Mystic Burek’s Spasia Pandora Dinkovski on off-licence snacks and emergency birthday cake

Pick ‘n’ mix

What do you eat for breakfast?
Any combination of toast and egg. Always savoury. Sometimes with bacon.

What food could you competitively eat?
Lamb chops and ribs.

What’s your top home-cooked comfort food?
Mac and cheese.

What’s your favourite high street chain – and your regular purchase?
I don’t mind the hot sausages from Tesco.

What would you do if you were asked to bring a birthday cake to a party?
Make a Guinness cake. With anything I don’t have one favourite recipe for, I’ll usually flick through a few different versions and figure out how to bring all the best techniques together. Burning the butter was a really good accident the last time I made one!

 

What are your favourite social media accounts you follow and why?
@margot.combat (French cocktail expert Margot Lecarpentier) and @Balkanism (an educational collective and visual arts platform about Balkan culture and solidarity).

Do you use kitchen paper with abandon or do you ration it?
I don’t really buy it. Blue roll (catering industry paper towel) is a must, though.

The main meal

Do you write a weekly menu plan?
To be honest, I barely ever do a food shop. I’m lucky enough to eat leftovers from my shop and I’m always very much in the mindframe of making something out of nothing.

How does your job affect how you eat?
If I have to do a long day at the shop, I find it hard to eat anything because whenever I take a bite, someone walks in. But I always have breakfast.

What’s your opinion on snacking?
I love a snack. I love picking out the best snacks at the off licence. I opt for Lay’s Creamy Forest Mushroom crisps, which have been popping up a lot more, for good reason. Nik Naks always. And a cold can of Strawberry Mirinda.

What was your local supermarket branch as a child and what’s the best memory you have there?
My mum worked at Sainsbury’s for a while and I loved their staff Christmas parties – they used to call me Little Miss Chatterbox.

My bite-size week

What was the best thing you ate this week?
A smoked beef sausage from Ruben’s Reubens, the smokehouse run by 23-year-old barbecue chef Ruben Dawnay, which I finished off on the barbecue with a creamy potato salad.

What was the most mundane meal you ate?
I don’t waste my meals on mundane!

What food/drink did you buy on the go?
A couple of chicken goujons, rushing on the way to my book launch ahead of some fizz-drinking.

Was there a meal you planned as a treat/looked forward to?
I slow-roasted two baby chickens, then grilled them. I then made a super juicy sauce out of stock, butter, honey and harissa, and drenched it all. I honestly look forward to every meal, though.

Where did you shop for food – and what did you buy?
I got some ayran (a refreshing drink made from yogurt, water and salt) and a pistachio bar from a Turkish shop near me in Sydenham called Istanbul.

What did you do to relax?
A good few laps around the park and many episodes of Ab Fab.

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