Breakfast fruit woes - and then there was juice!

So this morning I crawled out of bed (literally - I've got a bulged disc in my back) and wandered off for breakfast as normal. Cereal - check. Milk - check. Two non-5aday-items - check. Drat. On a 2-to-1 basis, that means that breakfast now involves 4 pieces of fruit or veg. And, having eaten an apple and an orange already this morning and contemplated with horror the thought of another pair of fruits before the fruit juice saved me, that's a rethink about breakfast.

So. Jam counts. Soft fruit counts. And -halleluja- so do fruit juice, smoothies and the red bits in red berry cereal. Which gives a small (and somewhat fruit-laden) set of breakfast options...

• Cereal/oats, milk (2nf) with fruit (raspberries, blackberries, frozen soft fruit mix, red berries etc), juice/smoothie and 2-fruit mid-morning snack (apple, orange, carrot etc).
• Bacon, toast (2nf) with 'shrooms, tomatoes, juice, 1-fruit snack.
• Toast/croissant (1nf) with jam/banana, juice.
• Kipper (1nf) with tomatoes, red pepper.
• Yoghurt (1nf) with fruit (berries, pear).

I'm still debating whether Pain Au Chocolat is a single non-fruit item or two of them. I think I'll declare it as one, before this all gets way way too confusing. On the plus side, a 2nf day will get me to 5 a day by lunchtime; on the minus side, I need to go and buy an awful lot more fruit.

Yeehah! I've just been to the 5-a-day veg portions list. Chickpeas count and so does onion. Hello, hummus...

I hate fruit so much, I've gone off chocolate

This is set to be a difficult month. And one low on chocolate. Twice now (already) I've foresworn a bar of chocolate because I couldn't face finding, buying and eating fruit to go with it. It's not that I dislike fruit per se - I like fruit when I'm eating it - it's more, like exercise, I dislike the thought of it until I get there. And so my chocolate consumption is curtailed (thanks, Hwsgo)... now all I need to do is work out a similar scheme for exercise. Maybe 1 exercise session for every 2 times I use the car?

2-to-1 month...

Yesterday, Hwsgo and I went shopping together. For food for each of our respective houses. Hwsgo helpfully put my shopping in front of his at the checkout. And it was more than a little embarassing. Hswgo: mainly fruit and veg, passata, some alcohol (champagne, I think). Me: bread, potatoes, tinned soup (tomato and scotch broth), baked beans. No veg. No fruit. Now admittedly that was because I wasn't sure whether I'd be visiting the fruit and veg market at the weekend, but it still didn't look good, and Hwsgo was at pains to point out a) my terrible diet and b) the ingredients in the tins (baked beans: sugar and salt; passata: mostly tomatoes).

So we tried again today. Spent most of my shopping time in the fruit and veg section, as advised (by Hwsgo). And when we got to the checkout with that lot and counted things up, we found that it had a 2:1 ratio of healthy things to eat (like green stuff) versus less-healthy ones (like bread). And since I don't have a theme yet for this month (still being on the Tesco-less diet), it's become 2 to 1 month. Every time I buy a foodstuff that isn't on the 5-a-day list, I have to buy 2 that *are* on the list. Oh, and I have to eat in that ratio too. Buying: not so difficult. Eating: almost bloody impossible, but I will at least try. It's only a month. Only a month...

But what *is* on the list? Hwsgo assures me that potatoes aren't, and apples definitely are, but what else? Ah - looking at the NHS site, pretty much anything fruit-ish or veg-ish that's not a potato. Passata counts (annoyingly), as does veg in soup. And if I eat 2 pieces of fruit a day, that should keep my ratios up okay. It's already started though: I went out to pick up some bread, which meant coming home with 2 french sticks and 4 assorted greenish things (rocket, mango, sprouts - yum-, and something green that I've already wiped from my memory). It amused Hwsgo though...

Simon: Parsley Soup, P146

I hate it when Hwsgo's right. Well not really - he is rather good at this cooking lark and I do listen to him, I'd just never admit that to anyone. Especially not to whoever's dropping in on my blogs... anyway, frying off some fennel then adding and frying off some chicken is a damned good way to reheat said chicken, and yes, admittedly, much much better than some of the dodgier things involving white sauces that I've done in the past.

And so from horror to disappointment. I've made soup, but it's not one of my best ones. I had almost all the ingredients for Simon's parsley soup, so when I saw bundles of Parsley in the market I leapt on them in anticipation of another special tasting treat. But no: I've made leek and potato soup with some parsley in it. Noticably. I may be being unfair to the recipe - I didn't quite follow it exactly in a not-quite-having-the-right-ingredients sort of way, i.e. I could only find one of the two leeks that I thought I had in the fridge, didn't have the energy to completely separate parsley stalks from leaves etc etc. (and I didn't envisage pulling parsley stalks out of my hand blender when I first started this quest). Simon recipes are usually robust to a little ingredient variation - maybe this one wasn't. It's not a horrible soup, it's just not spectacular.
But it did at least bring back another of those fun moments in cooking: the one where a lumpy bunch of vegetables suddenly turns into a big smooth soup. Maybe it'll be better in the morning.

Simon: Milk Chocolate Malt Ice-Cream (p45)

Hoorah for the credit crunch: rabbit is back in the shops again. Which is good, but we got ours from the game dealer at Bentley (always a bit suspicious seeing fridges stocked with duck a couple of miles from a wildfowl sanctuary, but hey at least it's had some exercise...). Hwsgo cooked the rabbit (whole, unjointed) as a French casserole with lots of tomatoes and veg inside: a good thing to come home to after losing the ability to move my arms much in the gym. Wine: Katnook Estate cabernet; not best matched to the Wabbit, but definitely best matched to our relaxed-out mood for the evening.

Oh, the Simon? Chocolate malt ice-cream. Not difficult really: I dashed home at lunchtime to make it (having collapsed into bed early last night), which mostly consisted of whisking stuff carefully and having patience whilst things melted into each other (and taking an educated guess at what "thickens slightly" means). It's had 7 hours of freezing now, but was at a happy cold-fudge state when we got home two hours ago, so it is possible to both make and eat it on the same day. Which judging by Hwsgo's earlier reaction to tasting it is really quite likely to happen.

The *really* important thing that I forgot to mention earlier was that I didn't use an ice-cream maker. I didn't even need to whisk the ice-cream mixture midway through: there were no ice crystals at all in it, and it just froze directly into the right state. Homemade ice-cream without the faff? Oh yes...

Outed

I cooked for my parents this weekend. Without breaking into a cold sweat. And I've outed myself: they now think that I can cook (eeek!). I did the Simon roast chicken (which I can now do with my eyes shut after a couple of glasses of red - well, I haven't tried that experiement yet but I'm willing to give it a go) with roasted onions, potatoes, garlic, red peppers and a thin gravy, followed by the Magimix apple crumble (translation: shove all the ingedients into the Magimax, hit the button, pour into dish, shove into oven, take out, gloat) with the custard recipe from my well-thumbed copy of the Good Housekeeping cookbook. And apart from cooking the custard a little too quickly (not watching it enough whilst chatting to my mother; possibly also affected by said couple of glasses of red by then), it seemed to be perfectly edible.

Okay, a little background here. My little sister is, as I've probably said before, a serious chef. A *really* serious chef. Gold medals at 18, world competition title by her mid-twenties, own gourmet restaurant before 30 - that sort of serious chef. And I by comparison - well, let's just say that I grew up burning things and making almost-inedible sauces with lumps in that looked like new life forms. My parents have been visiting a lot lately (few things to sort out down on the old farm etc), and every time they come I offer to cook and they do anything - anything, up to and including going out for a kebab - to avoid this. But yesterday they were so tired that I got away with it - and had the lovely warm feeling of producing a whole meal from start to finish including dessert in just over an hour. And having my mother go back for seconds (something she very rarely does) of *my* cooking. I'd consider being shocked if I wasn't too tired.

But a few details before I go. The crumble was great: a real light French apple crumble. This was partly because it was a French recipe book, but also because the apples were right. I had a bag of little red apples (I think from Tescos) that were floury and nasty to eat: I thought they'd cook well, and they did. I'll look for them again, next time I want to do a baked apple dish. It *is* possible to hurt yourself badly with a potato peeler (I did). Roasting peppers and garlic works really well if you put them into the roasting dish 30 minutes before the chicken's due out of the oven. And you can't hurry a good custard: if you set the temperature too high and whisk it too much, it will curdle (will taste fine but look horrid). Be gentle, be patient and it will, as most things treated gently in the kitchen, come right.

Pigeon, mmmmm Pigeon

First an aside: I've been told to drink more. Now anyone reading posts about me cooking with wine will find that a little surprising, but what I've been told to drink more of is water. So from now on you can call me 'camel girl'. Oh, and if you see me, please remind me to drink more.

Yesterday was a lovely day for a foodie, made even better because there were two of us out and about enjoying an accidentally fruitful shopping trip and a glorious autumn day. I bought Hwsgo a lovely bottle of wine (De Bortoli Yarra Valley reserve Chardonnary 2003?) to celebrate something a while ago; unfortunately it appears to have been one of the last bottles stocked by Oddbins, but fortunately after a little Internet searching we found a place near Eastbourne with some in stock. So off we drove to Hailsham Cellars, and a lovely journey it was, taking in some game shopping, a pub lunch, two cycle rides, a car museum, miniature train ride and a very serious game of crazy golf. And when we got to Hailsham Cellars, Hwsgo not only found exactly what he wanted, but he also made a new friend - the wonderfully friendly shop-owner - and found lots of lovely grape juice to drool over too. Heartily recommended, and a lovely place to sit and watch Hwsgo happily explore.

And the game shopping. We were having a moochy, lets-see-what-comes-up-and-do-what-we-feel-like day. And amongst other things, what came up was a sign for "Over ready game". So we followed the signs over a couple of country miles (like normal miles, but longer) and found South Brockwell Farm Shop. In Simon terms, it was like Christmas coming early: lots of the things that I haven't been able to find, even in the great game butchers near home. So we bought two fat pigeons, two - erm small birds that I'll have to ask Hwsgo about - and a nice plump piece of rabbit. And today we had the Roast Pigeon with Braised Lettuce, Peas and Bacon (page 155), with the pigeon that it was intended for (instead of the partridge that I used on the 9th January). Hwsgo cooked it whilst I was in the gym. The veg were as yummy as I remembered, and the pigeon was wonderfully richly liver textured and tasting. I think we may be going back there again soon too (probably on the way to the wine shop).

