Do Me a Favour

My little CC, aka Little Muchkin, has started a new blog and would like all my readers and followers to also read/follow her. I didn't have the heart to tell her that barely anyone reads me (sob!), and promised that I would add a link to her blog here.

So, just for my little CC/Munchkin - here is the link.

In all honesty, this is the best dessert I've had all year. ;o)

http://littlemunchkin-cookingproject.blogspot.com/2012/01/it-is-sucess.html

Please excuse the spelling mistakes on her page, I am trying not to helicopter-mother her on this one, but have just reminded her that she could  perhaps use the spellchecker! I've also just asked her to go and make my last serving of this. It really is delicious. Well done to my little CC-Munchkin-Baby-Lady.

Mommy loves you!

Exercise update: Today I did the school run - 4.06km I think it was today, I'm easing myself back in gently - especially after those French hills. I'm signing up for Sussex marathon tomorrow (!) it's on April 1  - so to all my running buddies out there - won't anyone join me ??

I have some great Garmin gps routes to upload from my recent trip to France. I know I keep going on about it, but those hills were so steep, I seriously had to walk them, which should set me up well for Sussex, because apparently it's a beast (or some other word(s) beginning with b) Tee hee. :o)

Happy New Year !!

Wow! It's 2012 !! That jumped up and hit me out of the blue, or so it seems...

Still no time for bloggy blog, so just a quickie..

Had a(n) horrendous pit-of-tummy feeling earlier today when I realised I will turn 40 next year - eek!

Also, am on cereal and soup thang to drop a few pounds - yikes!

Am about to sign up for Sussex marathon on April 1 - anyone wanna join me ???

More on that, and much more... coming SOON! :o)

Monday Hyde park run at Garmin Connect - Details

Hi,

Testing out the upload from my lovely Garmin watch to the bloggy blog.

What do you think, not bad eh ? This is one of my favourite runs, which I only do on a Monday lunchtime with my BB, so it's special. Ah....

Monday Hyde park run by kookygirluk at Garmin Connect - Details

Merry Christmas everyone, I'll be out there running off that big dinner on the 26th! :o)

Kai Mayfair

Despite having all (well, most) of the Christmas shopping done and wrapped, I can still feel Christmas fatigue setting in.

However, let's move on to one of the nicer aspects of Christmas today, the office lunch. We went to a restaurant called 'Kai' in Mayfair, London. It has one Michelin star and serves Chinese cuisine. I guess you would call it 'fine dining'. We went for the tasting menu, with a choice of starter, main and desert with a variety of 'amuse bouches' on the way through. Here's what I had.

1) Miso broth - A lovely heady, fragrant broth flavoured with soy and laced with tiny cubes of silken tofu. It was lovely.

2) Starter - pork and prawn wanton. This was dropped with chilli oil from a pipette at the table. It was nice and spicy and it came in a little concentrated jus which had spring onions and chilli in it.  The jus was also poured at the table, as I recall. It was a little spicy, but very yummy.

3) A palate cleanser of a little pineapple granita with popping candy(?). Lovely.

4) Main - 5-hour roasted pork belly - this was served with rice. The pork came in a lovely sauce and had an almost jelly-like, melt-in-the-mouth layer of fat. I usually abhor fat layers on meat, but I ate this. It tasted sublime. The pork itself was really like any pulled pork that you might have done yourself. I know I cook belly pork for hours at a time in soy, honey, spring onions, chinese 5 spice, for a not totally dissimilar effect. Other than that fat layer, of course. Who knows how they do that ... ???

5) Desert - Chocolate and peanuts 'done 5 ways'. Actually, this was something of a layer cake, each layer made up of various variations of chocolate and peanuts. There was some more popping candy in there too. I love that stuff! I could defnitely have eaten more of this.

6) A little selection of chef's chocolates, or petit fours, were brought to the table for our tasting pleasure. I tried another chocolate/peanut combo and also a chocolate fudge. My lunching friends also tried passion fruit marshmallow, and something with raspberry. They all looked delicious.

