Tag Archives: soup

Back to Basics

Onions and celery

I’ve let things slide a bit over the last year. The last few months have seen my writing and my diet fall into disarray, and my personal grooming could do with some attention.

The last one was easy. Julia bought me an electric head shaver as an early Christmas present and a few days ago I gave myself a good going over with the trimmers then had a go with the head shaver. It doesn’t produce a smooth and shiny bald head like a wet shave, but it’s quicker and easier and, let’s face it, safer. There is always a danger, when impersonating an octopus and wet shaving my head, that I’m going to do a quick van Gogh impersonation. When you see what some people can do to their chin with a wet shave and a so-called safety razor, you have to wonder what I could do if I slip whilst contorting to do the fold at the top of my neck.

Tin and label

I just had a look on the internet to find the correct term for this. You’d think it would be easy enough, but it’s a bit tricky. I don’t want to get it wrong, so I’ll just say that the back of my skull has a prominent ridge of the sort associated with thugs, gorillas and cavemen. It’s supposedly a sign of neck muscle attachments, but to me it’s a sign of deficient social skills and a slightly lower position on the evolutionary scale than I would like to occupy. It’s strange that of all the deficiencies in my body and appearance, I fixate on the back of my head. Apart from that, it’s not easy to shave. A smoother skull would be a definite advantage in head shaving.

I realised, when reading about skulls, that although I am familiar with many of the names of skull parts from my viewing of CSI, that I don’t actually know where most of them are. There are 22 of them, all with long names – parietal, occipital, temporal, sphenoid, and ethmoid for starters. I’m going to admit defeat on this – I really don’t have time or brain cells to assimilate it all. If I ever need to describe a head injury to a doctor I will stick to simple terms like front and back and trust that they know the rest.

Simmer

Anyway, that’s what it is. Next, I will trim my beard, but I like to take my time over that.

The writing is a permanent mess that never seems to run well for more than a few months at a time, so we can leave that for a while.

So it’s diet now, and as the title suggests, I’m starting from scratch. Soup.

Last night’s soup was tomato. Onions, celery, a tin of tomatoes and a tin of water. If you use boiling water it saves heating the whole pan again, and also makes it easier to take the label off. Hand blender. Note I used a steel saucepan after my casserole misadventures. Today I will make broccoli and blue cheese soup, and use the leftover tomato as the base for tonight’s curry sauce. Sweet potato and chickpea curry tonight. A simple staple that we have drifted away from after discovering biriyani seasoning in a kit from TESCO. That’s the thing about getting organised, it makes things easier. It’s also cheaper than buy seasoning and sauce in a box, and contains fewer chemicals.

All done

And a tuna sandwich garnish . . .

Hands free can opener – one of my devices for coping with arthritis. Most days I am OK, but some days I just don’t feel like wrestling with a can. JML also made my head shaver. They seem to be the modern RONCO.

Bridges, Birds and Big Boys Toys

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Two views featuring the same bridge

Last night I started typing, got as far as the corned beef sandwiches and was woken by Julia at 3.30 am. She had woken in the night and noticed that the bed wasn’t as warm or as noisy as usual, and come to look for me. I was asleep in my magnificent office chair. I knew it was a good ideato buy a good one.

I don’t remember feeling tired, I just fell asleep mid-blog. I will continue now, using the lines I had already written.

In the 24 hours prior to the events I have just described, I had written 33 haiku and 9 tanka. It doesn’t sound much but it felt like my head was being crushed. I’d also dealt with several emails, written 1,000 words on Prime Ministers who were shot and done the normal sort of cooking and washing up.

Heron waiting to have a poem written about it

Many of the poems will be deleted, or heavily edited, but the purpose of the quantity is practice and defeating the inner critic. Once you have the material you can carve it into shape, but if you keep telling yourself it is not good enough you never have anything to work with..

The corned beef hash from Sunday became thick vegetable soup for Monday night, and thin soup for Tuesday lunch. The thick soup was accompanied by bread from the bread maker, and the two soups were accompanied by corned beef sandwiches using the rest of the bread and carefully stretching the corned beef by keeping it chilled in the fridge and cutting it thinly.

Between falling asleep and being woken by Julia I found I had had an acceptance from overseas. That’s two from last month’s submissions, and it was a good way to start the day. I use the term loosely as, when you use email and have an international reach, every day is a new one somewhere and where it starts and ends is just a constant process of change.

As an example of editorial opinion, the piece I had accepted last night had been rejected just weeks before by another editor. It was, I thought, the weakest of the three I sent out this time, which just goes to show that you never can tell (to quote Chuck Berry).

Flying Scotsman

A Good Start to the Day

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Today, as i so often do, I rose trotted along to the bathroom and looked at the clock. Time, I thought, to start my energetic morning. And for once I was right.

