28 August 2011

The husband set of for Australia yesterday evening.  He had a cold and really was feeling miserable plus his eye was sore and he wasn’t feeling great.

So here I am with a list of things that I should have done when he was here but somehow I never did. I think this includes spending a little more time in bed in the morning and catching up on my reading!

I have started with the fridge and getting rid of all those bottles and jars that I know we will never use. 

When we lived up north I used to clean out the fridge on a Sunday morning  and we would have what the children used to call ‘fridge soup’.  All the weeks left-overs would go into a pot, a few unused boiled potatoes, the end of the cabbage, those end bits of meat finely diced and onions augmented with perhaps  a tin of baked beans or corn. Just add chicken stock and there is meal fit for a special family.

If there was enough meat left over then it would be turned into fritters, as special treat with tomato sauce.  Add some grated potato for extra ‘crispy’.  So really you can fritter anything but you have to make the right batter.

I have been making yogurt for the constitution and as the recipe  makes too much for one, and as the husband wouldn’t be seen dead eating it, I have to find ways to use it. So this morning I made an apple, yogurt and olive oil cake which has been in one of the files I found when I used to do the recipes for tele text, a real blast from the past. The step daughter had just turned up and there is something so luxurious about eating warm cake, drinking good coffee while sitting in the sun.  Oh bliss.

Now that the husband is not here I can eat what I want to and eat healthily. The garden has wonderful little leeks and the spinach is great and with a handful of little last tomatoes from the glass house makes dinner look rosy. I might even throw in the last of the frozen runner beans which have turned out to be positively delicious.

Meringues and run and raisin ice cream are on the cards for tomorrow. A lot of dill in the glass house and the mint and parsley that is just romping away. So that means Green Goddess mayo as well. My friend, Phillipa, seems to get hers really green and I will endeavour to do the same in the morning.

The weather is wonderful at the moment even the frosts are gone for the meantime at least. Planting is happening as it feels right but one can be lulled into a false sense of security. But two grafted tomato plants are in the new places in the green house and a new courgette. I hope they grow and produce earlier and give me a little more variety to the diet.

Fritter batter

1 cup of white flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 egg

1 cup milk

1 teaspoon chicken stock powder

Salt and pepper to taste

Mix all the ingredients together until you have a thick coating batter.  You may need a little more milk.

Fold in any finely chopped or grated mix that you might fancy.  Salmon and spring onion. Carrot, onion and cabbage.  Corn and bacon. If you have it you can fritter it.

Apple, yogurt and olive oil cake

Beat 3 eggs, 2/3 cup of yogurt,1 cup of brown sugar and ½ cup olive oil until they are thick and creamy. Fold in two cups of cooked apple.

Sift 2 cups of white flour, 1 teaspoon baking soda and 2 teaspoons of cinnamon.

Fold these two mixtures together and tip into a cake tin and bake 45 minutes at 150c.