What's everyone eating this week?

[Joanbunting Profile]

Our lunch guests left about half and hour ago - ie 5.00pm our tine!

No worries though because we had an amazing 4 hours in the garden, under the shade and in the lovely just right warmth. Foie gras and pain d'epice with HM fig or onion confit to start.

Main was a spring navarin of lamb with 5 different vegetables - but as they are all in the one pot no hassle to serve.

4 sorts of cheese cow, sheep and goat

Cherry and almond clafoutis with creme anglaise.

Last night we watched La la Land on dvd while eating osso bucco with courgette flower fritters and creamy polents. We had tarte au citron afterwards

[jeral Profile]

Sounds lovely Joanbunting, especially as the weather was on your side too which makes everything more a pleasure even if some hard work involved.

Sakkarin, I imagine the peas were meant to be cold as they don't stay hot for longer than a minute anyway. Is the meat jelly like clear (prized) aspic, and maybe keep a separate stash of dripping and jelly for fried bread? I seem to recall that carrots were used as all sorts of subs during UK war rationing and I think similar scarcity prevailed under Ceausescu's management for two decades, so the photo is probably a feast for the time.

Nothing exciting here but all nice. I baked a gilthead bream (a Greek lemony style) plus olive oil and rosemary mash, and broc florets. I used up some shell pasta with mussels in a mustardy cream sauce with new pots. decidedly preboiled to "scuffed" stage ho hum then fried, plus baby plum toms. Fish finger sandwich so far today... Fancy something samosa-ish tonight. It's the cold peas what's got me. Mmm cold peas.

[Gillthepainter Profile Website]

On my way over Joan .................................... just kidding.

I'm really impressed with tarte au citron as a pudding. It's a fantastically good end to a meal.

No idea what we're having.
Food's a bit dull at the moment, although we are going to have chips at the weekend with something. The airfryer will be used again.
Jeez that was a good purchase.

[Gillthepainter Profile Website]

I agree Jeral.
Cold peas in things are lovely.

[Lusciouslush Profile]

Cold peas reminds me of too many injuries..........! Okay they were frozen, but you know what I mean!

Pork stroganoooof here last night - enough to feed a small army! so lunch today as well.... oomph! Tonight will be brill & samphire - also bought some large juicy prawns from the fishmongers this morning so that will be a Thai curry at some point over the w/end.

Why no tomatoes for Tony Grilly? I've only recently found out that they're the culprit for my acid reflux - raw that is - cooked don't seem to affect me ( I think) - I've always loved salsas etc. so I'm missing them right now apart from the odd temptation - it seems the sweeter they are the worse the reflux

[WhitefieldFoodie Profile]

After quite a sobering start to our week, me amongst thousands of others decided to show how stubborn we all are and spent as much time in Manchester City centre as possible. This has meant eating out lots with most places profit going to the charity drive. This weekend however I have a curry night, again all profits going to the 22 victims families.

So I am currently slaving away over a big chicken saag curry and a Dal. House is smelling lovely!

Tomorrow we are visiting Ashton de la Zouch in Derbyshire to see friends and visit the food festival

[Joanbunting Profile]

Good for you WFF. Hope the curry night goes well.

We had lunch out yesterday. Highlights were Sandre (zander)in a crayfish bisque and a rum baba maison - still warm from the oven served with extra rum and chantilly cream.

Today we had a melon, mozarella and jambon cru salad with a very minty dressing - first melon of the seaon and very good it was.

We have been pigging out on cherries, the stoner has been in overdrive and I have made jam, bottled some and am going to pickle some tomorrow - I do those whole and with stalks.

Tonight two thick slices of roast ham from the butcher this morning with broad beans, garden spuds and parsley sauce. I have just taken an apricot and almond tart out of the oven for pudding, if M doesn't get his hands on it first.

I have a beef pave marinading in the fridge for tomorrow, I'll do it on the bbq and do some parcels of lyonnaise potatoes at the same time. Courgette spaghetti would be quite good with that I think.

We've also got some lovely cheeses to use but better have some fruit as well !

[strictlysalsaclare Profile]

WFF - I hope you raise loads of money at your curry night

Joanbunting - Your apricot and almond tart sounds divine, I would also devour it, like M . Unfortunately Mr Strictly does not like apricots very much.

Tonight I have combined 2 classics - chicken caesar salad (minus the lettuce) and risotto primavera with great results. It was almost like those two dishes had an affair and our meal was the resultant lovechild! I seem to have a habit of doing this ! I made the risotto with home-made chicken stock too. I incorporated the crouton element by making a slightly fancier version of garlic bread. I added worcester sauce and parmesan to the garlic butter. Pudding was Spicy Apple Bars (a Farmhouse Kitchen recipe) with yougurt. It's basically an upside down apple crumble and was really delicious. Well worth trying again with different fruit.


