august

Lunch. Spag with tomatoes, tapenade, ewes cheese

The fridge was pretty empty save for some manky strawberries, Colin suggested spag with strawb sauce.

Dinner Navah's party

Lunch: Ate out

WR chevre and onion tarts

Aubergines with red pesto; peperonata, rocket, ciabatta

Gratin of sweet potatoes and dolcelatte

Cherries, cream/yog, shortbread

Cucumber with yog, feta, dill; pitta

Beetroot with walnut sauce; green lentils with mint; buckwheat with p-seed oil

Tracey had leftovers, and a burger at Andy's race; Colin ate out.

maghreb carrot salad, toast

Spag with sauce of roasted tomato puree, cream, garlic chilli olives; courgettes and red peppers (like ratatouille)

ate out

Lunch: Ate out

Dinner: spag with cingiale ragu (a jar from Italy), watercress salad

Nectarines, cream/yog, amaretti

Lunch: Salad of potatoes, watercress, dolcelatte, peas

Dinner: Cod, saffron-tomato-cream sauce, potatoes, green beans

Raspberry ice cream

I made a custard with 5floz cream and 1 egg, cut the rasps small and threw in a slug of framboise. We think the alc inhibits lowers the freezing temp, so the icecream stayed soft, maybe a bit too soft.

Fennel-toatoes-olives-Pernod ; peperonata ; ciabatta

WR lemon possets

pea soup

Duck breasts, sour cherry sauce, fried potatoes, broad beans

Turkish vine leaf and yog pie, tabbouleh

This was roughly based on a recipe in the newspaper. I used loads of vine leaves because I had just pruned the vine. Make 3 layers of leaves and in between put in a paste of yog, semolina, pinekernels, almonds, sultanas, and I can't quite remember what else.

Quince and cream

BBQ Lamb, yog sauce, courgettes, rice

Strawbs and choc brownies

Pea Soup

Salmon risotto, peas, green beans

Lunch: spag with saucisson and tomato

Party Claire, John, Ruth, John, Charlotte, Richard, Pauline, Mark, Navah, Kathy, Gill, Rebecca, John, Val, Beth, Leo, Andy, Ed, Helen, William, Geraldine.

Theme this year was central Asia

Coulibiac (Russian salmon pie), lamb kebabs, kidney beans with Georgian plum sauce; breads (cheese, walnut, sesame); potato and caper salad; green beans, broad beans and peas in yog with mint and dill; red pepper, aubergine, walnut, bulghar, buckwheat; beetroot in yog and pomegranate.

The coulibiac, I used a whole salmon and 2 packs of puff pastry no not home made, it was a bit "cheaty" in that I just put in mushrooms salmon eggs and dill and not all the other stuff it said in the recipe book.

Cake with apricots; cake with sour cherries, yog, almonds

The yog cake was a recipe I got from the internet, the apricot from a book. I made the mistake of trying to put double amount in a big cake tie. I thought it worked but the middle was uncooked.

Lunch: spag

That's to say, Colin had spag; Tracey scavenged all sorts of things because Tracey for a birthday treat ran the Standish Woodland Chase 10 mile race around about lunchtime

Dinner: salmon pie, the green-veg salad, lettuce, toasted bread

Apricot cake with yog/cream

We didn't have too many leftovers. There was a lot of cake but that got taken into work. I had bought a vast excess of lamb mince (1.5 lbs) and that got made into 3 things: a base for moussaka, kebabs in vine leaves, Moroccan meatballs.

Beetroot with feta and dill

Kebabs, beans, potatoes with pumpkinseed oil

Ate out

Salmon fish cakes, spinach, lemon dill cream sauce

sour Cherries, brownies, creams

Broc with fried lentils coconut cashews

Shiitake mushrooms garlic peas, miso; fried aubergine slices; egg noodles

lamb meatballs, fried courgette, couscous with salted lemon

carrot cake

a slice of the one Mark had made for Navah, left from their party & in our freezer

Lunch: watercress, bacon, potatoes, horseradish cream

Dinner: chicken livers with orangepeel, sumac, black pepper; round courgette hollowed stuffed with fried courgette, barberries, pinenuts, quinoa; potatoes

Sweetcorn cream with carmel popcorn

recipe from Dessert. I used 1 corncob, 1 egg, 1 tbs sugar, cream and milk to make 10floz, 1.5 sheets gel. (it was quite soft, ie not too hard). Popcorn is fun, I'm amazed this is the first time I have tried it - I think

Lunch: spag with cream tomatoes garlic basil

Dinner: roasted peppers with salt cod puree

1 piece of salt cod, poached in cream and milk with garlic then I reduced the liquid and added breadcrumbs 1-2 tbs, and the cod and mashed it up a bit to make a thick puree, then sanwiched between 3 layers of the roasted pepper. very nice.

Dinner: Steak, olive puree and breadcrumb crust; aubergine, tomatoes, cuminn pomegranate molasses, potatoes

Aubergine slices with red pesto, peperonata, chevre with breadcrumbs, rocket, ciabatta

Pears, pistachios, whisky, cream

Avocado, tomatoes, chilli-tomato-garlic-mint-oregano-shallot, p-seed oil

that last lot was my doing. the p-seed oil is quite nice but we weren't sure it really works here

WR fish stew; fennel-tomato-olives; rice

vine leaf pie, courgettes, potatoes

Cheese: Ardrahan, Roccolo, Lessino

round at Janet's (we ponged her house out)

Moussaka, lettuce and fennel salad

Damsons in caramel, cream

Cauli and cheese soup

Fried squash, dukkah and walnuts; chard and bulghar

cornbob, soba noodles

Dinner: John

Pea "pannacotta" with bacon and rocket

1.5 5floz bowls of peas, half a shallot, cooked these and pureed with enough cream to make 12floz. Also 1 cube of stock and 1/2 tsp vanilla essence. 2.5 leaves gel. It's quite a firm set but not overly so. Bacon cut finely and fried.

had a nice Macon that John brought

Duck breasts, beluga lentils with stock and barberries, chicory, roast potatoes with ras.

Parboil potatoes and dredge in the spice mix before roasting. We had a Chateauneuf du Pape and it went very well

Sweet potato cake and spiced mascarpone

from Dessert

Cheeses (as weds)

Lunch: spag with cream, lemon, bacon, rocket

MPW Indian chicken and lentil soup

Bruschette with fried celeriac and borgonzola, green beans

Lunch: WR cheese and smoked ham tortellini; cream and chilli

Mushrooms in cream and sherry, polenta cakes, peas

Grilled nectarines, mascarpone and amaretto