Tag Archives: Food

Boxing Day

Christmas day passed quickly. It’s now the early hours of Boxing Day. Several meals, presents, chocolates, Bailey’s, Strictly, Love Actually and several naps filled the day in a most satisfactory manner. We also had phone calls from the kids and I spoke to my sister so all the family stuff is done too. I am, as I have said before, a man of simple needs and it doesn’t take much to make me happy.

The Ancient Santa card is on the left, the other is only about 25 years old.

On the writing front, I allowed another deadline to slip by without submitting anything and reminded myself that there are two more to look at before the end of the month, which isn’t far away. I’ll get round to doing something in the next few days I suppose, but if I decide to sit with Julia and watch TV instead, it won’t be a tragedy. I quite like sitting and watching TV with Julia.

Boxing Day sees my favourite meal of the holidays – turkey sandwiches with cranberry jelly and stuffing. I usually add mayonnaise to, but I’m planning on heating some part-baked baguettes for tomorrow and I’m not convinced that hot bread and mayonnaise will go together that well. The day after Boxing Day usually features turkey sandwiches too, but they aren’t such a novelty by then.

Santa and Snowman figures

The pictures show our Christmas decorations by candle light. The Santa card is 33 years old. Julia always brings him out for Christmas and I have gradually phased out buying other cards, so it proved a wise investment. The Santa and Snowman figures are part of Christmas tradition too. I tried several different settings to allow for the colour temperature and managed to produce a number of odd effects. None of them quite captured the magic of candle light.

That’s about it. Another ordinary day in a dull life.

Thinking of Food

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I’m still not working with all my brain cells. Doing the online shopping tonight I actually ordered reduced fat cheese. Fortunately I realised my error before pressing the button. Reduced fat cheese – you might as well go the whole way and just make a lettuce sandwich.

Apart from that, nothing much happened. I started some research which will hopefully bear fruit in a post next week, packed ten parcels, loaded several lots on eBay and went home.

Julia had bought sausage rolls on the way home and despite my diet I was, I admit, happy to see them.

The diet is up and down at the moment. I have been eating a bit too much recently but am currently trying to cut back. It is just after eleven pm as I write this and I am hungry. This is probably a good sign.

I had a large bowl of vegetable stew for tea, with three dumplings balanced on top. Julia has not, if I’m honest, taken the concept of portion control on board. No dessert. I only had one biscuit with my evening drink. Only one sandwich for lunch. An apple. An orange thing of indeterminate parentage. Breakfast was two own brand wheat biscuits with half a banana and some blueberries.

Yes, I admit that it’s hardly a starvation diet, but it lacks the two slices of toast and marmalade, a sandwich, and pudding, as well as the cake, biscuits and chocolate that always seemed to crop up.

That’s where you score with online shopping – no impulse buys, no sudden urge to eat a pork pie just because they look nice in the chiller . . .

Musings on a Lack of Industry

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What sort of day was it today? I hear you ask.

Well, it’s our day off, so it started with a lie in and then we baked a couple of bake at home baguettes (we have accumulated several packs over the last few weeks) and filled it with the poor quality bacon we got from TESCO last week. For lunch we had excellent avocados on sourdough toast (because TESCO does ro some things right) and this evening we had stir fried veg with rice, because we seem to have a lot of vegetables.

Tonight I have put in a grocery order online but have concentrated on things like washing powder and stuff as we don’t need a lot of food. In a couple of weeks I will probably rearrange the shopping so we can miss a week – we just seem to have accumulated too much food as a result of having to make a minimum order every week.

There are a lot of pitfalls to grocery shopping online, even without the inefficiency of the supermarket, one being the accidental stockpiling of baked beans and tinned tomatoes.

The rest of the day was reasonable. We picked up our prescriptions, though mine was two pills short. It isn’t even worth ringing up about, but it will go down in the new diary I am keeping about my prescription ordering, because I’m getting sick of the inefficiency.

I actually got a bit of writing done, read some blog posts and started to organise my submission plan for the month ahead. A couple of magazines have reorganised things – one isn’t taking haibun for a while and another is going to publish every two months instead of every month, so it needs allowing for in the plan.

That’s what they don’t tell you when you start writing – for every hour you write there’s at least on for errands, one for planning, one for reading and one for watching TV. Actually writing time is limited, and that’s before you squander it on video games, looking out of the window and chewing the end of your metaphorical pen.

Cup a Soup Chronicles I – Batchelor’s Chicken Noodle

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Cup a Soup Chronicles I (12.02.21)

Batchelor’s Chicken Noodle – ASDA 75p for four sachets

There haven’t been many scones in my life over the last twelve months, but as I was sitting at work drinking Cup a Soup last week, I thought “I know what I can do”. So here I am, doing it.

