What are you eating today?

[Stokey Sue]

I've been away for the weekend staying at a hotel that's really a conference centre, and the food is ok but not posh restaurant, I have over-eaten as it was all there ready to eat, and there were nice things, like fresh pineapple I didn't have to trim, it was just in neat chunks; the inevitable breakfast buffet etc
They give you a full breakfast buffet; lunch is ok posh sandwiches, soup, salad and dessert; dinner is choice of mains, then cheese and/or dessert
Dinner was sweet & sour chicken on Friday (poor); good chilli with all the trimmings on Saturday and a roast chicken dinner on Sunday. There were some nice desserts around, I eschewed the sticky toffee pudding but did have some rhubarb crumble and custard, a sort of tiramisu thing, and a crème brulée.

One thing to take away was chef's method of carrying forward extra/leftover things - the delicious tiramisu or Eton mess type thing was made to use up slightly dry chocolate brownies, with a lot of chocolate chips and other things added; he made a mayo-free potato salad by blitzing extra fresh salsa from serving the chilli to use as a base for the dressing; and I think the particularly nice red cabbage with roast chicken contained a good dollop of spare berry compote from the breakfast buffet.

The downside of this (for me) was that he had a big pack of tarragon to put in mushroom soup for Sunday lunch, and so he put some in one of the salads, I didn't like it when I ate it, though didn't immediately identify which herb it was, and my tongue was sore for several hours after, so I think perhaps I am mildly allergic to it as I have long suspected

[liketocook]

Food sounds pretty decent for that sort of venue Sue, shame about the tarragon surfeit. It's fresh pineapple that gives me a sore mouth if I have more than just a couple of chunks. I'm fine with tinned.
The Korma style chicken curry didn't quite hit the spot for us despite a bit of additional spicing. Nothing inherently wrong with it but not on the make again list. Cooked a pot of chicken, veg and rice soup yesterday so will have some of that for lunch. Halloumi pasta with salad and crusty bread for dinner.

[Suffs]

Tesco’s Finest cod and parsley sauce fish cakes with new potatoes and a large portion of runner beans from the garden.

Quick and easy as I was already busy and DS announced he was dropping off post-festival washing mountain …

Must say we were pleased with the fish cakes … a good flavour and oozing parsley sauce.

[Pepper Pig]

Do we close this thread when it’s reached 100 pages?

[WWordsworth]

https://www.olivemagazine.com/recipes/m ... with-slaw/

I just made this and it was really nice.
I didn't do the slaw or tortillas, just served the chicken and sauce with potatoes and salad.
Lips are tingling nicely now.

[Amber]

We had Jamie’s Bombay Chicken, with the addition of a red pepper, and the shredded spinach stirred through the cooked rice. Delicious, and easy to pre prepare. My kind of meal.

https://www.nationalworld.com/culture/c ... _content=1

As an aside, how would you read this recipe? Half of a 400g cauli (ie 200g), or, half a 800g cauli (ie total weight 400g)? I know which works for us, but I think the recipe is very confusing.

[herbidacious]

I made a pasta dish for dinner using homegrown courgettes and tomatoes, the latter having been roasted yesterday. It also contained garlic, pinenuts, s-d tom paste, parmesan, thyme, chipotle flakes lots of black pepper and a splash of double cream.

[Smitch]

We had Jamie’s Bombay Chicken, with the addition of a red pepper, and the shredded spinach stirred through the cooked rice. Delicious, and easy to pre prepare. My kind of meal.

https://www.nationalworld.com/culture/c ... _content=1

As an aside, how would you read this recipe? Half of a 400g cauli (ie 200g), or, half a 800g cauli (ie total weight 400g)? I know which works for us, but I think the recipe is very confusing.

That’s an article about Heston and his mental health diagnosis rather than a recipe

[Amber]

Oops, incorrect link. Sorry. Hope this one works.

https://www.womanandhome.com/recipes/ja ... li-recipe/

[Stokey Sue]

That is a rather confusing recipe, clearly the person who is retelling Mr Oliver’s method neither organises nor proofreads. I didn’t read Amber’s question first, just followed the second link and I read it as 400g of cauli into the pot, sanity check - I think a medium cauli would be about 700 to 800g.
Several things I don’t like - I assume the turmeric and curry powder are a heaped teaspoon of each, but the word each is missing and I thought we given up on heaped and rounded spoonfuls and started using them properly as level measures.
Personally I don’t like a proper recipe that tells you to follow package instructions for a component like the rice here, especially since I tried to follow a Thai recipe that said to cook noodles according to the package instructions but the English instructions just said to cook “as required”

[Amber]

We used the recipe ‘numbered’ amount of cauli and mint, ie 400g cauli, and as far as I remember, 15g mint. Very tasty.
Recipe calls for a heaped tsp each of turmeric and curry powder.

