Category Archives: food+drink

beliefs, books, food+drink, quotes, science

Quotes of the Week

Well if last week was quiet, at least on the amusing & interesting quotes front, this week has seen a glut. So here’s a selection:

I will also continue my preliminary work on Project Be-less-fat. Because I WAS working on that project and that was all going well and good, and then in the last couple of months that all dropped off a bit because there was stress and bother and worry and comfort needing to be had. I do so wish the words “Yes, it’s been dreadful, we’ve been so stressed out the weight’s simply been falling off us” ever fell out of my mouth, but I, my scales, the gym manager and the owner of our local chinese restaurant know this is very very not true. And much as I know in my clever new-brain that exercising stops me feeling sad or anxious, the only thing that I want to do when sad or anxious is curl up under a duvet and sleep, so it’s hard to balance the two.
[Anna at http://littleredboat.co.uk/]

Don’t ever show something is important to you or you feel strongly about something otherwise you will be ridiculed.
Accept all abuse without retaliating.
If someone accuses you of breaking any rules or laws – don’t rise to it and defend yourself – you’ll only end up in the wrong.
Everything you think is insulting is actually humorous and you’re the stupid one for taking it seriously – no good expecting your own comments to be taken as a joke because they won’t be.
[Jilly at http://jillysheep.blogspot.com/ on how to deal with internet trolls]

Flora or Fauna?
Do you mean which would win in a fight, which is better company when I’m lonely, or what do I prefer to spread on my toast?
[Times Eureka science supplement, 08/2010, interview with Prof. Jim al-Khalili]

The formalism of post-selected teleportation closed time curves shows that quantum tunnelling can take place in the absence of a classical path from future to past.
[Times Eureka science supplement, 08/2010, in a snippet on time travel]

Great people talk about ideas, average people talk about things, and small people talk about wine.
[Fran Lebowitz]

A well-organized society is one in which we know the truth about ourselves collectively, not one in which we tell pleasant lies about ourselves.
[Tony Judt]

Good taste is the worst vice ever invented.
[Edith Sitwell]

Give sorrow words. The grief that does not speak
Whispers the o’er-fraught heart, and bids it break.
[William Shakespeare]

Worry never robs tomorrow of its sorrow, it only saps today of its joy.
[Leo Buscaglia]

food+drink, natural history

Chillies


Chillies in a Row, originally uploaded by kcm76.

The first chillies of the season, variety Habanero Tasmanian. Grown from seed (sown a bit late though) on the study inside windowsill in a couple of plastic window-boxes. I’m also growing Bulgarian Carrot (they look like their name suggests) and Hot Lemon (long yellow fruit with a fresh lemony flavour). These are all hot varieties. Unfortunately none of them seem to be very prolific for me so the crop will be small, but judging by the one Habanero I used tonight the quality is good.

food+drink, personal, photography

This Week's Photograph: Sky & Corn


Sky & Corn 1, originally uploaded by kcm76.

The East Anglian sky taken from the passenger seat of the car while travelling up the A11, early-ish on Wednesday morning. Wonderful light and cirrus clouds with ripe corn fields. The best few shots are on Flickr; I think this is my favourite of the series. Not bad for almost random grab shots!

We spent the whole of Wednesday with the house clearance guys finally emptying Mum’s bungalow which is now on the market. All we have to do now is get someone to buy it for a decent price. We dropped in to see Mum briefly on our way home; see looked so much better now everything is essentially done and she can draw a line under the whole thing. But it was one hell of a tiring day we just had to stop for an hour on the way back and have something to eat and (in my case) a couple of beers; we’re still recovering.

food+drink

Summer Dinner

I write this having just bade “good night” to our dinner guest, the lovely Katyboo. Though I say it myself the food, the company and the conversation was rather good.

Steamed English Asparagus and Jersey Royal Potatoes
dressed with butter and flaked Parmesan

Smoked Chicken, Broad Bean & Pasta Salad
with Tomato, Rocket & Avocado
Served with a Lemon & Garlic Dressing

Alcoholic Summer Fruit Salad with Clotted Cream
(Nectarine, Blueberries & Raspberries marinated in Cherry Brandy)

Coffee & Florentines

Washed down with a couple of bottles of excellent
Louis Jadot Beaujolais-Villages

All devised and prepared by me. Yes, I am showing off ‘cos I’ve eaten a lot, lot worse in expensive restaurants.  And I don’t think I need eat again for a week! Hic!

