The Best Roast Veg Ever

If you've watched my snapchat story at any point over the past two months, you may know this recipe off by heart (it's my favourite thing to eat right now... okay!). However, I've had lots of messages from people genuinely interested in the details, wanting to try it out themselves - plus some positive reviews from those who have - so I thought a proper post would be good for anyone curious.

It's essentially roasted vegetables and chorizo in a spicy tomato sauce. Nothing extravagant, but still very special. It's filling on its own so no need for pasta, rice, bread or any of your usual processed carbs. The batch I based this on took about 45 minutes and served 3 portions, but I regularly make it just for me by halving the amount of courgette, sweet potato and sauce. Keep reading for how to rustle up your own.

With meals that aren't an exact science I rarely use recipes, preferring to exercise my own judgement when it comes to amounts. With the ingredients themselves I usually just use up what's in the fridge, which is why I so often opt for this meal because as long as the main four ingredients (in bold) are there, it's gonna be good. What I love about this meal is that none of the components need to be prepared separately (except maybe the sweet potato if you prefer it very soft), you can just chop 'em up and shove 'em in the oven all at once!

YOU WILL NEED:

1 large sweet potato OR half a squash

1 pepper

1 courgette 

1 medium/large onion

1 mushroom

A handful of tomatoes

A handful of spinach

1/2 a chorizo, if a similar size as above *obv not if you're a vegetarian

Lashings of olive oil

A pot of pasta sauce OR plain chopped tomatoes in tomato juice

5 or so olives (to taste) OR two+ heaped spoonfuls of olive & chilli tapenade

2 cloves of garlic (or to taste)

A pinch of pepper

A hefty amount of paprika. I used smoked. Everything is better smoked. Except ur lungs.

A pinch of basil

As much cheese as you feel you need in your life. I prefer mozzarella for this dish.

Extra vegetables I'd also recommend: peas, carrots, aubergine, squash... any vegetable that can be baked. Literally.

METHOD:

Pre-heat your oven to 160 degrees celsius. (It's just what I usually have it on, I guess every oven cooks differently)

Chop all your vegetables into similar sized chunks, then pop in a non stick baking dish.

Cover with a good amount of olive oil and mix so the whole mixture is covered, then add your pepper, basil and paprika. Mix again, distributing the seasoning evenly.

Pop in the oven for 20-30 minutes.

After 20 minutes take it out to give a little stir, redistribute the juices then put back in if the sweet potato/courgettes feel too hard.

Now you can prepare your sauce. Don't worry about leaving your veggies out, it shouldn't take long and they're going back in the oven to heat up again anyway.

Put your chopped olives and crushed garlic into a small bowl and mix with half a pot of pasta sauce. Pour the sauce onto the vegetables, careful that there isn't too much. You don't want the vegetables to be swimming in sauce, it's more to mix in. Any left over sauce can be kept in the fridge for your next meal!

Layer with slices of mozzarella and pop in the oven for a further 3-5 minutes.

Serve up and ponder about how together your life is right now.

People always go on about not being able to cook, but honestly if you follow the steps and don't fall asleep on the sofa while your food is in the oven, you can't go wrong! So if you make this, do let me know! I want everyone to eat all the nice foods. Also do tell me whether you found this a good post, I'd love to do more recipes :)

Polly xo

Four Inspiring Books for Designers

Books. You'd have thought during my gap year I'd have found time to open one before this month. Better late than never, I was in a very uninspired mood, searching the interwebs for hand lettering book reviews and three caught my eye. I've had the little black number on the end for maybe a year now, but hadn't had a good look at it until recently.

Today I'm going to discuss four books that I've been flicking through daily to get my creativity juices flowing (which is MUCH needed as I have a hell of a lot to design for the new school year!). Two teach you hand lettering, and the others are informative about keeping a good mindset and growing yourself as a designer.

Work For Money Design For Love | Steal Like an Artist

"Work For Money, Design For Love" is possibly the best title there has ever been. I added this to my basket instantly, without fully knowing what it was about but suspecting it held the lessons I needed. And indeed it does. I'm on page 79 out of 264 and have already gained a great deal. The author is essentially teaching you how to be a freelance designer, as he is, but also discusses working with agencies. He starts by contacting Design graduates, asking what they wish was included in their course, then addresses them. On many topics he includes anecdotes of his own working life, or cases he's heard of. Already he's touched on issues I've experienced (namely, clients assuming you'll work for free). "I feel like certain clients abuse designers. There should be a class on how to deal with them".

Professionalism is something I need to work on, and I fully believe I'll come away from this book with a strong, healthy respect for myself as a designer. This is a well rounded education, and I could not recommend it more to anyone wanting to pursue a career in design.

