... had a busy weekend!(warning - long post containing 3 recipes)

It's Monday again, and this is the scene outside my living room window. Look at the frost rooftops! I think winter is officially here in Dundee. The perfect day for blogging recipes and the weekend's events whilst drinking tea, don't you think?

The weekend past was full of busy for me. Because we knew the weekend was going to be rushed in places, on Friday I cooked lovely beef casserole (which we are having leftovers of for tea tonight), and Dave and I ate it whilst watching QI, Argumental, and a bit of Jack Dee (who actually Dave is very like, if you wish to read his rantings, click here).

I'd eaten half of it by this time, but the light was better where

I was eating, so I took this photo!

We had leftover spiced cider from Bonfire Night, which I have found a hot cup of sends you off to sleep quite nicely!

The picture doesn't show the steam rising off this, or

the spice, appley smell. my blog needs smellivision

On Saturday evening, we were going to a party at Dave's new boss' house. Cue much worrying about what to wear. The thing is, you feel as someone's partner that how you are percieved will reflect upon them. The party was in someone's (quite grand) house, so I was worried about being either too dressed up, or not dressed up enough. Having decided to just buy something new, Dave accompanied me into town, and I dithered and worried around town looking for something. To add to trying to get the balance, I am above the biggest size most shops stock, and I am 5'10", so I am limited! The trusty DP and M&S saved me, and dressed in a new purple dress and patterend tights, off I went to the party.

The party itself was fun - fab food - tuna with wassabi, roast pork, chorizo, smoked salmon, beef stew, oysters, herring - lovely red wine, good music, and really relaxed! There were very dressed up people and very casual people, I was somewhere in the middle, and roughly dressed like the hostess, so I obiously got that one right! I pretty much managed to behave myself and not embarrass Dave, so jobs a good'un! We got home at half past two in the am, and went to bed knoing we had to get up early!

On Sunday, we left home around 11 to go to Dave's parents for lunch, Before heading to a gig Dave was playing in Glasgow. Lunch consisted of good food(Coq au Vin and bread and butter pudding), cups of tea, much chat of our ucpcoming holiday to Poland (EXCITED), and the boys all 'discussing' how their tiny laptop/blackberry/phone was the best. What tends to happen here is that the women mock them for being so obsessed an drink more tea.

Full of food an happiness, we got into the car and drove to Glasgow, listening to Alkaline Trio who I LOVE! Dave and our friend Ross were both playign the gig, so their were lots of freindly faces, but my hangover tiredness kicked in, and by the end I was a walking, talking 'needs sleep' poster!

Today, I am relaxing, staying in the flat because we have 3 packages to pick up from missing the post and I refuse to add the others to the collection, and baking a cake. Now here's the thing. The past few days have produced three recipes that I think are worth blogging, so I'm going to go ahead and do it here! Beef Casserole, Hot Spiced Cider and today's Pear-Ginger Upside-Down Cake!

Recipe 1 :Beef Casserole Topped with Potatoes

4tbsp olive oil

500g diced beef

50g flour

large red onion, diced

3 carrots, diced

5 large chestnut mushrooms, diced

1 pint beef stock

250 ml red wine

400g tin chopped tomatoes

tsp mixed spice

tsp parsley

tsp basil

tsp oregano

3 medium potatoes, peeled and slice to 1cm thickness.

• heat 2tsp oil in a pan
• flour beef chunks, brown in batches and remove from pan
• add onion and remaining olive oil to pan, fry till soft (3mins). there will be brown juicy flour bits in the pan, but leave them there, it's fine in the end
• add a little of the wine to deglazze the pan, scraping all the bits into it
• add rest of wine, tomatoes including juice, and herbs.
• cook on a low medium heat for 2 hours, stirring every 20 mins or so
• you should end up with a really dark, quite thick, glossy sauce

• somewhere in those 2 hours, parboil your potato slices - 7 mins should do it
• add beef mixture to pan, top with potatoes and brush with butter
• cook in oven for 30ish mins, till golden

You should find the top of the potatoes are crisp and the bottom nice and squidgy, like in a gratin. The beef should be tender, and the sauce deep, sweet ansd herby. These amounts made enough that we had a sizeable bowl each, and there was enough of the casserole to have with baked potatoes for another dinner. Leftovers for the win.

