quick summary of the last week for the record…

Wednesday 19th
Planning to eat the coc au vin this evening
Pret Lunch, ham and egg sandwich with a “vitamin enriched HIPPIE” drink.
Canteen breakfast (Sausage, fried egg, bacon, beans, etc…)

Tuesday 18th
Christmas party food & wine
Gormet Burger Lunch
Skipped breakfast

Monday 17th:
Cheese left over from Saturday.  Leak Pasta
Beef stew and dumplings, very salty
[cooked up coc au vin]

Sunday 16th: (in london this weekend)
Supper with Clare, venison sausage, spinach.  Made mince pies
Late Breakfast, scrambled egg

Saturday 15th:
Dinner party, CP, Pippa, Noz & Drew.  Roast Ham, mash, Cheese, Christmas pudding ice cream
Eggs for late breakfast, no lunch

Friday 14th:

Started to make mincemeat…
? Can’t remember.

After a spot of Christmas shopping with a colleague we pop into a local thai resturant for an ”express” lunch.  Manorom Too.

Spicy chicken soup with mushrooms

Green chicken curry with rice.

all for about £6. 

Burger Joint “PJs” just off covent garden played host to us this lunchtime.  The silly season has yet to start in ernest, but for my immediate team we went out for a longish lunch to get the ball rolling.

“When in Rome” I thought…  so went for a real surf and turf menu selection.  Prawns in batter to start with, followed by a cheeseburger.  All good enough but the batter was a little greasy, and the burger surprisingly dry (although the beef was both tender and full of flavour).

We all washed it down with a dry cote du rhone.

Simple banana today for breakfast.  No wonder i’m hungry by lunch!

Lunch in the staff canteen : Bangers and Mash with peas and gravy.  Simple and good.

Planning cauliflower cheese for supper, not had it for years and years….

Up and at the day before noon, can’t be bad.

After some shuffling around and a good browse in the most excellent Aldeburgh Book Shop.  It’s back to the cottage to roast up some sweet potatoes, leaks and tomatoes.  A little garlic gives it some kick, and the left over feta cheese adds the much needed fat calories.

Warming winter fare.

Back in London, there’s time for a quick omelet before bed using up some old goats cheese I found in the fridge to give it some tang.

Breakfast : Yoghurt & Oats

Lunch : Shared two dishes at “Munchies” on Aldeburgh high street.

1) Cheeseburger in a Suffolk bap (£5.95).  Juicy.

2) Beef hot pot. (£4.95)

(Lashings) of ginger beer to wash it all down.

Over to the in-laws to pick up some furniture; Mother-in-law was cooking a simple tasty looking Sausage dish for supper.

Food:

• onion
• apple (any kind)
• sausage
• mustard

Method:

Slice onions & apples into rings (or whatever) and place in the sort of dish you would cook lasagna in.  Place sausages on top.  Spread a little mustard onto the sausages.

Cook in oven (med/high) for C. 1hr.

The onions and apples will caramelise and you will be left with a delicious “goo” along with your sausages.  Serve with mashed potatoes and savoy cabbage.  Or whatever….

Then it’s off to the badlands of Norfolk for a Christmas drinks party.  Details are a little hazy but I remember it being very wet.  Tasty snack food at the party (sausages, bread and cheese, sausage rolls, etc…) .  Late drive home.

Tea and Muesli start the day in a healthy enough way, Radio 3 in the background. Rain and wind lashing outside. Heating on all is warm and cosy.

We brave the elements to go and get Christmas cards from the charity place under St. Martin in the Fields, then a quick trip to the National where Wife buys me an Advent calender.

Back home for an impromptu lunch of Pasta with a bacon and cream cheese sauce cooked up by Wife while I fix the car.

Now time to do a bit of research on some Christmas cooking that we have to do.

Cooked ham.

Mincemeat

Figgy Pudding

Rushing back from buying a replacement battery for the car and not having long before I have to be up in town for Wife’s concert I just have time to pop into the local (farmers)market to forage for a spot of lunch.  Also find some fine looking Pak Choi.

A small queue has formed by the sausage seller, so on the basis that if somethings good it’s worth waiting for (Oh what it is to be English!)…

Well I’m no nutritionist but I’m starting to see a pattern emerging here. Breakfast is usually a vaguely healthy affair (fruit, porridge, cereal, yogurt, etc…) followed by a more substantial lunch (sandwich, salad, soup, etc…) followed by an enormous blowout evening (fine wines, roasted swan, boiled children, etc…).

Tonight however the mold has been broken. Swan is off the menu at The Builders Arms on Britten street in Chelsea. Instead we make do with some very very young Malbec, scrambled eggs in a box of toast (carve out a box from bread then fry it solid), steak + chips.

All round a fine evening of good honest 21st century Chelsea pub grub. That is to say, not that slightly over priced, honest, poor service and “good enough” food. Still I suppose it really is genuine pub grub for the age.

Time to head home and annoy the neighbours with a bit of the remastered Zeppein Mothership album…

Those boffins in the soup spin-off division at “Pret a Manger” have been busy recently for there cannot be a tastier soup on the high street.  Today’s 5 Bean Cassolet has the usual powerful kick of garlic of all their soups, but is backed up with such chunkyness that i can hardly believe that there’s no dead animal in here.

£4.95 gets you…

1 x 5 Bean Soup

1 x 8inch length of regular baguette

1 x Can of Grape and Elderflower fizzy pop

1 x Flapjack

I’m not saying that it’s interesting, it’s just my lunch.