Another weekend

Friday, we cycled. Or at least attempted to cycle up a bloody big hill. And I mean a big hill. The sort of hill that, if it wasn't hidden by trees and meanders in the road up it, would be screaming "don't even attempt this" before we started. But we got up it. Not necessarily on top of the bikes all the way, but we did get up it with a modicum of dignity. We were both tired, both had had a long week, so we shortened the ride down and tried again the day after. Up the bloody big hill again, and on through some very pretty hillside lanes (yes, even Surrey has pretty bits, and boy were they crowded with blokes in lycra) to a lovely pub lunch at the Scarlett Arms in Walliswood, then on across the heaths and home. Not always a happy ride, but certainly a lovely one.
And on Sunday I ran. My first 10k for erm possibly years, and one performed entirely on a treadmill in the gym (as one of the 1000000 runners in the Human Race). It hurt, it really hurt, but I came in at 1hr 10mins in the end: not bad for an unfit old type. The Human Race gave me a distance counter for my runs, with a neat little dongle that downloads all my pavement-pounding onto an online log. It's an advert for Nike, but quite a useful one for the simple fee of staggering around for an hour (my previous running bribes have included beer, cider, t-shirts and medals). The only problem is the pledge section: I couldn't enter a running goal on the site without putting in a corresponding pledge for what I would do if I failed to meet that goal. So, if you see someone running a 10k after christmas and dressed as a giant rubber duck, it may just be me (but only if I can't run and log a 10k of less than 55 minutes).

On the food front, the Simons continue. No new ones this time, but I can now cook both the roast chicken (having memorised the oven temperatures: 240 and 190) and sauce bernaise recipes from memory. This is a good thing: if I can remember enough recipes, then I can compile a menu from what's available in the shops (without taking the book) rather than what's written on my shopping list. Which given there are beasties like guinea fowl in the freezer, has got to be a very good thing indeed.

A long slow descent and a Simon (Spinach Dumplings, p200)

An active bank holiday this. But first, the news from the scales... 6 days as follows: 177, 177, 176, 176, 175, 175. Yes, really. It would be nice if this series could continue... And exercise: two bike rides (33 miles and 34 miles, rides 4 and 2 from the OS book for Sussex etc). One fitness test: 14.33 for 1.5 miles, 28 press-ups, 30 sit-ups and a faintly pathetic number of floor pull-ups (with a retest every month from now) and a bootcamp circuit (just getting the hang of medicineball press-ups, but only just: my arms gave out on them tonight, as did S's). And a lovely little (4-6 miles?) walk in the country. Hwsgo, despite my worries about his fitness for the bike rides, surprised me enormously by not only being fit but also dashing away from me most of the way round. Although we were both terrible hill-crawlers on the first ride, by the second ride we were improving, and Hwsgo at least seems to have his grimp sorted now. I've now threatened to go to spinning classes (static bikes) until I can catch him on a hill again. Erm, I mean at all.

Foodwise, there has been a Simon, but no picture (too tired to face either the stairs or the hunt for the digital camera). Spinach Dumplings: a mix of blanched spinach and cheese, pepped up with nutmeg and pepper then cooled, formed into balls and boiled in a pan. Hwsgo loved them, but I don't think I'd actively try to cook them again, especially if the choice was between them and Parmesan Fritters. Worth noting though is the optimal ball size: inch-wide balls cooked a little too fast leaving quite dry balls; 2.5 inches was too big, with not-quite-cooked middles; 1.5 inch balls were just right, crisp without being dry and cooked through with a good crunchy shell. Oh, and coating the balls in lots and lots of flour helped a lot too.

A cheesecake also happened. And has been left behind by Hwsgo in an attempt to even up our weight loss distribution. I'd say that I could resist, but I can't. Never have been able to resist a good home-cooked carrot cake, and am not about to start resisting now. The good side is that the cake won't last much longer. The bad side is that I will have single-forkedly eaten it.

Onwards...

Dismay

This is so unfair. I haven't eaten chips, pies, chocolate or ice-cream, I've been to the gym, I've eaten sensibly (and believe me, plain flavoured healthy crisps are so sensible they're calorifically in dark brown lace-ups), and yet I've still put on weight. 176.8 yesterday, 177.4 today. Ah well, I'm sure it's one of those glitch things.

The good news balancing this unexpected attack of the sugar-plum elephants is that I fitted into some more of my old clothes. I have a pile in the bottom of my wardrobe, of things that I like but can't fit into. Or rather, that I liked: several items have been consigned to the Oxfam pile as soon as I can see how wrong they look. But my work shirts are good though: I bought these exactly a year ago in Edinburgh, was a bit too big for them when I got them home (they're an old-fashioned size 14, i.e. somewhat smaller than the 14s of today), but today they worked, give or take a little bust button strain. So something must be going right.

And meanwhile, today's the day when the serious exercise starts: S and I have our first session with Nick the personal trainer tonight. I may have problems walking tomorrow...

Training dip

S and I are both in quite an interesting training dip. Over a week of going to gym and getting on with it, only getting tired during the exercise itself, and we finally got round to being tired before the exercise started. We'd both pulled long days at work yesterday, but it seemed a bit more than that (at least to me). Many years ago I worked with someone who put themselves through Canadian forces training whenever they needed to get fit quickly. Apparently they started out okay, felt like hell for the first fortnight then were okay. And in a smaller way, I think this may be happening to us (the feeling like hell bit before we're okay). It's almost a fortnight since we started, and this is usually the point at which I start to give up on the new routine. I'd always put this down to some sort of mental resistance: the point beyond which it became difficult to sustain enthusiasm, but maybe it has a simpler root. Right now we're both a bit tired, so we did a simple set, and I'm currently vegging out on the sofa, but tomorrow it starts again. Big time: we're booked into a boot camp session with an ex-marine PTI. I think I may write the number of a local taxi firm on my arm before we go, just in case we need help getting home.

Oh, and the food slipped a bit. A late night, being a bit tired: I've seen a little too much of the "Snack Time" machine in the last 24 hours. And I went to the supermarket to stock up on veg and found myself almost desperate for chocolate, sugar and white bread. But I resisted and headed the urge off with sweetcorn cobs and multipacks of low-fat crisps. So. Back on the wagon and another evening without carbohydrates or sugar, and yogurt and fruit for dessert. It's worth it, just to see the scales going down every day. Or at least, possibly more realistically, not going up.

The fat lady gyms

Since my holiday (just over a week ago now) in summary: weights look something like this: 179.8, 180.0, 179.2, 178.6, 177.0, 176.4. Training looks something like this: powerplate almost every day, with 10 minutes of 10-minute miles on the treadmill, interspersed with walking or cycling every other day. Food: breakfast special k, lunchtime sandwiches, evening meat and veg, with packs of low-calorie crisps inbetween; not a single chocolate bar or sugary snack (although I do have to declare one scottish sweet). Health: fairly stable, one mild food reaction (100mph brain again) and the odd sniffle, with the powerplate situps doing an excellent job of keeping my bronchi clear (very similar effect to the percussion my parents used to keep my chest clear as a child) inbetween.

And that sorted, on to today's post. Gym etiquette with large ladies. S and I were on the powerplates last night (I think we may be becoming a feature on them...) when a rather large lady was led by a personal trainer onto a neighbouring machine. And while she was fighting some sit-ups, she glanced over and gave me that look. If you've got fit and hung around gyms for long enough, you know that look: a swirl of defiance and uncertainty, a subconscious division of the gym into me over here and you over there. If you've also got unfit and restarted training at gyms enough times, you also know that feeling: you've paid your money, you've bought your kit, you've walked through the doors, but somehow that extra layer of fat removes any sense of belonging in or to said gym, often to the point where it's easier to give up going rather than wait for the toned bodies to finish with the machines that you need. It's a sad fact that most people's mental image of female gym attenders is that they are all fit, thin, toned and that somehow they've always been that way and just need to go to the gym to top off their natural healthiness (I'll skip the other image of musclebound hulks for now). It’s up there with ‘thin people have always been thin’ and its dispiriting caveat ‘so I can’t even hope to join them’. And in that moment, with that stare, I realised that I didn’t know how to start to break down the divide. I thought about walking past and whispering “I was a size 18 two months ago” into her ear, but that seems patronising. I racked my brain for anything positive that I could do to help break the going-to-the-gym barrier down from fighting ones own body and attitude at the same time, to just fighting the fat, but there was nothing I could say or do at the time. So I just smiled and got back on with my own torture. I guess this is partly my own social inadequacy, partly my deepset belief that difficult things can become easier (not easy, note, but easier) if they’re done within a community, partly a comment on the powers of perception over reality, especially in matters social, but that moment did make me think for a while. And writing about it has helped: next time I see someone fighting themself and looking uncomfortable in the gym, I’ll smile and say ‘Hi’ before I get on with addressing my current inability to do a full wide-arm pressup properly. It takes a great deal of courage and determination for a fat person to walk into the gym: the very least that everyone else can do is acknowledge them as one of our own.

Food

Today is a risotto day. A lovely 20 minutes of typing mixed with occasionally watering (well, beering to be exact) and stirring the rice. My food habits have changed since Malta, and this is one of the first things that I've cooked alone that hasn't consisted of fresh meat/fish plus some fresh veg. Still, I'm having the risotto with a bit of smoked haddock and green leaves, so it's not quite as unhealthy as it could be.

I've also cut my coffee consumption down to 1 or 2 in the morning only (since the one night on holiday where I had a coffee late was the only one where I had problems getting to sleep) .
And taken to only eating low-calorie snacks and fruit between meals. And not eating chocolate... I ought to be losing weight, I really should, but I'm not yet. Still, I've give it a couple of weeks and see if I stop building muscle mass and start losing fat at the gym instead. And the boot camp session on Thursday should help...

Oh, and Melliha has a restaurant serving absolutely stunning rabbit risotto: the old windmill at the top of town. Lovely place, great service, and good European food.

Exercise

Well, it's been a while since I last wrote here, so I'm splitting this post into exercise-related stuff vs food-related stuff.

