haddock fillets marinated in lime and coriander

I made myself a very nice and simple meal the other day. The haddock fillets in lime and coriander came from the fresh fish counter at Tesco and I cooked the fish, in the oven for half an hour in a little butter, at the same as boiling some new potatoes and steaming some vegetables for the last ten minutes of cooking. To finish the dish I added a few pitted black olives. A few chilled glasses of white Chateau Pierrouselle white wine helped the meal turn into a mini event.

a medley of vegetables

ready to go in the oven on a medium heat

Cooked fillets just out of the oven 

 The finished meal

Breakfast with Phil

Just made a simple breakfast of shop bought croissants, Bonne Maman blackcurrant conserve and a steaming cup of Carte Noire coffee. To me this is a bit of a 'starting work later today' treat. What do you enjoy for breakfast when you have time to spare?


Carte Noire – un café nommê désir.

eat me!

in the depths of the freezer

Had a bit of a clear out of old food in the freezer over the last week. Aside from the remains of a woolly mammoth embeded in the ice at the back and a family of frost bitten refugee peas snuggled in the right hand corner of a frozen Yorkshire pudding, there is little left  that is well out of date. So yesterday morning I got out a bag of frozen meat cubes that could be either lamb or beef. Hard to tell really. Before I came home from work I got myself a jar of curry sauce to make a nice curry with the hopefully de-frosted meat that evening.

When I got home at 6pm the meat had certainly de-frosted but looked greyer than a grey seal wrapped in a grey blanket looking out upon a grey sea on a grey day .

I didn't trust it and the smell was a bit odd. Therefore I dumped it all in the dustbin and went shopping for fresh meat. If I were a caveman I would have spent hours or even days hunting down a wild beastie in neolithic tundra but, in these modern times, I was able to purchase a half leg of lamb from the local Co-op.

To make the lamb curry I boned the leg and chopped it up into stew size chunks and cooked it all in my wok along with some mushrooms, par boiled cubed new potatoes, some sliced tomato and a few pineapple chunks. I also added a spoonful of honey to final part of cooking the meat. I couldn't be bothered doing any rice so I popped a couple of naan breads in the oven for ten minutes.A glass or three of Merlot helped make the event a jolly one and the curry was pretty good and will last me two more generous helpings.

A tart citron with berries made a nice dessert.

hot chicks

This is my friend Steve from Leeds who works on the hot chicks - that's cooked chickens to you and me. He shares his job with three other colleagues and together they cook each day roast chickens, sausages, roast potatoes, ham hocks and chicken nuggets. The hot chickens range from plain, barbeque, extra tasty, garlic and herbs and peri peri.Steve says all these types in his sweet Yorkshire accent and extra tasty becomes extra tairsty and peri peri becomes puri puri. He's a lovely guy and takes our teasing well.

The hot chicks gang serve full chickens, half chickens, thighs, legs and wings and other cooked goodies including pies and sausages. They must be good as they are constantly busy.

extra tasty chickens

chicken drumsticks

garlic and herb chickens

too keen for my own good and a New Year resolution.

Aaaah, the joys of getting to work over the Christmas/New Year period. From 19th of December to 1st of January my normal work shifts were altered due to the holiday period and the need to stock up the meat and deli cabinets and in my keenness I rather enthusiastically said OK to any changes in my hours.

In brief, I worked seven hours overtime on Sunday 19th to help prepare the huge stock of cheeses needed on the deli. I swear I still smell of blue Stilton after cutting up at least twenty full Stiltons plus all the other cheeses needed. After finishing at midnight I waited around in the freezing cold for a taxi home that didn’t arrive until one o’clock. I was supposed to finish at ten o’clock but there was still loads of cheeses yet to be cut, wrapped and priced up so I stayed on. Outside it was decidedly chilly. Expensively chilly with three drunken youths dancing awkwardly on the frozen fringes. Christmas, a time to be merry and bright and marginally scared. I just wanted be at home in the warm and safe bosum of my living room.

On two separate days before Christmas I was at work for 4am in the morning and worked until 1pm. I was very busy and the time flew by.  Predictably, I fell asleep when I got home after enjoying some dinner with a well deserved glass of wine, or two.

I was off work Christmas Day and Boxing Day and never thought to check on the bus timetables to see how the buses would be running from the 27th of December onwards. Twice during that week I discovered that the 5.35 am number 10 bus wasn’t operating. The first time I waited around (just in case) until about 5.45am. No bus arrived but a big fox passed me by and silently disappeared into the misty graveyard by the bus shelter. It was like being on Nature Watch the tv programme. On that particular day I went back home and did my overdue washing up and caught the 6.29am bus instead and I was still only ten minutes late for work.


------------------------------------------------------------------------

The second time the 5.35am bus didn’t arrive was on a very foggy morning and, rather rashly, I decided to walk to the nearest main bus route. This was about a mile and half away across the moors and local golf course. Ten minutes into my power walking exercise I heard a car behind me and stuck my thumb out for a lift. To my utter amazement the car pulled over. I got in and a very kind man called Paul took me to his workplace – a Pizza factory. This factory was situated near the river Trent and I would say that to walk back into the city centre would’ve taken me about fifteen to twenty minutes. After thanking this stranger for the lift, I set off walking again through a slightly dodgy housing estate called The Meadows.

Along my way, and having suffered no drive by shootings, muggings or early morning flashers, I found myself on a familiar tree lined major walkway that I have traversed many a time before. ‘Great news’ thought I.

So, still on this dark and foggy morn, I hot footed it along the half mile route towards the city centre and the bus station to catch my bus to Beeston. It felt pretty good to be out and about so early and being able to walk properly again after my recent visit to the doctors.

Imagine my amusement to find, as I came off the walkway, (and I’d walked now for about half an hour ) that I was bloody well back where I started, by the river Trent!!! I’d just walked round in a big circle!

Gritting my teeth and girding my loins I quickly walked back along the route (the right way) and arrived hot and sweaty at the Broadmarsh bus station where I caught the 6.23am bus to Beeston. I was still early despite all of this rather absurd adventure.

The biggest faux pas that I made over the festive period was agreeing to work New Year’s Day from 8am to 1pm. Yes, quite a short shift I grant you. And time and half pay too. What I didn’t consider in my blithe agreement to work was that there are no buses at all on New Year’s Day AND taxi fares are either double the normal rate or charged at time and a half. New Year’s Day cost me £30 to get to work and back!! Ouch!

New Year’s resolution: ALWAYS check things out in advance. I reckon its beans on toast for the next five weeks, to recover my finances. I will try to vary my blog posts: Beans on toast, beans by toast, beans with white toast, beans with brown toast, toast with beans, just a few beans on a cracker, the day I ran out of beans, etc.