SPRING HAS MOST DEFINITELY SPRUNG: FRUIT FLIES ARE BACK!!

Well, it's here, finally here!  After tempting us with warmer weather and a few buds and then reverting to dull, overcast days with temperamental rain, I think that Spring has arrived.  Hoorah!! Just wish that my mojo had returned 100% as well though as it hasn't!  Last week was full of quick dinners, freezer dinners and shop bought dinners; not really good, but every now and then it really doesn't matter so I'm not beating myself up about it!

Also had a rather bad experience at work that seems to have escalated completely out of hand and tonight I'll face whatever excess fallout there may be although, might I add, I am not to blame for any of it and did what I could but, as is quite normal for some members of the public, it wasn't good enough and as I'm front line staff, I got the brunt/blame from said parent.  Must admit as far as I'm aware I have been backed up by the powers that be although I haven't received a phone call to say as much and if it wasn't for a colleague I wouldn't know the outcome until tonight.  But I'm digressing and having a moan which isn't what this blog is about, although life does obviously affect moods, abilities and time allowances.

Yesterday I had a quick jaunt around the back garden and a proper clean up and sort of the front yard.

Told you Spring had sprung!

Camelia in flower!

Ready for my close up 😂

I've had to reconfigure pots out there as the Camelia keeps being blown down by the wind and as they don't like a lot of water...... Think I might need to re-pot, but it's now wedged up against another pot so hopefully....

Back garden is also looking good and bulbs/blossom is now blooming:

Muscari bulbs

Blue Lungwort - Bees adore it

Plum Blossom

We've also seen our first flog in our pond.

As to the kitchen; weekly banana bread is still happening although this week it'll be a bit late as I've run out of eggs!!  How did I run out of eggs? I'm never out of eggs!  But it would appear that I am, so tomorrow will be shopping and baking.

Yesterday, admittedly, I did an egg based dish (hence discovering that I had run out of eggs or at least didn't have as many as I thought).  Getting really bored with leftovers on a Monday especially when it's just roasted veg and a few greens.  Soup isn't something that other half considers as dinner so it would be a lunch item and I'm a little fed up with bubble & squeak although can't do that unless mashed potato involved and I'm not cooking spuds just to get mash! So a roasted vegetable frittata was the order of the day with a side salad of mixed peppery leaves, last of last week's tomatoes and half of this weeks cucumber with a mustard dressing.

Not a fab picture and the vultures had descending leaving me with this bit to photograph and eat!

Tonight is a mixed bean chilli in the slow cooker as I have work.  Cooked chickpeas from freezer and last of the dried black beans (soaked overnight and cooked this morning), along with last courgette, red pepper, onion, mushrooms, chilli flakes, ground coriander and cumin and a carton of tomatoes.

I also tray roasted off 2 courgettes, 1 red pepper, a tonne of various tomatos (before I used the last in the salad), red onions, garlic, balsamic vinegar, salt, pepper and mixed herbs yesterday so I've got the basis of a pasta sauce tomorrow.  Might leave as it or might add some chicken or some tuna depends on what I fancy.  Means I'm not having to worry about dinner tomorrow either and I can concentrate on shopping, baking and hopefully a bit of veg planting!

As to the title of this blog; fruit flies are back big time.  My plastic council compost bin is full of them as it is every year so whenever I take off the lid there is a cloud of them erupting! Just have to remember not to breathe in, haha!  Does make pretty good compost though and the worms love it!  I love my worms and my frog and my crows and my other birds and the bees and, and, well you get my drift, but I DO NOT like fruit flies; they get everywhere!  Hey ho!

BUSY WEEK AND A TON OF BOXES AND TOMATOES

Oooops!  I missed a week.  Sorry about that but it was a pretty uneventful week on all fronts anyway.

This week a lovely pile of boxes arrived from my veggie delivery although as you can see from the contains I probably didn’t need that many boxes just as you never need the amount of carrier bags that they put things into when you get a supermarket delivery unless you shop with one that gives you the option to be carrier bag free.  Bonus for my delivery is that all the boxes and 90% of the packaging can be returned and reused, even the string.  Must admit I tend to keep the string as it’s handy for tying up plants in the garden and some of the plastic trays are useful as seed trays or pot holders, haha.

A pile of boxes and their contains

It’s been an odd week of ‘in and out’ the house, so dinners have been as quick and as simple as they can be with the exception of Monday when I felt like doing a full on curry using left over chicken from Sunday to make a korma and the left over pumpkin to make a dahl.  I still marinated the cooked chicken in the spices and yogurt and I replaced the lentils in the recipe for the smashed up pumpkin.  No-one died of food poisoning and there were clean plates all round.  And before you ask; no I did not make the poppadums!  They were bought and are gluten and grass free; I checked. 