So, exercise. I've been on holiday - a diving, eating, beer-drinking (apparently compulsorary for divers) sort of a holiday. All 3 of us desperados wanted to get fitter and thinner during the trip, so we went out running together on the first day - a lovely 7am run round the streets before the Maltese sun was too hot (at about 7:45) to do much more than walk. And it was a great run, a good start to a one-week running program, but it interfered badly with the diving. Let's just say that getting overheated before diving lends oneself to things like screaming "get me out of here" and damaging one's instructor using only handily-available diving gear mixed with local wildlife (he was very good about it, and I know that sea-urchins hurt). So the morning run was banned after the first day, and exercise was limited to diving twice a day, carrying dive gear to the water (138 steps down - and up - in one case) and back, and walking round interesting places. All I can say is that diving in warm waters is amazing. I felt so utterly priviledged to be in amongst the wildlife in its own environment, and have memories (like finding myself in the middle of a huge school of fish who swam with me as though I was one of their own, or sitting out on the terrace at 6am, and less-good memories of fireworms threatening to attack me. Not seriously, though) that will last a lifetime. Anyways, between that and the cheap/ plentiful/ good Maltese cooking, I came back heavier than I went away, but I think a little fitter and with slightly stronger leg muscles.

Since then, S has decided to help her training prospects by booking us into a set of personal trainer sessions. He's on holiday too at the moment, so we have just over a week to get fit enough to show a convincing fitness test result and survive the start of his training (few things more worrying than a trainer's evil grin). We've been on the power plates most days this week: I haven't seen any weight loss (despite eating sensibly), but I do seem a bit more toned, and I'm definitely a bit fitter and stronger: today, I ran comfortable 10-minute miles where normally I would struggle to finish them. And I walked to work yesterday: 50 minutes, which at 3 mph is roughly 2.5 miles: a perfect distance for a daily training run. Cycling back from the gym hurt a bit though: the powerplate sessions are very leg-heavy, which is great for their shape but no so good if I'm trying to use them for something afterwards. Anyways, onwards. Current weight is 178.6, so quite a bit of work to do on that, but fitness first, then fat...

Don't Cough

Ouch. But in a good way. S and I tried out the vibrating plates machines (PowerPlates) at the gym two days ago (why does it always hurt 2 days later; why not on the day or 1 day later? Why always 2?). 15 minutes of fairly gentle exercise whilst whichever part was in contact with the plate vibrated at 30 or 35 hz (the 50hz setting is for massage not exercise. Which we didn't know on the day that we decided to play with the machines, set them to 50hz+high, lay on them then watched S - who is quite tiny - bouncing bodily up and down on the plate). The exercises didn't seem at all strenuous on the day. Apart from the press-ups, which I've always hated with a passion even when I could do them with one arm. And the sit-ups seemed particularly useless at the time. Then nothing. And nothing for a day again. But today - ouch. One cough, and I'm doubled up, muttering about the lower half of my 6-pack.

But no matter: if it's having an effect, then I'm going again. And again. Starting with today. Bzzzzzz.

Officially fat

And so I'm (almost) officially fat: the needle (or in this case, the digital readout) on the dial is nudging the "too heavy to be fun" mark after a weekend's overindulgence in Munich. Not that the weekend was a bad thing: for someone born and partially raised in Germany, a whole long weekend of beer, sausages and excellent saurkraut (as well as a stunning dancer of a wine and some civilised ravioli) is bad-foodie-indulgent heaven. But now I need to get serious (I mean really serious, not just a bit upset and moving a little bit closer to serious) about the weight. My weight. And of all things, this I know: there is no food in this world that I love more than the amount that I hate being overweight. There is no exercise (possibly with the exception of super-heavy indoor rowing) that I hate more than fat. And this, as the man might say, is a no-brainer.

Missing Simons Found: Delices d'Argenteuil (P2)...

...erm. I'm not sure what the other one was called, but I have the pictures: it's asparagus wrapped in parma ham then grilled.

More Simons

I've been a little remiss about writing this blog of late. Food has happened, exercise has happened, weight has happened (both up and down), yet the keyboard has remained silent. My apologies, gentle invisible readers.

So. Some delicious Simons have happened of late. Except it wasn't me cooking them: all the glorious credit should go squarely to Hwsgo and his equally glorious culinary talent. Which Simons? Poulet Saute au Viaigre (page 40) happened last weekend, but I can't right now remember what the earlier Simons were. I remember them being absolutely delicious though.

On relosing weight

Losing weight is one of the great rollercoasters of life (another is financial security, but that’s another story). You work hard, you watch the pounds slowly go away, then poof- something disrupts your carefully built routine, takes you off the treadmill for a while, and the pounds pile back on. And bring their friends too.

This is normal. This is life. For the thousands, perhaps millions, of us who haven’t had a stable weight since their teens, this is also deep deep despair. Weight is a great discriminator, gathering all our fears, all our weaknesses into one single flabby point. It makes our features look old, but our actions look immature; it changes the way we fit into the world, from the width of an airline seat to the attitudes of employers and strangers. Weight shouts "lazy" even at the active amongst us; shouts careless except at those camouflaged with immaculate make-up (and the world is also full of larger women with perfect lipstick). We legislate on age, gender, colour (not that that always helps, but at least the framework is there), but fat, flabby, bulky, hefty all have their connotations and uses.

But it’s not all despair. And apparently strangely, one of the first steps in losing the weight again seems to be holding an acceptance in your heart of who you are now, what you are now; to love the person you are and the body you are in regardless of the extra pounds. Because one of the biggest enemies is indeed that despair. Because that’s the rot that stops us going out for a run ("it’ll never make a difference now I’m fat") or doesn’t stop us reaching for that biscuit ("it won’t make any difference, I’m already fat"). And that is indeed rot: there is no magical non-overlapping fat-you and thin-you; there is just you. And what you do now affects you, and what you put in and take out of your body affects your body. Every little bit. Every walk-to-the-next-bus-stop, every extra bag of crisps: it all makes a difference. And the good news is that you get to be in charge of this ‘you’ character. You are just you. The weight thing is ancillary. So if it makes you feel better to be thinner, then do that extra walk and say no to that biscuit.

Me, I lost a lot of weight (3 stones at the last count), but put a lot back on (holding steady at just over an extra stone). Yes, that’s depressing. Yes, it’s rough starting again every time. Except it’s not really starting again. Because each time I understand what’s happening, each time I learn a little more about what I need to do (or not do) to start pushing down that weight, I’m going to write it down here, leaving a trail of breadcrumbs to follow, or if the food analogy is a bit too much, a carefully-knotted set of bedsheets to climb back into the size-12 window with. And hopefully, slowly, I won’t be starting again each time, but continuing at a place that I left off from earlier. With a bit more wisdom to beat down that despair with.

Someone I love very much is upset about their weight (in fact, two people I love very much had an almost-identical conversation about it with me this weekend). I need to lose weight, they need to lose weight; I miss being active. It’s a simple fix really: get out there and get proactive myself, and drag them along with me when I can. Stop bringing tempting foods with me so they don’t suffer afterwards too. Stop being a partner-in-crime and start being supportive instead. And ban the chips and chocolate. Full stop. Until we’re active enough to earn them (and even then, just share a small one). Onwards!

Time to make a list

I am conscious of not having Simoned recently, so I've bought pork belly and will be attempting one of his pork recipes soon.

Meanwhile, since I'm stuck in the house and I'm still trying to simplify my life, I thought I'd make a Sara-specific basic storecupboard list (and eat up everything else that's in the cupboards til they look like this):

• Spices: black peppercorns, sea salt, chilli flakes, paprika, nutmegs, vegetable stockcubes, beef stockcubes, saffron stalks, truffles.
  
• Wet: olive oil, soy sauce, balsamic vinegar, rice vinegar, sunflower oil, lemon juice, longlife milk
  
• Dry: brown sugar, self-raising flour, plain flour, bread mix
  
• Tins: tomato soup, baked beans, chickpeas, kidney beans, sardines or pilchards, anchovies
• Bits: brown rice, deCeccio pasta, Mr Mash, risotto rice, white beans, coffeebeans, coffee, hot chocolate, cereal, crackers
  
• Condiments: ketchup, marmite, honey, jam, dijon mustard, horseradish
  
• Fridge: gouda cheese, milk, butter, tomato paste, chorizo
  
• Frozen: mixed soft fruit
  
• Fresh: yams, onions, lemons, apples/pears, garlic.

And there are some Simon bits to keep too: mace, cloves.

On bike, off bike...

After a day of being irritatingly smug about cycling instead of using my car, I've fallen off it. Don't try to brake, undo a cleat (the thing that firmly attaches a shoe to a pedal) and round a corner at the same time: it doesn't work. And it's surprisingly difficult to undo said cleat whilst lying down. But I've cycled everywhere today (station and back, meeting and back, shopping and back), I feel good about it and I'm going to do it all over again tomorrow. Hopefully taking a longer route home too: I'll start by trying to get 10 miles in, and work my way up from there.

Pimp (del)(del)(del) Map my ride and friends

I'm trying a no-car week. Which failed miserably on the first day (monday) because I didn't have the nuts to cycle to the dentist (it's only a few miles) during worktime. Oh, and my dentist is in a dodgy area and I didn't have the requisite number (more than one) of bike locks. But it's Tuesday and I'll try again. Is interesting though: I used to spend most of my spare time on a bike (I averaged 300 miles a week when I lived in a flat place: many of them spent cycling to the nearest hill to practice grimping) , but now I'm daunted by more than 2 miles. I need to fix this, and cycling to work instead of using the car is only the start of it.

Ah... despite chickening out at cycling to the dentist, my travel this week includes: going to the doctors, to Hwsgo and a meeting in Farnborough. And whilst I was trying to find a route from the train station to my meeting (I've given up on the business image and reverted back to cycling techie. It's me. I'm happy with it), I found Map My Ride and its sister site Map My Run. Excellent idea. I've already measured a set of routes by hand for the wiki at work, but a "how do I get 5 miles in at lunchtime without being fumigated by a truck" website is a great idea. I'll be in checking at lunchtime. I would be running, but I did my first BodyPump class (weights to music) for a while last night, and I need to be a bit gentle on myself. The good news is that the back problem survived this okay. The bad news is that I seem to have quite a lot of muscle strength in the meantime. Oh, and my weight. 176.6lbs. Which is a slight improvement on the last few days at 177.4. I have much to do again, but at least I'm starting to do it.

1 Simon: Braised Endives

I have been quite bad (very bad is reserved for very special occasions) and not released the review of Hwsgo's Braised Endives yet. This is partly system rebuild (the photos are elsewhere) and partly a wrestling with my conscience about whether I could claim a Simon that someone else (albeit someone very close) cooked. So this is a review, right, unless I get down the wire with the 'how many Simons did I manage to cook in 2 years (note the more relaxed timetabling slipping in there)' thing.

Hwsgo braised the endives (and has done so at least twice since, which is possibly a good measure of how good the recipe is) at the same time as grilling some nice fat Cornish sardines, neither of which took an excessive amount of time (less than half an hour). It was truly excellent and classic Simon: rich and comforting, with enough sauce to enjoy again with bread at the end of the meal. Oh, you wanted me to review the food? Later...