Now, I'm sure a lot of you creative folk would also groan at the idea of looking at a wordy page. School is out, text books have been flung into the bin with no regret. When going through manuals, I follow the diagrams. When in the Design section of the library I wearily put down the picture-less books, no matter how valuable the contents might be. Unless it's fiction, I just can't concentrate on pages of text. HOWEVER. David Airey, author of the book above, must have considered our short attention spans as each topic is short, to the point and easy on the eye, cohesive with the style of the front cover (of course). Headings are bold, followed by no more than one page of text. This also makes it a lovely read to have in your bag, as you can get through a chapter while waiting in the queue for your morning coffee.

Steal Like an Artist is also very well laid out. Its headings and illustrations are all done in what looks like a marker pen, as if you're attending a talk by a motivational practitioner who's scribbling on a whiteboard (in my head, anyway). And no wonder this is marked a "New York Times best seller", it's simply brilliant. Packed with truths nobody wants to talk about, or confess, this book is sure to enlighten you. I love the no pissing around view that everything we create is a culmination of ideas we've stolen. Being "inspired" is a very sugar coated phrase. Once you've accepted this, your mindset opens up! Steal what you love, then put them all together to create something new, something of your own. It's also packed with helpful advice on how to boost your creativity, so overall a very inspiring book!

"Everything that needs to be said has already been said. But, since no one was listening, everything must be said again" -Andre Gide

"What is originality? Undetected plagiarism" -William Ralph Inge

"Emulation is when imagination goes one step further, breaking through into your own thing"

Creative Lettering & Beyond | Modern Calligraphy 

Unlike most design books I own, Creative Lettering & Beyond is clearly aimed at amateurs (that's to say, people who are interested in lettering as a hobby, and didn't study it at school), with easy to follow step-by-steps and relatable projects to try out. "With the lettering projects in this book - and helpful artist talks throughout - you'll soon be on your way to developing and mastering your own unique style of lettering". Touching on the very basics of digitalising your work, I've already learned useful methods I didn't know! (as you may have seen me demonstrate on snapchat "pollyvdsz"). Split into four sections (Modern Calligraphy, Illustrated lettering, Chalk Lettering and Lettering Crafts), this book is sure to get you trying something different. It even has pages after most sections to practice in, but I prefer using a sketch book (one page is NOT adequate to try out a new technique). Tips include how to manoeuvre an ink pen, letter spacing, font pairing and how to lay out a typography piece!

Modern Calligraphy is a gorgeous book, perfect for someone who wants to get into the elegant art of calligraphy that is so popular on the likes of Pinterest and Instagram. The wedding invite and decorative print inspiration will have you making your own work in no time. Packed with useful techniques, including: watercolour, coffee painting, gold trimming, sticker making... and so much more. I positively squealed at the pages and pages showing variations of how each letter of the alphabet (upper and lower case) can be formed. Usually modern calligraphy instructions only show you one way, which may not be appropriate for your project! I like to integrate a bit of dainty and loopy, or brush painted calligraphy into most of my hand lettering pieces, but often it's the part that takes the longest to sketch out. So, I'm very happy to now be able to flick through this book until I find a style I can emulate.

So there you have it! I do hope lots of you invest in these books, I know they've helped me tremendously over the past few weeks. The peaceful relaxation that comes with reading, plus some motivational words, or a particularly interesting technique of drawing the letter "L", is the push needed to get you over that creative block.

Polly xo

"This Bag Contains" Tote

Release date: 13/06/2015 | £12.50

Cardigan & roll neck crop - Urban Outfitters | Skirt - Topshop | Watch - Daniel Wellington

Photos by Beth Norton

I've been harping on about these tote bags now for weeks on all my social media, but I do hope you're not too sick of them yet! I'm just SO. Bloomin. Excited.

Originally I was going to use a supplier for these, but when I realised their maximum print was about 18cm^2 I had to look for other options. This design needed to span the entire bag or the "crumbs" would look silly. Thank goodness they were willing to sell me plain bags, and I had other means of printing. 

Charlotte (the northern Graphic Design student angel) (soon to be Sighh employee/co designer), with help from Lo and the technicians at Leeds College of Art, managed to screen print a batch of these the day before she left to go home for summer. Unfortunately most ended up with patches where the screen had dried up with paint, so for the past two weeks I've been making my way through them, paint brushes and fabric ink in hand, so they're as standardised (perfect) as possible. However I still need to sew logo tags on half of them, and iron them all...

Although I do love sleek, professionally printed products, I've always wanted to stock hand made items. They're naturally more special for the buyer as real love and hard work goes into every single unit. So when I move to Leeds for uni (squirm) me and Charlotte will be blasting out the hand printed tote bags, art prints, note pads... MANY THINGS. The thought of LCA's extensive resources being at our finger tips (for cheap) is just... YAY. I can't wait to do blog posts on the production process!

So there it is, Sighh's first tote bag. Hopefully one of many in the set! I'm thinking a for-school version would be awesome.

The Beach Bag version will be released early July! And comes with an Instagram giveaway... stay tuned.

Polly xo