As I sit here. full of potato cakes, sausage and scrambled egg, I feel frugal and well fed. The sausage was one set aside from last night’s meal (sausages with onion gravy and mustard mash – we had to change plans at short notice so I fell back on something easy) and the potato cakes were made from the leftover mash with spring onions, flour and an egg.

As I write, I can hear the soup maker on its final blending cycle (broccoli and leek – I should have used onions but we have too many leeks) and the scent of slow-cooker lamb casserole is filling the house. It’s not quiet the same recipe as the one on the internet (which is so often the case when using online recipes) as the recipe uses just carrots, onions, peas and potatoes as the vegetables. We only had one carrot so I made up the deficiency with sweet potatoes, parsnips and swede. We also had surplus leeks and celery (see above) but it’s true to the spirit of the recipe. However, I was a bit annoyed to find it was New Zealand lamb when I looked at the label. I had assumed, in the absence of information on the supermarket website, that it was British lamb.

And that is pretty much all the news for the day. I am now writing, and that, if I’m lucky, will fill the rest of the day.

This is how I filled some of it.

Photo by Lisa Fotios on Pexels.com

Pens and Days Pass So Quickly

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I realised a couple of days ago that I need some new pictures of pens artistically posed across scribble (my general purpose photo for talking about writing or poetry (as if I know anything about it)). The orange Parker Pen, which I hoped would be my way to fame and fortune and free pens, proved o be a dead end. Then it broke. The barrels of recently made pens are so thin that they crack and when the ink gets into the cracks on brightly coloured pens, it shows up badly.

I also broke a good quality one and most of my others started clogging on a regular basis and I got so fed up of washing them out that I went back to fibre tips, then biros. Biro is cheap and, mainly reliable. Fibre tips, particularly cheap ones (my natural position in the market) can be erratic and unreliable so I bought some cheap Parker ballpoints and they are doing OK.

There will be some new photos in coming days.

Iranian Vegetable Stew – last night’s stew had dumplings and no yoghurt, and the greens were different. But it’s the nearest I’ve got.

Meanwhile, I have successfully wasted a day. The morning was quite productive, then someone sent me an auction catalogue. Well, you have to check in case there is anything you want, don’t you? According to Julia “You don’t.”. This is one of the areas where we disagree. However, she was the one who wanted children, and they have cost far more than my collecting. The main difference is that my collection has a resale value, but that sort of thing is frowned on when it comes to children. Mine were badly trained, so I don’t suppose they would have been worth much anyway.

At lunch (which was last night’s vegetable stew with additional herbs and a go whizzing from a stick blender) we realised it is Thursday already. Where does the time go?

Sumac and Sedum. I had no pictures of dumplings but after “dum” I picked up a picture with sedums. Search engines, less reliable than politicians . . .

I Grow Old . . .

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I don’t have long because the soup maker is on and the timer is running. I don’t have long and it’s difficult to type with my fingers crossed. (I haven’t used the soup maker for around seven years – doesn’t time fly – and I’m not sure that I have done it right. However, the die is cast and we will just have to see what it turns out like. Tomatoes, water, onions, red peppers, celery, garlic, cumin and chilli. What could possibly go wrong?

I was in trouble earlier this afternoon, as I went to visit the shop and Julia was expecting me back at twelve. I don’t know why, I only mentioned it vaguely in passing. It was an aspiration in my mind that became written in stone in hers. That seems to happen a lot these days. What do I say? Three men in a shop, several customers passing by, talk of coins, and the time just flies by.

Edward Lear Stamps (1988)

Ooops, I have to go now, the soup maker is bleeping at me. No, it’s stopped, so I will finish this before serving soup. I didn’t include lentils because I wasn’t sure they would cook properly in 21 minutes. I will have to look it up, or experiment. The trouble is that you have to make at least a litre at a time, which is a lot of soup. It’s three cans Or about two pints. It’s easier, despite my attachment to the weights and measures of my youth just to go with the flow. I drink beer from bottles these days so a pint means nothing to me, and the soup maker is marked in litres so that’s whay I use now. Except for milk. I still do that in pints too. and fuel. Sold in litres, converted to pints in my head, at which point I sigh heavily and remember the days I could fill the tank of a Ford Escort for £4. Of course, I forget that I only earned £15 a week after tax. Times change but the ramblings of old men plough a familiar furrow. I remember once saying that if I ever started talking about prices of today relative to the prices of my youth I would like to be put down.

A first class stamp is now £1.35. You could have a night out for that when I was young. Three pints of bitter, a packet of cigarettes nd some chips on the way home. I was a simple soul . . .

