I have arrived

No Blog entries for a long time because my cooking has become so routine ! I now have a number of recipes that I know work, I don't have the spectacular failures and I no longer need to start preparing at 2 in the afternoon to eat at 6.

This week started with chicken breast stuffed with pesto and wrapped in bacon served with broccoli and salad. Tuesday was cheat day so it was tuna pasta bake with the sauce from a jar and served with salad. Wednesday was going to be grilled trout but when I went into town to buy the trout (at 4:30pm - hows that for calmness !) the fish shop was closed. So I went into the supermarket and bought some mixed fish (salmon, cod and haddock) for a fish pie.

Now the next bit is a first - I didn't follow a recipe for the fish pie but made it up as I went along (apart from the white sauce which BBC Food helped me with). I served it with carrots and salad and the result was really good - my very first meal made up by myself.

So I have decided to share this recipe so that others can enjoy it and have decided to use the same style of the inaccurate, misleading, assuming, ambiguous, complicated recipes I have mostly struggled to follow to date.

Ingredients:
A handful of potatoes
300g of mixed Melanogrammus aeglefinus, Salmonidae and Gadus
A slosh of olive oil
A bag of leeks
A twidge of seasoning
A bottle of milk of the size that used to be delivered to your door years ago
Beurre
Flour

Method:
Wrap the poisson in baking foil and place in the fridge gas mark 5, electric 200 degrees c or fan assisted washing machine 180 degrees and cook until the timer goes ping. The setting for the timer is the number of books in the New Testament minus the number of the shirt Roger Osborne wore when he scored the winning goal for Ipswich in the 1978 FA Cup final

Simultaneously, make the white sauce

Place the leeks into one of those metal things, add water that has been passed by the management and cook for a little while

Sorry - forgot to say that the potatoes should have gone on 5 minutes before you started anything else - whoops - sorry

Now - add the fish into the oven dish, cover with leeks, cover with potato and smother with white sauce

Take the potato and white sauce back out again - my mistake. Put  the white sauce back in again over the leeks and fish then mash the potato and spread on top. Add the grated cheese which wasn't one of the original ingredients

Place back in the fridge and cook until The Consort arrives home from her exercise class - simple !

Spice up your life

"We need a bit more spice" The Consort urged and before I could make some helpful suggestions she went on to say that although the food I was preparing was very nice etc etc it lacked some bite sometimes, and why didn't I attempt a curry.

Hiding my disappointment I agreed that I'd give the curry a go. I stuck to a boring Chicken curry but it did go down very well with The Consort and worth a repeat at some time.

Say cheese :-)

The Consort isn't from these parts so isn't fully aware of the local customs and traditions - such as packaged cheesecake from Tesco for less than a pound. You add butter to make the base and then add milk to make the topping. Make it look good by grating some chocolate on top and hey presto, a quick, easy and cheap second course.

So when we finished the main course and I presented my cheesecake, her mouth dropped in amazement that I was capable of creating such a well presented and tasty dessert. I kept it going for as long as I could but my face gave it away and eventually confessed - but it really does taste very good !

Pretty maids all in a row

So we had some people for dinner and The Consort was very fortunately in charge of the cooking but my role was to prepare the Strawberrys and then dip them in chocolate. The problem was how to store them while they dried. Just the sort of problem I like to solve so a "washing line" was constructed in the kitchen and each strawberry pegged and allowed to drip dry - simple !

Hands off my Leeks

After watching lots of the latest Masterchef series, I now see why presentation of food is so important and any food can taste better than it actually is by being nicely prepared. So when I decided to try a recipe of Frozen Bassa with rice, lemon and garnished with leeks (inevitably), the stylish (!) presentation involved cutting the leeks length-ways and placing alongside the fish to make it look nice. OK - not exactly sophisticated but a start and at least I'd thought about it.

The Consort arrived home from work and while I was busy taking the fish out of the oven, she very kindly started serving up the Leeks. I couldn't help it - before I could stop myself I was shouting out "Hands off my Leeks" and then had to quickly explain that they were the focal point of the presentation and had to be carefully laid onto the plates after the rice and fish had been served.

Think I'm starting to take this all too seriously !

Think I'll stick to flowers

No blogging recently because there has been nothing to report. Just repeating food I've prepared before like the Cauliflower Cheese with carrots, baked potato and salad leaves in the picture above which I served up on Tuesday.

So following a very kind encouraging comment from The Consort's sister and another "prompt", I decided to try my hand at baking today.

