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I am luckily in the summer veg department. Both my dad and J's dad are keen gardeners who have allotments. Fresh organic veg is plentiful and given free of charge to me all summer long. I love it. The tomatoes are to die for, they taste like nothing you can buy from the shops. Beautiful deep shades of red with velvety skins, i eat them like i would an apple. J's dad also gives me all the slightly squashed and odd shaped ones which I turn into soup and freeze for autumn. In autumn winter I have soup just about very day for lunch. It feels me up and doesn't give me the afternoon slump that I get with sandwiches etc.
Today, inspired by Gill who is cooking up lots of nice meals throughout the summer, I decided to make Shepherd's Pie. I usually use beef and make Cottage Pie but I tried lamb today.
Shepherd's Pie
(i apologize in advance for the vague measurements!)
Put some potatoes on to boil. Brown 1 lb Lamb Mince in olive oil and add a chopped onion, 2 gloves of garlic, season and cook cook for 5 mins. Add a large dollop of tomato puree, some Worcestershire sauce, rosemary and a couple of gulgs of red wine and cook until the wine is reduced. Add 1/2 pint of chicken stock and cook for 10 - 12 minutes. Pour into a large (or 6 small) oven proof dish. Mash the potatoes with 2 egg yolks and some grated cheese, top the meat mixture and cook in a hot oven for 20 minutes. Eat.
I made quiches earlier this week and seem to have lost my nack of making shortcrust pastry. The pastry simply would not co-operate and ended up being way too crumbly. So I am on a mission to improve my pastry making. Any tips?
It's STILL raining.....
Just what I needed after a really long day at work, having to bake zillions of buns for the school summer fayre cake stall. Why do I always get myself into these things? Anyway they are all done now but kitchen looks like this.......
Ok not my best effort but I was in a rush! They will blend in fine with all the other baking people have done. In about 20 minutes during morning break they will all be sold and eaten.
Three more days to work and then 6 weeks of pure bliss! I think I can just about manage 3 more days before collapsing.
I better go and tidy the mess up. I have ironing to do and lunches to pack. Then I think a nice soak in the bath and hair wash and re-style are on the list.
Ok, what is happening here? I peg out my washing then go inside to make a yummy lettuce, cucumber and salad cream sandwich (ok, just yummy to me!)
Seeing as it's a lovely sunny day, I plan to eat it in the garden while reading these....
So there I am, five minutes later, sandwich on tray with a mug of tea and I am just aboout to return to my sunny spot in the garden and find this...
soggy washing! It rained so heavy in a couple of minutes that I had to wash it all over again. I pegged it out again and the same thing happened. Now I am nervously watching the sky for any sign of rain!
We bought a caravan by the sea. At last! We've been wanting one for a few years and have been saving up and looking for one we really liked. We finally picked Skipsea on the Yorkshire coast as the place we wanted to be. A lovely quiet little village with a couple of caravan parks, plenty of good walks, and enough to keep us happy. We have looked a zillions of possible caravans. Eventually we found just the one on Ebay of all places! (Now they will really be callling me the ebay queen at work!) So this weekend we went to stay for the first time. I will take some pictures when the weather is better. I am so looking forward to relaxing there and catching up with some reading, going walking and visiting a few of the nearby pubs! It managed not to rain until today so we did manage to get onto the beach and walk a little.
Bridlington is about 10 miles away so we took a drive there to see the new Bridlington Eye
and did some shopping for the caravan. I can't wait to get some good weather now!
Leeds - UK |