Recipe 2 :Hot Spiced Cider

1ltr Good quality sweet cider( I used Henney's because I love it)

500mls cloudy apple juice( I used Copella English Apple)

2 Cinnamon sticks

1tsp ground cinnamon

1tsp ground ginger

1tsp cloves

1tsp ground nutmeg

Put everything in a pot on a medium heat (if you want to remove the alcohol, do it on high), and simmer for 10 mins. If your cider is carbonated, it will fizz, which is fine, but to keep the alcohol in, you can't let it boil. Strain it to remove the cloves. and drink on a cold night, when you are watching the fireworks(feeling a bit smug that everyone else is paying £2 for watery tea), and then have the leftovers re-heated the next night, to make you cosy before bed.

Recipe 3: Ginger-Pear Upside Down Cake

Ginger and pears go. They just do. Might as well have them both in a cake then eh?

150g butter

150g light brown muscavado sugar

30g root ginger, chopped

tin of pear halves, drained

1tsp baking powder

2tsp ground ginger

1tsp cinnamon

2larg/3 medium free range eggs

• Pre-heat oven to 180c
• mix till smooth 25g butter and 25g sugar
• spread over the bottom of an 8inch round, non stick cake pan.mould. if you pan is not non stick, butter it and line bottom with greaseproof paper
• scatter over quarter of the ginger, and place the pears in flat side down.

• put remaining ingredients in a large bowl, and beat with electric mixer(mine is a ahdn mixer) till smooth.
• dollop a spoonfuls of the mixture between the pears, then and rest of it. this make it easier to keep the pears in place
• bake in centre of the oven for about 35 mins, till top of cake springs back when pressed

• remove from oven, and leave to cool in pan for at least 10 mins
• turn onto a plate, so that pears are visible, and remove paper if used
• serve warm, or leave to cool completely and slice.

Some of the cider would be pretty good with this I think! If serving warm, some vanilla ice cream would be lovely, If serving cold, creme frais would work well.

...remember, remember the 5th of November

The 5th of November in the UK is Guy Fawkes' Night, also know as Bonfire Night. It commemorates the Gunpowder Plot, which you can read about in the link. All over the UK, councils set up bonfires and firworks in community parks, and communities watch them together. In smaller, more rural areas, people build their own fires and organise thier own displays.

I really, really love fireworks, some of my favourite childhood memories are of my whole family going to displays, and when I lived in Dalmellington, building our own bonfire, and roasting potatoes on the edges of it. The potatoes were alwasy burnt on the outside and almost raw in the middle, but it was tradition! At the centre of all of these memories is my mum, handing out sparklers and clapping with us in our excitement about the fireworks, and making us hot chocolate when we got home.

6 years ago, after a long period of illness (noticably from when I was 8), my mum died on Bonfire Night. Until two years ago, and even last year to an extent, the event just brought out a horrible feeling of helplessness and sadness in me. I always miss her, but for some reason, this day being an anniversary amplifies it. Part of me hated the fact that I could not take pleasure in something that she had loved so much, and that I have so many memories of.

Over the past two years, as I have become more settled in all aspects of my life - relationships and career alike, I have also been comfortable in dealing with feelings I think I just wasn't equipped to. Having spoken to Dave and my sister about it recently, I have realised that time actually is a great healer, but only if you allow yourself to deal with things, and are aware of the support network you have. Where previously most of my memories focused on my mum's deteriorating health, I've found in these two years that I am able to remember the good times much more. I've stopped feeling that I have to be so very sad, because though I miss her immensely, my mum's one ideal for my sister and I was always just that we be happy.

Last year Dave and I went to two different displays, and though I had some moments, I was ok for the most part. This year, I realised that in the run up, whilst I have had the feeling of loss - it actually feels like theres a wee hole somewhere - I have also looked forward to going out for the occassion, watching the fireworks as part of a community, and being with my husband. This felt to me the most appropriate way of remembering my mum, not in sadness, but by doing something that she so loved to do with someone I love, by thinking of her, and being happy.