Cup a Soup

I’ve been meaning to ty the Chicken Noodle for a few weeks but ASDA have been unable to supply it. I don’t know why, it’s not that good that people will be stocking up with it.

My first thought was that it looked like washing up water after a hard day cooking – a little grey with a sheen of grease. My second thought was that it tasted a bit like washing up water too. As I got to the bottom I found that despite energetic stirring at the beginning, a lot of it had settled back in the bottom of the mug, particularly the noodles. I wondered where they had got to – they had seemed a bit sparse. Be warned at this point, do not scoop out the noodles and eat them, when they are semi-dissolved and eaten in bulk they resemble wallpaper paste.

My second cup, taken later in the day, was a better experience. I stirred it several times whilst drinking it and the colour, flavour and noodle distribution were all greatly improved. The main problem, once that was solved, was that two of these soups provided me with 50% of my daily salt ration. That’s not good.

For 75p it’s not expensive and as long as you stir several times whilst drinking, the taste and noodle issue is solved.

look at all that salt!

Doing its dishwater impression

Gratitude

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I’ve just been looking at how to write a Gratitude Journal. There are mixed views on the best way to do this but one way which is, according to a research study, very effective, is to write a list of three things just once a week. It seems that less is more in this area. Al the information is on the link. Having established that minimal effort produced good results, I stopped reading.

So, here we are. Three things for me to feel gratitude for.

One, fruit crumble. We had apple and dried apricot crumble last night. It was a decision aided by the presence of just one apple and the remains of a bag of dried apricots. The rhubarb is currently looking a bit sparse and needs time to revive. We have, in truth, picked too much. We have been neglecting it, so a good measure of manure will be needed this autumn.

On the crumble, we had custard. We have been having either cream or milk or nothing with it, depending on the supply situation. They are all pleasant ways to eat crumble but custard is the best.

The fact that I have plenty of food, and Julia to cook it for me, are the icing on the cake. This is perhaps not the best figure of speech to employ at this point, but it puts things across nicely, even if it is culinarily confusing. The spellchecker doesn’t like ‘culinarily’, but it is a proper word, so hard cheese.

Two, my health. It might not be the first thing you expect me to say. I’m obese, hypertensive and arthritic with a variety of other faults that keep me involved with doctors and phlebotomists, but in general I’m OK and while I may not make 91 like my Dad, I’m not feeling too bad at the moment. In fact, I’m feeling downright perky at the moment. It could, of course, be a lot better.

I should. I suppose, be ashamed of myself for getting into this state. However, let it never be said that I have gone to my grave with a song still in me. When I am old and huddled in front of Countdown, I will have many a disreptuble memory to bring an enigmatic smile to my lips.

Three – WordPress. What would be the point of writing all this if nobody read it? Or if there was nobody to discuss it with? Plus, I can be nosey, and live several lives apart from my own. Within moments of switching on the computer I can be riding my cycle in the Scottish borders, walking in the New Forest or sitting my Maine woodland garden. Or watching the Oregon sunset with my cats, making demented videos with an iconic yellow bear or gardening in Leeds.

There is just so much to do and so many people to see. And that’s before I start on the other sites. My grasp of American military history, with associated cartoons, and the archaeology of death is now much better than it used to be, as is my gardening and cookery knowledge.

Without the writers of WordPress my lockdown would be a dreadfully dull and lonely place.

That, I think, will do. It seems you can wear your gratitude out if you use it too much, and I don’t want to risk it.

Lockdown Diaries

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My diary for yesterday – 29 April 2020. I’m writing it in the early hours of the next day after a full day of loafing. I thought I’d have a go at writing a diary so I can look back in years to come. I also means that I can moan in this one and write a soup recipe in the other post.

Despite my commitment to earlier rising I managed to roll over and go back to sleep after Julia got up. This is becoming a habit and something I need to avoid. It started as a matter of practicality – I would let everyone else in the house use the bathroom and dress before rushing round, eating breakfast prepared by Julia and then giving her a lift to work.

It has, over the years, become less a matter of practicality and more a matter of laziness. I am also finding, with having arthritis, that it isn’t so easy to rush in a morning. I used to resemble a meercat, bright and busy, but I now move like a tectonic plate. The grating in my knees and back adds to the impression of geological motion.

My back has been particularly bad for the last three days and I’m having trouble getting around. I am using my stick even to get round the house. Last week I had trouble with my knees and ended up wearing a knee brace. I seem to be falling apart by installments.

