march 2011

Borscht

Pancakes, chocolate and orange zest and cardamom sauce, Cointrear

oops, we got the date wrong

Avocado, tomatoes, shallot, chilli, cilantro, popcorn

Quinoa with caramelised garlic, chestnuts, mushrooms; flower sprouts with orange zest oil and

I stirfried the sprouts and tossed them in the oil and vinegar - it's a good combination. So was the quinoa, it's a good rich combination this.

Flower sprouts, steamed, with bacon strips and tomato, a little raspberry vinegar, creme fraiche

Cauli in spiced yoghurt, fried; split peas with tamarind and cilantro, caramelised onions, rice

The cauli spice ends up quite bitter, not sure why

ate out

Champignon Sauvage, with Michael. We had the Rully and Gigondas - the Rully made more impression. For the record we had lamb(C) pigeon(T) venison(M) but to list all that went with it would take too long.

Lunch: spag with artichoke puree

Dinner: Ruth and John

Mushroom soup with grilled leeks and Austrian smoked ham

I used 750g of mushrooms with a few porcini, fried, with some onion and garlic, then pureed, a little veg stock, cream. Very thick. I grilled 3 small leeks and sliced them, and 4 slices of Austrian ham sliced into very thin strips, these piled on top. Then truffle oil. Pretty good

Confit duck, butter beans and sausage, salad, bread.

Pear and ginger cake; ginger ice cream

More or less the first pear cake recipe I found on the web, Hugh FW's. I used 6ox SR flour, 5oz sugar, 6oz butter, 2 eggs, 2 pears, some ginger spice. For the ice cream 1 egg, 5floz cream, some mashed up chestnuts, some ginger in syrup. Maybe should hav done a bit more. It froze a bit too quickly.

Mountain gorgonzola, Devon oak, swaledale Ewes

Lunch: spag and red pesto

Dinner: WR boreks, salad

Gratin of potato, onion, ham; leeks

WR chevre and red onion ravioli, tomtatoes olives and chilli, basil, fried courgettes

grilled peaches, panadoro, creme fraiche

Thai curry of those funny little mushrooms and red pepper, pea aubergines, rice

Pancakes with lemon and limoncello

Salad of watercress, beetroot, blood orange, fried apricot kernels

Fried sweet potato, chickpeas in harissa, quinoa, smoky garlic, watercress

This was a pretty good combination of flavours and textures. I cut the potato into slices about 1cm thick and boiled them, then fried them with a dusting of gram flour; they go soft inside with a nice crust. The chickpeas are nutty. The quinoa I put avocado oil in. I tried to make the garlic smoky by toasting/frying 6 fat cloves with lapsang souchon and sesame oil. Mostly they taste of garlic.

Ate out

Namaste, yet another of William's leaving dos.

Smoked trout, beetroot, radishes, creme fraiche and dill

Jerusalems (fried), sesame and chickpea sauce, couscous, lettuce

Ivan, Sarka, Wendy here

Lunch: Linguine with leeks and cream

Dinner: Celeriac soup, scallops, porcini and truff cream

Cooked a whole celeriac, about 1kg. This is about feeds 8. But I felt the texture was a bit too watery-rooty, maybe some spud would improve it. Scallops weren't great, they were watery (ex frozen) - other than that it's nice.

Roast chicken, giblet, chestnut, apple stuffing (cloves nutmeg); pearl barley with saucisse and onion, spinach.

Very good combo of strong deep flavours. Chicken was a big free range one from the farmers market, meaty and moist. I had intended a guinea fowl but the market was on and I got this instead

Rhubarb cake, ginger ice cream

2 medium eggs, 10floz cream, 3 tbs sugar, vanilla, ginger spice, a little ginger syrup, ginger pieces. This doesn't set solid, stays soft. Good. Wendy didn't like the lumps ha ha so more for the rest of us. She did like the cake.

Cheeses as last week, plus two Czech ones

Lunch: dhal, rice

We went to Prinknash bird park, and saw some guinea fowl and chickens

Dinner: chicken with a sort of oriental sauce (soy-mirin-chilli-sugar-sesame), pink firs, lettuce

I have a sodding cold, today it is the no-sense of smell day, but fortunately yesterday was Ivans fab wine day

Rhubarb cake, cream, more rhubarb.

Filo parcels with Moroccan spiced chicken and potatoes, couscous with courgettes, onion, pine kernels

Colin describes this as a Moroccan Cornish pasty

Raspberries, cream, panadoro

NCG Goa soup

Risotto of porcini and flat mushrooms, peas

fried parsnip and apple with ras, apricot kernels

Linguine with chicken, lemon (zest and juice), cream, green peppercorns, psb

Sardines with lemon; couscous with shallot fennel seed lemon juice; Pernod

the Pernod was prompted by the fennel seed, it works

Squash slices in gram flour fried, brown lentils with red pesto, Red fir potatoes

the gram flour works well

Sausages, onions, psb, potatoes

Pear cake, ginger creme fraiche

Ate out

yeh a weekend away at last! Obv with gold cup on we couldn't get away until saturday morning but we did a nice big ride in the Brecon Beacons, lunch at the Red Cow and dinner at Gliffaes

Lunch: at Nantyffin cider mill

Dinner: soda noodles, savoy, spring onions and an evil chilli

pear cake, some v old peaches in booze, yog

Haddock, fennel sauce, new potatoes crushed with olive oil, peas

Filo parcels of chocolate and banana

NCG tagine soup

Spag with meatballs, red pepper, chilli; courgettes

Aubergine slices, garlic-ras-squash-hummus puree, shallot and peppadew relish

not quite sure what I was up to except varying the hummus as sauce idea. It as nice

Caramelised Onion omlette, new potatoes, salad

not sure here really, I cooked 3 large onions then threw in 2 eggs + 2 tbs SR-flour + some cream so a sort of quiche without pastry, it mostly set but ended up as a sort of messy hash

Celeriac soup

part of the batch I cooked for Ivan and Sarka. Not much flavour, a bit disappointing

Filo parcels of squash, peas; couscous with red pepper, sundried tomatoes, pine kernels

Ate out

Thai bras. I had a Thai salad to start but it's a bit big for a starter. Nice and hot.

Lunch: Ate Out

Pear tree at Purton, with the Champion clan

Dinner: Aubergines parmigiana, potatoes, salad

Lunch: spag (Colin), a bacon roll (Tracey) plus several other calorific things

Tracey stuffing herself after the Cleevewold race

Dinner: WR boreks, chutney

Braised lamb shanks, barley, green beans

Porcini and mushrooms in cream and sherry, polenta cakes, braised lettuce

Prune and armagnac ice cream, amaretti

actually cheapo WR brandy not Armagnac

Chicory in balsamic and cream

Colin said he likes chicory

Smoked mackerel fish cakes, green beans, wasabi mayo.

Chicken thighs in a sort of chinese barbecue sauce, savoy in oyster sauce, soba noodles

Pear in ras caramel cream, amaretti

Not sure if I haven't tried something like this before, it's taken from David E-M's ras caramel but here used in dessert. Quantities were 2 tbs sugar caramelised, a heaped tsp of ras, and some cream, maybe 1-2 floz, with 1 pear. I'm threatening to do a ras ice cream

Split pea and saucisse soup

Grilled leeks, tapenade, wild and basmati rice