One good, one bad, all shellfish

Well I did manage to have a bad meal in Philadelphia: an oyster plate at Pearl's Oyster bar in Reading Market. Where do I start... well, it's a plate. With oysters and fries and coleslaw and two little pots of relish. But the oysters are in batter: not light, floaty, enhance-the-taste tempura, but the sort of batter usually found round a 3am fried and anonymous piece of chicken: heavy, nasty, cloying. And the oysters? There are fish stands in the market with lovely lovely fresh fish in them, all full glassy eyes and taut shimmering tails. These oysters didn't taste that way. Although that may have had something to do with the strange slimy green sauce that they were each wrapped around. I had coffee with this; the cheque arrived on my table before I could even think of asking for a second cup. Think I didn't enjoy this? Let's talk about the other seafood...

...The Imperial Inn in Chinatown. I wandered in quite late, alone, and was amused to be ushered past all the big circular tables and gilded decor into a singles, locals and other sad folks room. Which was really rather jolly: I had a table with a prime view of a Chinese news channel (earthquake pictures very sobering over dinner) and the lady who was really in charge doing the accounts and being properly fussed over. As was I. As soon as I sat down and started thinking about my order, a glass of ice water, a pot of chinese tea and some nibbles (some form of chinese cheese straws as far as I could tell) and sauces appeared, although it's only fair to warn you that the yellow sauce with the nibbles is in fact very hot mustard and not a sweet mango relish as I'd supposed. So repressing the urge to order something smaller, I decided to try the pork dim sum and the mixed seafood-and-other-stuff (chicken, pork, vegetables) sizzling plate. And a beer: which arrived, as asked and requested, with the main meal; not a moment sooner, not a moment later. Which given it was a very drinkable pot of tea suited me just nicely. The dim sun: cheap, hot and four of them: looked hand-made, tasted authentic (as in would be perfectly acceptable in Wing Wah's in Birmingham: that's an accolade, btw). The sizzling plate: delicious (and came with rice: no "do you want anything with that madam", just a sensible bowl of proper sticky rice) , with big fat fried prawns (light tempura) and some other battered seafood that was firm, tasty and had just the right amount of bounce to it. Now Imperial managed that well as part of a much more complex dish: why couldn't Pearl's?

I ended with the water and a fortune cookie. "You are a person of strong sense of duty". Hmmm.

Philled me up

Hanging out in Philadelphia for a few days, and I haven't managed to have a bad meal here yet. Which is something of a record: either I'm getting very very good at choosing where to eat, or this place is a genuine foodie hotspot that I hadn't noticed before.

Case in point: Reading Terminal Market. I'm staying a block away, so it seemed silly not to try eating there at least once. Although I was only going out to get some more coffee from WaWas (24oz cups of decent filter coffee: one of the things that the US does well), it was close enough to lunchtime to drop in for something to eat at the oyster bar. Except. Except. I thought I'd have a walk around the market stalls first. And found Greek, Mexican, seafood, French bakeries, Chinese, Italian, Thai and sushi restaurants, all looking good, all deeply tempting. And then I was saved: the one thing I'd been hoping to try on this trip hove into view, and I ended up eating big plump blueberry pancakes with bacon at one of the Amish cafes. And I mean Amish, not some pastiche of 'Amish-style food' and low-paid girls in suitably ethnic frocks. I think they're used to that cultural pause/ intake of breath when someone rounds the corner and meets them for the first time (yes, reader, even I the seasoned liberal and traveller have cultural pauses sometimes) : the zip-free lass who served me in the Dutch Eating Place just grinned at me, got me some coffee and gave me a minute to get my bearings. Darned good pancakes, good enough that I may have to find a lower-fat route to the coffee next time.

Other places tried this trip: El Vez (great mexican presented in a modern european style; I think: it's a little difficult to tell past the haze of the blood orange and pomegranite margueritas), Marathon grill (damn fine quesadillas in all flavours, and more biiig cups of coffee), Capo Giro (Italian ice cream; highly rated icecreams online, but disappointing in reality apart from the stunningly good dark chocolate flavour), Mosulu (great setting on a schooner, but the chef, although good, seems unconfident, covering way too many of the dishes with over-sweet flavours) and the Caribou Cafe (I know where all the good French food has gone now. It's not in France anymore; it's hiding out in Pennsylvania. No problems getting a table-for-one inside on a busy day or turning up mid-afternoon for lunch; great food, and very moreish sourdough with it). I'm staying near Chinatown, but with this much choice, Chinese, even the sort of Chinese that sees queen conch as a staple food ingredient, just isn't tempting me at the moment. And more problematically I may also finally be full: tonight may just be a staying inside with a bag full of low-fat soy crisps (Glennys, cheddar flavour) sort of night. And maybe some more coffee.

1 Recipe: Basque Chiorro (Page 105)

It's a hot summers day, the kind of day that makes men get a haircut and fight to get a space at the supermarket, for the british dreams of beer and barbeques to begin. But not here, oh no. We're going to do a Simon. Today. Albeit one that can eaten on a sultry evening with cold beer and conversation.

So. First problem. The recipe is for hake. And no hake is to be found; the curse of visiting the fish counter on Fridays ("yes, we had some earlier but it's gone") strikes again. But it suggests cod as an alternative, so line-caught, earth-friendly cod it is. The other problem is the wine. The recipe suggests 2 glasses of red wine. But it doesn't say which red wine. So off down the wine aisle to look at not-terrible-because-I'll-have-to-drink-it but not-too-good-because-I'll-cry-cooking-with-it. The result: a 2005 Altos de Tamaron, complete with a 2007 silver from the Challenge International du Vin (cheap trick: if you're in France and know nothing about wine, head for the medal winners; it's a 1"ish gold silver or bronze circle pasted onto the bottle; Paris or regionals are usually good, and silver is usually worth a punt). I'll see how it goes. Smells quite fruity anyways.

Oh, and man does this recipe have a lot of garlic in it. 2 tablespoons of; Simon might as well have said "a small bulb" in the recipe and have done. Still, it's interesting to be using mace in a recipe (I got powdered, not realising quite how small a 'pinch' was) and the hot paprika that I bought by accidental finally found a use. Although I may have to make quite a lot of this recipe before I get through the whole tin of it.

I also treated myself to my wine of the month. A Marques de Murrieta Ygay (Gran Reserva 2000). Probably not the right wine for this dish (although Spanish and Spanish - whoops, I mean Basque- could work), but I'll see what Hwngo thinks. If indeed after the journey from heck (delayed flight, hot day) he's still capable of thought.

I've tried a little of the Altos de Tamaron. I have a cold, but I can still taste serious amounts of blackcurrants in it. I may possibly have bought Ribena by mistake. And it has a bit of a vicious backtaste to it, so perhaps more cough medicine than Ribena. But it's quite nice all the same. Although I'd be very careful what I'd put it with (wimpy food, no) it could be quite fun to feed to friends.

Oh Dear

The standards in this household have been slipping dramatically. A few days of hack-coding, and I'm back to techie-food, which consists mainly of. Erm. Coffee. With side-helpings of anything else that can be eaten with minimal preparation and interference with the typing fingers. Like ice-cream. Nuts. Random items from the cupboards. Beer. And more coffee.

Honestly, I must get a grip. Recuperating is no excuse for this. Being gripped by a need to fully understand all the java map classes is no excuse either. And nor is musing on the fineness of the ethical line between search and suggestion. No. I need to do a Simon. Soonas. That, and go to the gym. Just as soon as I've finished this code snippet...

57 whats, exactly?

Just back from a wild night out -erm, mainly spent sitting in train stations actually, but a lightning strike on the signalling system must take a while to sort out- and whilst I was finishing off the last of the risotto (so I wouldn't have to admit to dinner being a chicken sandwich and a bag of crisps) my eyes alighted on a tin of Heinz tomato soup (I'm so virtuous -cough- it was recently cleaned and about to go into the recycling) , and more specifically the little "57" on it.

Now almost everyone who's ever eaten baked beans knows about Heinz's 57 varieties. But have you ever thought how odd that is? It's a very old slogan, back from the times when there were only 5 types of tinned soup (or at least it seemed that way), but yet this company that I can only remember selling soup, baked beans and possibly some form of spaghetti hoops had 57 -count them- different varieties on their books. Now that is one heck of a set of variations on "tomato", and one that I (not too drunkenly) feel the need to investigate a little further. And heck, it's *my* blog...

Cooo.... wikipedia's entry on the 57 dates it back to 1892, when Heinz had more than 60 products but liked the number '57' lots. So what were they? I have some of the list: plum pudding, strawberry preserve, india relish, olive oil, spaghetti, euchred pickle (is that one that knows how to play cards?), currant jelly, chilli sauce, peanut butter, celery soup, horseradish, sauerkraut, vinegar, tomato ketchup, red pepper sauce, green pepper sauce, cider vinegar, apple butter, mincemeat, mustard, tomato soup, olives, pickled onions, pickled cauliflower, baked beans, sweet pickle. Looks a little like the base list for my own cupboards now. Except I'm a little light on the apple butter stuff. Sadly, despite my best search efforts, this is as big a list of 1892 varieties as I can assemble without seriously bugging the Heinz historians. Perhaps I will. Or perhaps tomorrow will bring a new and equally interesting question into my life. Who knows?

Oh, and I went to the gym today. Bodypump followed by pilates. Two (count them) sets of push-ups and planks. I confidently expect this to be the last time I can get my hands close enough together to type with both of them at the same time for quite some time... I can already feel the beer wearing off and my shoulders starting to stiffen towards useless. Goodnight.

Comfort Food

My comfort foods have changed over time. Once it was an omelette or beans on toast or rice pudding; now it's risotto. I have a panful on the go at the moment, getting ready for work this afternoon, and I suddenly realised that I've made quite a lot of it of late. It may be association; every time I make risotto, I have this memory of Hwngo patiently showing me how to cook it just after we'd met. Or it may be the process; the physical act of stopping everything for 20 minutes just to tend to my pan of rice. Whichever it is, it's comforting. And -ahem- somewhat fattening, but I'm not going to go there today.

Allotment, weight, exercise

Sunday saw me back on the allotment. It's peaceful down there: there are trains going past and planes and cars in the distance, but the birdsong is clear and the area is in enough of a cutting for the air to be quite still most of the time. I've planted the other two sets of potatoes (early Charlottes and Epicures), built my very first raised bed frame (well almost; I miscounted the timber slightly so it's a frame minus one plank at the moment) and put Hwngos sorrel seeds into it (they'll need the protection; they're tiny onionseedy things that look like they wouldn't survive a fight with a miniature carrot). I forgot to hide the big tools so they'll probably not be there when I get back, but at least they didn't cost much (Asda are good like that); I'm starting to accept theft from an inner-town allotment as a normal fact of life.

