Dinner, 10/3/15: Pasta with Breadcrumbs and Anchovies

...and half a jar of black olives I had in the fridge, which was a nice addition.

Dinner, 9/3/15: Potato & Cabbage soup with bacon

Enjoyed this. The texture was nice, as the soup was blended and then the cabbage added - and of course the crispy bacon was crispy. And bacony. If you wanted to make it vegetarian or vegan, you could easily put some chopped toasted nuts or something like that for the topping - we like bacon, but it's the saltiness and the crunch that are really important and there are other ways to achieve that. Originally from Good Food magazine.

Book 19: Maze Runner, James Dashner (YA)

Several of my kids have read this series (or part of it) and they've been suggesting I read it (partly because it's good, and partly so they can talk about what happens with impunity) so I decided to give it a go. Verdict: it's a good story, quite gripping and I'm not sure what's coming next in book 2 (which I will of course go ahead and read straight away). The character development is not quite so good as in some YA books - perhaps a little bit because the characters don't really know who they are themselves, but mostly because I think it's just more of an action-driven story. But it's very entertaining, and looks as though the series is going to take a stab at addressing at least one Big Issue (to wit: Are there circumstances in which the ends justify the means?). 

Dinner, 8/3/15: Chicken Fajitas

All ready to wrap...

A walk in Cannizaro Park

Absolutely gorgeous day, and as we had friends round to lunch, we headed out for a walk after our meal (which we ate outside on the patio!!). Went to Cannizaro Park, a local park near Wimbledon Common - us and half of the rest of South London - but it didn't matter; it was lovely anyway.  The ground was just carpeted with crocus and snowdrops - both this type of more in-your-face crocuses and the more gentle, wild ones (like above, mixed in with snowdrops). Lovely!

There was some climbing, mainly by the small boy...

and the large boy.

Sarah took a somewhat more relaxed approach to the whole climbing thing.

A few early rhododendrons and magnolias were out - though nothing like it will be in another month's time  - must remember to go back over the Easter Holiday!

Lunch 7/3/15: Fresh Lasagne with Pesto, Florence Fennel with Breadcrumbs, Green Salad

Friends around to lunch today and WE ATE OUTSIDE because it was so warm and sunny. I love spring. Hurray!

We had a lasagne - this one is lighter and fresher than some as there's no tomato sauce, just fresh cherry tomatoes (the ones in the layers, I cut in half, works better, but it's nice to see the whole ones on top) - of course there's still a bechemel sauce, so it's not that light. And cheese. It also has spinach in, which we like - we've had this lasagne before a number of times...

The fennel dish was new, but I really liked it - I didn't make quite as much as in the recipe, but there was plenty. I forgot to cut back on the amount of breadcrumbs in line with cutting back the amount of fennel, but it wasn't really a problem to have extra topping.

And a nice salad on a plate, looking very summery.

Book 18: Island of Wings, Karin Altenberg

Historical fiction, set on St Kilda (an island in the Outer Hebrides) in the 19th century. Lizzie is a preacher's wife and goes to remote St Kilda with her husband, who feels a mission to minister to the St Kildans.  She speaks no Gaelic, however, and they have very little English... It's an interesting portrait of the way people cope with isolation, and of Lizzie's relationships with the islanders and her husband. I really enjoyed this. Apparently, too, it's based on actual people, though of course fictionalised. 

Dinner, 6/3/15: Spicy Enchiladas

Always a favourite. As usual, I added a second tin of beans to the mix. We ate it all, even though it's quite filling...

Dinner, 4/3/15: Mushroom and Sausage Pasta

One of those easy mid-week pasta suppers we have so often. Yum. I didn't put any bacon in this time, as I had a whole package of chipolatas to use up, so I used them instead.

Dinner, 3/3/15: Tofu Noodle Bowl

This is one of those meals which should have been better than it was; there was very little flavour to the soup part of it, and even with the addition of stock (rather than water combined with the leftover marinade from the tofu) it wouldn't have been that interesting. Not a keeper.

We did think the tofu was really good though, so I will certainly be using the method for frying tofu (drain, cubed, dredged in cornflour). 