We paid an additional £12.00, on top of the £35 for the food, for 3 small glasses of wine which were matched to the threee main courses, respectively.

Next time, I will definintely go 'a la carte' to try specific items from the menu, but the taster menu was the perfect introduction today. I would definitely recommend this for a lazy, indulgent, yet still light lunch.

Easy Christmas Entertaining

It's only a couple of weeks before Christmas, so it's time to bring on the Christmas Entertaining.

Kicking off this weekend, we have my parents, sister, brother-in-law and my little niece and nephew along for the day on Saturday. They have a three hour car journey each way, so by the time they arrive, they will be hungry and thirsty. Of course Christmas entertaining is all about the food isn't it ?

Trouble is, I don't really feel much like cooking this weekend (Oops!), but that's only because I feel like I'm coming down with  a cold or something. My body feels exhausted and drained. But then I was thinking that I have a couple of options which don't require a lot of work.. Here's option 1:

Option 1 - Roast

Roast a great big chicken, chuck in some roast potatoes and parsnips, serve with some carrots and brussel sprouts, with some stuffing and bread sauce on the side. That's just like a Sunday roast, no ? Other than the chopping and peeling, there's really not a lot to it? It doesn't need a nursemaid to stand and stir it or watch it, so I will be able to get on with chilling with my family. We will be six adults and 2 children, so that's not massive numbers to cater for. This is also the less expensive option. Desert will be Apple pie (courtesy of Costco) served with custard, cream or ice-cream. Yumlish!

I quite like this because we can all sit round the table and serve ourselves and pull a Christmas cracker. It will be quite convivial and fun, and well, like a Christmas meal.

Option 2 - Buffet

There's not a lot of work involved in this one either really... but, to me a buffet is something you have later in the day after you have eaten something warm, and not then main foodie event.... but if I go that route this is what I will serve

Roast chicken
Sushi
Prawns with dip
Warm Pesto pasta with bacon
Mixed salad
French bread
Nibbles - Sausage Rolls/Onion bhaji

Desert will be the same. apple pie with various accompaniments

Which one would you choose??

An Update

Saturday
In the end I served Roast beef, Yorkshire puddings, Roast potatoes, Roast parsnips, carrots, sprouts, sage and onion stuffing and beef gravy. It was really yum, and went down really well with all the family. I made my easy tiramisu for desert, or there was apple pie and cream.

Sunday
I took the easy way out on Sunday and baked some pizza and garlic bread and then freshened things up with a big bowl of salad and salad dressing. We also had some chicken goujons, and stuffed, breaded mozarella sticks. It was perfect for the occasion.


Next week...

One more set of entertaining next week when my friend travels down with her hubby, 3yr old female twins and 14 yr old son. Of course, there will be myself BB and CC. What to cook that will suit us all and still give us time to chat and chill out. They will have driven for a few hours so will need a good feast before they hit the road again...

Suggestions anyone ??

Non Such Park Run

I'm on the search to better my recent 5K PB of 25:41 which  I achieved a couple of weeks ago in Banstead park run. Banstead's rather a hilly course, so I'm seriously hoping I can break the 25 minute mark, enter then 24:?? and give myself a new challenge... and of course work my way up the finisher's list. I have been told that Non such is nice and flat, so I have added that to my 'to do' list for this weekend.

I have just had a lovely 40 minute run in today's chilly weather. It was really nice to get out there instead of succumbing to the ironing pile and a cuppa. not forgetting the warmth of the indoors. I donned  a hat and gloves, but I didn't really need then. I say that now of course, had I not worn them I probably wouldn't be able to type!

On the subject of running, I am currently on the look out for some new race goals. So if any of my running friends know of a good 10K, half marathon or marathon that they would recommend then drop me a comment and let me know. Maybe we could go together ?

