I will not munch on your poussin

Australia, England... same language, same sort of culture, so why sometimes are things so bloody difficult? What, when you see poussin on a Sunday roast menu otherwise written entirely in English, might you think? No, not a fish, not a Russian president, not a vegetable, not a saucy vagina, a WHOLE FUCKING CHICKEN.

I didn't know that before three this afternoon. Now I do.

Thanks to the lovely bloke at Royal Inn on the Park who sweetly reversed my order after he arrived at the table and I almost freaked out as badly as the first time I ever saw steak tartare.

Why not just call it chicken, yeah?

Sunday market bonanza

The Lake District: The Old Mill

This is my second attempt at this post - frustratingly, the first one went AWOL - and so I don't lose the will to blog I've decided to break it up into parts, which is probably better anyway.

Earlier this month we escaped the "killer heatwave" and spent a week up North with some good mates living in a house, a very big house (with turrets!) in the country.



Why? To celebrate Kelly's 29th and Carter's (more significant) 40th birthday. If Carters had had his way we probably would have been forced to wear medieval costume for the whole week, but unfortunately there was limited luggage space.

We split into teams and took turns cooking dinner which is what the next few posts will be about...

The saturday ramble

My mate Kirsty K and I have totally embraced the English pastime of rambling. Not so much walking poles and maps wrapped in plastic as the joy of taking a very long stroll to a country pub for dinner.



One Saturday a little while back we took a train to Guildford in Hampshire then ambled through field, farm and forest to Liss. We enjoyed a halfway break at the Hawkley Arms getting smashed on the local cider but feared a come down deep in the woods so took the precaution of carrying four more pints in milk bottles to tide us over till we reached the next pub. Part two of the ramble was a bit woozy then but still remarkably beautiful; bright yellow canola fields and wooded tracks carpeted with pretty and pungent baby shoots of wild garlic.





When we finally got to Liss some seven hours after we set off, we were dozy and starving. I can't remember the name of the pub we stumbled into but the food was brilliant (in our experience the country pub kitchen can be a bit hit and miss if it is open at all). In that moment, a big bowl of mushrooms in a cheesy, mustardy, creamy sauce topped with buttery crumbs was the best thing I ever ate.

A sticky situation

Getting up this morning was easy because I knew there was a home-baked brioche in the breadbox calling out my name. While I was waiting for the toaster to do its work I came to the sudden realisation that we were out of jam. Another frantic rummage in the fridge yielded one of those little pots of jam you get in fancy hotels. Yippeee!
Now that breakfast has been saved, I'm thinking about where that pot of jam came from...did I bring it home from a holiday somewhere? Am I turning into my grandma? Arrrgghhhhh!!

Today I baked...

...a brioche.
So goddamn delicious!

Oink oink

If you're in town tomorrow between 12-6pm head over to Brick Lane for the annual Art Car Boot Fair and grab yourself one of these cute little swine flu piggies made by Guy. Mmmm, pinky, lemony goodness...

Yellow raspberries

Do these exist in nature or is it some weird genetic experiment? These yellow raspberries were surprisingly sweeter than their red counterpart - their yellowness made my brain think they would be super sour. We enjoyed them with some vanilla ice cream but they were also lovely on their own.

An anniversary lasagne

Yesterday we celebrated our first year of marriage by making a lasagne and watching Flight of the Conchords while Jasmine slept. A good test for any relationship is how long you can last in a small hot kitchen together and I think after living together for a few years we may have finally mastered it, sort of.

I haven't attempted a lasagne since I dropped the one Adam and I made about a year ago, so this time I was VERY careful when taking it out of the oven.

Anniversary lasagne

What you need
1 jar of good quality tomato pasta sauce
1 eggplant, sliced 5mm thin
2 red capsicums
2 courgettes, sliced 5mm thin
1 bunch chopped, cooked and drained spinach
1 bunch asparagus
Adam's homemade pasta dough (we used 500g of '00' flour and 5 medium eggs)
1 mozzarella ball
mature cheddar cheese
handful of pine nuts

The do
Heat up a griddle pan until super hot, and grill the veg - if you don't have a griddle pan a fry pan will also do the trick. Set aside.
Roll out the pasta into sheets with the pasta machine until you get to the number 4 setting. Cut the sheets to size and cook two at a time for a few minutes in a big pot of salted boiling water. Fish out with tongs and throw into a big bowl of cold water.
In a 30cmx20cm baking dish, pressing each layer down firmly as you go:
- spread a thin layer of the tomato sauce
- then a layer of pasta
- courgette and half of the spinach
- layer of pasta
- tomato sauce
- eggplant
- layer of pasta
- capsicum and the rest of the spinach
- layer of pasta
- asparagus
then cover with grated mature cheddar cheese and mozzarella. Sprinkle pine nuts on top. Season with salt and pepper and drizzle with olive oil. Dollop on some of the tomato sauce.
Bake in oven for about 45 minutes or until heated through and brown on top. Serve with rocket leaves dressed with a little balsamic and olive oil.

1.30pm Procrastination + Green & Black's almond chocolate