My weight? Well, I'm about to go running as part of my grab exercise when I can strategy (busy night tonight and a short lunchtime means that now's the time today); the weight today is -tada- 174.6lbs. So. Under the 175 and aiming now for the 165 via the 170. Each day, another challenge. But today a chance to be a teeny big smug about having met the first one. Inch by inch, block by block. But seriously, this is a good thing for sometimes the strangest of reasons: like the pattern I'm using in my needlework class being big enough for my bust but a centimetre smaller than my waist. And jokes about becoming square aside, it's little things like that that form the basis of fitting properly into ones world. And if the only thing I need to do to do that is get a little fitter and lose a little weight, well hey, that's hardly a big penalty on my life. Onwards...

And we're off...

176.2 this morning. Down a little (yesterday's 179 did drop to 177ish after an hour; please don't ask). Still heavy, but I can work on that.

I've been resisting going running for a while. I thoroughly enjoyed running out with Hwngo t'other week, but I just haven't been able to persuade myself to go out on my own. But this morning (spurred on by the over-175 thing), I got on with it. I only did a short one, a run to the pub and back to get a timing for it (25 minutes, door-to-door including stretches, easily possible as a run before work). My legs felt sooo heavy after yesterday's BodyPump (sore gluts, ouch!) but I'm glad I did it. It's too wet out to go play on the allotment today (digging is good cardio) so I'll just see how many miles I can walk on the pavements and gallery floors of London before I fall over/ my feet want to fall off. Lunch, I think, will be healthy. Dinner (with Hwngo) appears to involve a chicken...

It's only a crisis if I let it become one...

I weighed myself this morning. I still weigh myself every morning, but I'd got out of the habit of putting it onto this blog. I guess I forgot that it was about health as well as food, and stopped writing daily because I wasn't getting the Simons in. Well, now I'm back. And heavy. I stepped on the scales this morning and nearly jumped back off again in horror: 179kg! Back to the edges of unreasonable. Elephantine. Ugly-blobby. Too fat for hope. Well, no actually. I've put on too much weight again, the campaign to slim down and become sexy has faltered but I have a choice here. I can carry on sliding, comfort-eat my way out of my I'm-a-girl wardrobe and feel sorry for myself, or I can do something about it.

So here I am again. My new phrase when I think about food is "do you really need those calories". It's simple but remarkably effective. I've walked away from the snack machine, the fridge, a quick snack in the gym after training and the temptation to buy some good chocolate on the way home today. Oh, and I went to the gym today even though I didn't want to. And actually enjoyed it once I was there: another thing to reinforce, I think. So here I am thinking about some cheese for a light suppery snack. And I may just, but it will be a small piece of cheese not a block, and it comes after a day of carefully behaving myself. Onwards...

...Postscript: I didn't eat the cheese. I got to the fridge, said "do I really need these calories" and wandered off to bed instead. It works...

Les P'tit Parapluies, Rouen

Rouen is cute. Definitely a town they forgot to burn down, all leaning wood-framed houses, cute curving alleys and big churches. I mean *big* churches. Man, do they like their gods towering over them. But I digress: this blog is about food, and food we shall discuss.

Les P'tit Parapluies is nominally a modern European (more of that in a minute) restaurant in an old umbrella factory on the edges (i.e. walking distance from the cathedral) of Rouen centre. Hwngo had done his research, and this looked like one of two possibly good places to check out the non-traditional cuisine in Rouen. He's pretty darn good at snuffling out decent food, so off we went.

What we found was the plight of French culture in a microcosm. Well, in an impeccably put together, difficult-to-put-your-finger-on-the-problem neat room with a perfectly laid table and well-turned-out staff. Got it. It's like listening to classical music. You know you love the Messiah, you know it's a great piece of music, you've paid to hear a decent choir and orchestra, but this is the season where they just don't quite get it together. All the ingredients are there, but somehow they add to less than the sum of their parts. I s'pose we're back to cooking there really, aren't we? So. The ingredients were good. The food was competent. The look was good (if a little Euro-hotel in places), the staff were friendly. But the service wasn't quite right: we waited ages for bread, then the staff kept bringing us more - damn good bread, so we weren't complaining about that- not because it was the right time and sense to do so, but more because they really wanted to please.

And so to a sex metaphor. Sometimes what you want in bed isn't a transaction, a by-the-numbers quickie, but a sharing of souls, a sensitivity of them to your needs and you to theirs. Now I'm not suggesting that we should get way over-friendly with the sommelier, but a great restaurant experience has much in common with that style of sex... you feel cared for, listened to, but so discreetly that when asked you couldn't say when the extra fork arrived or why it all flowed so well, you just know that it was special. And in return, you get it; you hit that moment when you understand that this is indeed a great thing, and are humbled that someone could make you concentrate so much on their art and give you such a high from it. And then you pay, but hey, that's only fair. Les P'tit was a high-class hooker rather than a proper French mistress; all the curves and lacy bits, but there was no way she was going to kiss you. The food was competently put together, but my sense was that the person who wrote the menus and bought the ingredients wasn't the same as the person who put it together in the kitchen. There were bum notes; my pigeon was well cooked, the potatocake with it was excellent, but they really shouldn't have been together. The asparagus amuse-bouche were good but I'd had the same and better in Switzerland (Switzerland for god's sake) the week before; the desserts were over-sweet and cooked at too low a heat... the list goes on...

Now be well aware: this is not a bad restaurant. The food is reasonable. It's just that it doesn't quite live up to either its own aspirations or to the pool of equivalent European restaurants to which it's aspired. Which is a shame. France has a long tradition of great food and serious chefs even in the most back-of-the-woods places (roadside caffs, yum!), but it's slowly being lost. There's a Thatcher revolution in the air there, a sense of moving into the modern world that has young madames driving past the boulangeries in the mornings and picking up ready meals in the hypermarches at night. And just as the UK lost much of its traditions during its own Thatcher years then reinvented them as heritage pastiche, so too is France going down that same path. It saddens me, but I won't be surprised to see more French restos starting up with neat modern decor and the spirit seeping from its expensive menu, more French food whose commonality is with the cookbook rather than the soul of the ingredients available today. I hope La France can sort out its social problems, its massive unemployment, its impassable social strata, but I fear it will pay a very high price.

2 recipes: Parmesan Fritters (P141) and Marinated and Grilled Lamb Cutlets with Hummus, Olive Oil and Coriander (P115)

Hwngo stayed over after a hectic, rainy weekend; he nominated these two recipes for Sunday supper. They're very different, but both perfect for a tired, wet night with a good bottle of wine (Rioja).

Luckily, I had a hectic weekend too, and looked at the recipes in the morning (second attempt at morning, after getting home partied-out at 5am) instead of later in the afternoon. Both of them need to be prepared in advance, and although it wasn't a great disaster, I did push the time envelopes a little; the lamb needed marinating for at least 12 hours (it got about 8) and the fritters to cool in the fridge for at least 4 hours (hurriedly shoved into the freezer for 2-3).

Fritters. Pretty darned easy: essentially an over-thick Roux with cheese etc thrown in. Neither of us (Hwngo and myself) can understand how a Roux can go wrong; there isn't much that moderating the heat and pressing the lumps out with a spoon won't fix, but it may just be that we've done it so long that we've forgotten what we're doing right. I wasn't sure how small to cut the mozarella, so I made it 1cm cubes. I worried that they were too big, but this worked okay; instead of mozarella throughout the fritters, there was a soft bite of it every so often which gave a little variety.
I don't have any small flat metal baking tins (another kitchen deficiency that I need to correct) so I put the mixture into my fluted pie dish and shoved the whole thing into the freezer to cool. When it came out circa 3 hours later, an inch wide swath of mixture around the edge was set, and the centre was still quite runny, so maybe several hours cooling would be a sensible idea. But I cut 1" squares out of it, flour-egg-breadcrumbs (Hwngo was interested to see how the flour stops the breadcrumbs from falling off) and into a pan filled with sunflower oil (to get the right heat). The result? When I first went to Prague, I found the city that I had always hoped Paris would be (but am always disappointed... well, not so much these days, but places and tastes change). When I bit into one of these fritters, I found the cheese-in-breadcrumbs that I always want deep-fried camembert to be (but am always disappointed). And deep-fried parsley is just one of those small wonders of nature; it shouldn't happen, it shouldn't work, but it does. Yummily. We both agreed that this was excellent grown-up party food; now all I have to do is move to the city, change my life and start throwing dinner parties again. Which is really quite an excellent idea. Hwngo pointed out that I'd forgotten the lemon wedges, but we were both hungry and the fritters so lovely that I don't think they would have added a huge amount to the experience. It's better than Dutch cuisine anyways (although Indonesian can be pretty good in the Netherlands).

Lamb cutlets. Another round of finding things in a big supermarket (I'd meant to go to the organic butchers but ran out of time on Saturday, and they're -sensibly- closed on Sunday) ; got the very last jar of tahini, so big points there, spent a while hunting down the Tabasco (had forgotten it was in little bottles), and bought a fuse for the Magimix. Marinade was easy: mix, pour and shove to one side. Hummus was a little more tricky; Magimix still refuses to start (it will have to go back to its makers) and my original machine did not much more than sit on the side and whine at how many beans I was asking it to mush (it went straight onto the recycling pile). There wasn't a lot more too it really, apart from cooking the cutlets for longer than I'd normally expect, to get them nicely charred (Hwngo saved my bacon - erm lamb- there) and making the result look pretty on a place. We served them with coriander, cayenne and baby plum tomatoes (I have a great weakness for good hummus mixed with flavoursome tomatoes). It was very much a dish with North African style without actually being North African; it balanced well, and would be suitable for a more intimate party (say, a 4-person dinner party with a salad-based starter and healthy dessert) than the fritters. Another competent dish, and all the better for it; something that could be enjoyed with friends but that wouldn't badly alienate the mother-in-law. And then we flumped in a corner because even we didn't have room for any dessert.

Starting to think fit again

Being fit isn't about timed, forced exercise: going to the gym, cycling for x minutes per day etc. We do timed exercise to get fit; to be fit, we need to live that way.

Okay, I'm not making much sense here so I'll try again. Every so often, I try to get fit; I restrict my diet, I go to the gym, I make progress until some event happens that disrupts all the carefully laid plans, and suddenly I'm carrying an extra stone of weight and don't have enough energy to get to the gym.