Dinner, 2/3/15: Chicken and Rice One-Pot

February Round Up

WHAT WAS  FOR DINNER, FEBRUARY 2015

• 28th: Spicy Cheese and Tomato Bake
• 27th: Dinner out at Yauatcha (kids made pizzas)
• 26th: Everyone fend for yourself
• 25th: Carbonara Style Spaghetti
• 24th: Red Pork Curry with Green Beans
• 23rd: Courgette and Goat Cheese Frittata
• 22nd: Mexican Style Salmon
• 21st: Greek Lamb with Orzo
• 20th: Chicken soup with pasta
• 19th: Out in town with Olivia
• 18th: Roast Chicken, Sprouts, Oven Potatoes
• 17th: leftovers
• 16th: Pasta Bake
• 15th: Beef Burgundy
• 14th: Baked Bean Cassoulet
• 13th: Thai Green Chicken Curry
• 12th: Plaice, Peas, Potatoes (Geoff only)
• 11th: Bacon, Spinach and Gorgonzola Pasta
• 10th: Sticky Ginger Chicken (leftover) with Lentils
• 9th: Teriyaki Pork with Oriental Veg
• 8th: Sticky Ginger Chicken with Cashews; Hot and Sour Aubergines
• 7th: Out - Hard Rock Cafe (Alex, Kate); Spag Bol (Geoff & girls - Geoff cooking)
• 6th: German Sausages, Sauerkraut, Salad
• 5th: Find your own dinner
• 4th: Lamb Curry, Courgettes
• 3rd: Tagliatelli with Walnuts and Lemon
• 2nd: Brussels Sprouts Quesadillas
• 1st: Roast Lamb, Roast Potatoes, Carrots

Mixed Fruit Crumble

Dinner, 1/3/15: German Lentil Soup, Cornbread

As we were planning to be out in the afternoon, possibly not getting home until near 6, I put some lentil soup in the slow cooker. Yum. 

A walk in Richmond Park

We had arranged to meet up with a friend for a walk and some tea in Richmond Park this afternoon - as it happened, it turned out to be quite sunny, though still not warm and with a strong breeze.  It was good to get out, though. And luckily, the weather lasted through our walk - by the time we finished our tea, it was chucking rain, so I'm glad we weren't any later!

The park was full of deer, as well - a cull is due soon, unsurprisingly. It was nice to see a big herd of them...

Book Plan Update - February

If you're a regular reader here, you'll remember that at the start of the year, I made a plan to try to read through books I owned, and not buy any new books until I'd made a substantial reduction in the (unread) books I owned. I did, however, allow myself library books (both those I order in because they are part of a series I'm reading and those which I happen to see which take my fancy) and a few gifts, e.g. birthday and Mother's Day. 

In the first month, I didn't gain any books, but I read a lot of stuff from the library and a few re-reads from what I already own, so I only managed to remove 2 titles from my list.  

Was Month 2 any better?

• I bought 2 books from a charity shop, but one was a book I've already read by a favourite author, so it's going on the shelves with the other stuff by that author. The other goes into the reading list (Can't Wait to Get To Heaven, Fannie Flagg).
• No library books this month (there was a cookbook/memoir I ordered which I had a look through and decided not to buy, but it doesn't really count as a read).
• There were two  re-reads from the books already in the house, including the book that Alex and I were reading aloud as a bedtime book. (The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catheryne Valente)
• I managed to read six titles from my list. (A Gate at the Stairs, Lorrie Moore; The Distant Hours, Kate Morton; Losing Nelson, Barry Unsworth; Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons; Foolish Mortals, Jennifer Johnston; PopCo, Scarlett Thomas )
• One title from my list (The Small Hours, Susie Boyt) I didn't really like, so after a few chapters, decided to donate it to the charity shop. It counts as a book off the list, but not as a read title...

So, a good month - one book added to the list, but 7 removed, for a net loss of six.  Pretty good in a month!

Here's the updated list of Books to Read in 2015.  There are now 49 books on the list, with 10 months to go. That's down from 5 books per month left to read to 4.9 books.  Yeah, I know, not down by much!  But it's still very feasible - the main thing being, more steps forward than back, which is the main idea of the exercise!