Somehow, too, we seem to have magically added another branch to the extended family.  

As Samuel Pepys might have said “A good day.  And so to bed.” 

food+drink

Sizzling Beef

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Over bank holiday weekend Noreen and I were in Manchester – just because we had the opportunity of a cheap-ish weekend break. We spent the time doing next to nothing – a bit of sightseeing; some shopping; lots of sleeping and reading. We managed some good food and avoided an excess of alcohol. The highlight was probably Sunday lunch at the Pacific Chinese Restaurant in George Street (in Manchester’s Chinatown).

Knowing we were staying close to Chinatown, I contacted a former colleague in Manchester (who is Chinese) and asked where was especially recommended to eat. He said to try the Pacific and then admitted it was owned by his father! He also said “I recommend you try the Sizzling Beef Fillet Steak – Cantonese style. It’s to die for”. Noreen phoned and booked us in for Sunday lunch.

Manchester’s Chinatown is fairly scruffy and unprepossessing and arriving at the restaurant the omens did not look good: a scruffy doorway into a stairwell that looked as if it led into a semi-derelict block of high-rise social housing, complete with buggered lift. We followed our noses up the stairs to the first floor and found ourselves in the restaurant: Chinese on this floor and Thai on the floor above. Yes, a single establishment with two different cuisines in separate restaurants. This was quickly followed by “no we do not have your reservation and we don’t have a table for you; please to wait a few minutes”. Doubts set in but a quick check revealed that we were in the right place; so we waited.

The restaurant was indeed full. Full of Chinese. Large family parties of them; three or four generations sprawled at large round tables covered with what looked like mountains of food. Hardly a European face to be seen, a the few who were in evidence were going upstairs for the Thai lunchtime buffet. We waited; maybe 10 or 15 minutes, then were shown to a table in the middle of the restaurant and presented with the usual bewildering menu. But yes, there was the Sizzling Fillet Beef, with a choice of sauces.

We ordered a mixed Dim Sum starter for two. And for the main course we both ordered the Sizzling Fillet Beef, one with Cantonese sauce the other with spring onion and ginger sauce. Plus some mixed stir-fried vegetables and noodles.

Mountains of scrummy-looking food kept walking past the table: big dishes of duck and rice; towers of five or six bamboo steamers; endless pots of tea. The Chinese just appeared to eat and eat. Some left; more people from the long queue by the door appeared at the empty tables. The noise of chatter was deafening. Black-clothed waiters scurried hither and yon; and paired up to carry huge round trays piled with dirty crockery off to the dishwashers.

The Dim Sum arrived. They were clearly excellent, but for me were a disappointment. This was something to do with the combination of flavours and textures not working for me. Noreen was more impressed.

My colleague’s father, very recognisable and dapper in his grey suit, wandered round generally keeping a watchful eye and lending a hand here and there.

The sizzling beef arrived – sizzling! The hair-like noodles; mixed stir-fried vegetables (nicely crunchy after the Chinese style) and bamboo shoots with mushrooms were all delightful. The Sizzling Beef with Ginger and Spring Onion sauce was excellent with whole slices of ginger just waiting to assault the taste-buds. The beef with Cantonese sauce – a very subtle and nicely balanced sweet and sour; lots of onion but not a sign of the normally ubiquitous pineapple or lychees – really was to die for. It was one of those dishes one could just go on eating it was so, so good. So good in fact that we decided to forego a dessert and enjoy the flavours lingering in our whiskers.

At just over £60 (including soft drinks and service) for the two of us it was the same price as we paid the previous day for an equivalent lunch in Café Rouge (one of the better national chains of bistros). Both were good. But the Pacific was much more fun and stole the award for the overall best dish: Sizzling Beef Fillet Cantonese Style.

food+drink, memes, photography

Thing-a-Day #5 : Cheese & Onion Muffins

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Thing-a-Day #5 : Cheese & Onion Muffins, originally uploaded by kcm76.

Today I made muffins, which are incredibly easy as well as hugely versatile. And you don’t have to stick to the omnipresent blueberry or chocolate chip varieties as this shows.

The recipe is adapted from “Savoury Cheese Muffins” in Muffins Fast and Fantastic by Susan Reimer.

