Experiments in slow cooking

When the Boy is working evenings, I find it difficult to get inspired cooking for one. In an attempt to wean myself off my lazy nursery food habits - fish fingers and mash, beans on toast, soup and a baked potato - I invested in a slow cooker.

The plan was to cook up a storm one night a week and fill the freezer with delicious home cooked "ready" meals. Unlike most resolutions of this type, it seems to be working so far.

I started timidly with a couple of recipes designed specifically (or perhaps just marketed?) at slow cooker owners. With limited success... Bland mostly, with overly sweet gloopy or watery sauces.

So I've mostly been adapting regular stew and soup style recipes. The key seems to be browning the meat and shaking it in flour to get a decent gravy, chucking softer ingredients in halfway through the cooking time, and running it off a timer switch (Mine is a pretty basic model that doesn't have an inbuilt timed off switch).

Tagines work really well, this one is adapted from BBC Food.

Chicken and apricot tagine

Adapted for slow cooker from http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/chicken_and_apricot_97224

1. Marinate chicken in harissa.
2. Fry chicken until colour changes, shake in seasoned plain flour. Put to one side.
3. Fry onion and garlic.
4. Chuck everything into the slow cooker with stock, apricots and tomatoes EXCEPT chickpeas. Cook on high for five hours. After two hours add the chickpeas and give a quick stir.
5. Go and get on with your life.
6. Eat with couscous.

Having said that, though, the most delicious thing so far was a melt-in-the-mouth bolognaise sauce: pancetta fried off, browned mince seasoned with basil, oregano, thyme and black pepper (did you read about this recipe book boo-boo? Awkward! ), simmered in passata and stock for five hours. So good!

Holiday Breakfast - Tuesday 27th July

Mmmm, eggy bread - really channelling my roots this morning (Northern half, not Caribbean, obviously...)

Holiday Breakfast - Sunday 25th July

Delight of delights: late breakfast in the garden. Homemade thyme bread and scrambled eggs on toast. Not a million miles from my daydream earlier this week...

Holiday Breakfast - Saturday 24th July

So, after a month of craziness at work, I am on vacation for a whole week!

The best thing about holidays and weekends, and other high days, is having time for a leisurely breakfast.

Today it's Greek yoghurt, with stewed gooseberries from the Abel and Cole veg box, and a handful of seeds. On the side, organic shortbread from the Eat 17 deli in the poshest Spar in the world, and a cup of fresh coffee.Mmmm. Dig in!

Weekend treats

Here in the doldrums of mid-week, I have been thinking that, for me, breakfast is one of the big weekend treats.

Instead of grabbing a mouthful of museli while simultaneously brushing your hair and ironing your clothes, Saturday and Sunday mornings are all about laziness. You can luxuriate over the weekend papers, gaze out of the window or do a little light knitting in your dressing gown with a pot of fresh-brewed coffee till lunchtime and no one bats an eyelid. And then, of course, you just move seamlessly onto brunch!

My best weekend breakfasts:

• Srambled eggs on granary toast
• American style pancakes with blueberries and maple syrup
• Muffins with goats cheese and homemade chutney
• Toasted sodabread with Nanna's orange and ginger marmalade
• Homemade banana muffins with walnuts and pumpkin seeds
• Porridge (not instant!) with nuts and seeds, and sweetened with honey

Here's the easy-peasy recipe for Nigella's American Style Pancakes:

30g butter, melted
225g plain flour
2 teaspoons of baking powder
1 teaspoon of sugar
pinch of salt
300 ml milk
2 eggs

Stick everything in the blender!

Mmmmm ...

Bring on the weekend!

In praise of beans on toast

These big fat juicy broad beans came in this week's veg box from Abel and Cole (our driver's name: Orville). I was stuck for ideas, until the Boy flippantly suggested dip.

Goldmine!

I blanched the wrinkly white beans in salty boiling water, then whizzed them up with olive oil, a splash of lemon and liberally seasoned with coarse ground black pepper and chilli flakes.

Perfect on a slice of toasted honey-and-ale bread, crafted by the Boy's own fair hands.

Not flipping out

Is it wrong that it's Pancake Day and we're not flipping?

We ate Nigella's lush American style pancakes at the weekend and frankly, after that, crepes just won't cut the mustard.

We are having mushroom ragout and flatbread for dinner, so I guess that is sufficiently unleaven?

Hey, I was hungry

Marinade for pork chops - organic and British, naturally.

• Three teaspoons of wholegrain mustard
• One teaspoon of cider vinegar
• One tablespoon of olive oil
• One heaped teaspoon of honey

Served with crisp green beans and buttered new potatoes.

Should have been mash, of course, but I hadn't the patience. Hey, I was hungry.