... loves sweet potatoes. And soup. you can probably see where I'm going with this one!

This is my favourite teacup. It is huge and has red flowers. Whats not to love?

Normally when Dave and I go shopping, I have a rough idea of what I want to make for the week. When we bought the chicken for our roast, I knew I would use the leftovers for soup. In the same shop, I decided to get an extra sweet potato, though I hand't decided what to do with it.The end result. For some reason my soup is always this colour!

I spent 3 hours today simmering the chicken carcass (Does anyone else REALLY not like the word carcass? it gives me the icks!) and some root vegetables to make stock for some chicken soup. I don't want you to get the idea that this is something I do frequently. I do make vegetable stock from scratch, but beef and chicken stock normally come in the form of cubes. The only reason I made my stock this time is that homemeade stock is really good if you do have time, and I had the chicken carcass anyway.

I was planning to make the soup on Monday, but after spending hours on buses going to and from Glasgow, coughing and spluttering, I ended up having enchildas for tea. Asda pre-made (though fresh) ones. Housewife extraordinaire image shattered eh?

So anyway, the soup. Well, I love soup. I can put it in the freezer, Dave can take it to work for lunch, and you can bung anything in, with good results 90% of the time. Normally if I use chicken in soup, I make it with rice, but the sweet potato in the fridge was calling to me. No really 'Lissaaa, Lisaaaa, put me in the soup, It will be delicious' it said, and so I did. The resulting soup is yummy (the talking sweet potato is clearly quite smart).I am so, so looking forward to having a bowl of it for tea.

Sweet Potato and Chicken Soup

This is what it looks like when it's just boiled...

For Stock (feel free to just use cubes though)

Carcass of roast chicken (i left all of the meat and skin on, for the nice roast chicken flavours)

2 carrots, sliced thinly

1 leek, sliced thinly

1 tsp mustard

1 tsp turmeric

itsp parsley

6 pints water(you may need more to top up)

• put everything into a soup pot
• bring to the boil
• simmer for 3 hours till liquid reduces and take on flavour
• strain

At this point, I took off the meat off the chicken, discarding skin, bones and veg used for stock, and shredded the chicken. If you don't have leftovers cook 3 chicken breasts in olive oil in your soup and, shred them and leave what juices have come out in the pan. Just add your olive oil to it.

...and it should look like this, with chunks of sweet potato,

carrot and chicken near the end

For Soup

1tbsp olive oil

1.5 Red onions, finely diced

2 cloves garlic, squished

large sweet potato, diced

chicken meat from roast/ 3 chicken breasts, cooked and shredded

3 small, carrots sliced finely

1 leek, sliced finely

1 heaped tsp mustard

2 stalks rosemary (tied together for eay removal)

2 bay leaves

good pinch chilli flakes

3tbsp tomato puree

salt and pepper to taste

• Heat oil in soup pan
• add onions and garlic, cook till soft (3mins ish)
• add veg and chicken, cook 1 min
• add all other ingredients
• bring to the boil, and simmer, stirring occasionally, 20 mins.
• when sweet potatoes are soft, use mashed to mash within soup
• boil further 25 mins
• remove rosemary stalks(leaves will have fallen off) and bay
• mash a little more.

The end result. For some reason my soup is always this colour!

This soup is really nice. It's quite sweet, so you may wish to add more salt, but it have a lovely deep, comforting spicy flavour, and is nice and meaty from the chicken. everything breaks down so that the 'bits' are small enough that I don't want to blend it, as its quite thick and hearty. It will set me up nicely for getting up early tomorrow, and provide tomorrow's dinner as soon as I get home!

...on presents and winning things :)

This is a bit of a backdated post, but some good things happened on Thursday, and I had no camera to document the good!

So, as I mentioned before, Dave got ill in the week. On Thursday, when I got up to go to work at 5 am, I'd had about an hour of sleep. I think you can Imagine how I was feeling! When I actually got to work, I was greeted at the door by the eldest of my charges, who was very excited, having 'made a picture' for me when visiting his childminder. It kind of made my heart burst that he'd thought of me, as I've only been with the family for a little more than a month. He came home with another one, a rubbing of a leaf, and they are now desplayed in my tiny kitchen!