I meet with a friend most weeks for tea/coffee (me/him) and we mostly discuss our latest disasters in the world of investment and give each other hot tips about the next big thing we can lose money on. As we left the coffee shop yesterday, he said he would call in at the market to get some flowers for his wife. I was on my bike so buying flowers for The Consort wasn't an option as they would have been decimated by the time I got home. Unfortunately, we'll be meeting with the friends this evening for our monthly "film evening" and there is no doubt at all that he'll mention the flowers to make sure I am embarrassed and left with nothing but excuses as to why his wife got flowers and The Consort didn't get any from me.

So when The Consort left for work this morning and mentioned that maybe I could try some baking (Banana and Apricot Bread) for this evening, I feigned a lack of interest but here was my "get out of jail free" card. When my friend mentioned the flowers he'd bought for his wife, I could respond with a winning riposte of how I'd spent the day preparing the food for the evening. Gotcha !!

So I followed the recipe precisely, carefully measuring everything out, mixing it all up well and cooking for the prescribed 20 minutes at the exact temperature. I let it stand for 2 minutes as instructed and then started slicing it up. The end just collapsed and a load of gooey uncooked mixture oozed out so I put it back in the oven for another 15 minutes and tried again and it was still very runny. I turned the oven up by a further 10 degrees and gave it another 5 minutes and the result can be seen in the picture above. I've got a strong feeling that it will be inedible and The Consort will end up cooking another one when she gets home from work.

Got to go now, need to visit a florist !

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Its been a while since my last post because I've needed time to recover from the cooking trauma that I've been through recently. It had all started so well and I think a false sense of security kicked in about how easy this all was. The praise, the adulation from the mass of people around the world, the easy successes. Surrounded by people who don't want to speak the unpalatable truth about the disaster all around that has been created  - I think the term "giddy with perceived glory" is apt together with "believe your own publicity" and its no surprise that the effect of the so many failures are still being felt by so many.

Anyway, enough about the Thatcher years and back to the cooking trauma I've been through recently.

The Good

The Good was what I think is my best food so far - Sausages in a sticky sauce.

The Bad

"These look good - you could easily cook these for us" enthused The Consort one Sunday Morning as she browsed through the Sunday "Style" supplement. She enthusiastically tore the page out and I have to admit that it looked good - Sprats in a spicy batter. So a few days later when I was strolling through Tesco and saw Sprats for sale I immediately knew what to do for the evening meal.
This was definitely the hardest thing I've cooked so far as it was all so fiddly and I had to cook the Sprats in 3 batches and then try to keep it all hot.
The Consort and her son were both very kind and said that it tasted good but the truth is they were disgusting - I've decided that my cooking was absolutely not to blame and that this particular fish really are only good for catching Mackerel.

The Ugly

The kitchen was an absolute disaster area by the time it was all over and it took lots of Labour to sort it out afterwards - which takes us right back to the Thatcher years.

Melanie Safka

Have you ever played the game where you are with a group of people and everyone has to think of  something that is exclusive to yourself. For example you may say that you have never been to a football game and if everyone else in the room has been to a game then you score a point. Many years ago I read an interview with Melanie Safka who said that she was playing that game and she won by saying that she had never wondered what the time was.

Up until a couple of days I'd never watched a cookery programme on TV but on Wednesday I actually sat down and watched Masterchef and really enjoyed it and have been watching it every night since.

My latest effort (with a huge amount of help - thanks Emma) was Lasagne which was a recipe hand-carried over from South Africa and I particularly liked the subtle touch of leaving the sheets of pasta off the list of ingredients and then slipping in "add sheets of pasta" in the very last instruction. Nice try Jean but fortunately my lovely assistant spotted your skullduggery and we didn't fall for it !

For anyone wondering who Melanie Safka is then click here or to see her singing click here

Where's the tuna ?

After a break from cooking duties (short walking holiday in Germany) it was back to the grindstone and slaving over a hot stove. We have a BBC "101 Fish and Seafood Dishes" recipe book and the Tuna and Pea Pasta had some of my favourite foods - Bacon, Tuna, Tomatoes, Peas, Creme Fraiche, Pasta and Onions.
As usual, I had all the ingredients laid out, measured, prepared and ready to start cooking for when The Consort arrived home.  Everything went as it should and I even had two processes running at the same time completely disproving the theory that men can't multitask.

It all came together as expected and the main meal was served with fresh grated carrot and peppery water cress. We sat down to eat and it tasted really good - I was very proud of my efforts and The Consort was suitably impressed.

After the meal I went into the kitchen and to my horror rapidly leading to great amusement I found that the Tuna and Pea Pasta was actually just Pea Pasta as the full tin of Tuna was still sitting on the work surface.

Guess what ingredient the next meal will have ?