Stamps, stamps, stamps…

I grow old … I grow old …

I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

A Retired Couple

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Things that make me happy – Number One – Julia at a tearoom

Julia retired today. She will be back at work on Monday because they are short-staffed, and I suspect she won’t be paid for it. However, with the MENCAP pay rates being what they are, it won’t make a lot of difference.

On Tuesday we will officially be a retired couple and I suspect my life is not going to be as relaxed as it has been over the last few months. There is a lot more housework in my future. I can see it looming now. And a lot more decluttering.

Julia’s feet. Red shoes are almost a modern icon – from Judy Garland to Elvis Costello.

That’s a link to the story of how he wrote the song. Ten minutes of inspiration. Bowie mentions red shoes too. I must write a poem about them and have my moment rubbing shoulders with greatness.

We had soup for tea tonight. I meant to photograph it, just to get a new photograph to use. All my old soup photos have already been used several times. This is Tomato, Pepper and Lentil Soup. It also had half a strong home-grown onion in it. It was a can of tomatoes, a can of water, two peppers (we have quite a few at the moment) the onion, and some lentils. I always have red lentils about because I always think of them as healthy and you hardly notice them in soups. I like it with celery in it, but we didn’t have any as I’m slimming the fridge down at the moment. Normally I make it with beans too, as a sort of main course soup, but was surprised to find I had run out of canned beans. I must get a grip on the supplies.

Julia, Sutton-on-Sea, in a chip shop. It’s like a duller version of Cluedo, isn’t it?

That reminded me of something I could have written about last night – can openers. Our only can opener proved unable to remove the top from another can, and this one wasn’t even bent. A can opener that doesn’t open cans is not much use. In fact it’s not technically a can opener at that point. I must buy another but it needs some thought as the last one we bought fell apart within weeks, lasting only long enough for me to misplay the receipt. I’m also going to buy one of the old-fashioned bull’s head pattern – they are dangerous but effective, and I’d hate to starve to death as I gaze at a pile of unopenable cans. I do actually have one around the house from my antique dealing days. They are quite heavy so if I can’t cut the tin open I can bludgeon it until it gives up its contents. Lightweight versions of this were the only things we had at one time – the modern type safety opener was a marvel when we first saw them.

Julia as Lifeguard – Britannia Pier, Great Yarmouth

A Post About Vegetables

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It’s that time of night again, and having got used to relaxing I am having to force myself from a comfortable chair and set to cooking without a plan. The vague notion was “cauliflower cheese”. I thought I might do cauliflower steaks but it started falling apart and so I compromised by roasting two halves. It will be much the same, just not so charred and attractive. But there will be fewer irritating cauliflower bits around the place. They get everywhere!

Tree Gibraltar Point, Lincolnshire – dramatic setting

Sweetcorn and baked potatoes will be the only accompaniment in what is likely to be a disappointing meal. And a small amount of cheese sauce – we seem to have used most of the cheese. My vegetable intake has gone down seriously over the last few weeks and I need to address it. If I count the berries I had for breakfast as one portion, the cauliflower and sweetcorn only makes three and an apple will make four. That’s one short on my five a day and quite a lot short on the recommendations of many countries, and many scientists. I have let it slip badly over the last few months.

Time, next week, to start clawing my way back to eating better. The first step is planning. Sitting down to order from a list is always likely to result in better meals than pressing buttons as I try to think. That’s why we end up with sausages, pasties, pizzas and quiches so many times. Add a few beans, some potato and a tub of shop coleslaw with a few salad bits, and you are set for the week. It’s neither healthy nor nutritious, but it is filling.

Dabchick, Gibraltar Point, LincolnshireIt’s partly to do with being rushed all the time (or disorganised, as it is also known) , and partly to do with being lazy.

I also need to get back to making soup. I’ve been having far too much cheese on toast for lunch. It is fatty, calorific and lacks vegetables, even with tomato or spring onions on top. Soup is much better.

A late butterfly

Pictures are from September 2020 – post apocalypse.

The Twilight Zone

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I had a very bad night last night, due to several factors. Heat, too many thoughts and pain all contributed. As a result, I hovered. Part awake, part asleep, part wondering whether it was all worth it. And, of course, part wondering whether I would get anything done. My inactivity this summer has been stupendous. Comparing what I need to do with what I have actually done I don’t ever remember such a mismatch.

Fortunately, as I said to Julia, we have quite a lot of leeway and though we will move inefficiently it will be inconvenient rather than a disaster. She didn’t seem particularly pleased at the news. In fact she was quite snippy with me. She felt, it seems, that I could have left this news a few hours longer and told her after her alarm had gone off.