When I got home to ill Dave, after giving him medicines and sympathy, I discovered I had post, from the lovely Lisa , It included this lovely card and some Reese' cups, which I have only managed to save two of! Lisa is incredibly thoughtful, It was so sweet of her to send me some loveliness all the way from American-Land!

Then, having procured some dinner for us from the local shops, I sat down to look at the new blog posts for the past couple of days, to find that I had won a runner-up prize in Caroline's Blog birthday givaway. I honestly never win anything, so I found this quite exciting! My prize was a voucher for her lovely shop of vintagey goodness - Patchwork Harmony. Be warned that if you look, you will want to buy EVERYTHING! I have already used my voucher to buy some lovely Christmas decorations. Thank you Caroline!!!

So that was my Thursday of good stuff. Today, I am going to rest, watch TV, read, drink fluids and use the leftover chicken from the roast to make some soup. Mmmmm soup.

...on what we eat in the Hughes flat when we are both ill and it's miserable outside.

Dave got ill early in the week with a lung-cough-thing. He has asthma, so it's a tad more worrisome than when a person gets it normally. Cue no sleeping and lots of administering of medication and juice. It was still fairly bad on Friday, so we cancelled all of our weekend plans (family dinner on Friday evening, going out for Halllowe'en on Saturday).

On Saturday, I woke up with the sniffles, but thought nothing of it, and Dave was feeling a bit bette5. so we decided to go for a wee drive. We went to Dunkeld, which is a lovely wee Scottish village which has lots of lovely shops, a cathedral, and a wildlife reserve among other things (people should go!). We walked around town, and visited the cathedral, and an antiques shop that sold books, and it was lovely(Not too taxing). All the while I was sniffing, but I assumed that it was just from being outside in the cold. We went into a wee hotel for some dinner (which was not very good, for £8 I'd expect actual chips and puff pastry, not frozen stuff), and in the midst of eating my pudding (sticky toffee pudding with ice cream, the best thing about both of our meal and I couldn't finish it)), the feeling of ill and sore hit. Dave infected me. Did I mention I have a wisdom tooth coming in too? Wisdom tooth pain + the cold + being in a car = not so fun.

Fast forward to this morning, and Dave and I both awoke feeling ill and very blah, added to which it is UTTERLY DISMAL outside. We had to go to ASDA for me to get passport photos taken (yep, when I'm ill, 10 years of looking dead on my passport, hooray!), and Dave had expressed and interest in having roast chicken for tea('chcken...for the noms?' being his exact words), so a-looking for some ingredients we went, and this is what I came up with.

Herby Roast Chicken with Mustardy Sweet Potato Mash

For Chicken

A Chicken (mine is 2.5 lb)

55g butter

2 cloves garlic(squished in the squisher)

2 sprigs rosmary leaves, roughy thirded.

2 thich pork sausages, skin removed

half a red onion, diced

salt and pepper

Before

After

• In a bowl, mash sausage meat,5g butter, onion, pinch of rosemary, aquarter of the garlic, and 2 twists of pepper and one of salt.
• in another bowl, mash remaining butter, rosemary, garlic, and salt and pepper as above
• place chicken in roasting tray/oven dish
• preheat oven to 220c
• stuff chicken with pork mixture
• cover outside of chicken with butter mixture

• bake in oven for 20 mins, then reduce temp to 190. bake for 20mins for each lb(50mins for my chicken) basting often
• give it a tin foil hat if it's getting too brown.

• when cooked (juices should run clear when chicken is poked with a skewer) remove from tray and leave to sit for 10 mins on plate
• on a medium heat, boil remaining juices in tin until they thicken to gravy(what happened here is my oven dish literally exploded. No gravy for us, but please make it as it tasted lovely before this incident)

What happens when you ovenproof dish isn't actually ovenproof

For Mash

1 large sweet potato, cubed

1tbsp mustard

1tbsp sour cream

salt and pepper.

Hubble, bubble, toil and trouble - I love this picture!