The Consort is revolting

It had to happen - the honeymoon period is over ! After 4 weeks of non-stop appreciation and praise for my efforts the first "helpful suggestions" have been received. It followed my second back to basics meal shown above - a delightful combination of Pasta in tomato and herb sauce with carrots and Leeks (inevitably). My meals can apparently be improved by improving the quantity of vegetables and reducing the amount of pasta/meat. It was also suggested that rather than going to the shops before each meal I could plan in advance and shop for multiple meals. Now while I can take on board the vegetable suggestion, the advance planning idea is clearly ridiculous. It takes all my effort, powers of concentration, blood sweat and tears to pull one meal together but to also plan for several meals in advance is way beyond me.

So the next day it was Vegetable gross out - Cauliflower cheese, leeks (of course) and carrots. The Consort's usual arriving home time came and went and eventually I got a call to say she was delayed at the office and would leave in 5 minutes. Much later she eventually arrived home full of excuses about last minute meetings, unexpected calls, the boss wanting additional work done etc. I tried very hard not to but I couldn't help it - it just slipped out. "You treat this place like a hotel. I work my fingers to the bone slaving over a hot oven and this is the thanks I get. You just take me for granted. I sometimes think my only role is to supply you with food". What fun :-)

Back to basics

When I play golf and it all starts going wrong (like it always does) I try to go back to basics just using my short clubs and playing it simply. Similarly when playing football and having a bad game I stop trying to do any clever stuff and resort to simple passes and basic defending.

Following a couple of disappointing efforts on the culinary front I decided to follow the same principle and go back to basics. So it was breaded Hake from the local Co-op which I sprinkled with Lemon and Black Pepper flavouring and baked in the oven with boiled potatoes and broccoli.

Not very exciting but very easy and low chance of getting it wrong.

Stupid recipe

The Consort has loads of recipe books including some which are hand-written. I found one that had all the ingredients I like - chicken, bacon, lemon, tomatoes and spices. The hand-written instructions all seemed very simple so I was comfortable to give it a go. First problem was that after frying the chicken for 4-5 minutes I was meant to "Tip the chicken and any juices from the pan into a roasting tray" but I had no juices. No problem - I poured in some white wine that was in the fridge. The next instructions were beyond me - "put the frying pan back on the heat and add rosemary  - move round so they get covered in juices". What is meant to get covered in juice ? I've already put the chicken into a roasting tray and poured the non-existent juices into the tray !
At that point I just started improvising and completely ignoring the recipe with the result that I missed the crucial step of putting the bacon over the chicken before putting under the grill. Fortunately The Consort arrived home and recovered the situation and it all tasted pretty good.

Oh Dear !

It seemed like a good idea at the time - a simple recipe from the Internet to cook Pork Chops in Ginger Beer. So off I went to the local Co-op to buy the chops and an onion. Trouble is the recipe was too simple so when it said to "Brown the chop in a frying pan" I thought it meant to cook the chop so left it in for 15m until cooked through. Only found out later it meant to leave it in for a few seconds to just brown the surface :-(.
Then I improvised with a few extra ingredients including the obligatory leeks and left it all to cook for about 40 mins.

The recipe said to then remove all the ingredients and add cornflour to the remaining juice to make it into a sauce. How much cornflour and how does it magically turn into a sauce ? Fortunately The Consort was home by now and advised on what to do next and very helpfully pointed out what "Brown the chop in a frying pan" actually means,

Served it up and the taste was really impressive unlike the potatoes, carrots and leeks which were a bit on the hard side and the chop which was rather tough. So The Consort took the potatoes away to microwave to soften them up and we chewed and crunched our way through the meal. Hey ho - next time !

Don't forget the veg

"If you want a quick and easy recipe for tonight then let me know" said The Consort as she recognised that all this creativity is taking its toll on me. "Just take some frozen fish, cover with tin of tomatoes, sprinkle on some mixed herbs and bake for about 30m. Add cheese and breadcrumbs just before serving then bake for another 5m and that's it !" Never one to shirk an easy way out I decided that would be the meal for the evening and all went according to plan. Meal was assembled and into oven and I retired to watch the final few minutes of "Pointless" followed by "Eggheads" on BBC2.

The Consort arrived home just as the Cheese and Breadcrumbs were being applied and asked what we were having with it. In my euphoria of having an easy night of cooking I hadn't even considered any vegetables etc so last minute panic to quickly do some leeks and toast some Pitta bread.

Second time lucky

Better planning this time and put the frozen pastry out to defrost early morning. Then got on my bike and went to Tesco to buy chicken breast  for my Chicken and Leek pie and cooking apples for Apple Pie.
I need total concentration at the moment so decided to have everything completed before The Consort arrived home from work so started at 4pm. It all went pretty well apart from the sauce not thickening very well but my timing is not good and it was all ready to serve up far too early. So had to keep everything hot until she arrived home at 5:30pm.