Chicken Korma, Pumpkin Dahl and Poppadums

Tuesday’s slow cooker recipe was a huge tomato sauce as I appear to receive a ton of tomatoes this week and still had some left from last.  Red onion, courgettes (yes Abel & Cole had some), the last of last week’s mushrooms, balsamic vinegar and salt and pepper, oregano and thyme were added and set on high for about 5 hours.  Then served with pasta and grated cheese on top!

Weds I went all Asian again and did stir fry fish with lime, leek, remaining cooked carrot and green beans from Sunday, Aldi mangetout and baby sweetcorn.  I sloshed in some fish sauce, rice wine, spattering of sugar, ground cloves, fennel, coriander and sesame seeds, then served with mushroom, egg fried rice.

Mushroom, egg fried rice with spring onion

Fish with Lime, Carrots, Green Beans, Mangetout and Baby Sweetcorn

Apologies for photos; it was a bit steamy, haha

Yes I know! I had rice! I only normally eat rice about once a fortnight, if that, as it bloats my stomach and I feel awful, but I needed something a bit more exotic this week and rice just happened to be in the cupboard and I’d run out of my noodles. L

Thursday, as always, was busy backwards and forwarding to trampoline centre with an extra lengthy session in the afternoon as son had group lesson followed straight away by private session.  So time was short and having prepped Tuesday night’s dinner on Monday night and sticking it in the fridge to shove in slow cooker in the morning, I did the same on Weds night by prepping layers of sliced potato, Jerusalem artichoke, celeriac, leek, chopped ham and grated cheese.  In the morning I poured over a combination of cream and milk and switched it on and walked away.  Next time I won’t add equal quantities of milk to cream as it did produce quite a lot of liquid.  However, it tasted fab!

Alfred on the move!

In other news; the bulbs I hastily planted a couple of weeks ago are growing rather well.  The potatoes that The Potato Council sent us are chitting away nicely on the window sill and Alfred, after moving about and deciding to stop on the ceiling right above the kettle and abseiling up and down with the inevitability of eventually landing on someone’s head and thus causing panic and death, was carefully removed into the garden to find a new home.  I’ll miss him, but hopefully he’ll find a comfy spot and a decent mate.

ENERGY LEVELS UP AND DOWN AND SUPPLIES RUNNING LOW

Had a brilliant start to the week; woke up at a reasonable time, garden was all frosty and beautiful and I felt I had some energy.  Garden was so pretty I rushed outside in pjs and bare feet just to get some photos. Needless to say that my tootsies were a bit ‘cold’ by the time I’d finished, so wrapped up in slipper socks and boot slippers under a blanket with first morning’s coffee.  Roasted off a whole pumpkin; cut it in half around the middle, rubbed with salt, pepper and oil and cooked in the oven for about an hour. Half of it was used for the pumpkin polenta and the other half will be made into a pumpkin and walnut loaf (I still have 1 very large and 2 medium pumpkins left from Halloween, but as I hadn’t cut them due to their decorative skin, they’ve kept perfectly fine in my chilly utility room).

Was a bit slower on the energy levels on Tuesday, but that was mainly due to having osteo the evening before.  Took an age for me to decide what to do for dinner as was slightly lacking in inspiration; yes it does happen to me!  So after ploughing through about half a dozen cookery books, not finding anything that totally grabbed my attention, I decided that a couple of recipes could work if I combined them and added my own flavours, so roasted roots with chickpeas, feta and Moroccan spice.

Still struggling for ideas on Wednesday; it’s the end of the month and the cupboards are getting a little bare and because I’m trying to eat as seasonable as possible I’m finding that I’m getting a little bored with the same old thing; time for spring!  Cleaned out the freezers (I have one large one that gets full quite quickly when we are harvesting, but remains half empty if I’m not filling it up with baked goods when garden isn’t over producing) and a small upright one in the kitchen which is used for open packets, breadcrumbs, leftover meals, etc.  Now I have two clean and tidy freezers and I know exactly what I have in them which should help a bit when planning meals.  I’ve also had a chat with partner and should be taking full control of food shopping again as of next week!  He took over the shopping nearly 10 years ago when I broke my leg and has been reluctant to let me take it back even though I’m constantly shopping as he only ever buys the basic boring stuff as he’s a meat and two veg kind of guy when it comes to cooking.  Ended up cooking six of the bubble and squeak patties I made before Xmas, grilled bacon, fried mushrooms and eggs and whizzing up my own version of baked beans (we didn’t have any; like a said, it’s the end of the month) using an inch of chopped chorizo, 2 finely chopped tomatoes (no tinned toms either), squirt of tomato paste and ketchup, splash of balsamic vinegar for sweetness and a tin of cannellini beans.  Actually I rather liked them and, although wouldn’t necessarily want to do them every time I used baked beans, I would definitely do them again.

