Weekend in Leeds

Have come back from a wonderful weekend in Leeds. Think I've put a stone on in weight as we ate wonderful home baked bread, lovely meals and breakfasts.

Lovely fresh eggs from their chickens.

The weather forecast for the weekend was a bit rubbish - rain and minus temperatures. But our friends are very accommodating and agreed to being dragged up Ilkley Moor.

This is a small garden within Ilkey.

Oh I so miss this kind of view, living in a city.

And being good British people we sat in the freezing cold, on Ilkley Moor having a picnic! Couldn't legitimately sing the song as we were wearing hats!

We finished the walk with a wonder through Ilkley and dribbled at the window at Bettys. Decided not to go in as we were covered in mud, dripping wet and were very cold. Not sure they would have let us in or probably put us in some obscure corner. If you have never been to Betty's then you are missing out on a treat. They have other stores in Harrogate and York - so do treat yourselves if you ever go there.

Seems a life time ago since we were so hot and paddled in this river.

Back to our friends home for hot chocolate and teas. Time to have a browse through their wonderful array of cookery books. But I was sooooo jealous when I found this.......

Julia Child is an American chef who decided to publish a huge work to teach Americans to cook French cuisine. There are no colour plates but lovely little sketches when words are not enough. I love the layout and am tempted to buy this with some birthday money.

Sadly all good things have to come to an end and we made our way home in the very cold temperatures. But home to cards, presies and flowers.

Aren't these orchids amazing. Well I think they are orchids - no label.

And more flowers.

Look a cute owl!

And a BASKET - a girl can never have too many baskets.

Didn't I do well - sooo lucky to have 4 wonderful children.

Finally - I will shut up and leave you in peace - woke up to some more snow and the weather woman informing us of the temperature feeling like -6! Ooh so chilly.

Guess The Dinner?

At Christmas time (golly that seems an eternity ago now) my wonderful No 1 daughter kindly wrapped some food up and placed it in the freezer. Decided it was time to start using it - but what is it?

Definitely does not look like vanilla ice cream!

Close up view. Mr P and I think it is a beef casserole.

Also found this dish - so hopefully it will go together.

Meanwhile time to complete another dish.....

This pudding I was going to make at the weekend.

Often looked at this book but not used many recipes from it.

Starts off in a frying pan - doesn't it look pretty.

Then it was covered with pastry and baked in the oven. This is what it look likes before I inverted it.

Ta dah one yummy pear tarte tatin.

Well any guesses as to the dinner?

Well we got it wrong but only a bit wrong.

It was slices of roast beef in gravy. Thankfully this obviously went well with the mash and veggies. I know there are a few more mystery items in the freezer, from Christmas. In fact they look so mysterious that we do not know if it is even sweet or savoury! So you will have more opportunities to guess the frozen product.


17 books used. 110 books to go. 300 days to go.

Welcome Spring

Last two days have truly felt as if spring has started. This was the view this morning when I went out to my car at 7am to go to work.

The view looked lovely and cheered me on as I had a very long and full day ahead of me. Out in the back garden the snowdrops are still flowering. I cannot remember them lasting this long, but they probably have and I have never noticed before.

Me trying to be arty farty in the following picture!

Had a bit of a shock yesterday after blogging about the cookery books used. For those who didn't notice the comment here it is "You need to be using a book at least every 3 days to stand a chance of getting near- A tall challenge! Lots of 5 course dinner parties might help with one course from every book". Oh heck I have a lot of cooking to do so having a few minutes to spare last night I hastily prepared a carrot and coriander soup.

Have to be honest and say I have used this recipe lots of times, but I love the way that you save a bit of carrot to grate and add at the end as a bit of texture. Also last night I did not add the cream so as to keep it lower in calories.

 

Plenty for me to take to work for the next few days.

Well all my good effort to help my challenge yesterday went by the way today as after a 10.5 hour shift all I was capable of making was cheese on toast!

Finally a glimpse of No. 3's baby at 20 weeks - amazing how much you can see.

Looks to me as if "Nemo" is practising eskimo kissing!

 

 16 books used. 111 books to go. 301 days to go. 
 

Cookery Books

Cookery Books Used For The Challenge - Ongoing List

The challenge is to use one recipe from every cookbook I own - which is 127 books, within this year. End date of challenge 31.12.13

Oops I have already used one book twice so my counting will need to be sorted out!

Antonio Carluccio's Simple Cooking

Laura Washburn -  Home Cooked Comforts (Used this book twice - oops)

Jamie Does France, Spain .....

The Dairy Book Of Home Cookery

Good Housekeeping's Basic Cookery

Cook With Jamie

Baking Made Easy - Lorraine Pascal

Kitchen - Nigella Lawson

Mary Berry's Ultimate Cake Book

Easy Comfort Food

Practical Pasta Italian Cookery

Jamie's 30 Minute Meals

James Martin - The Great British Village Show Cookbook

Ainsley Harriott's - Meals in Minutes

Jamie's Ministry of Food.

15 books used. 112 books to go. 302 days to go.

Family Weekend

For any Welsh readers happy belated St David's day.

Had a lovely weekend spending time with part of the family. No 3, hubby and dog came to stay (from Bristol). She's now 20 weeks pregnant. They came Friday night and Mr P and No 3 stayed up till 1am talking - how sweet. Saturday my dad came too and this provided an opportunity to reduce my challenge slightly. So lunch I made a pea and mint soup with some olive toasted ciabatti.

