Sorry!

Hello and sorry!  I have not been here anywhere near as I much as I should have been but I have not been well (on top of the usual not well) and I have had no brain power to cook never mind write about it!   I will be back soon and I have treats up my sleeve for you later on today (whoo) and meanwhile I have been playing with PicMonkey and made a thing so I thought I would share it.

Want to download it?  Click here

Innocent on Pinterest. Amazing Resource.

and I thought I'd share it with you.  I am hooked on Pinterest and I am also a massive fan of Innocent.  I love their juice and smoothies, their cookery books, their amazing quirky-ness and their do gooddings.  I just love them.  I have innocent socks that they sent me and I love them too.  Enough gushing.... to the point.  Innocent have a seasonal produce board on Pinterest and I am going to share it with you.  Feel fee to follow me while you're at it if you fancy.  I pin a load of shit, but I love it!

Innocent on Pinterest

Produce Box Four

It's Monday so it's produce box day!  Whoo!  I made a special request for extra carrots this week for Brian's cake and it's all here and it looks lovely!

This weeks box contains:

2 portabello mushrooms,
a bunch of flat parsley,
3 onions (one red, two white),
a broccoli head,
cherry tomaties,
3 nectarines,
2 bananas,
5 apples,
3 oranges,
2 pears,
a leek,
a courgette,
half a savoy cabbage,
a yellow pepper,
a red chilli,
a swede,
sugar snap peas,
dirty fat carrots,
clean carrots for cake, and,
Edwards potatoes.

another marvellous haul I think

This weeks hot spot, what am I doing with these things are:

the swede, and,
the cabbage.

This chap is the biggest mystery...what do I do with him, answers on a postcard please!

Wish me luck!

Cupboard Soup

I don't know if it's the way I was brought up, or the fact I'm from a farming family, or if it's just a thing that happens to some people but I bloody love soup.  There is something so comforting about it and it can be an amazingly quick thing to make happen - yet it's still so rewarding!  I know opening a carton, a tin or a packet is for sure quicker but it's nowhere near as good, as healthy or as filling.  

This soup is based on a Hugh recipe, but I have put my own spin on it to use up what I had that needed using.  I intend to make many many variations of this in the future so I shall keep you updated on what works and what isn't so amazing....

This soup is cannellini beans, pearl barley, carrot, peas, chicken and chicken stock and it could not be simpler to make.

For two people as a main lunch course, or four as a side.

400g tin of cannellini beans,

50g pearl barley,

one large carrot,

chicken stock,

100g peas

a handful of kale (hard stalks cut out), and,

a few bits of left over roast chicken.

Bring the stock (around a pint) to the boil and add the barley.  Leave this to simmer till the barley is softened - this took about 20 minutes.  In this time cut up your carrot, roughly shred your kale, chop up your chicken and drain your beans.  Then have a sit down and relax (or get the rest of the lunch ready!).  Add the carrot, beans and peas to the barley and stock - let this to simmer again for 5 or so minutes till the carrot is softened and the beans are hot.  Add the kale and the chicken, let them warm and wilt.  Season liberally with pepper and a little salt and serve immediately.  

Brian enjoyed this so much that he didn't believe that it had kale in it (he's a kale hater) so I will for sure be using kale up in this way in the future.  It was very tasty and there is enough left over for my lunch another day too.  Excellent!  I think this would be a lovely thing to serve at a lunch this time of year (it's snowing here in Monifieth today, excellent, thanks weather man!), it's hearty, quick and it looks so fresh!  We ate far to many black olive crackers with this today and the salty taste of them went with the beans beautifully so crackers are highly recommended (the ones we are a bit addicted to are from Marks and Spencer's - thanks Mum!) no butter or cheese needed... but I wouldn't say no  if you offered.  