When I finally creaked downstairs the post had already been and I had a letter about a telephone consultation with rheumatology. I’m beginning to wonder why we can’t always do it by phone, apart from blood tests and X-Rays. Later in the day I had a phone call to tell me the blood tests results were OK and I could start taking the Methotrexate. This was an exact copy of the call I had yesterday, They are trying to patch a service together using part-time staff and staff out of retirement, and there are a few rough edges. On the other hand, it’s not a great problem to get an extra phone call – it’s a lot better than not getting the results at all, which, unfortunately, has happened in the past.

The Methotrexate has several side effects, and I think I may have one of them as my stomach is giving trouble. After taking the pills last night (you take six on one day and then take a vitamin pill on the other six days) I did not feel very well. On the other hand it may be coincidence. The vitamin pills are to help counter some of the drug’s side effects. You know you have problems when you have to take pills to protect you from the other pills you are taking.

If I had my life over again I would look after my health and my money more sensibly. And my wife.

I made soup for lunch, which I have already written about.

plastic container with fruits and vegetables on green grass

Photo by Lisa Fotios on Pexels.com

Later I went online and finalised my grocery order. We have a Click & Collect order to pick up tomorrow and, as it’s difficult to order groceries two weeks in advance, it needed quite a lot of alteration. You have to secure a slot as soon as it becomes available and worry about the details later.

I did put in an order two weeks ago and haven’t been able to alter it until now. The original order had 19 items and they were unable to supply five of them. I cancelled some things and added others. When I went to checkout I found four of the items were out of stock, including the flour. Twenty minutes and they were already cancelling things…

I went back to the flour to look for alternatives and there were none, However, they were still showing my original selection to be in stock. I thought I’d order it again just to check. It was out of stock when I got back to checkout. I am thinking bad thoughts about ASDA.

Six weeks after the panic buying and I still can’t buy flour. I also had trouble with eggs, baked beans and tinned chickpeas. Makes you wonder about the “robust supply chains” they claim they have.

The ASDA site even asks if you can go round the shop instead of using the delivery or collection services. To be honest, no. If I do click and collect or delivery I meet one or two people, who keep well away from me. Mathematically that’s a lot better than walking round a shop full of people who walk too close.

I’m not a great worrier, but I’ve decided on a strategy and I’m going to keep to it.

Photo by cottonbro on Pexels.com

Tales from Lockdown

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“Amateurs talk about tactics, but professionals study logistics.” – Gen. Robert H. Barrow, USMC (Commandant of the Marine Corps) noted in 1980

Julia has had a lecture from Number One Son. She let something slip about her trip to hospital and he wanted to know why she hadn’t told him. I’m beginning to know what my grandparents felt like when my parents told them off for various misdemeanours (like the time we called on my grandmother and found her standing in the kitchen sink to replace a light bulb).

I have a fairly hands-off approach to the care of the elderly and, as with my child rearing, feel that they turned out well despite my neglect.

Anyway, Number One Son and his partner sent Julia flowers. That is what is in the picture. I’m not actually sure whether partner is accurate, because nobody ever tells me anything. I’m considered to be “tactless”. However, he’s been hanging round with her for several years now and she hasn’t applied for a restraining order so I deduce that they may be an item.

We bought the curtains at a car boot about 15 years ago

Then it was my turn, as he texted me to make sure we had enough food in.

Ha! Do I look like I’m going to let myself starve? I read a quote recently – you can see it at the top of the post. It applies to many other things too. The fight against coronavirus shows how important it is to have the right equipment. The food shortages show how important it is to have strong supply chains.

Anyway – I have enough food to eat well for the next two weeks. After that I will run out of bread and milk, so will have to have black tea and make porridge with water (yes, I know that’s the proper way, but I do like milk). After that I have food for two more weeks eating out of cans and packets – including Spam and canned haggis. I’m pretty sure there are enough odds and ends for a few days beyond that too, but they really don’t bear thinking about.

At the moment I still can’t get a food delivery for this month, so I’m going shopping on Wednesday morning. TESCO has a Wednesday morning slot for the elderly and infirm. If it cuts down on queuing I have no pride.

The top two pictures show the flowers and, regrettably, the Car Boot curtains we bought about 15 years ago. Garish, dated, but functional and cheap.

The other shows roasted veg (carrot, parsnip, leek and broccoli) with cauliflower and cheese sauce. I made the sauce like Welsh Rarebit, hence the yellow colouring – it’s from the mustard.

My tea tonight

Scone Chronicles 33 – Yes, we have Scones

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I had meant to space the food reviews out a bit more, but I’ve been forced into this by a certain amount of heckling about the lack of scones.

Move smoothly on from Sunday evening, ignore the next couple of days and that brings us neatly to Wednesday and time for elevenses. We are at the Peak Shopping Village, the ducks are clustering round looking for food, and a small scone shaped gap is opening up in my middle regions.