Tomorrow I will do a pizza bianco with a posh potato, egg and chorizo salad for lunch. We'll probably have oven baked mackerel for dinner.

[Renée Profile]

WF, I hope that you raise plenty of money with your curry night. I was in the centre of Manchester yesterday with Charlotte, my granddaughter. We walked through St. Annes Square where people had placed lots of bouquets. The square was crowded, but there was an overwhelming feeling of closeness and warmth from the people.

We had lunch at Cote Brasserie, which was excellent. We had tartine of smoked salmon with dill, capers and crème fraîche dressing for starters, roast seabass with basil potato purée and sauce vierge for the main course and then Charlotte had crème caramel and I had ice cream. One of the ingredients for the crème caramel had been specially shipped over from France.

[WhitefieldFoodie Profile]

Mmmm, everyone's food is sounding delicious!

We were treated to a BBQ on Sunday evening by friends. However, I ended up doing most of it as my mate is useless as a cook

Also, the curry night on Sat raised £167.75. Not a mammoth amount, but at late notice we only had 12 people attend. I dropped our contribution into one of the local tattoo parlours this morning, one of the ones who have got direct links with the charity for their "worker bee" tattoos. Totalling over £6,000,000 now. So proud of my adopted home city!

[Renée Profile]

Well, of course you didn't want a rubbish meal, WF!

What a shame only 12 people attended your curry evening, but the money received was a good contribution to the charity and the total amount raised by them is fantastic!

What lovely food you're all eating. I do enjoy reading through all the posts.

I made Shakshuka yesterday and have enough for two days, so no cooking today.

[Amyw Profile]

Yesterday I had two very small lamb steaks with a tomato,ginger and basil dressing, courtesy of Nigel Slater. While I'm not keen watching him on the telly , I find his recipes very tasty and this was no exception . Just a very big salad with it, plus strawberries and clotted cream.
Today, I cooked a chicken traybake. Chicken thighs, fennel,fennel seeds, a good dollop of Dijon mustard, plus olive oil and the juice and fruit of an orange and lemon. I love one pit dishes and this was minimal effort. The potatoes were par boiled new potatoes, mixed with those roasted peppers you get in jars and a little bit of the oil in there, with some greenery.

[Renée Profile]

What a lovely meal, Amy. The all-in-one chicken dish, I will make very soon. I've never used fennel with chicken, but I suppose that tarragon which I often use has a similar flavour.

[Stokey Sue Profile]

Renee, I make a chicken tagine with fennel, preserved lemon and green olives

[Renée Profile]

I would enjoy that, Sue! Do you make your own preserved lemons?

[Stokey Sue Profile]

I would enjoy that, Sue! Do you make your own preserved lemons?

No, I buy them
They aren't that expensive, they keep better, but mainly because the best (Belazu) are made with the small, aromatic, Beldi lemons that I can't buy in the UK, and IMHO they make a real difference

They keep quite well in the fridge if you float a little oil on the surface, stops green fur coat syndrome

Having said all of which at the moment I have a big jar of Egyptian lemons, not Beldi, but I couldn't make them at the price I paid

[Joanbunting Profile]

I get the little preserved lemons in the North African section of the market Sue , they are lovely.
The beef I cooked on Sunday lasted us for two further meals, even though it was, according to our butcher just for the two of us for one meal!!

On Monday I just made courgette spaghetti with multicoloured cherry toms, pitou pinenuts and parmesan and serve the rare beef on top. I used the rest mixed with multigrains, bulgar, spelt and millet with softened onion, extra herbs and used the mixture to stuff red peppers which i topped with cheese and panko crumbs and served the lot with a sun-dried tomato sauce. We had pain perdu with strawberries afterwards.

I've got calves liver tonight and the good old spiraliser is coming out again to do spiced sweet potato strings to go with it. Local faiselle cheese (drained fromage blanc ) with raspberries afterwards.

[Renée Profile]

Thanks, Sue. I've seen the Belazu preserved lemons in Sainsbury's and Waitrose, so will pick some up.

You are lucky Joan, having a North African section in your local market! What a lovely meal you had on Monday.

The Shakshuka that I made lasted three days. On the second day, I gently fried chorizo to remove most of the oil and then I added them to the rest of the Shakshuka and I added green flat beans and courgette. I did plan to freeze the rest down, but I didn't feel well today, so had the rest with the vegetables. I definitely need a change tomorrow!

[jeral Profile]

...[clip]... I gently fried chorizo to remove most of the oil ...[clip]...

If you don't want the oil that comes out (yells of sacrilege I hear), sliced chorizo takes 30 secs (or less) in the microwave, on kitchen paper on a plate (or without paper if wanting the oil).

Hope you feel better soon.

[Renée Profile]

Thanks for the tip about microwaving the sliced chorizo. Well, I did keep about half of the oil!