I've had a complaint from one of our Colonies that my presentation needs to be improved but I haven't taken this criticism to heart. However, I have decided to take moderate revenge by publishing an incriminating picture of an act of vandalism that would otherwise have remained unpublished !

The best laid plans

My plan was to use the 2 bits of chicken that The Consort told me was in the freezer so I looked up a recipe that used chicken and leeks and found just what I wanted. Went to the local shop to buy some pastry and a couple of additional bits of chicken but although they had frozen pastry, no chicken. No problem, I'll half what the recipe says and made a start. First problem was that the pastry was solid and I had no idea if it can be microwave defrosted. Second problem was that I assumed that the chicken was going to be breast pieces but turned out to be pre-prepared BBQ chicken and no good for the pie I wanted to make. So I abandoned the original plan, baked the BBQ chicken in the oven with leeks and potatoes and added a bit of salad. The Chicken and Leek pie would have to wait until next time.

Which vegetable needs a plumber?

     
The trouble with a lot of recipes is that they assume knowledge - that I haven't got. I wanted to cook some leeks so looked up a recipe (click here - I chose "Roasted"). It just says "add leeks". To most people it's probably obvious but not to me...

Do I wash them ?
Do I peel a layer off ?
Do I slice them and if so, length-ways or across ?
How much 'leaf' do I cut off the top ?
Do I cut any off the bottom ?

I chose Yes, Yes, Yes(across), probably to much and Yes.

Anyway, the leeks were pretty good and showed that I'd made an effort given that the rest of the meal was some salad I found in the fridge and pasta bake using sauce from a bottle.

The really good news is the The Consort took pity on me and cooked this evening - relief all round.

Where's the salt !

It seems to me that the hardest part of cooking is knowing where things are, or even if they exist ! The recipe yesterday called for a pinch of salt but I couldn't find the salt anywhere so eventually settled for a twist of Himalayan Rock Salt. Then I needed some almonds so I looked in all 4 possible places but couldn't see them. So here's the problem:
a/ do we actually have any almonds
b/ if we do, have a missed seeing them in the 4 possible places
c/ is there place number 5 that I haven't thought of
So eventually I gave up and used pine nuts which seemed to work out OK. When The Consort arrived home she was able to confirm that we didn't have any almonds and if we did they would have been in place 6 !

The meal of Lemon Fish Fingers  (see picture above)seemed to be a success but looked nothing like the picture in the original recipe (click here to see it)

Second course was baked apple that I haven't eaten for years (an advantage of doing the cooking is that you eat the food you really like - no more butternut squash :-). The recipe said that the apple needed to be cored but the only corer I have slices the apples too but that actually seemed to work out quite well.

So a first day success, its all downhill from here........

The start of something new

So I've finally left my job and tomorrow is the start of my culinary career. Have decided on my first creation but have already hit the first problem as the recipe calls for an unwaxed lemon. Where can I buy a hairy lemon?

Confession

The Consort has asked me to point out that microwaving a prawn red thai curry that she had cooked a few days before and put into the fridge does not constitute my "first success".

I apologise unreservedly for any misunderstanding that my post yesterday may have inadvertently caused.

Tomorrow could be my last day at work so then reality really kicks in.

First success !

The Consort went straight from work to her work-out so I decided to go in at the deep end and attempt my first creation. Thai prawn red curry looked easy enough so in for a penny......

....and here it is:

Nothing to this cooking lark :-)

Another day closer

No further news today about my imminent departure - but one thing for sure is that its a day closer. The Consort rang during the afternoon to see if she still had to cook this evening and I think she was disappointed when the answer was yes.
So instead of cooking news I'll pass on my latest news on investments which in my very humble opinion is far more interesting than cooking will ever be......

Bought Vodafone at £1.59 last week and today closed at £1.71
Holding Wessex Exploration - still languishing at 4.5p but I'm hoping that their next well exploration is positive
Holding BT - topped £2.50 last week - may sell some soon to reduce my exposure

Wonder what tomorrow will bring.......

Welcome

Hi and welcome to my Blog !

"How would you feel if I left my job and took early retirement ?" asked 57 year old male stressed out from 41 years working for the same company. "OK with me, on the condition you cook on the days that I'm working" came the unexpected response from The Consort. "And why don't you write a blog about it?"

So here I am on the verge of having to start cooking for the first time in my life (apart from the odd emergency meal).

I'm still a few days from starting my new career but this blog will capture the successes, failures, mundane and special - hope you enjoy it !

And the title of my blog ? keep coming back and answer will be revealed !