Thursday, March 09, 2006

Recipes.

After nearly four years of Hubby working away during the week and only being here Friday to Sunday nights, he`s suddenly started appearing home every evening. (Change of job, from Preston, 3 hours drive away, to Stirling, one hour drive away.)This has required a total reorganisation of the daily schedule...I`m no longer a part time single mum, but one that has to cook grown up food every single night. Bah. I quite liked M&S ready meals, and it saved a lot of washing up. Plus cooking was one of the many, many things that I kind of lost interest in doing during the worst bits of my depression. (I never lost interest in eating, alas!)

However there are a few advantages, not least the one that my cooking tends to be better than even M&S. This week I am on one of the revolving curry weeks...I cook a different type of curry every night except for the first night, when I make two and freeze half of one. This means that you can eat a different combination of two curries every night for...well, as long as you want, really. Fresh rice and/or nan every night, ratias and chutneys optional. I think the longest time we did this for was three weeks (I know a LOT of curry recipes) then we succumbed to the Chinese takaway.

Today I made cauliflower, carrot and pea curry from the Madhur Jaffrey`s Indian Cookery book.




I`m amused to see she`s been "re-established" as the UK`s leading authority on Indian food. I hadn`t actually realised that she`d ever stopped being so, as I`m still using the spice bespattered edition of this book that I bought in 1982.

Last night I made Spicy Lamb and Chickpeas, from the Delia book. Tomorrow night, I think we`ll go vegetarian and have some sort of spicy chana dahl. Etc. (And I might even clean the cooker before I take another photo.)

Knitting and spinning things. I got two parcels through the post today.......first parcel contained these, a recent Ebay buy.







Make sure you click on the pictures so you can read the blurb on the packet. I LOVE the bit about the "insistant demands" of us knitters! These old packets are brilliant. And Aeros are my favourite sort of pin.

Second package was quite small, so I was surprised to find this in it.



I think I always sort of assumed that this would be a whopper of a coffee table book, but it`s no larger than a decent size paperback. I`ve only had a brief peek inside, but it looks full of lovely stuff and luscious pictures of yarn in the finest PluckyFluff style. Yummmmm..... In fact, it looks at first glance like one of these fancy food porn recipe books. Not at all like Delia or Madhur`s books!

Last but not least, I talked before about doing a bit of stashbusting on Ebay. I finally got round to this and started modestly with six lots. (There are another forty or so lots bagged up and ready to photograph stored in the attic.) Odd balls, singles or six or so...none of them enough to make a sweater. A couple of Rowan, Jaeger, Sirdar...nothing nasty or acrylic, but nothing spectacular. And I raised over £36 from these six motley lots!

More has been listed. (No, I`m not into blatent self-promotion of auctions, so I`m not giving you my Ebay name unless you really, really beg.) One woman`s surplus stash is truely another wo/man`s treasure! And guess what I`ll probably buy with the profits?

Yup...more yarn.....lol.

5 comments:

sal the spider said...

We're packed and ready, just need your address now and you can expect us forthwith!!LOL We LOVE curry and could do three weeks with glee ;-)
Sal x
Oh,and I'm begging where's yr stuff on ebay??

gourdongirl said...

we're coming too, I love yer cooking Missus. I'll bring the desserts and the chicken dippers for Bob......LOL. (only joking btw!) Need to go check out ebay....just out of noseyness!!!!

Melissa said...

Ooo.. I just discovered Madhur Jarrey's books this past year. I'm a big fan of Charmaine Solomon's Asian Cookbook, though.

And I discovered your blog through following random links while looking for info on spinning wheels. I got an obnoxious monetary birthday present and am looking at looms and spinning wheels. I want a new hobby and am a self-confessed fibre whore without the finger dexterity to be good at knitting. ;o)

veritas said...

those madhur books! that big curry book is like, $80 australian dollars... and it sells within a few days of us ordering it in. every single time! yep. everyone loves them. (i work in a bookstore. :) )

Woolly Wormhead said...

Wow, loads of posts for me to catch up on! Should check fave blogs more often, Ruth. Tsk..

Anyways...! Yeah, I was disappointed with the size of the PluckyFluff book too - still, it is full of lovely pictures and ideas, and somehow, the quality of the printing/paper and the knowledge it's an independant book kinda justifies the price to me.

So when are we gonna see some yarns in this stylee? I mean, 4 wheels.... c'mon!