Best quick sandwich recipe
One of the great things about winter is that Jalopy becomes a sort of mobile fridge. Most of the door seals have deteriorated to slivers. This is great for keeping sandwiches chilled. Yesterday’s unfinished sandwich can fill a ‘no time for breakfast’ gap if I am running late the next morning. If you drive a ‘normal’ car, you need a letter from your parents to try this trick as the interior of most modern cars are well insulated against the cold. If you drive a Jalopy, this post may be of interest to you. I’d bought a...
read moreLate morning brunch: Cheesy mushrooms on toast with a dash of spice recipe
To cut our carbon footprint we decided to combine the post run and the weekly shop and travel to Newmarket in the same car. This meant that Danny had to face an experience that he refers to with tight lipped horror. Saturday supermarket queues. In fact he hates any sort of queue. Even the queue for the tote to collect his winnings. I now refer to queues as moving lines. This seems to calm him. As we drove into the Tesco car park we couldn’t find a space. I knew that unusually long moving lines were already threading across his mind as he...
read moreCrisp fried or baked cheese recipe
“Even though we’d been vegetarians for years we sometimes had a yearning for bacon.” Teresa was running a vegetarian restaurant at the time. “What did you do?” I imagined Teresa hot footing down to the local town wearing a large brimmed hat and scoring a wad of bacon from a backstreet butcher. “We fried cheese.” Her face softened with the memory. “How on earth do you fry cheese?” “It’s easy. Grab a non stick frying pan. Heat it to a medium temperature and cut your cheese fine....
read moreOven roasted cheese toasties recipe
“August has been terrible, this year. It seems to have rained every day.” My prospective client stared out of the window into the greyish, damp gloom. I’ve only had outside work for the last few weeks. I know the Met Office site better than our redundant garden table, where we used to eat our supper most summer evenings years ago. This morning I rambled through the blog archives. August was cold and wet last year and 2006 had its low points too. When summer weather turns chilly, an indulgent treat can lift the spirits in just...
read moreEggy Bread recipe
“How much do you love me?” I asked. I was standing under the kitchen table as my mother ironed above on an old folded blanket. “I love you lots.” “More than the others?” The iron thumped and swished above. “I love you all the same.” “If you tell me that you love me more, I won’t tell them.” This was a lie and I knew it. I had a plan. If my mother admitted that she was fonder of me than my older brother and sister I’d creep out of the kitchen and run down the garden,...
read moreBoxing day lunch: smoked ham with a fresh parsley sauce recipe
We always buy a ham at Christmas to keep the goose company in the fridge and provide us with endless meals. Starting with ham sandwiches on Christmas day and hot ham with a fresh parsley sauce on Boxing Day. The latter is eaten on trays as we indulge in an afternoon of horse racing on the telly. Danny and my mum sit watching the racing whilst I put on my pinny and provide the maid service end of things. Homemade parsley sauce is a cinch to make. A basic Béchamel with parsley lemon and quite a bit of freshly ground white pepper makes a good...
read moreSimple baked egg recipe
My Mother prefers to eat a proper lunch rather than a big meal in the evening. Always one to watch her figure, she knew the dangers of eating too much late in the day. So in the school holidays we ate a ‘Proper Lunch’. Quite often this was forced down within an hour of getting out of bed. The culinary highlight of the day for me was supper. Everyone prepared their own meal. The fridge was bursting with good things. Perhaps this is why I prefer snacky food to proper meals all these years down the line. A constant, comforting staple...
read moreTomatoes for breakfast
I harvest our tomatoes in the evening, when I water them. They are collected in the fold of my jumper and transferred to a bowl on the kitchen worktop to be admired and eaten. The harvest is just three or four a day at the moment and most mornings the bowl is bare. “Where are the tomatoes?” “I ate them for breakfast. You told me I could eat some.” Danny quite often gets up at four to start work. But tomatoes for breakfast Yuk! If I want to eat our tomatoes I have to hide them in a dark spot in the fridge or my secret...
read moreJam sandwiches
“I wondered if you’d like a jam sandwich? Margaret pushed a tiny bag of dainty sandwiches along the worktop towards me. “They were rejected by a passing monk.” I was intrigued. “He took the paté and cucumber ones. It’s a long drive to Ambelforth so I’m surprised that he didn’t want the others.” She pushed the bag a little further toward me with an encouraging nod. I was vaguely peckish but . . jam sandwiches? To be polite I took a tiny sandwich and sampled it. Perhaps it was the jam...
read moreBrie de Meaux and fresh ripe plums
Danny loves Brie de Meaux and, unfortunately for him, I am becoming addicted too. It’s available in the UK but there is nothing like a slab bought from a French cheese shop and delivered to your door the very next day. It tastes better, fresher and even looks more tempting dressed in the chunky fromagerie paper. Then wrapped in an outer layer of delicate brown paper that has the soft, gentle crackle of a special present, wrapped with care. Supermarkets have forced out most of the small specialist shops in the UK. It’s still OK if...
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Recent Comments
{ I was thinking the same as Magic Cochin but then like you I don't have my phone attached by an umbilical cord wherever I go.... } – Wed 8 :47 pm
{ Good point but I don't tend to take it about with me everywhere 
} – Wed 7 :25 pm
{ Doesn't your mobile phone have an alarm setting? C x } – Wed 6 :32 pm
{ I would put it towards a bbq, it's just a shame you can't purchase some sunshine from b&q } – Wed 12 :04 am- { Hi Lesley The clucking means that she is brrody also plucking her own feathers is a sign too. } – Tue 11 :58 pm
- { Hi Lesley They have to stay in the broody coop 24/7. Could you put in a garden shed or garage? } – Tue 11 :57 pm
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