And finally, everything has been used up!

I have sliced the last of the oranges and put them into a sugar syrup with vinegar, peppercorns, mace, cloves, cardamom pods and cinnamon sticks, simmered it until they are cooked and soft,and when cool I will bottle them to have with cold meats such as ham or pork.

There was a box of mushrooms right at the back of the fridge,so I have made some soup, in this weather it's nice to have some ready to use.

Food left from christmas time.

I have all sorts of stuff lurking ,needing to have something done with them.

Parsnips, carrots, sweet potato have been made into a mash,with some butter to enrich it. Made two dishes. 

Then the tomatoes were completely tasteless,so I stewed them up with lots of garlic and onion,plus rosemary and a huge bay leaf,and some almost gone over fresh  basil.i blitzed the basil with  the tomato, which was flabby and weak tasting,so I added some tomato purée which gave it some  more body then sieved the lot .i have frozen the sauce,and used the residue to cook a guinea fowl Breast .  Then I roasted some garlic which was a bit soft, and blitzed that with some cream,and have frozen that. It will come in useful later on.

Finally I made some more lemon curd ice cream with the leftover Double cream,and Greek Yoghurt, it has made a kilo! That will come in useful at any time. 

In all, a good morning's work !

And I cracked and shelled all the walnuts and hazlenuts ,have frozen the walnuts,as they tend to go rancid easily,and have grilled the hazlenuts,and of course, left then too long under the grill so they are somewhat bronzed.... 

The crab ...soufflés

Only three, but they look OK.  

Quite the most difficult thing I have attempted one handed

I th ink the crab shell and total  mess says it all!    Happy New Year  everyone.

Happy New Year to all my supporters!

Sorry I haven't posted anything recently, things got a bit out of hand....

The best thing I have made over CHRISTMAS was an icecream, 

Equal parts of whipped  double cream, Greek yoghurt and home made lemon curd, into which I folded grilled  and thinly cut slices of pineapple and the juice of four passion fruits. Frozen in a bowl,it fed 14 of us on Boxing night.

I also made a venison casserole, some seafood pancakes ,and an Apple and amaretti Tart ,with home made mincemeat underneath the apple slices,which were dusted with cinnamon and sugar.

Wonderful traditional Christmas dinner of Turkey and all the trimmings! Sprouts with chestnuts, carrot and parsnip pureé ,spiced red cabbage, and roast potatoes , delicious,and huge thanks to my daughter in law for. Cooking the meal.

May 2015 be a happy and fruitful one for us all.  I have 2 great new cook books,and will enjoy cooking some of the recipes

Look at what I have made!

Lovely Cranberry Stollen. 

Recipe from a Sainsburys Magazine pull out on Baking from YEARS ago. 

Actually, I think that the Stollen one can buy from LIDL is just as good as this was ! Rather heavy, and considering the time,effort and ingredients, it was not really worth making. Such a shame. I'm really disappointed .

Can't wait to try it.

Why do I want to eat salad on the coldest day of this year?

Because I have masses of vegetables ! 

So here's what I have done.

Chopped half a leek as finely as possible,and a handful of Brussels Sprouts...I  am always reading about them now,and they seem to be the vegetable of the month! Then two carorots,and a small green chilli. All the vegetables were incredibly difficult to cut finely, but with perseverance, they seem OK.

 To this I have added a dressing made with a teaspoon of grainy mustard, some runny honey,salt and a little olive oil,then perked up with some fresh lime  juice. Finally some basil leaves on the top,chopped as fine as I could cut them.

It's now marinating,and I shall have some for lunch.

I also made a soup from a red onion, half a sweet potato, half a red pepper and a small butternut squash. Simmered with some chicken stock cubes until soft,and then blitzed  with my hand blender. 

This tasted a bit bland, so as there was some lime juice left from the salad, I put that in as well.