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ventaAt the weekend, while not frolicking in record shops or climbing trees, I did a lot of cooking.
And before that, I did a lot of shopping.
That's what £20 looks like[*]. It's kind of the opposite of Living Below The Line, really - there's some very profligate purchasing going on there.
For curiosity, I just tried totting up the cost of the same batch of veg on tesco.com. It came to £17.70, plus the price of potatoes because I couldn't find loose potatoes of the same sort, and have no grasp how much that bag weighed. It's all pretty approximate, because "a bunch" of spring onions and "a bunch" of radishes may not be the same size. "An aubergine" may not be the same size, either. But it was actually not as much cheaper as I'd feared[**].
I'm willing and (currently) able to pay a little extra for the privilege of having a proper greengrocer within easy walking distance of my house. Looking at that selection, I now feel slightly guilty for having not bought more of the unusual things they sell :)
With the exception of the beansprouts and the sugar snap peas, everything is either as-is or in a friendly brown paper bag that will be re-used or re-cycled. And I can buy almost everything in the quantity I want, rather than the quantity Tesco has pre-packed for me. Of course, the obvious downside of that is that if you do want a large quantity of something you still have to pay full price for it rather than buying a huge discounted bag.
Rather disappointingly, the sugar snaps had (by the time we tried to eat them two days later) developed a rather distinctive coat of fluffy grey fur :( That's never happened before, and I shall be grumbling profusely to the greengrocer about it on Saturday. I should probably have let them out of their packaging anyway, but I think two days is a reasonable amount of time to expect non-fluffiness.
June is looking frantically busy, so I spent most of the day cooking things to go in the freezer. I'll defrost them as I run past during the next month.
I was halfway through making a batch of small lamb koftas (destined to go in my bento box at intervals) when I realised that it relied on having a food processor. If you haven't got one, ran the recipe, then ask your butcher to double-grind the lamb, and grate the onion, and do a whole bunch of other things that sounded a right palaver.
Instead I used my singly-ground lamb, and chopped everything finely but not obsessively, and threw the finished mixture through my long-suffering meatgrinder. It actually worked reasonably well, though on cleaning the grinder afterwards I found a small cache of pieces of onion which had got left behind. I am currently unsure whether using the grinder in this way constitutes another episode of meatgrinder subversion.
I also made some more of the coconut-flour gluten-free brownies (it was World Baking Day at the weekend, after all). Baked at a slightly higher temperature, they came out fine. I have a lot of coconut flour left, though. I may try experimenting with other less forgiving cakes, but the internet's dire warnings about potential disasters have scared me a bit. If anyone's got any particular recommendations, do let me know.
[*] OK, legally it cost £20.82. But if you're the sort of person who shows up most weeks and buys a basket full of stuff, your friendly local greengrocer rounds down to the nearest whole can't-be-bothered-sorting-out-change.
[**] If I wanted proper cheap, I'd go down to the market stalls on Uxbridge Road where they sell "any bowl for a pound". You can get some really good deals there, but you do have to want what they're selling. You can never rely on them having anything particular on special offer, though they're great if you happen to want a bunch of stuff and are willing to work out what to cook when you get home.
And before that, I did a lot of shopping.
That's what £20 looks like[*]. It's kind of the opposite of Living Below The Line, really - there's some very profligate purchasing going on there.
For curiosity, I just tried totting up the cost of the same batch of veg on tesco.com. It came to £17.70, plus the price of potatoes because I couldn't find loose potatoes of the same sort, and have no grasp how much that bag weighed. It's all pretty approximate, because "a bunch" of spring onions and "a bunch" of radishes may not be the same size. "An aubergine" may not be the same size, either. But it was actually not as much cheaper as I'd feared[**].
I'm willing and (currently) able to pay a little extra for the privilege of having a proper greengrocer within easy walking distance of my house. Looking at that selection, I now feel slightly guilty for having not bought more of the unusual things they sell :)
With the exception of the beansprouts and the sugar snap peas, everything is either as-is or in a friendly brown paper bag that will be re-used or re-cycled. And I can buy almost everything in the quantity I want, rather than the quantity Tesco has pre-packed for me. Of course, the obvious downside of that is that if you do want a large quantity of something you still have to pay full price for it rather than buying a huge discounted bag.
Rather disappointingly, the sugar snaps had (by the time we tried to eat them two days later) developed a rather distinctive coat of fluffy grey fur :( That's never happened before, and I shall be grumbling profusely to the greengrocer about it on Saturday. I should probably have let them out of their packaging anyway, but I think two days is a reasonable amount of time to expect non-fluffiness.
June is looking frantically busy, so I spent most of the day cooking things to go in the freezer. I'll defrost them as I run past during the next month.
I was halfway through making a batch of small lamb koftas (destined to go in my bento box at intervals) when I realised that it relied on having a food processor. If you haven't got one, ran the recipe, then ask your butcher to double-grind the lamb, and grate the onion, and do a whole bunch of other things that sounded a right palaver.
Instead I used my singly-ground lamb, and chopped everything finely but not obsessively, and threw the finished mixture through my long-suffering meatgrinder. It actually worked reasonably well, though on cleaning the grinder afterwards I found a small cache of pieces of onion which had got left behind. I am currently unsure whether using the grinder in this way constitutes another episode of meatgrinder subversion.
I also made some more of the coconut-flour gluten-free brownies (it was World Baking Day at the weekend, after all). Baked at a slightly higher temperature, they came out fine. I have a lot of coconut flour left, though. I may try experimenting with other less forgiving cakes, but the internet's dire warnings about potential disasters have scared me a bit. If anyone's got any particular recommendations, do let me know.
[*] OK, legally it cost £20.82. But if you're the sort of person who shows up most weeks and buys a basket full of stuff, your friendly local greengrocer rounds down to the nearest whole can't-be-bothered-sorting-out-change.
[**] If I wanted proper cheap, I'd go down to the market stalls on Uxbridge Road where they sell "any bowl for a pound". You can get some really good deals there, but you do have to want what they're selling. You can never rely on them having anything particular on special offer, though they're great if you happen to want a bunch of stuff and are willing to work out what to cook when you get home.
