At My Table is a new food series on Parentdish, profiling celebrity chefs, cookery writers and food bloggers.
Lisa Marley studied cooking at Ashburton Cookery School and trained as a chocolatier in London and Belgium. Having set up her own company The Cocoa Box in 2009, Lisa teaches classes and workshops around the country and abroad.
Dr. Oetker has teamed up with Lisa Marley to launch the Great Chocolate Bake – encouraging British home bakers to push the boundaries of working with chocolate. Enter The Great Chocolate Bake for your chance to win a trip to New York at Facebook.com/droetkerbaking.
Describe your cooking style in three words:
Fresh, satisfying, indulgent
The weirdest thing I have ever eaten is...
Cow's heel soup in Tobago (tangy and spicy - never again).
Rosemary chocolate. It felt like I was eating a sweet roast lamb dinner. Wrong!
In my cupboard you will always find...
Chocolate, flour and eggs.
What would you cook for the queen?
I read that the Queens likes clean and simple food and her favourite sweet treat is chocolate (good choice, ma'am!). Keeping that in mind I would choose:
Scallops from Devon with a pea purée
Venison from Balmoral with seasonal vegetables
As the Queen is known for her nightly tipple of gin, I would hand make sloe gin truffles dipped in dark chocolate.
My Guilty food pleasure is...
I have so many to choose from! A really good cheese burger with fries is something I only indulge in every so often. But when I do, heaven!
My most memorable food experience so far is...
I like food and try to eat as many new dishes and cuisines as possible. My most memorable meal to date was in Reykjavik. It was a tasting menu by Hrefna Rosa Saetran at a restaurant called Fish Market. It was the meal that kept on giving and was truly amazing.
For my last meal I would eat...
I would want it to be something I haven't tried before. At the moment I am really inspired by Momofuku Milk bar in NYC. They create chocolate cookies and cakes that just look amazing. I would like a tasting menu from them.
I would never ever eat..
Foie gras. Ever. It actually offends me.
If I had to eat one thing for the rest of my life it would be...
This isn't an easy question to answer, speaking as someone who loves food with a passion. I will go with bread. As it's very versatile and I'm part Irish so it's in the blood.
When I am home alone I cook...
A lot of fish and vegetables. I try to eat cleanly as much as possible as most of my life is spent eating cakes, biscuits and chocolate (and I wouldn't change that for the world!).
My kitchen is always..
In use! I bake and cook every day. At home and at work. I wake up and turn the oven on so I know it will be at the correct temperature when I start cooking and baking.
Number one on my foodie bucket list is...
To eat my way around the world. I love to travel and I think the best way to grow as a person and as a cook is to try as many different cuisines as possible. I would also like to visit a cocoa plantation in Venezuela. I talk about the process from bean to bar (how chocolate is made) in my workshops but I've not actually seen the first stages in person. My husband also likes to eat and travel so I have the perfect travelling companion.
My must have kitchen gadget is...
Digital Scales! I would be lost without scales. I can sort of guess as I'm used to it, but I like to know that my measurements are exact. My other gadget would be my food mixer. Butter cream is a dream when whipped up with real power.
Here, Lisa shares some delicious cake recipes with us...