Making pasta
Tag: cooking
What goes around…
So I’ve reached the point where I’m the one cooking stacks of pancakes for Ben and his friends in the morning post-sleepover. No hangovers, yet, though.
The sad thing though is that we’re down to our last tin of proper maple syrup ?. We did however realize that Aldi sells Canadian Grade A (dark), which should be acceptable until we can get some more of the good stuff.
Toques Junior Christmas apero
Ben’s cooking school held an apero on their last session of the year.
Chasse!
Everything on the plate, save for the spätzle, is homemade: balsamic bacon brussel sprouts, braised cabbage with apples, mulled wine-poached pears, boar fillet, mulled wine gravy. Been cooking most of the afternoon, but da-yum!
Move over, le Motty, there’s a new chasse game in town!
Finally made it!
I’ve finally gotten around to making the chili con queso recipe that I’ve been wanting to make for ages! Verdict? It was yummy! Next time, I need to make the queso a little bit thicker (less milk). I added paprika (for warmth) and a bit of turmeric (for color). My chili sauce worked really well for Bean, because it’s more flavourful and fruity than burn-your-face-off hot.
Everyone needs to know more about Julia Childs
Child was deemed “too tall” for both the Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES) and Women’s Army Corps (WAC) so she took a position at the Office of Strategic Services (OSS). She helped invent a shark repellent that is still in use today.
Child did not have a natural talent for cooking. In fact, she was a self-admitted disaster in the kitchen until she began taking classes at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris.
Child spent her early years working for what would become the Central Intelligence Agency. In 1993, she joined another CIA: the Culinary Institute of America. The group inducted Child into its Hall of Fame that year, making her the first woman to ever receive the honor. She was also awarded the French Legion D’Honneur and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
She credited her long life to red meat and gin. Some great quotes:
- A party without cake is just a meeting.
- The only real stumbling block is fear of failure. In cooking you’ve got to have a what-the-hell attitude.
- If you’re afraid of butter, use cream.
- Maybe the cat has fallen into the stew, or the lettuce has frozen, or the cake has collapsed. Eh bien, tant pis.
- Small helpings, no seconds, no snacking, and a little bit of everything.
- I enjoy cooking with wine, sometimes I even put it in the food…
- With enough butter, anything is good.
- Everything in moderation… including moderation.
- The only time to eat diet food is while you’re waiting for the steak to cook.
- As you get older, you shouldn’t waste time drinking bad wine.
- Cooking well doesn’t mean cooking fancy.
- Always remember: If you’re alone in the kitchen and you drop the lamb, you can always just pick it up. Who’s going to know?
Spice tin
I am the proud owner of my very own, genuine, Indian masala tin.
I’m sure that all of Katy’s aunties will tell me I’m doing it wrong, but mine contains mustard seed, fennel seed, turmeric, ginger, cumin, chili and coriander.
Hard at work in the kitchen
My helpers and I have handmade sausagemeat to then handmake scotch eggs. Very tasty teamwork, and I love the taste of the sausagemeat. I pan roasted fennel seeds, coriander seeds and peppercorns, then added some salt, dijon mustard, nutmeg, onion powder, and a little ground clove. It came out really, really well!
Stocking up the freezer
Since we recently bought a freezer, I’ve been cooking up a storm to fill it up. So far, aside the pizza bases and sausages, it contains carrot & coriander soup, broccoli & stilton soup, pasta sauce and beef chili. Any comments on what I should do next?
All planned out, over and done with!
In the past few weeks, I have been working on the planning of:
– the PST group xmas party
– the main EBI xmas party
– mince pies & mulled wine for 100 people at work
– booking 50 tickets for Stomp
– booking 150 tickets for a cinema screening
– getting 500 mugs printed for work
and a boatload of smaller tasks, none of which are actually my actual day job.
It’s been stressful, to say the least but the good news is that everything is now done and over. The office paella potluck went down a treat. It was held at the Great Chesterford community center and the comments about the food and the venue were uniformly positive (many thanks to the paella chefs!). The day had a rocky start with a trip to Addenbrookes A&E after Bean dropped a chair on his big toe but bounced back once the food started being served. We already had all of the food prepped and packed in the car, but there was a ton of last-minute stuff we needed to deal with. Still, with a few phone calls, everything got sorted out and in the end, we were in and out of Addenbrooked in about an hour and a half. I have to give mad props to the guys who helped clean the place up afterwards, it was a big help!
The EBI xmas party was last night, at La Raza in Cambridge. The comments I got on the night were also very positive, with people saying that it was a better party than in the past couple of years. I can personally vouch that the food was not only feckin’ plentiful, but very very good as well. Given all of my allergies, the fact that I was stuffed at the end of the night was a very positive fact IMO. The jalapeno poppers were great, but those beef and horseradish yorkie puds were pure crack! Plus, you know, 5 drinks for a fiver is a deal you can’t beat :) The only critiques I would give for the night was that the music the DJ put on wasn’t what I would have preferred for a xmas party. Other than that, and the totally unfounded rumours of a rigging of the raffle draw (hehe!), the night was a success in my books.
Becky had a bit of karmic retribution when Bean woke up at 11 and, realizing that we weren’t there, cried for an hour before getting himself back to bed. Becky was a bit frazzled when she called, I think…
So now, I only have one more week of work before I get some leave time to chill out and cook stuff for the holidays. I’ve already started tonight, with a braised beef topside and some chicken stock that I’m going to use to make a hamhock terrine in the near future. Katy and I are trying to finalize the list of all the recipes we want to try out for new years :)
The prezzies are mostly all bought and just need wrapping, so that’s a load off as well.
Go us, for being productive!