 
Definitely green! Recipe taken from this book - yet another book by Jamie.

The afternoon was spent down Queens Road mooching around the charity, antique and of course the wonderful wool shop. Have to say we were very restrained and I got a couple of balls of wool to make a matinee coat. No 3's hubby and my dad felt a calling to the cafe for cake and hot chocolate. Should say Mr P does not do shopping, so he stayed at home to change his bikes brake shoes. Unfortunately dinner was a roast so no book was required.

Mr P finally managed to have his first experience of cutting up my credit card! No I haven't been naughty it was just that he had lost his credit card and mine being linked to his was no longer valid.

Sunday was church followed by a trip to the Fabric Guild - didn't buy much just one remnant at 60p and 1 ball of wool. Mind you at church I thought we would never get out as so many people wanted to congratulate No 3 and hubby, examine the lump and them deciding that the baby will surely be a girl. The people at church are so so sweet. Strange their verdict because hubby is positive it will be a boy! I find it so funny how people can make such judgements - I haven't a clue.

After lunch - yesterdays leftover soup was a serious game of chess.

Silence was in order with the only noise being the clicking of the knitting needles - oh and telling Poppy, the dog, to lie down - as her tail is lethal and was in danger of sending the chess pieces flying.

She looks so innocent but every few minutes she has to do a circle around the rooms downstairs to check there has been no food dropped and left for her! As soon as anyone goes into the kitchen she's there with you! Ever hopeful!















Dinner came out of the same book - useless aren't I. I am getting behind with this challenge - oh heck and it's only March.

 

This was the first time I have ever used shitake mushrooms - they are certainly full of flavour and have a sort of texture that the regular mushrooms do not have.

This knitting pattern was the first thing I ever knitted. It was when I was first pregnant with No 1. and I knitted it in jade green. Sadly I do not have the garments, don't know what happened to them. SO it seemed appropriate to be knitting my first garment for little Nemo using the same pattern.

This is the back, ready to put onto a pin. I like this green, sorry the picture has washed the colour out.


 127 cookery books     16 recipes completed        111 books to go.

302 days to go.

In Training

Last night I asked Mr P to accompany me to a store that we have not been to for about 18 years. I wanted him to come with me because I felt I need some therapy or rather training. I find it hard to believe it has been this long since we went to buy something from this store when there was a time in our lives when this store would almost be a weekly trip. You may well ask what shop am I on a about?

They still have the catalogue and in some ways the store looks rather familiar and I feel as if time has stood still. Think I'm finding it hard to believe it's not me I am having to buy for but my daughter. Where have all the years gone - she can't be old enough to be a mum yet - she's still my baby. She's still the little girl running out of the door with her hair in a whale style and her school uniform thrown on.

An assistant comes up to us I think a little confused as I guess we didn't look quite like the average shopper in there. She was probably even more confused after talking to us. Looking at this picture on the catalogue that's how old I feel - the mirror is telling lies. Well that is until I start thinking about all those sleepless nights and the never ending energy required in raising children - mmmm me thinks that perhaps the mirror isn't telling lies.

Well you can't go into a shop like this and come out with nothing, so not knowing the sex and in denial that any grandchild of ours could ever be small enough to fit into a 0-3 month range of clothing we come away with a bath towel! What are we like!?

 But the towel bought back happy  memories of our children having fun in the bath and then snuggling them into these towels with the cute hat/type corners, smelling so wonderfully sweet. Oh dear enough emotion - time to get ready for work.

Grumbles and water

Last night saw me in a bad mood - I don't often feel like this but yesterday was the exception. Think my frustration came about from working too long hours at work, having someone offload their marriage problems without asking and knees hurting. So in distance past when I've felt a bit low or not been able to deal with a situation I've got my knitting out. Off I went into the wardrobe, a bit like the one in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe to dig out some gorgeous cotton wool by peaches n'creme. A dishcloth - yes that is what I knit when I'm disgruntled. Buried myself in a gorgeous French pattern, watched some tv on IPlayer and it was not until I finished it did I realise my mistake!

Think my holes went in the wrong place but hey ho it's only going to be used to wash dishes with and NO I am not blocking it when shortly it will be in a bowl of washing up.

Today felt as if it was going from bad to worse. Decided it was time to call the solicitor up re the claim after the accident last September. Beginning of February they had emailed me and asked for some photographs which I sent the next day, should say this comes after months of filling in millions of forms, physio reports and a medical examination. They then said they would get back to me well they have not. During the conversation it became obvious that they have not done anything! AAAARGH! So I have made a note in my diary to phone them up again in 2 weeks if I have not heard anything. Then on a mission I got Mr P to phone the police up re the accident as yet again we have not heard anything from them. Discovered that they have only just interviewed the guy that ran his car into us - 5 months after the event! Mr P pointed out that this has taken a while and they said well they have 6  months to deal with it! So the police too are in my diary to chase up. Can you imagine if we all worked like that - nothing would get done.

Well enough moans and off I went to the gym, for some time on the walking machine, the bicycle and then a wonderful swim. Oh the water is just so so so so wonderful. There are no phones, no loud music, no computers, no TV just yourself and time to think. Something about the water has a therapeutic effect on me. Have always liked water whether that's being in it or walking by it or sitting and dreaming by it. Now that I am truly destressed, calm off for a well earnt cuppa and off to work.