A friend uses a flapjack recipe that calls for a heaped tblsp syrup??? How on earth…?

[Stokey Sue]

I think spoons of syrup are always a bit rounded, because you can’t actually level them off but, no, not heaped.

I made a gratin - a sliced courgette and tomato mixed with herbs and garlic, par cooked under cover in the microwave then topped with a mix of grated mozzarella and breadcrumbs and baked I baked a crumbed piece of haddock too and had half the gratin with the fish and a couple of new spuds.

[Earthmaiden]

I would read the recipe as 400g of cauliflower.

I'd assume a heaped spoon of syrup would be one where you dipped the spoon in and took a generous amount which needed winding round the bowl of the spoon before adding it to other ingredients. Since the advent of silicon spatulas I haven't found weighing syrup so difficult as it scrapes off spoons and bowls quite easily. Pity the elderly couple in my childhood village who had run a grocery shop when they were young where syrup was bought in bulk and had to be weighed out exactly to customer requirements. Goodness knows what kind of container was used.

[herbidacious]

Had to go to my optician's in Paternoster Square and there is an Itsu next door, so picked up my favourite 'no meat Mondays' - a platter of smoked tofu, sitcky rice, various veggies including avocado and edamame with a delicious dressing. I also had a white chocolate and slated caramel pot.... and then... it was someone's birthday, so chocloate cake I am going out tonight, though, so won't be having dinner.

[liketocook]

Dinner yesterday was Jamie Oliver's gingery, garlicky, black bean mince with rice and veg. Homemade chicken & rice soup for lunch today. Tonight I'm making this traybake but using chicken breasts instead of cod https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/gar ... v-traybake

[Stokey Sue]

I suddenly noticed I hadn't made any gazpacho this year, so I made some on Tuesday for lunch, good time to make it when the greengrocer has cheap fully rip tomatoes
Last night I had the second part of the courgette gratin, also form Tuesday, cooked some homemade lamb kofta from the freezer and roast some cooked new spuds with them. Nice but slightly overdone, not because I forgot, but because the oven was hotter than I thought, which is rather annoying.

Going out so it will be a quick supper involving more gazpacho and something.

[herbidacious]

I've only made gazpacho once this year (but have made two chilled cucumber soups). I blame the weather.

I made a simple pasta thing last night. Roasted garden tomatoes turned into passata, with roasted aubergine also from the garden, garlic, thyme, a pinch of chipotle, eaten with Maccheroni al Ferretto from Lidl (too long!) and some stracciatella stirred in at the end. Parmesan on top.

There is left over sauce. I think I would add black olives and capers to it. Only enough for one, though. I thought T would be out tonight, but he's not.

I seem to be having a bit of a pasta renaissance after years of rarely eating it at home.

[halfateabag]

It's probably me Herb. I never order pasta when eating out, it's something I cook at home.

Last nights light supper for me was an Istanbul kebab which was a mix of beef and lamb mince with some aromatic spices which worked well. OH had a proper pork kebab with actual cubes of pork and not mince. The real Greek pittas are so much nicer than our British pitta breads which I think are a copy of the Cypriot style.

[Suffs]

Thursday’s supper was an HFW veg biryani from his Veg Everyday book. Pleased with that … very tasty and easy enough to prepare ahead of time and pop in the oven when guest arrived. I made the tamarind and coriander raita to go with it.

Yesterday’s supper was a Spanakopita based on the one in the Hairy Bikers Perfect Pies but I used a mix of spinach, spring greens and wild rocket … and a generous amount of dill rather than the thyme. I made a salad of chunked beefsteak tomatoes and cucumber with mint and red wine vinegar to go with it. Everyone very happy with that and there’s enough of the pie for us two tonight. I’ll have to make more salad tho … our guest had thirds of that

[Stokey Sue]

As mentioned on the Aldi & Lidl thread I made a a Thai (ish) noodle think last night with Lidl bean sprouts and marinated tofu.

I’m now experimenting with storing the remaining sprouts as there were a lot. I’ve tried open freezing a few, I’ve heard mixed reports of success. Most are in Tupperware in the fridge covered with water with a spoonful of salt and a spoonful of sugar, which is what I usually do