Being fit is thinking things like "why don't I cycle over to the airport to check the baggage allowance" (not as heroic as it sounds; I live only a couple of miles away from it) instead of paying a queen's ransom for the parking (Queen's ransom: the country might not want its king back, but a king might be prepared to pay a great deal for the right queen, and it would be a brave chancellor to stop him emptying all the coffers). I've caught myself doing this a few times over the past couple of weeks; things like "hmm, I got up early, shall I cycle the long route to work" and "I'll walk it instead". That way, I think, lies true happiness...

Running again

Well, not so much running as advanced jogging, but I did turn up at my local running club for training yesterday.

There are running clubs everywhere; some are athletics clubs that primarily cater for people who want to run round in circles on nice dogpoo free tracks, leap over hurdles, throw pointy sticks and jump into sandpits; others are road running clubs for people who think that running 6+ miles every Wednesday is a good idea. Most clubs meet at 7pm on Wednesday. I don't know why; maybe because it's a few days away from the weekend races, maybe just because it's traditional, like Quakers meeting at 11am so they can all get home in time for lunch; most clubs also have other training days, but I'll get to that in a minute.

Anyways, my local club is mixed. Pointy sticks, sandpits, small kids whizzing in every direction and folks doing that impressively graceful I-couldn't-do-that-without-falling-over thing over hurdles. And instead of heading out onto the pavement, the road running group were out on the track as well.

Let me tell you about running times. No, you can't run away now, I've already started... Road runners (the ones who run miles on pavements rather than metres round and round a track) measure their speed by the number of minutes that they take to run a mile. A good steady plodder will run a 10-minute mile; fast runners are usually around a 5 minute mile, some people are slower (12 minute miles for the terminally unfit, i.e. me at the moment) and most people are somewhere inbetween. Most clubs have several groups going out; the main group is usually 8-minute mileing, with some slower and faster groups as appropriate. Now I knew I was in trouble when I asked the first road racer who arrived (apparently they're always late so I should fit in beautifully on that count) about the group speeds... and with a totally, take-it-to-the-bank (although that is becoming something less than a good metaphor these days) face, he told me the fast ones (including the other only girl there) were 5-minutes and the slow ones like him ran at 7 minute pace. 7! What the... I *dream* of 7-minute miles, of one day being able to run fast enough to feel like I'm floating rather than fighting to keep moving. 7!

Which is how I ended up being overtaken. Lots. Often. My first track session was... on a 400m track (400m = 1/4 mile), 3 laps slowly to warm up. Then 6 faster laps with a 50-second stop between each lap. Then the trainer (70 years old, so still a spring chicken in running terms) taking a good hard look at me and leaving me to run slowly steadily and continously until everyone else was ready to go home (and I'd done 4 1/2 miles in total rather than the 6 that was planned). Well, that went well. Not. But I'm going back. I can take humiliation, and there is no pride where getting healthy is concerned. And at least if the other b*ggers are running that much faster than me, I've always got something to aim at. Even if it is at the finishing line before I've got halfway.

And anyways, I've got out of the midweek (Monday) training session because it clashes with my needlework class. Although I strongly suspect that I might be going for a run before class anyways. I will get fit, I will get fit... meanwhile, if you're reading this and not totally put off yet, most clubs are listed on the Runners World site.

2008 exercise plan

I now have a set of fitness goals for the year. And just for posterity/ so people can laught at me at the end of the year, they're:

• Get below 165lbs on the scales (and to 155 if I can).
• Push the whole stack on the leg press machine.
• Get bike to 30mph (without hills, following winds, and for a reasonable period of time).
• Walk a 25-mile day.
• Do a 10k in under 60 minutes.
• Swim 100 lengths without stopping.

This could take some time, but it's worth aiming at. I'm at 172lbs today (but have been under 165 already this year), I've got my race bike mended and set up for distance, I'm still going to the gym sporadically but am ganging up with the girls from next month, and it's getting light enough to walk or cycle in the evenings now. It's all possible; I just have to keep enough nerve to do it all. That, and eat less cream, sugar and chocolate. I've already fed my part of the shortbread to the young engineers in the office; I'll donate my 2 bars of 70% green + blacks to them tomorrow.

Okay, I've also knocked up an exercise plan that fits (as far as possible) into the rest of my life and gives me that all-important rest day every week (ironically it's today, even though I didn't purposely plan it that way!). So...

• monday: run lunchtime, cycle to work, weights in evening
• tuesday: cycle to work, weights&swim in evening
• wednesday: cycle to work, run in evening
• thursday: cycle to work (optional); rest day (am diving in the evening)
• friday: walk/cycle in afternoon (leave work at lunchtime on friday); weights&swim in evening
• saturday: run/weights morning, cycle all day (optional, depending on shopping trips etc)
• sunday: walk/cycle all day

I think that just about does it. I'll have to ramp the intensity up gently of course, but it should help me hit most of the goals above.

1 recipe: Smoked Haddock Baked with Potatoes (p?)

First difference between book versions spotted! I cooked this using Hwngo's book (first edition hardback, well-thumbed and -ahem- slightly foxed with various food products, aka much loved...) . My version suggests removing the fish bones with tweezers; his doesn't (I didn't; the chances of finding tweezers in a batchelor pad are... well, quite good actually, but I didn't want to ask...).

I'm starting to think that West Sussex is deeply conservative/ old-fashioned. Again I had problems finding good fish, so I went to the fish man at Tesco's yesterday lunchtime (he knows his halibut); no smoked haddock because he tends to get this in at the end of the week. I can only conclude that there are either a lot of weekend Simon cookbook users in the area, or there are still lots of people here eating fish on a Friday. Anyways, 3 packs of the thickest lumps of fish I could find later...

There are 3 layers of potatoes in this recipe and not a lot of cooking time (1 hour in total), so slice the potatoes very thin (mine were about 1mm) or risk having them crunchy at the end. I bought a whole bag of parsley but only used half of it; the recipe would have coped well with all of it. I overpoached the fish slightly and had a long job removing the skins; 15 minutes poaching instead of 20-25 would have made this an easier job and left the fish a little less flaky.

The layers worked well but I forgot to put potatoes on last and ended up with some decorative tomato slices on top. This didn't really make a difference, aside from putting some colour in the (yummy) brown crust. The result was edible. Not the most spectacular-tasting Simon so far, but a dependable cold-evening recipe nonetheless.

Hwngo made one of his excellent rhubarb crumbles. He says it's easy to make, but I think that really translates to 'easy to make if you have years of cooking experience'.

Gardening News

A snottogram from the council last week; I have 4 weeks to tidy my plot or lose it. Now I agree with keeping the plots cultivated, growing vegetables etc, but it's still winter. It's cold out, there's no planting to be done and even the slugs are fast asleep. Luckily Hwngo came over and did some sterling rotavating work last weekend, so my (our?) conscience is clear. Maybe the letter's just the council's version of an annual "wake up, you need to start digging your potato beds" call. Whatever.

Speaking of potatoes, I'm chitting. Well, they are, and with very little help from me; chitting really just consists of standing a bagful of spuds on their ends in the light and warm until nice strong shoots shoot(please pardon pun, is late) out of their ends. And then, when they're big and strong, the potatoes go into the ground and come out a few months later as kit-form dinner. I have a bag each of Charlotte (yummy last year), Red Duke of York and Epicure; the Red Duke of York are already close to being ready to plant (see photo). And if someone steals my potato crop again, I shall be very very cross and consider spiking the bed with Scoville-rated surprises.

But next I need to build my first raised beds and sort out a bed plan and planting schedule. Because my house is dark (trees), I can't bring my seeds on early, but I'll still need to start planting them from the end of this month. In this year's packs are:
* Continental salad blend (sow march-sept)
* Chicory Orchidea Rossa (sow feb-aug)
* Chicory Variegata Di Castelfranco (plant feb-aug)
* Shallot Zebrune (plant feb-apr)
* Tomatillo Purple de Milpa (plant feb-apr)
* Carrot Purple Haze (plant apr-july)
* Tomato Black Cherry (plant feb-apr)
* Climbing bean Blauhilde (plant apr-july)
* Dwarf bean Purple Teepee (plant apr-july)
* Broccoli Rudolph (plant apr-june)
* Pak Choy (plant apr-july)
* Climbing french bean (plant apr-july)
* Chicory Agena (plant July-Aug)
* French sorrel Rumex Scutatus (plant mar-apr, 2 packs)
* Cos lettuce Marshall (plant mar-july)
* Sweet pea Fragrant Skies (plant Jan-May; because it's nice to have some flowers in the veg patch)

And yes, many of those vegetables are black...

1 recipe: onion tart (P136); 1 rotw: millionaire shortbread; 1 experiment: arab-style sweetmeats

First, the shortbread. From a Guardian recipe, and a special request from Hwngo in return for starting running again. 1 square = 1 40-minute run. Which means I'll either go shortbreadless or have to fit a run in sometime tomorrow.

It is almost impossible to buy unsalted peanuts after 7pm here: Sainsbury and Tescos both nada. I wonder why: is it a response to increasing peanut allergies, or the perceived unhealthiness of this very fatty nut? In the end, I resorted to buying salted peanuts and soaking them in water until they didn't taste of salt anymore.

I have learnt a few things from this recipe. You can beat up peanuts in a pestle and mortar reasonably successfully (the magimix is unwell and I keep forgetting to buy it a new fuse) . The base expands to about twice its original size and smells truly deeply disgusting when it first comes out of the oven (but only for about half an hour), and it's a bad idea to slip and drop most of a can of cold cream into a panful of hot sugar. I think there may be toffee lumps in my caramel; the not-so-innocent should be warned...

The experiment worked nicely. I had some leftover pastry from the onion tart (more soon), some dates and apples hanging around and some grated pistachios (yes, really; from a Greek supermarket in North London) in the cupboard. Thin slice and dice the apples, rough chop and de-stone the dates, mix with some lemon juice and a little sugar, then divide the mix out into small pastry cases (think exotic mince pies). Bake at 180 for about 20-25 minutes, then devour because you've been so excited about cooking that you've forgotten to eat supper. Relax.

The onion tart is meant to be a surprise but of course won't be if Hwngo reads this before I arrive. I thought it best to take extra supplies (am doing Smoked Haddock Baked with Potatoes and Cream tomorrow) lest the poor thing have to suffer his own gourmet cooking. I mean, chocolate, cream and butter could happen. Oh. They already have. Whoops.