When you have 30 mins cooking time left, put sweet potatoes on to boil

• boil 20 mins till soft
• drain, return to pan and add other ingredients
• mash until smooth

Put your mash on the plate with some nice slices of chicken, dollop on some stuffing and top with gravy(assuming you dish didn't break). You will find, if you are anything like me, that this is happiness and comfort on a plate!

'Why Lisa', you ask, 'whatever will you do with the rest of the chicken?'

'Imaginary person I think is asking me questions', I say, 'some of it will be used for sandwiches, and the carcass and some of the meat will make lovely soup, to keep us warm on winter days'.

Which I will probably blog about...

How is everyone else spending this dismal Sunday?

... is Over The Top!

I've been working my way through the posts on my reader for about half an hour this morning. As ever, I was happy to see that Lisa of Lisa's Yarns had posted, for her blog is fantastic! So into the post I click, and am excited to hear that she has been given an award! I was even more excited to find that she has passed it on to me!

The Over The Top award is given by bloggers to other blogs they love! I am very happy to recieve this from such a lovely person!

With this award comes a questionnaire type thing(hurrah) and the chance to pass the blog on to six other bloggers!

1. Your hair: short
2. Your father: absent
   
3. Where is your cell phone : no idea!

1. Your mother: amazing
   
2. Your father: absent
   
3. Your favorite food: CAKE!
   
4. Your dream from last night: I don't remember!
   
5. Your favorite drink: Earl Grey
   
6. Your dream/goal: to have children and grandchildren, to have a job working with kids, to live in a Victorian house.
   
7. What room are you in: living room
   
8. What is your hobby: reading/art
9. What is your fear: Not making a difference in the world.
   
10. Where do you want to be in 6 years: Question 8 minus the grandchildren part! Hopefully somewhere in Scotland.
    
11. Where were you last night: Out for dinner with a freind, then at home
    
12. Something you are not: quiet
    
13. Muffins: Chocolate!
    
14. Wish list items: Kitchen Aid Mixer, more baking stuff, art for our flat, new art supplies, a new coat
    
15. Where did you grow up: Ayrshire, Scotland
    
16. Last thing you did: Had a cup of tea
    
17. What are you wearing: Wide leg jeans, white tshirt, grey v-neck sweatshirt.
    
18. Your TV: Is currently showing America's Next Top Model
19. Your pets: None - Dave is allergic!
20. Your friends: The best, ever. My freinds are amazing!
    
21. Your life: pretty fantastic!
    
22. Your mood: content
    
23. Missing someone: yep
    
24. Vehicle: The bus!
    
25. Something you're not wearing: jewellery
    
26. Your favorite store: H&M
    
27. Your favorite color: red/purple
    
28. When's the last time you laughed: This morning
    
29. When's the last time you cried: I cant remember
    
30. Your best friend: AWESOME
    
31. One place you go over and over: Greenock :)
    
32. One person who emails me regularly: None of my freinds email much!
    
33. Favorite place to eat: too hard!

And, the really fun part, these are the people I would like to give the award!

I know it's kind of cheating, but I'm passing it back to Lisa because I would have chosen her if someone else had given me the award!

Hannah of Seeds and Stitches

Fay of Dreaming of an Aga

Grace of A Southern Grace

Emily of Sugar Plum

Lacey of Perks of Being a JAP

You are awesome girlies!

...is having a quiet day.

So, this past weekend, I was volunteering at Oxjam Glasgow. I am happy to say that the venues Dave and I looked after made a fair bit of money, as well as raising alot of awareness about climate change, and the Copenhagen summit! I will write about the event in more depth when I have edited the photos I took.

One thing I'll say is, campaigning is EX-HAUSTING! We got home at 2am this morning, having decided that for Dave, a drive and then sleeping later was better than getting up at dawn's crack and dealing with rush hour traffic. I've woken up this morning feeling hungover, though I had nothing to drink. In a way though, I think it's good, becuase I obviously put alot into the weekend!

When I stumbled sleepily into the kitchen this morning, I was greeted by the ginger bread I made on Thursday, which I had completely forgotten about. It seems a cup of tea and some gingerbread makes one feel alot better! For the rest of the day, I shall be doing some reading(I have added two books to my reading, hurrah!), perhaps some baking, and editing my photos!

Of course, this will be accompanied by lots of cups of tea!