Yummy food

The first pantomime I ever saw was at St Bede's secondary school in Crosby when I was perhaps seven years old.  Someone, probably the Widow Twanky, being as it was Aladdin, sang 

 "Yum, yum, yum, I love my tum, 

Yum, yum, yum, I do.

Yum, yum,yum, I love my tum

And my tum-tum loves me too!"

Or would be a plump Buttons sang it?
It's odd that I remember those words, but they must have amused me because they mean you love your food and your body loves you. Enjoyable food is good for your body. Your body enjoys it.
Recently, husband and I have decided to have lunch once a week at a local wine bar. The menu includes:

• Smoked salmon and lemon risotto
• Grilled asparagus, poached egg and pesto
• Lamb kofta, tzatziki, warmed pita bread
• House salad, (honey, fig & goats’ cheese)
• BLT

These are all menus that I'd happily make at home. They avoid beef, or cow protein, milk and sugar, though figs can be sweet. Fresh figs are yummy and they'll be in season soon, so I'm encouraging husband to look out for them when he goes shopping.
The other places I get ideas for yummy recipes are the organic vegetable delivery services I use. They not only send you veg and fruit, but also recipe boxes, boxes that hold all the ingredients you need to prepare a meal. For example, last week we did haddock with oregano and olives. Now I know how to do it, I'll repeat it using our own oregano from the garden. More adventurous recipes for us include,

• summer miso and tofu broth (not sure I like tofu)
• lamb madras with homemade flatbreads(I'm not making those again!)
• Persian stuffed Portobellos (a waste of life)
• Thai chicken rice bowl
• Thai green chicken curry (Yummy and coconut is nice. Not sure how I'd make a the Tai green curry paste again though)
• Indian broccoli rice (like Goldilock's porridge, just right)
• broccoli and jasmine fried rice
• butternut squash and chickpea curry
• roast aloo gobi and chickpea salad
• Spanish chickpea stew (needs a spice pot with something unknown)
• aubergine & chickpeas (plenty of tins of chickpeas in the pantry)
• spiced cauliflower and lentils (news is that our hot summer killed off the caulis this year)
• courgette, halloumi and red wine lentils
• Lentils & tomatoes with kale and egg (will do again with our hens' eggs)
• curried broccoli quinoa (again served with eggs)
• asparagus, goat's cheese and lemon risotto 

It is amazing how yummy soft goat's cheese is. Last weekend the newspaper had a salad recipe to use a glut of tomatoes with soft goat's cheese and melons. Yummy, yummy, yummy. I love my tummy.

Christmas lunch out

We went out for Christmas lunch, just husband, self and daughter, the fewest I've been with since ever.  Husband arranged it only last week, at the last minute, after I'd suggested we go and stay in hotel like his brother and family has done for years, perhaps join brother but his brother has been travelling to foreign places this year, like Venice, so perhaps didn't fancy another hotel for Christmas.  Then husband found this lovely local place, run by people who run our nearest wine bar, great food, even if you do silly diets - it's still great food, run by great hosts who deal with you in a friendly and tolerant fashion even if you can't make your mind up and there's a queue behind you.  If I did food photos, I'd show you, but here instead is the menu.

Vendange

The harvest, or vendange, is about to happen. You can see that the grapes have ripened and are nearly ready for harvesting, which will happen towards the second half of the month.

In this photo, you can see the low hanging grapes. They prune them earlier in the year, removing surplus foliage so that the grapes get enough sun, and also the strength of the plant goes down into the lower hanging fruit.

Meals

When I last went on this St Emilion trip, I worried about drinking too much and having a hangover. Friend assured me,

"You won't drink too much, but you may find you eat too much!"

He was right. We tasted wines, but only drank them with food. And there were some super meals. The first two days involved two five course means that included:

• starter/nibbles /soup
• fish course
• meat course
• cheese course
• desert
• coffee & canelles

Canelle are these tiny little rum and vanilla cakes, a speciality of Bordeaux. They served them warm.

Duck was often served. Sometimes we were given duck paté - the wonderful paté de fois gras. At our last meal on Monday lunchtime, our hosts served generous servings of this on tiny squares of toast. I could have dined on those alone, along with the St Emilion wine.

Here's an example menu from Saturday lunch at Chateau La Couspaude:

Foie gras de canard mi cuit entier aux figues gellee au lillet et fantaisie de fruits
***
Pave d'esturgeons au sauternes
***
Supreme de pintadeau au basilic
Pomme sarladaises
****
Salad panachee aux noix
***
Selection de 7 fromages affines et confiture de derises noires
****
Fruits glaces
****
Cafe , canelle

With four meals like that on Friday and Saturday - were we full!

Italy - food

On holiday in Cergallina, we had some lovely meals, simple and delicious. And we didn't have to plan, shop, serve or wash up, let alone cook.

Yum - simple pasta with a tomato sauce one day. Another day we had a sort of ratatouille mainly of peppers fried up with garlic and onions, not bioled, with "zapped" potatoes. The potatios are not cooked; they're "zapped" in the mixer (whatever that means!). But the potatoes add a kind of thickness to the stew of vegetables. Findally Juidth adds aubergines, but they are peeled so you don't notice their purple skins, not salted, just added last. Yum.

Then there's the beef made from last year's cow, named Valeria. She made lovely meals.

See their ideas for food here.

Post curry

Husband did a wonderful curry last night. He found the Madhur Jaffrey book circa 1980, all covered with turmeric stains, and did a rogan ghosh, which he pronounced too hot so he did a cucumber raita as well. It was delicious and he served it with whole meal rice, which I love, so I was very happy and very full.

Christmas food & visitors

We have visitors on Sunday and on Christmas Day too. There are only 12 for lunch on Sunday - us five at home plus husband's brother's family and our son and his family. When the local grandchildren visit after lunch, we'll be a few more to play.

On Christmas Day we are 15. Us five plus visiting Italian in-laws and 5/6 children with their respective partners and offspring.

The menu includes a stuffed bird from Heal Farm and the usual accompaniments. I especially like their Grande Marnier tart. Yum! And I expect there'll be a little champagne.

Cooking efforts

My 19-year-old son pays rent when he's home from university, but hasn't been able to get a job and is feeling poor. He's also bored. So we have negotiated that he should do some of the cooking. This pleases him as he wants to learn to cook, and he gets a reduced rent in exchange. It pleases me as I have a full time occupation and don't want to have to rush home to cook.

Today was the first meal - shepherd's pie and it tasted delicious. Congratulations, son!

When I got in at about 7.30 I found hungry husband prowling about like jungle cat about to pounce while he watched his food s-l-o-w-l-y cooking. Poor old son started preparing at six o'clock because he hasn't done it before and didn't know how long potatoes would take to boil, especially when you don't cut them down first. If husband hadn't been so hungry he would have enjoyed the show.

This goes to show that there's more to preparing a meal than getting the right ingredients, right size of pan or dish and right recipe. You also have to remember the people you intend to feed, and recognise that persons prowling in the kitchen are likely to be hungry and hungry people get cross. And teachers of learner cooks probably have to have something to nibble in the corner.