Recent Food Outings

Well, a pub and resto really; I've been eating my way through the contents of the cupboards and freezer, and have only really gone out socially lately.

The restaurant: Chez Gerard in Guildford. Lovely; attentive non-servile staff who know how to keep just the right amount of attention going; good steak served in gorgeous slices with a decently firey pepper sauce, and a little pot of yummy anchovy butter with the bread (and a second pot delivered after we devoured the first one). Credible wine and a 'licious tarte citron to finish; all in all a most civilised experience, marred only by the difficulty of finding a pub in the centre of Guildford afterwards (we eventually found a really local local which itself would have been acceptable to eat at with a pint or two of beer, and warmed outselves with JDs before heading back out into the night. It can be cold out there without one's shoes on - high shoes, cobbles, tired feet, bad combination, especially when we headed back and found a disguised-in-black good-looking pub just down the high street from Chez Gerard).

Finding a pub was no problem the day after though; my friend S and I postponed a wild trip to Brighton (she was still tired from a wild trip to London; I was virtuous and had been pointed towards the train before 10pm in Guildford) in favour of a late working session and dinner at the Gatwick Manor. Now I know this is part of a big chain (Chef & Brewer) and the menus are meant to be the same everywhere etc etc but it's really not true: the GM kitchen staff turn out some damn fine meat courses, and the service is much better and friendlier than you'd expect from a pub of this size (it's huge). Mine was Pork Chops; fatless but succulent chops on a big bed of non-fatty bubble-n-squeak (delicious); S had the sausages and mash ('comfort food' said the girl with the hangover bigger than herself). I don't think I'll be trying that week's special beer again though. Now, if I could just remember what it was called...

2 recipes: chocolate bavarois (p47) and piedmontese peppers (p149)

Medium time no see... sometimes we all need time away, a period of adjustment to the things we cannot change, often whilst being blind to the things we can. So no cooking: I had thinking to do that it would have interrupted, and I needed to decide whether that was part of my old life or could continue into the new. And since I'm sat here looking at a trayful of naked peppers, I think we can safely say that it's continuing.

There were 3 simons booked for last friday; salmon, chocolate and creme anglais. In the end, the local fish suppliers beat me and Hwngo came too late, too tired and too hungry for me to justify going to the next town for supplies. So, fried duck breasts and onions (it would have worked better if they'd been the steaks that we thought we'd taken from the freezer, but it was still a surprisingly good combination), and the chocolate bavarois I'd made earlier. Hwngo looked appalled at the mussel soup; I had totally forgotten his revulsion at seafood, mainly because it is so out of character for his type of adventurer.

Anyways, the bavarois. Started early; finished just in time to get to Hwngo's train. Everything behaved fine except the cream: try as I did, I just couldn't get it to do soft peaks, so I whipped it as long as I could, shoved it into the mix then the mix into the fridge and ran off to fetch Hwngo. The result was a lovely chocolate erm soup. Three hours after finishing, it still wasn't set, so we ate it anyway. It was gorgeous; chocolately and milky but not in that 45% if you're lucky English candy bar way. And the next morning, when we had it again for breakfast, it had set into the sort of deep chocolate mousse that only a good French chef (and amazingly, the one at the Brest Flunch but that's another story, one with good steaks a point in it even) can make. Well worth trying again, but best accompanied by lots of exercise.

And today: the Piedmontese Peppers. Pretty easy, but two things to muse on. One, there is a lot of freedom in a recipe, which is both a good and a bad thing. I can slice garlic to sub-millimetre thicknesses, but I'm not sure if that's what "slice thinly" really means. And two, there are some tricks in cooking which one is incredibly grateful to have learnt. In this case, how to get the skin off a tomato, which is something that the person who first taught me how to make salsa properly taught me (along with that sometimes the hardest thing to do in cooking is persuade people that it's okay to throw part of your ingredients, e.g. tomato innard, away). Boil a kettle; pour the hot water into a bowl and throw the tomatoes in it. Wait 5 minutes; if you don't do this, the tomato will be as reluctant to shed its covering as a good catholic girl in a casting couch (the other thing I learnt in the past is that patience is a much undervalued but crucial ingredient in cooking). Then make a short line in the skin with a knife and peel it off gently; if it's had enough time, this will be as easy as stripping paint from a damp wall.

And the final verdict? Pepper and pepper and tomato are just such a classic combination; I love burnt peppers anyway, but the tomato has softened (like a good Sunday-morning fry-up) and mixed its taste with the pepper and garlic, and both are offset by the sharpness of the black pepper. The only thing I have a bit of a problem with is the anchovies. I can see that the dish might need something to balance it, but the salt in the anchovies is offputting in this context. Somehow, a softer fish, maybe one of the meatier white fish, would seem a better match for this dish. Maybe I'll try it that way next time.

My weight? Let's just say that a weekend with my mother feeding me up and a week of comfort-eating ('s all brain food honest) has taken its toll. About half a stone of toll. I'll start monitoring it again from tomorrow.

1 recipe: Saffron Soup with Mussels (p180)

I'm busy tomorrow, so I shopped tonight. The Friday plan has firmed up to Chocolate Bavarois, Creme Anglaise and Poached Salmon with Buerre Blanc (possibly in that order); tonight was meant to be Piedmontese Peppers but I forgot the anchovies, so it's just as well that I went a little OTT and sourced the ingredients for Saffron Soup With Mussels too. Which I'm cooking now.

The wine, as always, took longest to find (the gelatine leaves took a while too). I think this is essentially a soup version of Moules Mariniere, so I fancied a good dry German white in it. Sainsburys has the teensiest of German selections. Minute: only a few bottles hidden between the all-conquering spanish and french. Which made the choice difficult: a cheap bottle and risk it, or something more expensive that may be risking it anyways. In the end, I settled for an Ernst Loosen Riesling. And in traditional style, I'm going to cook half and personally evaporate the rest... tasting notes to follow... hmmm... apricots. Well, more like biting the fesh around an apricot pit; like the stuff you paint on to stop nailbiting, slightly bitter but strangely inviting. And sweeter than I expected.

Final straits now... waiting for the potato to soften so I can put in the mussels and declare the soup done. But there doesn't appear to be enough liquid for this to really be called a soup. I'll see what happens, but for now it seems somehow wrong. Tasty, but wrong.

My god it's good. The cream was enough to push it over the liquid edge from stew to soup, and it's no more an extension of Moules Mariniere than Jordan is an extension of Debbie Harry. It's rich, complex, smooth on the taste but plays off the crunch of the potato (I was sure mashing them was best, but no, this works well) against the tang and suck of the mussels. Kids, please try this at home. And invite me round to supper. Please? I only have a giant bowlful left...

ROTW: Mackerel Souffle

One souffle. I think it's my first ever, although I have a niggling memory of attempting one in the crooked house (two feet different in nominally- parallel wall lengths in a single room).

That was... fun. Usually cooking is calming or meditative or sometimes badly stressing, but this one was fun. Probably something to do with all the changes; lots of stirring and whisking and grating going on. Nutmeg especially is a cool thing to grate: you think you've just run it over the grater a couple of times and nothing's happened, and then you lift up said grater and a whole pile of magically- grated nutmeg is just there waiting for you. Some foods are just special like that. Like the eggs: I had a box of Old Cotswold Legbar eggs in the fridge (I have a soft spot for rare breeds, although they're hardly rare now I can buy the eggs in Tescos), and was pleasantly surprised to see that inside those pastel- blue shells are lovely deep orange yolks. The only down was beating the eggwhites. Hwngo showed me that using a stick blended really works on this, so I used mine, and nada. White fluffy mixture, but not a peak in sight. And I couldn't rescue it from there: after 10 minutes of fighting it with a hand whisk, I gave in and made the mixture anyway. Then anxiously watched through the cooker's glass door for half an hour.

I wasn't expecting texture. I've always thought of souffle as a smooth dish, a rolling hill of smooth curves forming a chef's hat shape over the top of the dish. But there it is, in photographic evidence: a textured top (and one that, ta-da, didn't sink when I took it out the oven!). It tastes good too: like the best of soft omelettes collided with a soft cake; worth missing my yoga class for even. The nutmeg and fish balance off each other beautifully, and the only regret I have is that I wasn't a little more adventurous with the pepper; I've been a bit too heavy-handed with it of late (the pestle-and-mortar full of pepper is probably a hint about my culinary proclivities) but I think this dish could take it. Peppered mackeral souffle, anyone?

And I promise when I have both eggs and mackeral in the fridge, the last thing I'll think about cooking is a kedgeree...

Back again

Back again. After a small period of adjustment. Hwsgo is now Hwngo; this may or may not be temporary, but it certainly won't get in the way of cooking and eating together. Last night was dinner out at the tapas bar near Borough Market. Which is itself surprisingly close to London Bridge. I'd mentally pegged it as just past Tower Bridge, so the familiar ironwork was quite unexpected at the end of a spooky-if-it-hadn't-been-well-lit tunnel near the station. But at least I know now that it’s a very short walk to the Artisan de Chocolat misfits stand on a Sunday…

The tapas was good; we’d been spoilt by going to Granada last month, but I don’t often get tapas this good in the UK (there’s a little place in Wales, but it’s a long way to go for a croquette). The ham plate looked enormous but the slices were delicately wafer-thin so we still had room for all the potatoes that Hwngo had ordered (I hadn’t realised he liked potatoes so much. No wonder he’s offered to help me dig the potato beds in the allotment). The hams were good: the chorizo properly spicy, and something that we couldn’t identify was good enough to have us both proffering the last piece to each other (then splitting it :-)). Croquettes were almost-Granada, with surprisingly good fried curly parsley on top. Potatoes aioli: good chips, and distracted Hwngo long enough for me to snaffle almost all the olives from the sardine (big, plump, yummy) plate. I rocked the balance a bit with ham cheeks and white beans; good, but we were full and it didn’t quite match the other plates… meat tasty and tender and reminiscent of the stews my mum made when I was young(er). And we washed it all down with sherry, with another piece of kitchen wisdom from Hwngo: if you don’t like the wine list, drink the sherry. And beer. And whisky. And…

...Enough: I have received my ROTW of the week and intend to assail it. Although being a soufflé, the assault may be in quite the other direction…

Souffle de poisson
100-150g smoked macheral (whatever you have), liquidised smooth in a little lemon juice
bechamel sauce [ white sauce ] made from 50g of butter, 50g of flour, 250ml of milk
salt and pepper
grated nutmeg
4 eggs carefully separated into whites and yolks
Put the fan oven on at 190.
Prepare the bechamel sauce by melting the butter in a pan over a medium heat. Add the flour working it in thoroughly with a wooden spoon. Remove the pan from the heat, add the milk and whisk until smooth. Season well with salt and pepper and grated nutmeg. Return the pan to the heat to cook for about 10 mins stirring frequently. Getting this smooth is key to success.
Remove the pan from the heat, beat in the yolks one at a time. Stir in the mackeral.Beat the egg whites to a stiff peaks. Butter the souffle dish. Put the flavoured bechamel in the souffle dish and fold in a third of the whites using a sharp-edged spoon. Add the rest of the egg whites in the same way: do not stir or beat: a hetrogenous texture is better than losing the air in the eggs. Pour into a butter souffle dish to about three quarters full.Place in the oven immediately and cook for 20 mins then increase the heat to 220 for 10 mins and serve without delay with bitter leaves.