This is what I did, but it is almost infinitely adaptable for other savoury ingredients including broccoli, peppers, chilli, mushroom, courgette, cherry tomatoes, ham.

Ingredients
9 oz (255 g) plain flour
2 tsp (10 ml) baking powder
½ tsp (2.5 ml) bicarbonate of soda
¼ tsp (1.2 ml) salt
2 oz (60 g) grated strong cheddar cheese, plus a bit for topping
1 egg
2 tbsp (30 ml) fine white granulated sugar
½ large red onion, finely chopped
2 tbsp chopped fresh herbs (I used fresh tarragon)
1 tsp garlic paste
2 tbsp sesame seeds
4 fl oz (120 ml) plain yogurt
6 fl oz (180 ml) milk
3 fl oz (90 ml) good olive oil (vegetable oil is OK)

Method
1. Prepare muffin tins. These tend to stick to paper liners so just using a well greased non-stick tin is probably better.
2. Preheat oven to 200°C for a conventional oven, or 180°C for a fan assisted oven.
3. In a large bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and salt. Stir in grated cheese, sesame seed and onion.
4. In another bowl, beat egg with a fork. Stir in sugar, yoghurt, milk, oil, garlic paste and fresh herbs.
5. Add all wet mixture to dry mixture and, with a metal spoon, mix ingredients together with a minimum of stirring. The batter will have a “thick dropping” consistency.
6. Fill muffin cups three-quarters full. Sprinkle tops with extra cheese.
7. Bake for about 20 minutes until tops are browned and spring back when pressed gently. (Mine could have done with an extra couple of minutes.)
8. Cool for several minutes to make removal easier.

Best eaten fresh and slightly warm.

books, food+drink, medical, nudism, personal, photography, pleasures, quotes, science, thoughts

Outlook for 2010

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Jilly over at jillysheep has prompted me to think about what I might want to achieve in 2010. This is not something I normally do, as I have always been content to drift with the tide and see what washes up.

But in 2010 I would like to:

  1. Win the lottery jackpot (minimum £2m)
  2. Lose 50 kilos (I keep telling you I’m hugely overweight)
  3. Do all the cooking (like I used to)
  4. Get the bathroom rebuilt (probably requires as a prerequisite)
  5. Get the house rewired (also requires as a prerequisite)
  6. Get the whole house tidy, uncluttered and clean – and keep it that way
  7. Get the two-thirds of the house which badly needs it redecorated (another that requires as a prerequisite)
  8. Go on at least three 2-week holidays, one railway-based, one to Europe and one naturist in the sun
  9. Travel from Thurso to Penzance by train.
  10. Have a good sunny summer and be able to walk skyclad all summer around my garden

That list was a joke! Yes, I would like to do all those things but the chances of achieving them are at best 1 in 14 million (ie. the chance of winning the lottery at any one attempt. If I win the lottery (odds over the year probably 300 in 14 million) all except , and #10 become relatively easy.

OK, so let’s be realistic. What do I stand some chance of achieving?

  1. Lose 15 kilos
  2. Get out to the shops (even the dreaded supermarket) at least once a week (ought to be easy now I’m retired)
  3. Cook 3 meals a week
  4. Go out to take photographs at least once a week (also should be easy)
  5. Write 2 weblog posts a week
  6. Get the heating fixed (like Jilly, we have an annoying intermittent and unsolved problem)
  7. Grow a year’s supply of chillies – on the study windowsill (given that we use a lot of chillies and said windowsill space is limited this will need a very prolific variety)
  8. Get my Anthony Powell Society work up to date, and keep it that way
  9. Get the sitting room and dining rooms properly tidy and inhabitable
  10. Rejuvenate my fish tanks
  11. Go away on holiday for 2 weeks
  12. Make some major progress on my family history (yes that’s vague; first I have to take stock of what I’ve got)

And if I actually manage to achieve half of that lot I should be satisfied.

I don’t make New Year’s Resolutions – that’s just setting oneself up to fail, because they are always so unrealistic – so I’m not going to start this year and I’m not even going to commit to trying to achieve any of the above. They are what I would like to achieve. It’s a “wants list”, not a “must achieve or else list”. One reason I took early retirement was to get away from the incessant round of unachievable “must achieve or else” objectives. That way come madness and depression. 2010 is about relaxing and finding a life again.

Happy New Year to everyone!
Please don’t go out celebrating and get frostbite. 🙂