Having a lunch today and no idea what I’m cooking!! …..What’ve I got?…….A pumpkin…..couple courgettes……some cooked chicken livers…….(yes I do luckily have things like this in my fridge as materials of my trade.) grapes…….spinach……. mushrooms…….. eggs…….chocolate……stock in the freezer……2 ears corn (bit knackered now)….4 avocadoes (from Tom)…..lots of pears……need bread and milk…. I’ll let you know….
Avocado mash…Preheat oven 200 C/Gas 6. Place 2 red romano or other red pepper in the oven and roast for 30-40 minutes, turning occasionally until charred all over and tender. Hook the cooked peppers into a brown or plastic bag, or dampen a tea towel and drape over the peppers. Each one of these methods will help strip off the skin easily. So peel and discard any of the seeds that can be bitter to taste and chop the flesh.
Brush some cherry tomatoes on the vine with a mix of crushed garlic, pinch of chilli flakes, salt, pepper and extra virgin olive oil. Add a handful of pitted kalamata olives and roast in a hot oven for about 10 minutes or until really softened and lightly charred.
Mash the flesh of 3 ripe avocadoes with a fork in a large serving bowl. Squeeze in the juice of one or two limes. Stir in the peeled and chopped roasted romano peppers and season with salt and freshly ground black pepper.
Spoon sour cream or creme fraiche on top and pull the tomatoes off the vine on top and scoop out the olives and any juices from the roasting tin. Eat.
I heated up the leftover cooked chicken livers gently in milk. then strained them and tipped into a blender, some butter and a little of the milk and whizzed until smooth. Seasoned then put in the fridge to set before serving as dip with crusty bread. Some cornichons would’ve been nice if I’d thought about it.
Cut pumpkin in half across the middle and remove the seeds and if like ours it was starting to go mouldy, cut that bit out. Brush flesh with crushed garlic in extra virgin olive oil and roast for 45 minutes to an hour. Longer if bigger…
Sophie sauteed chopped celery, celery leaf and onion in olive oil and butter until soft then added chopped shitake and portobellini mushrooms and some chopped sage until soft. Seasoned and then scooped into the nearly cooked (about 15 minutes before the end.) pumpkin halves.
I made a courgette puree by roasting 2 courgettes whole until very tender. Then I topped and tailed them and mashed the skin and flesh with a fork until lovely and gloopy! Stir in extra virgin olive oil and a few crushed fennel seeds. Season with salt and pepper and add a dash of lemon juice if you want. (See also Courgette puree post)
Jess made little meat patties of turkey mince, sausage meat, chopped chorizo, chopped sage, chopped onion and a little crushed garlic. Then she made them into little patties, wrapped them in a slice of streaky bacon and pan fried them until golden and tender. I had some aioli in the fridge to go with these.
We made a salad of grapes, chopped pear, orange segments and baby spinach with a dressing of the juice from the orange, the juice of a lime, a small slosh of sherry vinegar, extra virgin olive oil and sea salt flakes and freshly ground black pepper.
and Daniel had a brilliant idea of making a pear Eton Mess.
I had some poached pears from my cheat’s menu in the fridge.
And I had some egg whites. Daniel made meringue, Sophie adding the spice of cinnamon and nutmeg
We made what at one point looked like a complete disaster….A beautifully fluffy mound of meringue made by Daniel, got burnt in the hot oven so I moved it to the bottom shelf of the oven which then burnt the base. When we took it out of the oven it collapsed as if in hangover mode. But it turned out to be perfect for this.
With the very burnt base removed we were left with a gooey meringue centre, that alsmost felt there were ground almonds in the meringue mix. It was crispy outside and were almost like caramel macaroons, even though I’ve never had one. (But now there’s a thought.) When ripped up and mixed with softly whipped cream and a dash or so of Marsala. It really was, for someone like me who’s not into whipped cream, pretty sensational!
Amy and Glyn clambered in from hosting Happy Shopper at Dalston Superstore last night.
and…Mikey is writing in Style……
and Petra rebeaded all these (and more) for me!
And Petra is my new assistant/producer/manager!!!!!!
What a wonderful day.
………..Everyday stuff………Ok very soon now the blog will be transferred to WordPress. It’s taken so much longer than I thought even with the help of Kitty. I’m working more on the design this week so that when I put it out to you it works really smoothly. As I’ve said before the blog was getting confusing, so soon you’ll see how much easier it is to use. I want it to be beautiful and inspirational, but also really useful.
Which leads me to my new (cook) book as I’ve been working on a book proposal too. I’m very excited and the proposal has been received amazingly well. (It did look fantastic.) It’s now just a waiting game. I hate waiting. As soon as I have news I’ll let you know.
Anyhow, in the next week or two you’ll get to see the new blog and you can let me know what you think about it………..
HOT MEALS NOW 
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