Weight today is unknown, but has held at 166.6 for the last few days. Food intake to come shortly.

Pub, chinese and a decent-sized nightcap

Ah, the mutation into an eating blog continues apace: fridge still full, social life still active... Usual day routine of cereal soup and bag of something horrid but low-cal (quavers this time) yesterday, then out in town with Hwsgo, for a pleasant change. A pint of Spitfire at the seriously difficult to find Cock and Woolpack (pleasant wood-panelled pub with decent beers, down Finch Lane, between Cornhill and Threadneedle Street, but the buildings are so tall and close together that you can't see it from Cornhill), then dinner at Imperial City.

The online reviews for Imperial City weren't great, but Hwsgo usually knows what he's doing, and as usual was right about this one. The restaurant is in a basement, and has that lovely Victorian sewer architectural style of arching handmade bricks twinned with discreet good taste, which also pretty well describes the waiters (waitpeople? Has that term made it over the pond yet?). We started with seaweed and eel as suggested by Hwsgo because they go well together. They did: the eel was plump inside with a suitably dry edge to it, and the seaweed was, well, chinese seaweed (i.e. cabbage), done well (i.e. inoffensively). I had crispy duck for main course (goes well with the beer I'd had earlier) and Hwsgo sea bass; both cooked well, and the sea bass plump and fresh. The wine was a little punchy with apricots but calmed down after an eel-based talking-to: all-in-all, an elegant dinner in a place that allowed us the priviledge of relaxed conversation (sometimes a rare commodity in an English restaurant). Then off to the Counting House for some well-deserved whisky and people-watching. Although someone who won't be mentioned (but ratted on my chocolate frenzy earlier in the week) did manage to snaffle some chocolatebars on the way home...

Today I am mostly not hungover (unexpectedly) and 166.4lbs. Tonight I am planning another outing to the gym, this time combined with some plodging up and down the pool. One day I shall be thin...ner...ish... Scrub that plan: some of the livelier types from work dragged me (kicking and screaming honest) off to Ceroc tonight. Lots of fun, but it will take quite some time for me to stop looking like an engineer remembering how to count to four...

Back to normal

Healthy again now (although a canteen egg sandwich may yet see to that); weight 166.8, and fridge full so foodie tasks today are limited to planning and possibly making things with chocolate.

Food intake: 1 bowl specialk + milk, 1 bag baked crisps, 1 canteen egg sandwich, 1 latte, 1 machine coffee, lots water, 1 bag mini cheddars. Exercise: well, I'm thinking about it. I have a plan forming. I feel guilty about eating too much chocolate, and I don't run enough. So: the chocolate/running exchange rate. I've thought about it, and a half-hour run is mentally worth five 1" squares of chocolate. The catch? I have to do the running before I can have the chocolate. Boy am I going to hate myself for this one...

...really didn't want to eat tonight, so I headed off down the gym to see if I could work up an appetite. First bodypump, on the 10kg warmup because I'm a bit wimpy at the moment... still had a complete muscle rebellion 2/3 of the way through, but at least I made it to the end; then Pilates, which was in some ways much more difficult... a bit shocking how bad my core stability is at the moment, but I can work on it and the fat that stopped me bending properly a few months ago has gone now. Still not hungry, but I forced a bowl of chicken and sauce. I'm now eyeing up a square of chocolate and wondering if 1 bodypump will allow me to eat a square inch. I rather think it will.

Not much food today

It's a little embarassing this, but I appear to have picked up a food bug. Not really ideal for someone trying to blog about food. Today's fare will be less ornate than usual: active yoghurt, water and plain rye bread. All day. Simply missing out coffee will be death itself, but it's better than spending any more days waking up unreasonably spaced out and hurting every time I go near sugar (the chocolate last night was a very very bad idea). Although the weight loss is good (169.8lbs yesterday; 166.4lbs today), it's probably very bad for me not to be absorbing any energy from my food.

Enough. This is a food blog, and I have at least one morsel for today. I've found my local Polish food shop (not that that's very difficult anymore); well, Polish-Tamil food shop, but at least now I have a good source of rye bread, pickled fish, hot sausages and unusual ketchups. And German yoghurt: not something I often feel the need for, but I now know where to find it.

Onwards... food purgatory awaits.

Plans for today

Today is a good day to buy and cook a chicken to the next book recipe (poulet poche). And to attempt an rotw (lemon meringue pie) at the same time. And maybe consider buying a straightjacket in advance.

I was so out-of-sorts that Hwsgo cooked the chicken instead and we missed the lemon meringue completely. He was ever so sweet, and re-did Simon's roast chicken recipe for us; we bought a big bird (2.4kg, the smallest they had) at Allen Martin Meats; it was a good bird, but I think a little too large for the recipe; we got good firm flesh, but not quite as infused with lemon and herbs as the earlier one had been. The really really good thing was the banana shallots that Hwsgo packed around the baking tray (with roast potatoes; also good, but not as spectacular); they picked up the butter sauce, and caramelised into melt-in-the-mouth sweetness. We also finally found a use for the comedy turkey baster that's been sat in my kitchen drawer for the past year: it really does work, and it saves an awful lot of fishing around in the baking tray with a spoon.

1 Recipe: Leek Tart (Page 121)

I really really didn't want to cook today. Got out of work late (traffic snarled up again), went and bought the ingredients I needed then wandered aimlessly round Sainsbo's, trying to think of something I desperately needed and had to spend a long time thinking about, then eventually (I now know their entire range of non-food goods, which really isn't something to be proud of) came home. And read the Guardian, did the crossword (nearly), puzzle (absolutely), watched something fascinating about cooking on TV, checked hwsgo's now very-important-blog (vib); in short, anything but come into the kitchen and cook.
But I had to come here eventually (the butter was going soft), and start. So I made the pastry dough (p151) , started chopping the leeks, and suddenly it hit me. I'm in here doing something repetitive, difficult, long-winded (it's going to be well past bedtime when I finish tonight) because it calms me. And it calms me because I start to think. About life (not as bad as Monday), about work (definitely not as bad as Monday), about hwsgo and familes and roles and self and jobs and the limits of banks buying Bayesians because they're trendy but not thinking about what happens next (hopefully not the same as puppies after xmas, but my gut feeling tells me that only some will be allowed to stay in the house).
And then somewhere at the end of this reverie, I realise I have more leeks than I realistically have pan. I mean, I have some big pans, but the leek pile has filled a very large bowl and I'm suddenly wondering if I should revise my idea of 'big' for this quest. I also have my soup kettle, but I'm loathe to burn things on the bottom of it without reason, so I melt the butter and carefully tip all the leek cuttings into the biggest 'normal' pan that I own. Which they completely fill, as in no pan insides showing at all. Now I believe I'm logical, and I have several pieces of evidence that lead me to believe that everything's going to turn out fine. 1) I have enough pastry for an 8" dish, and there's no way that lot is going to fit into anything but an unreasonably tall 8" dish. 2) onions shrink, and leeks are basically onions on an Atkins diet, and 3) it looks a bit like my compost heap. Which is not as bad as it sounds. One of things I love about my compost heap (compost not having been one of them yet) is that it's always full when I fill it up (with leaves, grass, clippings etc), but when I come back to it, there's always a gap in the top waiting to be filled. Now either some kind soul has been digging out my compost for the last few years (and I wouldn't put the neighbourhood squirrels past that), or when you warm up a pile of leaves they shrink. So that's solved nicely then. But there's still the issue of where the butter went. I put leek clippings on it, stirred them and all the butter disappeared. And how are the leeks going to sweat without water? I'm really hoping the stuff about their high water content is true, or it's compost pie for supper tonight...
It's okay; it's half an hour later and all the mysteries (the leek-based ones anyway) have been solved. They do have enough water to sweat; the butter has run out and joined the leek juice too, and I can see half of my pan insides with no leek-shifting cheating. I think I can go and bake the pastry now...
...okay, problem. I don't own a small baking thing. I have 10" ones and huger, but nothing at 8". I must remember to buy at least one of these (all my baking trays are rubber, so another one of those would be good), as well as the large frying pan that I need, and a full-sized Le Creuset pot. All I need now is a town with shops that stock that sort of thing.
Okay folks. I'm supposed to be one of the smarter people in the world (there are also people who think I'm completely stupid, but I guess it's all relative). Let's think what happens when we try to put wobbly pastry into a wobbly rubber baking tin. Oh yes; collapse on a scale not seen since.. well, quite recently if we're talking finance, but. Oh grief. I've just looked at the oven. The sides have fallen into the middle. Using only your skill and ingenuity... I've been and poked it, but the sides are determined to lie down and sunbathe. I poked the leeks too: it does indeed take an hour to sweat them down. I do hope the filling won't turn out to be too runny. Oh, and you prick the bottom of pastry cases with a fork to stop them blowing giant bubbles on their base. Doing it halfway through cooking is definitely not a cool idea (but is fun watching the bubbles go down).
The pastry case is cooked. And shot. It's more of a bent pastry saucer; my first official kitchenblog disaster (takes bow/curtsey). But the leek filling is good. I was tempted to eat the tarragon on its own. I can't remember having ever cooked with tarragon, although I may have grown it sometime (I love just having herbs around to smell in the garden), and it's a much nicer smell and taste than I was expecting. I've put the filling over/around the tart bas(in), and I'll see what happens over the next half hour. Apart from me getting hungrier, of course.
It's done. Smells good but I've left it for a while to cool (there being no pastry edges to keep the filling in). And the verdict is. The tastes work really well together: the tarragon, the leek, the parmesan (I put it in, even though it was optional) is a really good combination. But it's a bit... erm.. squidgy. I suspect I didn't cook it quite long enough (out at 35 mins on a 30-40 min timing because I was worried about overcooking it). I think I like the recipe, but I don't think I've done it justice this time.