Bubble & Squeak Patties

Thursday was mega busy with loads of online grocery shops, son’s trampolining group and then work, so slow cooker back in business with sweet and sour fish.  I’ve used the recipe for chicken before, but didn’t have any so thought ‘why not’ fish! As it was it worked!  Phew!

Biggest excitement of the week apart from Monday’s frosty garden was the fact that Alfred the spider isn’t dead as we first thought but very much alive and well! I hate spiders normally, but I’ve become quite attached and was slightly over excited by the fact that after spending 3 days curled up in the corner of the window with no new webs being built he was back in the middle of a brand new web and looking healthy again.  Hoorah!

Alfred the Spider (old picture)

Menu plan for the week is as follows:

Monday – Garlic chicken with pumpkin polenta and peas.

Tuesday – Oven roasted roots with chickpeas and feta

Wednesday – bubble & squeak patties, fried mushrooms, fried eggs, grilled bacon and home-made baked beans

Thursday – Sweet and sour fish

KITCHEN BLITZ AND PLANNING

Hi all,

This week has been clearing out the fridge and freezer of any bits and bobs and frozen 'half' dinners so that I have a fresh freezer to fill with baking and all the final leftovers have been used. I try and do this at the beginning of most months, but definitely at the beginning of December as there will be cakes, extra bread, Christmas Day meat, pastry, biscuit dough and all the other extras that will be needed over the festive season, although I'm sure that some of it will be still there in January.  Also the kitchen itself gets a winter clean with cupboards and drawers cleared out of 'stuff' and washed down along with double checking on cleaning tiles and those hard to reach corners.  Why I do a winter clean I don't know, but it's become traditional for me to do a pre-Christmas blitz.

So after a mega blitz, Monday's dinner was a big moroccan spiced 'stew' made from a fairly large, already moroccan spiced, veg dish I found in the freezer, last week's sweet potatoes, tomatoes and carrots, quorn pieces, lambs lettuce (in place of spinach) and more spice.  This was basically shoved in the slow cooker all afternoon whilst I cleaned the kitchen.

Stores cupboard (left side)

Stores cupboard (right side)

Tuesday was breakfast with a friend I hadn't seen for a while, bit of shopping, posting a parcel and some Xmas cards and then work in the evening.  I have to admit that after a very large breakfast I wasn't that hungry before work, so I passed the responsibility of dinner onto my partner and requested he bunged a pizza in the oven for me for when I got home.  Sainsbury do a rather good gluten free pizza and I do tend to keep a couple in the freezer for those days when either I really fancy one or when the boys are having them themselves; normally a Saturday when it's partner's turn to 'cook'.

Mushroom 'risotto' on Wednesday as I had a tonne of mushrooms in the fridge.  The risotto is in quotation marks as I didn't have risotto rice so used quick cook long grain rice instead.  After frying off some onion and the tonne of mushrooms in some olive oil, adding plenty of fresh thyme from the garden and a twist or two of black pepper and salt, I added this and a large mug of rice to an oven proof casserole dish, then added two mugs of boiling water, gave it all a stir and put in the oven, covered in foil, for 20mins on 180C.  Another stir and more boiling water, about another mugful, and back in the oven for another 10mins whilst I grated a largish piece of parmessan and a big chunk of cheddar.  Out of the oven again, check to see if rice cooked and then stir in all of the cheese.  Check seasoning, add a little more water if dry and back in oven for another five mins to melt the cheese.  Voila!

Thursday was another slow cooker day as it was son's weekly group trampolining lesson and then back to work a couple of hours later.  This time it was an 'anything goes' stew, meaning leftover roast veggies from the weekend, couple of spoonfuls of mashed potato which thicken the stew, sweetcorn, any veggies that were found in the bottom of the fridge, tin of tomatoes, tin of beans and some water.  Plenty of salt and pepper and herbage and I've finally got rid of all the odds and sods.  Hoorah!!

Friday is my first day of not cooking dinner, so after a private lesson in trampolining for my son, it was home to wade through a pile of cookery books with a cuppa and plan out some menus/dishes for the next couple of weeks so that I don't have to think too hard about what to cook whilst I get on with baking, present wrapping, decorating and card writing.  Shopping lists written and I can relax for the weekend. Although I actually did a fair amount of visiting, shopping and a rather lovely amble around a Christmas Fair where I bought a rather ingenious bowl that folds flat when not needed, so not a huge amount of sitting and relaxing, but was a well spent weekend.