1. Karin Altenberg, Island of Wings
2. James Anderson, The Affair of the Bloodstained Egg Cosy
3. Gerhand Bakker, The Twin
4. Bill Bryson, One Summer: America 1927
5. Michael Collins, The Resurrectionists
6. Wilkie Collins, The Moonstone (this one would be a re-read)
7. Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles
8. Jim Crace, Harvest
9. Esi Edugyan, Half Blood Blues
10. Jeffrey Eugenides, Middlesex
11. Jim Fergus, One Thousand White Women (Summer 2013)
12. Anne Fine, All Bones and Lies
13. Fannie Flagg, Can't Wait to get to Heaven (Feb 2015, charity shop)
14. Ford Maddox Ford, Parade's End (Nov 2012 - birthday present - bought after the BBC adaptation - but I knew I wouldn't read it straight away as I wanted to let time pass from the adaptation.  Enough time has probably passed now...)
15. E M Forster, Howards End
16. Karen Joy Fowler, We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves (Christmas 2014)
17. Miles Franklin, My Brilliant Career
18. Robert Galbraith, The Cuckoo's Calling
19. Patrick Gale, Rough Music
20. Gabriel Garcia Marquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude (re-read, bought shortly after his death - spring 2014 - as I was reminded how much I enjoyed it)
21. Elizabeth Gaskell, North and South
22. Rumer Godden, Kingfishers Catch Fire
23. Laurie Graham, A Humble Companion
24. Graham Greene, Brighton Rock
25. Nicholas Griffin, The House of Sight and Shadow
26. Jane Haddam, Glass Houses
27. Laurell K Hamilton, Bloody Bones
28. Anjali Joseph, Sarasawati Park
29. Jim Lynch, The Highest Tide
30. W Somerset Maugham, The Magician
31. Azar Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Tehran
32. Kate O'Brien, The Land of Spices
33. Regina O'Melveny, The Book of Madness and Cures
34. Michael Ondaatje, The Cat's Table
35. Anuradha Roy, An Atlas of Impossible Longing (Winter 2013, bought in a cheap shop in Oxford)
36. Kathy Reichs, Spider Bones
37. Carlos Ruiz Zafon, The Watcher in the Shadows (Christmas 2014)
38. Richard Russo, Straight Man
39. Simon Sebag Montefiore, One Night in Winter
40. Muriel Spark, Memento Mori
41. Mark Slouka, The Visible World
42. Betty Smith, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Summer 2013 - a re-read, as I read it when a teen)
43. Magda Szabo, The Door
44. Amy Tan, The Valley of Amazement
45. Rose Tremaine, Merivel
46. Rose Tremaine, Music & Silence
47. Barry Unsworth, The Ruby in her Navel
48. Ayelet Waldman, Love and Treasure (new in December 2014)
49. December, Elizabeth Winthrop

Dinner, 28/2/15: Spicy Cheese & Tomato Bake

This was a case of using a recipe as a jumping off point - I also tweaked this to accomodate all the various leftover bits and pieces of stuff we had hanging about - some leftover mozzarella, tomato sauce and pepperoni from the pizzas the kids made last night, some leftover sunblush tomatoes from the carbonara style pasta from the other night, and some grated goat cheese from a block from something last week (instead of the soft kind in the recipe). Result:  really nice dish, definitely going into our pasta bake rotation.

Dinner at Yauatcha

Dinner out for our anniversary at Yauatcha in Soho - the best dim sum I've ever had. The rest of it was great too, though I did find the table lacked leg room a little...  

Sometimes when I'm dining out in fancy places, I don't photograph my food as it seems tacky, but this was the type of place where you definitely could do that without feeling odd, so of course I did. I didn't take a picture of everything we ate, but here's a good selection.  Rather than go a la carte (which hurts your head - too much choice!), we chose the dim sum menu, and ate:

• Blue swimmer crab salad with peanut and sesame dressing 
• Venison puff
• Poached Peking chicken dumpling (top right) 
• Har gau 
• Pork and prawn shui mai (top left) 
• Seafood dumpling soup (bottom centre) 
• Three style mushroom cheung fun (bottom left) 
• Crispy aromatic duck ¼
• Fried chilli squid with oatmeal and curry leaf (top centre) 
• Chinese vegetable (top centre)
• And then I also ordered a citrus tart for dessert, which was lovely  (bottom right)

Book 17: Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons

This is one of those books which I have been meaning to read for ages - years, even. And honestly, why did I wait? Very amusing, very light touch, and far more than (as has sometimes been asserted) a satire on the pastoral novel of the day. A winner, for sure. 

Dinner, 25/2/15: Carbonara Style Creamy Spaghetti

A quick, easy midweek supper. Yum.

Dinner, 24/2/15: Red Pork Curry with Green Beans

We love this and have cooked it several times before - the main change I've made to the recipe is I only add the palm hearts in right before the end - maybe 2 minutes, just enough to warm through. Otherwise they get mushy.

Dinner, 23/2/15: Courgette and Goat Cheese Frittata

Taking advantage of Olivia being away to cook a meal using two things she really doesn't like - eggs and peppers. Sometimes I make her eat them anyway - especially peppers, which we have in a lot of meals - but it seemed like a good time to cook a meal with both of those things in it!