award available - the 3 star Gold Award.
We're obviously really delighted. Tasting food before buying is really what our business is all about. We have the confidence in the foods that we create for people to try before they buy anything. That, along with all the wonderful recipe ideas that we share at a tasting makes for such an enjoyable evening!

School has broken up.....

2008-07-30T10:59:00.002+01:00

With the school holidays upon us and a growing business to run, we're having a "fun" time here as I'm sure a lot of you are! This is the first year that William has broken for the school holidays and he's at the perfect age for "I'm bored, let's tease my little sister" So it's definately going to be a long summer break!
Conveniently I need to set up our new consultants in Peterborough, Huntingdon and Manchester so I'm on a road trip....
We're just finishing the new gift bags and boxes and it's going to be the best set ever! We can do all the official announcing at the beginning of September! Anyway.....I'm late....!!

Girl on Film!

2008-07-21T10:56:00.002+01:00

Good day to all!

We're right at the end of the compilation of the DVD, just dotting the i's and cossing the t's now. It's hit home to me how good Clare is on camera! I turn into a dalek when I'm in front of the camera, complete with strange strangled voice, Clare on the other hand, is wonderfully animated and totally herself. We've had a couple of companies interested in interviewing her, we all need a new Nigella on TV. My campaign for Clare starts now!!

The record is broken

2008-07-16T08:35:00.003+01:00

I did my first tasting in Wales last night! Well... it was literally one foot in Wales, the other in England, in Chepstow, in Monmouthshire, which is a big foodie area. On the way there, Lyndsay, our first ever consultant, called and informed me that she'd broken the record for the biggest amount of sales at a tasting! She then proceeded to let me know that she would prefer the Sheraton over the Holiday Inn. I should explain that our top consultant is accompanying us to Chicago next May to attend the Fancy Food Show, one of the biggest food exhibitions in the world. With her two closest rivals being on holiday for the next three weeks, Lyndsay is going for it!!
I'll be working on the newsletter today so for those who have subscribed, this should be getting through to your inbox later. For those who haven't, why not? You get one newsletter a month with some tantalising recipes and offers galore! Myself and Clare are then off to Williams first ever sports day. As a competitive Dad I just hope I behave myself and don't accidentally trip up anyone ahead of him, it's just not the done thing...

Some secret good news!

2008-07-08T10:08:00.002+01:00

We had some lovely news yesterday about one of our products - but we can't tell anyone until the end of next week, which is agonizing!!
Clare's spending the rest of the week finalizing the new products for launch in September. I keep on thinking, how can we improve our current range, it's just perfect? (not in a big headed way at all)but Clare continues to amaze everyone when she has her strange foodie development head on. The ideas are fantastic, we'll drip feed you some hints over rhe next few weeks....

Some more new consultants and something for the weekend!

2008-07-04T08:07:00.003+01:00

Good day all!
Another busy week with one lady from Ashby de la Zouch and one from Huddersfield joining us. Where o where are foodie loving people on the south coast? We still have no consultants along the whole of the coast!
This weekend we're going to be busy at the village food fete in Ashton Keynes, showing a few of our wares to the locals, in the meantime I'm just finishing the July newsletter to the consultants, including the latest website statistics. We're getting around 150 different people coming to the website each day which is absolutely wonderful! Hopefully they're liking the new look front page!

Our new blog!

2008-07-01T11:10:00.007+01:00

Welcome to the new blog! The simple idea is to let you know what we're doing every week, where we have new consultants, new ideas that we're working on etc etc.

Please let us know any comments you have or any ideas you'd like us to look at. If you want a sneaky secret peek into My Secret Kitchen, this is the place to come to!

We've just launched the July promotion which is spend £20 at a tasting and receive a FREE bottle of our Thai Dressing with Kaffir Lime worth £6.99.

And if you'd like some inspiration for things to do with our Thai Dressing just send us an email – we've got ideas coming out of our ears for great salads and marinades!

Our new Summer Salads gift pack

2008-06-20T14:39:00.008+01:00

Let's face it – summer is an amazing time of year. All those barbecues, parties in the garden, get-togethers with friends... mmmm, we love it! In celebration of the sunniest season of the year (and to provide you with the perfect present to take along to those barbecues and parties) we've introduced a brand new 'Summer Salads' gift pack.

The pack contains a bottle of My Secret Kitchen's Blueberry & Acai Drizzle, a bottle of Miso Dressing with Ginger and a bottle of our new Thai Dressing with Kaffir Lime. Neatly presented in a gift box, we reckon this will bring a big summery smile to the face of any food-loving friend.

Find out more...