Chicken Bowl

Chicken Bowl flat

Do you think this lot will fit in the bowl??

WEATHER IMPROVES! HOORAH!

Rogue raspberry from under fence

Well it's been a week of hit and miss; some days have been brilliant and others have been, shall we say, a little stressful.  But the Wing It kitchen has been reasonably busy along with the Wing It garden.

Monday was last of the frozen pumpkin, last of the carrots from last week and chopped swede, coconut curry.  Problem was I thought I had some coconut milk in the cupboard which I didn't; whoops! I did, however, have desiccated coconut, so I stuck a couple of handfuls in a bowl and poured on boiling water and left for half an hour.  This I then drained and squeezed which gave me a very watery, but coconut flavoured liquid which I used to cook the veggies in before adding the curry spices and the coconut at the end.  Good flavour, but wouldn't recommend swede in a curry unless a tomato based one.

Tuesday was eventful to say the least as I had a hospital appointment to check my ears as I suffered from a dose of tinitus a few months ago and my ears felt blocked, but there was no wax or infection. On the way up to the hospital I get a phone call from a job I'd applied for many months ago asking if I was still interested and would I like to come along for an 'interview/chat' the next day.  Eeek!  Anyway, ears all fine, no hearing loss; probably just a dose of blocked sinus/ear canal and that is now drained.  Phew! So nice and easy dinner of spaghetti bolognese made with quorn mince and my oven roasted and slow cooked tomato sauce with added sliced mushrooms and a splash of balsamic vinegar.  Again I had the buckwheat pasta which I am definitely liking.

Weds arrived and I walked son up to his course, popped into docs for results of blood test and all now fine!  Eh???  So one week they are fine, two weeks later they are borderline diabetic and two weeks after that they are fine again!  Osteo after a quick Aldi shop and I can finally walk without feeling like an old lady.  Getting older sucks!  Haha.  Interview in the afternoon and I'm offered the job!!! Double EEEEEEEKKKKK!!!  So two evenings a week as of next week I'm a working woman again after many, many years.

Dinner was a disaster!  Yep, I have those days too.  Wanted to do a stir fry noodle dish and try out my new gluten free noodle find which are made with sweet potatos.

White haddock fillets were marinaded in the morning in a curried spice mix with a tsp of sugar, pinch of salt, crushed garlic and a tablespoon of olive oil and then cooked in a dryish pan until cooked through.  Then stir fried pak choi, baby corn, spring onion, sugar snap peas and mushrooms, with chopped ginger, coriander and a splash each of water, tamari sauce and fish sauce.  Noodles were soaked and then tipped into veggies to finish cooking as per instructions!  Yuck!  They looked like see through worms and tasted like plastic and acted like elastic bands.  I ended up attempting, and exceeding pretty well, picking the lot out of the stir fry and spiralising some courgette instead.  Meant the fish ended up cold, although nice flavour and my son refused to eat the stir fry as there were a few remaining 'plastic worms' left. He made himself toast! Never again!!

Thursday and I'm having doubts!  What the hell am I doing?  Am sure I'll be fine!  Ached like hell all day and brain was all over the place so it was an easy dinner of slow cooked chicken, butter beans, chickpeas and sweetcorn with leeks and plenty of freshly chopped parsley to have as a soup bowl dinner with bread for dunking.

No dinner cooking over weekend again as that's partners job so out in the garden to start putting things to bed.  Ie, chopping back herbs and seeing what's left to harvest.  And I made a banana bread using up the, now browning, bananas and some candied cut peel I had in the cupboard.

Chillis

Weird chilli

Chilli plants from seeds of a chilli are ready for picking.  As are the tomatos that were also grown from tomatos cut into halves and planted.  And the butternut squash seeds I planted (also from veg seed not packet) have gone a bit rampant.

Butternut squashes

Row of tomato plants from cut tomatoes

 MY BANANA BREAD

200g plain flour (I use a mix of soya, buckwheat, gram and potato starch, but any plain flour will do)

2.25tsp baking powder

0.5tsp of salt

0.75tsp of cinnamon

75g butter or marg

115g caster sugar (mine is sugar beet sugar not sugar cane)

3 ripe bananas

2 eggs beaten

2 tbsp chopped candied peel.

In a bowl sieve flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and sugar and then add marg and beaten eggs. Thoroughly beat the mixture together using a hand mixer if you have one or plenty of muscle and a wooden spoon.  In a separate bowl mash the bananas and then add these to the cake mix and beat again.  Fold in the candied peel and bake for 50mins to an hour in a greased and lined 2lb loaf tin at 180C.  It's cooked when knife or skewer (whichever you prefer) comes out clean and the cake is coming away from the sides a little.  Turn out and cool.