We went to buy half-price boots for Julia, as her expensive ones had started letting in water. This was easy – by the time she had made her selection I had made a circuit of The Works, failed to buy a book, and had left in disgust. We then went to the hospice charity shop where the only thing I wanted turned out to be part of the display. I hate it when that happens.

By that time I was definitely in e of refreshment so we entered Massarella’s cafe and while I sought a table Julia went to get tea and scones.

A mediocre scone, with badly applied egg wash

As we breakfasted late (porridge followed by sausage sandwiches, using the sausages left over from the night before), other people were already lunching. My quest for a clean table did not go well and left me elbow to elbow with a stocky elderly lady (I select my words carefully) chasing the final clean table. She had a fine set of elbows and a surprising turn of speed, and laid her walking stick across the table to claim the prize as I floundered in her wake.

Massarella’s always sounds like an Italian restaurant, with tiled floors and lots of chatter. Add the barking of a dog to that and the whole ambiance falls apart, and not just for me. Several other people were clearly irritated by the dog-friendly aspect of the cafe.

However, compared to the scones, the barking dog was no problem. The scones were dry inside, and lacked flavour. My mother used to mutter “cheap baking” at times like this. It certainly seemed to lack the rich, fluffy, buttery sensation you get from a decent scone.

OK, not as disappointing as England’s woeful rugby performance, but still pretty disappointing

I have a feeling they may have been frozen, and dried out in thawing.

We will go back because we like the atmosphere, and the Italian gent behind the counter charmed Julia. And, of course, because they offer Afternoon Tea at £18 for two people. But, like a trip to the hospice shop, we won’t expect too much.

That last comment could also apply to the charity shops of Bakewell where we visited later – they don’t seem to have much in, and it’s getting harder to justify the time spent looking round when there are no decent books.

So, Massarella’s, the Charity shops of Derbyshire and The Works (where I failed to buy a single book) had all better pull their socks up. This is just not good enough!

Because they have ducks, a nature trail and a carved owl archway, I will visit again, but they would be well-advised to get a grip. Carved owls cannot replace decent scones.

Peak Shopping Village

The Hasselback Potatoes

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There is no photo, as I left my camera at work and can’t be bothered to go back and get it.

The picture I have used is merely a repeat of one from yesterday. My report is this – they look good and they are easy enough to do. People who have never had them before will be amazed. But they don’t taste much better than ordinary baked potatoes they way I did them (rapeseed oil and garlic seasoning).

I will try olive oil next, butter after that and even goose fat if I need to. They make a good talking point if you are having people round.

The stir-fried Brussels and broccoli were better. boil the Brussels and broccoli fro 5 minutes the stir fry them with soy sauce, honey, some rings of red chilli, ginger and garlic. It was very nice, and I suspect it was healthy too. I’m thinking of ways to serve Brussels over Christmas, and this is going to be one of the ways.

No photo of those either.

You’ll have to be content with a repeated photo for now. I’m going to have tea and toast in front of the TV now because Julia is away in Leeds for the day and I have several hours of quiz viewing to do, uninterrupted by conversation or the rattle of wrapping paper.

Will be back with another post later.

Scones and Things

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Julia and my sister went out for a special offer gym session and Afternoon Tea yesterday, hence the scones in the picture. It didn’t go 100% well. Service was poor, organisation was poor and the daintiness of the sandwiches left a lot to be desired.

My sandwiches at lunchtime are very similar, and I’d never dream of serving them to people as part of a sophisticated afternoon tea.

She eventually accepted their apologies and left with a doggy bag, as service had been so slow that she needed to be elsewhere.

To be fair, the portions were large, and I ate well as a result.

In the evening, as part of a week of celebrations to distract her from the fact she’s about to have a milestone birthday, we had curry delivered.

They have changed the recipe since we last ordered and we were left gasping for air by the new spicing regime in the prawn puri starter which we shared. And it was late.

It’s OK having all these deals and services, but not so good if they are going to be perpetually disappointing.

Frankly, I’d been expecting a three day week, efficient public transport by monorail and a robot butler by the year 2000, having believed everything I’d been told about the future back in 1968.

It hasn’t quite worked out like that.

We used the rice and biryani leftovers from last night to make kedgeree and watched Strictly Come Dancing.

It’s a far cry from my dreams of robot butlers.

Similarly, as I stuff envelopes tomorrow morning, it will be a long way from my dreams of a glittering career as a captain of industry. Fortunately the human mind is able to adapt to most forms of failure band I will probably emerge from my troglodytic existence at 1 am in a happy frame of mind.

With a rapidly approaching birthday and no gift ideas, I have more immediate problems than a disappointing life. It sounds the same, but a disappointed wife is infinitely worse.

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Life after the Care Farm