We've been eating around the world recently. We had four friends over for the best of New York City, starting with a Manhattan and a platter of oysters, Bluff & Pacific served with thinly sliced sourdough, lemon wedges & Worcester sauce. This dinner started out because a friend said she'd never eaten oysters. She liked them. Oysters made me think of NYC so I went on to do a
rib roast served with
Delmonico potatoes and a garden salad with Thousand Island Dressing. I made my first ever attempt at New York baked cheesecake and it was excellent. Unfortunately we were having so much fun we forgot to take photos!
Then another friend said she'd like French onion soup so we had another group of four for a taste of France. We started with a
champagne 75 , kind of like a gin and tonic but with champagne in place of tonic. We followed the soup with a boeuf bourgignon, roasted potatoes and buttered peas and then Phoebe kindly made us a cherry clafoutis. Again too much fun, too few photos.
Then it was back to the best of British for Peter & I. I had a hankering for parsnips and found a Nigel Slater idea for
sausage with baked parsnips. Nigel had black pudding with his, but I thought we could live without. Peter however had other ideas and a
black pudding was duly purchased. It was actually really nice. Not just 'I managed to eat a slice' nice but actually so nice I had two slices and sought out another recipe to use the rest.
We came upon Jamie Oliver's
scallops & black pudding with clapshot which is just mashed neeps & tatties with chives. Note that when the Scots refer to turnips they mean swedes not the little white turnips we get. I served a handful of rocket & watercress on the side to counter the richness of the pudding & scallops. Sometimes it's worth trying new things even when we've spent all our lives thinking we don't like it.
Another recent find was
toad in the hole for vegetarians - mushroom toad with mushy peas and onion gravy. This was a perfect meal and just thinking about it makes me want to eat it again. I got the
blue peas at Common Sense Organics. They're so pretty. Try them with a simple fish supper.
I saved the cooked barley and had it as a salad with lamb meatballs later in the week however I think you could actually do the onion gravy without.
We've been eating around the world recently. We had four friends over for the best of New York City, starting with a Manhattan and a platter of oysters, Bluff & Pacific served with thinly sliced sourdough, lemon wedges & Worcester sauce. This dinner started out because a friend said she'd never eaten oysters. She liked them. Oysters made me think of NYC so I went on to do a rib roast served with Delmonico potatoes and a garden salad with Thousand Island Dressing. I made my first ever attempt at New York baked cheesecake and it was excellent. Unfortunately we were having so much fun we forgot to take photos!
Then another friend said she'd like French onion soup so we had another group of four for a taste of France. We started with a champagne 75 , kind of like a gin and tonic but with champagne in place of tonic. We followed the soup with a boeuf bourgignon, roasted potatoes and buttered peas and then Phoebe kindly made us a cherry clafoutis. Again too much fun, too few photos.
Then it was back to the best of British for Peter & I. I had a hankering for parsnips and found a Nigel Slater idea for sausage with baked parsnips. Nigel had black pudding with his, but I thought we could live without. Peter however had other ideas and a black pudding was duly purchased. It was actually really nice. Not just 'I managed to eat a slice' nice but actually so nice I had two slices and sought out another recipe to use the rest.
We came upon Jamie Oliver's scallops & black pudding with clapshot which is just mashed neeps & tatties with chives. Note that when the Scots refer to turnips they mean swedes not the little white turnips we get. I served a handful of rocket & watercress on the side to counter the richness of the pudding & scallops. Sometimes it's worth trying new things even when we've spent all our lives thinking we don't like it.
Another recent find was toad in the hole for vegetarians - mushroom toad with mushy peas and onion gravy. This was a perfect meal and just thinking about it makes me want to eat it again. I got the blue peas at Common Sense Organics. They're so pretty. Try them with a simple fish supper.
I saved the cooked barley and had it as a salad with lamb meatballs later in the week however I think you could actually do the onion gravy without.