Seasonal Specials - February

February.  How?  Where did January go?  What happened? I think I have spent the whole of January going from appointment to appointment, doctor to doctor and meeting to meeting and I want it to stop!
So February is here and we need to think about what food is going on for February.  There are three special things happening this month, Brian's birthday is this coming week, we have Saint Valentines day to suffer through and at the end of the month we are going on a tiny holiday to the hotel we got married in to celebrate our first wedding anniversary - so for the last weekend of the month I don't need to think about food at all as the amazing team at Rufflets will be dealing with it for me, I shall be taking close notes, lots of photos and asking questions for sure!

But on to what to look out for this month.... to be honest not much has changed since January.  This is what I picked out for January, but of course the times, they are a-changin' - pears are out, apples are still safe in store over the winter so long as you stick to the right ones you can till have delicious fruits!

My beloved Hugh Fearnly-Whittingstall (via the method of The River Cottage Year, I don't have him living in my garage, sadly) suggests rice pudding for February, this has been a highlight of my January so I'm not letting go of it any time soon!  He also suggests Spaghetti Cheese Soufflé, which just for the madness of it I want to make it!  I will of course share the results... and there there are pies, stews, soups, casseroles and such.

 I dub this month the
month of comfort food and getting fatter to stand the horrid weather.  Fact.

Burns Day Food Ideas

Em... better late than never?  I half wrote this and it got lost in my brain for a while and I just don't want to waste it... So!  Burns day food ideas.  I'm going to keep this simple, things to do with haggis and how to make shortbread.


Haggis is still on offer in the shops up here in Scotland so it's still fair game to eat far too much of it in my book!  Haggis is a funny beast that lots of folk don't like because they've only ever eaten it with horrid mash and wet turnip, and then there are the folk who just don't like the idea of it.  I am not one of them - I love the stuff.

Shortbread is not hard to make, I promise.  It doesn't have to be hard anyway.  This is one of those things that my Gran Betty can just make happen like magic and my Mum has he same skill.  Maybe one day I'll get there, but I promise it's not hard!  I also think this is the only recipie that I have committed to momory in ounces as it's so easy to remember!

Ingredients:

2oz (55g)  room temperature butter
4oz (125g) butter
6oz (180g) plain flour

And the rest is pretty easy too!

Preheat the oven to 190 deg C and beat the butter and sugar toegther till smooth.  Make sure it's really smooth, no short cuts here!  Stir in the flour little by little and you will end up with a smooth paste. Roll out on a floured board till it's about 1cm thick.  Now shape it however you want to!  Cut it into fingers, cut it into shapes with a cutter, keep it whole in a round and press it with a shortbread brand... use your imagination!  Bake it in the oven for 15 to 20 minutes (if you do a round it will need more time).  When it is baked and golden brown remove from the oven, place on a cooking rack and dust with castor sugar immediately.  Leave till it's cook and enjoy.  Or share.  But mainly enjoy.

And there we are, better late than never!  Yeah?  I promise the next Celebration will be up in time for planning (as I'm away to write it very soon indeed!).

Menu Planning and Produce Box Three

Menu planning has become on of my Monday tasks and I am really starting to enjoy it!  I wait for my Produce box to come and then I make a list of all of the things I have been sent - then I sit down with my folder, with my books and with coloured paper and pens... and get cracking!  

This is my though process for this week... starting with this weeks Produce Box contents.

a small-ish bag of kale,

a head of broccoli, 

400g mange tout,

a box of grapes,

2 bananas,

a massive courgette,

a parsnip,

3 pears,

yellow bell pepper,

2 fat, dirty, winter carrots,

a sweet potato,

3 round fat tomatoes,

a leek,

a red onion,

a white onion,

3 massive tatties,

3 oranges,

2 apples, and,

2 nectarines. 