As a result of my night spent hovering between sleep and wakefulness, I spent a lot of my day hovering in much the same condition and achieved very little.This is made worse by the fact I am currently reading a biography of Terry Pratchett, who seems to have packed quite a lot into his life. However I do take comfort from one thing _ I am disorganised, but I have never lost, as he did, a royalty cheque for quarter of a million pounds. I can’t imagine that I will ever get a royalty cheque, but if I do, I know it won’t be for that amount of money. Fortunately it will all be done by bank transfer these days – a piece of modern life that I can appreciate.

Tomorrow I hope to be more with it, as I have carrot and ginger soup to make, amongst other things. The catering has gone slightly awry over the last few days and I need to make an urgent cauliflower cheese. Alternatively I can make cauliflower soup, but carrots and ginger with cheese sauce, which will be the companion dish, don’t sound altogether edible.

Cauliflower Steak with vegetables and Nut Cutlets

Becoming the Boring Bloke in the Corner

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Reverse of the Russian Fleet Medallion

I started writing last night. First I finished editing a piece on a small medallion commemorating the visit of the Russian Fleet to France in 1893. Then I sorted the photos and sent it to the man who manages the Numismatic Society Facebook page. I am such an interesting man.

Then I did 400 words on another medallion – this one features the Prince of Wales on one side (later Edward VIII) and the centenary for the railways on the other. Was it really only 1830 when the railways began? Probably not, but it was the first timetabled inter-city service using only steam locomotives. Earlier railways were horse-drawn or featured assistance from winches and cables on the harder sections. I see their point, but saying railways started in 1830 is taking a lot of credit from the earlier pioneers.

I am well on the way to becoming the boring bloke with the unusual interests that sits in the corner at club meetings. In fact, I have probably already become that man. We don’t seem to have one in the club at the moment and they often say that if you don’t see one, it is probably you.

The meatballs were reasonably edible last night, though I forgot to do the pasta, so we had a sort of meatball and Mediterranean vegetable stew. We were probably better off like that, though, as we don’t need all the carbs. Unfortunately there wasn’t as much vegetable sauce as I thought so we don’t really have enough to make another meal from it.. We will finish the lentil soup for lunch today and I will probably make cauliflower cheese for tea. It’s a big cauliflower this week and I need to make a start on it. The remains of the vegetable sauce will do for the foundations of another tomato soup.

Edward VIII. Opinions vary on whether he was a doomed romantic figure or a spoiled playboy with links to the Nazis.

Soup and obscure medallions. This is not the stuff of my youthful dreams. Neither were bad knees, dodgy plumbing (personal and household) or insomnia. My dreams used to feature mysterious oriental beauties (so that, at least came true), sports cars and the South of France. Later they were about walking in the Lake District, eating pie and chips in roadside pubs. See my previous comments on mysterious oriental beauties. It never occurred to me that I wouldn’t be able to get out of a low-slung sports car, that I’d have to limit my intake of pie and chips and that walking would become so difficult. Fortunately, I still have my dreams, even if the focus has changed.

Centenary of the railways 1830-1930. Note that it is Foreign Made. Despite our industrial muscle in the 1930s, we still imported cheap foreign tat.

The medallions are all less than an inch across, which keeps the costs down.

Daydreams of Soup and a Troublesome Spellchecker

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Generally Green Soup – broccoli, cauliflower and cauliflower leaves

I made soup today – it’s Bean Soup. Julia has a joke that goes with it, but I will spare you the agony of hearing it again. It contains onion, celery, garlic, red pepper, tinned tomatoes, water and beans. So far I have used chilli powder and Italian herbs to flavour it.It is not so much a recipe as a list of things that came to hand while I was standing by the cooker.

My latest dietary resolution is to eat more soup. This should help me maintain my new lower weight. As a result I have been listing my normal soup recipes. It isn’t really a long list.

Bean Soup

Now we can get parsnips again, Spicy Parsnip will be on the list, plus Broccoli, Sweetcorn, Generally Greenish Soup and Mushroom. I must resurrect some of the others which I no longer make, including Pumpkin, Sweet Potato and Nettle. That’s three sorts, not one combination, though I have been known to mix various combinations of Sweet Potato, Carrot, Parsnip, Pumpkin and Squash to come up with an Orange Soup. I’m going to have a try at lentil soup too. I keep meaning to give it a try but never quite get on with it. And Pea. I used to make Pea Soup from frozen peas but the blender tends to leave a lot of pea skins at the bottom of the pan. I tried sieving it but it isn’t really worth the effort. I may try dried peas next time.

To dd tp my frustrations today, my WP spellchecker seems to have resorted to an American format. It’s like the English one but every so often it tries to correct a word that needs no correction. I’m not sure how this has happened, but it has happened before and I have managed to get it back. I ill have to have a look at it tomorrow.

Cauliflower Soup

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Life after the Care Farm