:o)

A French Christmas with Oysters Galore

This year, 2011, will see us celebrating Christmas in France for the second time. Last year was okaaaay. As I recall, we rose late, called family, opened gifts galore, gorged on smoked salmon and eggs, cooked a large dinner that no one wanted to eat - although, of course, we finally managed to force some down at about 6pm. Later we watched some Christmas telly on our very small TV, played card games and went to bed.

One of the best parts of the day for me, was the view out of the window. It looked like this.

Looks like something out of a magazine doesn't it? It was magical. The view is the reason we bought the house - Serious. I call the house my Labour of Love. Because it is.

We usually see our friends who also live in the village, and this year will be no different. For a while we have been threatening to do a curry cook-off, and I think that might actually happen this year, so I will shortly be packing my spices and Indian recipe books to take with me. What fun!

We always throw a nice dinner for our friends too, and for several years we have admired the wooden baskets of oysters from afar, but never cooked them. This year we thought we would get some and serve them to our friends for a starter. This is what I plan to do with them. It's funny talking about packing my recipe books, but with no access to t'interweb, what's a girl to do ? Actually, I secretly love planning my Christmas meals and packing my recipe books, something old stylee about it don't you think ? I also enjoy packing up all those lovely ingredients in anticipation of the delicious meals to come.

This is taken from my newest Christmas recipe book Celebrate Christmas

I plan to serve a 'mixed oyster platter' with a selection of oysters made according to the recipes below.  To accompany this we will drink chilled, dry (sec) bubbly blanquette. Oh yes, and let's not forget a little bit of baguette to soak up the juices. Yummies!

Oysters with bloody mary sauce

24 oysters on the half shell
3tbsp tomato juice
3tsp vodka
1tsp lemon juice
0.5tsp worcestershire sauce
1-2 drops tabasco
1 celery stick
1-2tsp snipped chives

1. Remove the oysters from their shells and set aside. Wash the shells in hot water and pat dry.

2. Combine the juices, vodka, tabasco and worcestershire sauce.

3. Cut the celery stick into julienne strips (eg v.v.thin) and place in the base of the oyster shells.

4. Top with an oyster and drizzle with the tomato mixture. Sprinkle with chopped chives.

Champagne Oysters

*I will use blanquette in place of Champagne, the grapes for which are grown in the vines that surround the village. It would probably be a criminal offence to not use blanquette.

1 French (it had to be didn't it?) shallot, finely chopped
150ml champagne, or sparkling white wine*
150g unsalted butter
2tbsp creme fraiche
2 egg yolks
500g rock salt
24 oysters on the half shell

1. Put the shallot and 125ml of the champagne blanquette in a small saucepan over a medium heat. Simmer until reduced to 1tbsp. Strain into a heatproof bowl, discarding the shallot.

2. Place the bowl over a saucepan of gently simmering water and whisk in the butter, one piece at a time, until thick and creamy. Remove from the heat and stir in the creme fraiche.

3. Whisk the egg yolks and remaining champagne blanquette in a separate heatproof bowl over a saucepan of gently simmering water until the mixture forms ribbons when drizzled. Remove from the heat and fold into the butter mixture. Season to taste.

To serve - spread the rock salt on a tray and arrange the oysters on top. Spoon a teaspoon of the champagne (oops! I mean blanquette), mixture onto each oyster and cook under a moderate grill for 1-2 minutes until golden brown.

Finally, recipe 3.

Oysters wtih prosciuttio and balsamic vinegar

24 oysters on the half shell
2-3tbsp balsamic vinegar
6 slices proscitto, each chopped into 4 thin strips

1. Remove the oysters from their shells and set aside. Wash the shells in hot water and pat dry.

2. Replace the oysters and put them on a baking tray.

3. Drizzle the balsamic vinegar over the oysters and arrange a coil of prosciutto on top.

4. Season with black pepper.

5. Cooked under a hot grill for about 1 minute, or until the prosciutto is starting to crisp.

That's the appetiser prepped, now what to do for the main course ??

Bon Appetit!