So now I have my list I work out what I will do with what.  This isn't a science, but the way that is working for me is to pick out the things that I'm not quite sure what I'm doing with and purpose them first then I can work with the rest.  The fruit I do not worry about as I eat it for breakfast and Brian eats it for lunch, and any left over will go in smoothies and in custard for pudding!  I also make a list of what I have left over from last week, what's in the fridge and what I have procured from the Mother and the Mother in Law (I got this and it was buy one free, would you use one? - the answer is almost always yes!).  

The existing, use it up list looked like this:

a white onion,

two lemons,

two small courgettes,

a head of celery,

a leek,

half a cucumber,

new potatoes, and

sugar snap peas.

These become the priorities to use before they are past their best.  

From the produce box list of mystery I picked out:

a small-ish bag of kale,

a massive courgette,

a parsnip,

a sweet potato,

a leek, and,

3 massive tatties. 

Now I think about what we are doing in the evenings each day of the week, and this week looks like this:

Monday - 

Tuesday - 

Wednesday - Silly busy day.  Needs to be an easy meal. 

Thursday - to the in laws for dinner.

Friday - 

Saturday - Lunch - 

Saturday - Dinner - Geekfest night.  No dinner needed as take out is happening at us! Whooo!

Sunday - Lunch - 

Sunday - Dinner - 

So now we finally look at meals!  I don't really plan lunches during the week but I do make sure that there is pleasant enough and planned out lunch at the weekend.  Brian almost always has a flat bread with meat, salad, cream cheese and some form of spicy condiment for the main element of his lunch so he's easily pleased.  I live on eggs, left overs, meat, soup and cheese.  Especially cheese.  

Please note that I was going into the stationary I use to plan all of this madness out, but I will do that separately as this post is turning into quite a thing!  

Ok!  Meal ideas.  I steel my self with a cuppa and grab my books that I refer to most (currently Hugh Fearnly-Whittingstalls River Cottage Veg and the Innocent Hungry?  Book) and we get cracking.  

Hit one - kale.  I am not a big fan of kale but it is excellent in soup, so soup it is.  My plan for this bag of kale is cannellini bean, barley and kale soup (recipe coming soon!) - so that's Saturday lunch sorted.  

Hit two - courgette.  I have been keen to make courgette fritters for a wee while but I'm not sure how I was going to fit them in to a menu that doesn't involve a roast chicken where I can serve them with left overs and new potatoes.  So I shall save that idea and for now the courgettes will go in a pasta bake.  This use of courgette is a good replacement for pasta (cut down the amount of pasta you use) to keep the calorie count lower.  

Hit three - sweet potato.  After last weeks soup incident I am not using this is soup... so what am I going to do with it?  It's getting roasted and we are eating it for Sunday lunch with... er... something.

Hit four - leeks. I have two of these now as I did't use last weeks one (bad Karen!) but I will use this up in my chicken parcels as they go so soft, so sweet and just yummy.  

So now we can fill in the week plan:

Monday - Roast gammon, new potatoes, and, sugar snap peas.

Tuesday - Baked risotto with left over gammon, mange tout, celery, onion, carrot and anything else I fancy!

Wednesday - Pasta bake, left over gammon, peppers, onions, home made tomato sauce. 

Thursday - to the in laws for dinner.

Friday - Mince and tatties, carrots, peas, broccoli.

Saturday - Lunch - Cannellini bean, barley and kale soup and bread. 

Saturday - Dinner - Geekfest night.  No dinner needed as take out is happening at us! Whooo!

Sunday - Lunch - Haggis toasties with cheese, onion and tomato.  

Sunday - Dinner - Chicken Parcels with roasted sweet potato, roasted white potato and mange tout.

And that's us done!  I know it looks complex but I can do this in about twenty minutes now and I actually enjoy doing it.  I do love a bit of a read and a plan.  So there we go... all planned out!  I'm not saying it always works which is why there is one more meal to plan... the emergency back up! This is almost always macaroni cheese, as we both love it, it's easy to make and it can be made in advance - so if I'm having a bad day I can make it early, if we get in later then it can be thrown together easily.  Done!  

I promise.