Summertime Cook-out
I haven’t been around much lately, but that’s because nothing much of interest has been happening. Except for the odd weekend, travel is pretty much over with until we’re going to Japan for Nippon 2007.
That’s even though flights to Central Europe are so cheap that some of them are free.
Why? I hear you cry.
Because getting to either Stansted or Luton from Tadley is an expedition in its own right, and would cost about as much as a week’s package holiday in Ibiza.
And because, in the Summer, England is one of the best countries to be in. I have no particular desire to go anywhere for the time being.
And finally, because at long last I’m working on that novel. I hardly dare mention it, in case I’ll dry up again, but it’s kept me on my toes for the past month and that’s what I’m doing whenever I’m not procrastinating (the technical term for that is ‘cat-vacuuming’, but the neighbours’ cats have been avoiding me recently).
Well, today is one of those days, because today I’m having a cook-out.
With my hubby working late and weekends otherwise engaged, we haven’t had any fresh ingredients in the house for about two weeks. Only when I threatened to serve up spaghetti hoops on toast from the Co-op across the road, did hubby agree to take me shopping on Sunday.
It was the occasion of the bi-monthly Basingstoke Farmers’ Market. —That’s living in the sticks for you: what should be a twice-weekly occurrence for people to buy seasonal and local produce has still not quite penetrated to these parts, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed.
(On a side-note, Basingstoke city centre comprises a soul-less shopping mall with nothing more adventurous than an M&S food store and a quaint high street lined with estate agencies, so it’s not a question of hopping on a bus for some local food shopping. I have a dream about opening a chain of city-centre farm shops, selling produce from farms from around a 30-50 mile radius so people can walk in there and buy the very best produce without having to scour the country side by car. One of these days, someone will do just that and earn millions. But I digress.)
Perhaps I have gone a bit overboard. The problem with market produce is that it has to be used quickly, and the freezer is full.
Consider the menu for the week::
- Roast pork with cider gravy (England),
- Sülze with potato salad (Germany—a perfect picnic dish, which is why, after a sunny weekend, the clouds have drawn in again),
- Black bean chilli/burritos (TexMex),
- Steamed pig’s trotters with cabbage and noodles (China),
- Jerk chicken with rice ‘n’ peas (Jamaica—one day I have to go there and try the real thing!),
- Braised haunch of muntjak deer with red wine, chocolate and mushroom sauce (dunno, probably modern European fusion, seeing that larding game is a German influence).
While the chicken and deer await in the freezer, fresh watercress salad means the chilli needs cooking today, and the pig’s head and trotters are already on the stove, as they won’t keep.
I’ll be blogging a few of these recipes here, starting with the Sülze. Vegetarians may want to look away for that bit.
Tags: 'Round the World Recipes, Cooking, Food, Tadley Times, Travel, World Food, Tag Index
Denni