For an excellent supper or lunch you will need:

Remains of Sunday’s pheasant casserole. (This will be largely vegetables in sauce, ‘cos you ate all the pheasant, right? It’ll still make good soup.)
Leftover potatoes, chopped into 5mm dice
2 small or 1 medium onion, chopped finely
Some vegetable or chicken stock or a couple of glasses of white wine
Small glass of port, brandy or similar (optional)
Cream (optional)
Chopped herbs (optional)
Grated Parmesan (optional)
Seasoning

Sweat the diced potatoes and onion in a drizzle of olive oil until the onion is somewhere between translucent and caramelised (according to your taste).
Meanwhile put the remains of the casserole in the blender and whizz until smooth.
Add the blended casserole to the frying onion & potato.
Bring gently to the boil and simmer for 10-15 minutes, adding wine or stock as required to keep it of a soupy consistency.
At this point you can turn out the heat and leave the soup until you’re almost ready to eat.
When ready return the soup to the simmer, add the port/brandy and the tomato paste.
Season to taste and return to the simmer.
Serve in a tureen or individual bowls with a swirl of cream, chopped herbs and grated Parmesan, and accompanied by good crusty bread and butter.

The pheasant is a stupid bird and if it weren’t for gamekeepers it would probably be endangered. But it has two saving graces: it’s colourful and it makes good eating. They’re in season now and, especially if you live in a country area, are likely to be easily available and fairly cheap. While pheasant is delicious roasted, it makes a scrummy casserole for a cold, snowy winter’s day. This is what I did this evening …

For two hungry persons you will need:

1 plump pheasant (hens are best)
5 small-medium onions (red onions for preference)
2 courgettes
1 yellow pepper
Handful of mushrooms
Quantity of ripe tomatoes
1 fennel
Garlic (to taste)
Tomato paste (optional)
2-3 tsp dried mixed herbs (or bouquet garni)
Olive Oil
2 tbsp butter
Wine glass of port
Salt & pepper

This is what you do:

Take a large enough casserole (with a good lid) and drizzle a little olive oil over the bottom.
Peel and quarter the onions and put them in the casserole.
Halve the pheasant (cut it down the middle with a good pair of kitchen scissors); rinse and place in the casserole on the onions.
(If you can be bothered to brown the meat and onion, now is the time. Personally I never bother unless I want the meat floured to give a thicker sauce.)
Roughly chop the garlic.
Core the pepper and cut into 8.
Cut the courgettes into 2cm lengths
Halve the mushrooms
Quarter the fennel.
Quarter the tomatoes, unless they’re cherry tomatoes when halve them. (I used a large quantity of very ripe cherry tomatoes; you could use tinned tomatoes.)
Put all the veg on top of the pheasant, tomatoes last.
Add the herbs, a very little salt, pepper to taste, followed by the port.
Drizzle a bit more olive oil over and put the butter on top followed by the lid for the casserole.
Cook in the bottom of a moderate oven for 60-90 minutes (until pheasant is thoroughly cooked and the veg is soft).
Serve with roast (or garlic) potatoes and Jerusalem artichokes, and a good red wine.

Notes:

In the unlikely event there are any leftovers, use them for soup.

You can basically use whatever veg you have to hand, although go easy on the root veg as you want the variety of flavours and colours – this should be a colourful as well as rib-sticking dish.

Never had Jerusalem Artichokes? They’re tubers (like knobbly potatoes) of a plant which is related to sunflower. In season in late autumn and winter, you’ll find them at good greengrocers but not in most supermarkets. Roast or steam them like potatoes but do NOT peel them (just scrub them clean); they’re softer than potatoes and caramelise better. They’re especially yummy roast and make a good variation with Christmas dinner. Oh and if you have a vegetable garden or allotment they’re dead easy to grow – we had them in an odd, otherwise useless, corner when I was a kid and never needed to replant them as you never get all the tubers out!

For once I managed to get off my beam end this evening and do as I always used to: cook tea.

Chorizo with Mushrooms, Herbs and Linguini

Preparation: 10 minutes
Cooking: 15 minutes

You will need (adapt to suit your taste and what you have in the fridge):

• 250gm Chorizo, cut into sensible sized pieces
• large Onion, coarsely chopped
• lots of Garlic, coarsely chopped
• 400gm tin Tomatoes (or you could use very ripe fresh tomatoes)
• White wine
• 8-10 button mushrooms (halved if large)
• 8-10 good Black Olives, stoned and roughly chopped (I used the end of a tub of fresh Kalamata Olives)
• 2 good handfuls of fresh Herbs/Leaves (I used some baby spinach, mint leaves and tarragon)
• Olive oil
• Salt & Pepper
• 250gm fresh Pasta (I used Linguini, but any pasta will do)

Fry the onions, garlic and olives until they just begin to brown.
Add the chorizo and continue to cook for a couple more minutes.
Add the tin of tomatoes and a glass of white wine; continue cooking over a moderate heat.
After about 5 minutes, add the mushrooms and herbs plus more wine if needed to prevent it sticking. Season to taste.
Cook until chorizo is done (another 5 minutes or so) and the sauce is beginning to thicken.
Meanwhile cook the pasta until just done.
Drain the pasta, add it to the pan with the meat and mix together quickly.
Serve immediately with shaved Parmesan and a robust red wine.

This was a rib-sticking main course for the two of us (no starter or pudding required) or would serve 4 as a small main course.

East Green … no it’s not a new BBC soap opera, although, yes, it ought to be a cross between Paddington Green and Eastenders – perish the thought!

No, it’s a delightful new “carbon neutral” beer from Suffolk brewers Adnams’. I’ve known about it for some weeks, and yesterday Noreen managed to buy me a couple of bottles in Waitrose. I know I’m an Adnams fan, but even so this has to be one of the best handful of beers I’ve ever had!

In the words of the bottle: “light golden beer [..] subtle citrus and grassy hop aromas […] a dry and refreshing beer with well balanced bitterness.” Yep that’s spot on. It is light, golden and pleasantly hoppy; just the right touch of bitterness for me (ie. not too much). For those who know their beer it is a cross between Adnams’ Bitter and Shepherd Neame’s “Whitstable Bay”.

Here’s what Adnams’ website says about East Green:!

East Green is a pale blonde beer that began life as an effort to produce an environmentally responsible beer that had flavour and integrity in equal balance. We wanted to design a beer that uses a minimum amount of energy without compromising on quality. We use 100% Maris Otter pale ale malted barley which is grown and malted in East Anglia, we also use Boadicea hops, which are grown in Suffolk’s only commercial hop yard. We chose Boadicea as not only is it available locally but it is also an aphid resistant hop. Aphids, as anyone who has a hop plant growing in their garden will know, love hops, and so aphicides are sprayed during the season to rid the plant of aphids. Boadicea is naturally resistant to aphids and so this cuts down on the amount of pesticides that have to be used. All that aside, I also think it is a great hop. It has a fantastic grassy lemon quality that works so well with this beer. We use the hops at 3 stages during the brewing process in order to maximise the flavour we get from it.

Yep, that’s one stunning beer. Well done Adnams’ Master Brewer. Just keep brewing it please boys!