“Chorizo, Spinach and Ricotta Frittata” from “Fast, Fresh, Simple”

Sorry, I don’t have any dialogue for you today as I made this for my lunch and I tend to eat alone. Not for any Greta Garbo sort of way, but just because that’s where I found myself that day. In fact, she never said, “I want to be alone” and instead said, “I want to be left alone.” Garbo later said, “There is all the difference.” Indeed.

But I digress. I can tell you that I enjoyed this dish so much that I have now eaten it for lunch twice. It is a whole lot of good eating in one little skillet. For the record, I never added the sage leaves it called for– I had them, I just kept fogetting to add them– but I don’t think that oversight left the dish wanting. Also, I didn’t have any single cream to hand, so I used milk, which also worked. I imagine the cream would make it an even richer dish, but it seems pretty good as it is, so I don’t know if its use is entirely necessary.

I didn’t think it would work to cook the spinach with the chorizo, as I usually cook down spinach with water. It did work, though, and it worked a treat. I will remember this trick when I make other dishes with spinach in the future.

Again, because I was eating alone, I cut the quantities down to make it for one person. It could very easily be scaled up, in which case you’d need to share the whole skillet of goodness, which might be difficult for some people.

I would definitely make this again, especially for a weekend breakfast or brunch, though lunch on my own was equally nice. I’m pleased to say that all the timings worked for this recipe.

“Apple & Watercress Salad” from “Jamie’s Great Britain”

In case you didn’t get the memo, Jamie Oliver’s next move will be world domination. He has a staff of 1,000. He makes millions every year. His “30-Minute Meals” was the fastest and best-selling non-fiction book of all time in the United Kingdom. The fact that the aforementioned book nearly killed us is neither here nor there. Jamie is an industry unto himself.

Just in time for the Christmas season is “Jamie’s Great Britain.” Bookmaker William Hill is offering 1:2 odds that this will be the best selling book this Christmas. Given how many Christmas trees had “30-Minute Meals” underneath them, I think that’s a pretty safe bet.

With the glorious Indian summer we’ve been having here in London, I thought the best way to kick things off would be with an Apple and Watercress Salad with blue cheese dressing and crushed walnuts. I’m sorry there’s no conversation for this one, but since I was eating alone, it would be a worrisome development for both the blog and myself if I did have dialogue to provide.

This was delicious and easy. The salad is basically apples, watercress, walnuts and blue cheese with a dressing of spring onion, yoghurt, cider vinegar, olive oil, seasonings and more blue cheese. I used my food processor to slice the apples thinly and quickly, and then used it again to whip up the dressing.

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“Beef Salad with Red Onions and Balsamic Vinegar” from “Easy”

Julia: Visually, it’s… (pause for serious consideration for the right adjective) appealing. The flavours are really super.

Tom: I thought it was very tasty with a good mix of flavours.

Julia: What’s it called?

Maureen: Beef salad with red onions and balsamic vinegar.

Julia: It should have a fancier name than that!

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“Pea, asparagus and Parmesan tart” from “Good Things to Eat”

Anna: I’m not really a tart person….

Jane: Guffaw! I don’t know, I’ve known you a long time  – have you forgotten the Nineties?

Anna: Thank you for that. As you well know, what I mean is that I seldom make tarts, quiches, those sorts of things. In fact I think I manage one a year.

Jane: Well this is beautiful.

Anna: I’d call it ‘rustic’. The pastry is threatening to fall apart. I’m not quite sure why, as I followed the recipe. It’s pastry alchemy. I don’t have the secret.

Jane: Did you make the pastry from scratch?

Anna: Did I hell. There’s a limit to how much work I’m prepared to do on a Sunday morning, even if I have the Archers Omnibus to keep me company.

Jane: It reminds me of the south of France. It’s delicious. Can I have another slice?

Anna: It is very good, isn’t it? But it’s not very filling. I put more parmesan in than it called for too, but I think it’s because there isn’t enough filling mixture. It feels like there’s more pastry than tart, if you know what I mean.

Jane: I do. It looks quite big and rich in the dish, but once you put the slice on the plate it looked a bit thin and sad.

Anna: Though that might have been because the pastry fell apart, as feared.

Jane: We had enough for seconds, and I still think it was delicious. Thank you for my lovely lunch!

“Chicken, leek and tarragon pie” from “Good Things To Eat”

Andrew (11 — pushing away his plate as he polishes off his dinner in record time): That was really good!

Nicholas (8): This is one of the best things I ever tasted.

Maureen: I agree. This has got to be one of the best chicken pies I’ve ever had. What did you like about it?

Nicholas: It’s got a lot of flavours but not too many flavours.

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“Butter Bean Soup” from “Leon 2″

Maureen: It seems like a good soup day, and with spring coming, hopefully we don’t have too many soup days left until autumn.

Nicholas (7): It doesn’t look like anything.

Maureen: Of course not. It’s white.

Andrew (11): Is this from the new cookbook?

Maureen: Yes, it is. What do you think?

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“Smoked Salmon”, “Potato Salad”, “Beets and Cottage Cheese”, “Rye Bread and Homemade Butter” from Jamie’s 30 Minute Meals

Time taken: 33min 22 secs. (not including prep time)

Anna: Bloody Jamie. He’s gone too far this time.

Kirstin: I love this recipe. I would DEFINITELY make this again. I’d make this every day. For a week.

Anna: What did you like about it so much?

Kirstin: I thought the flavours were great. And, home-made butter.  Even though it took most of that half an hour figuring out how to fit the whisk attachment to the food processor. I would definitely make my own butter again! And it was a joy to take pictures in the daytime. Just a joy with natural daylight.

Anna: What a mess though!

Kirstin: You just put it into the dishwasher! It was fine….

Anna: But if you don’t have a dishwasher, you’ve got a food processor and a whisk and your hands covered in sodding butter. Anyway, tell me about how you draped the salmon in rustic waves…. and the erratically chunked beetroot….

Kirstin: Yeah, nevermind.

Anna: Really, this recipe was just about assembling various pre packed ingredients, with a bit of potato-boiling and butter-making thrown to make look more like cooking. It’s no wonder it only took half an hour.

Kirstin: It was good though, it was yummy!

Anna: I agree, but it was more faff than it needed to be. Honestly.

Kirstin: Well I’d like it again please. I wonder if I should make my own butter again. The cottage cheese!

Anna: It was just cottage cheese, with some seasoning.

Kirstin: And the beetroot with balsamic vinegar!

Anna: Yes. Exactly.  Too much faff.

Kirstin: It was pretty exhausting. Did we win the cuddly toy?

“Best Menus” – Our Verdict

Kirstin: I was surprised how much I enjoyed this book.

Maureen: I was surprised by how much I was underwhelmed. The recipies for the most part all worked…

Kirstin: …and there was a good range with lots of different cuisines…

Maureen: But there wasn’t anything in here I don’t have in another cookbook. Though, to be fair, I do have a lot of cookbooks.

Kirstin: The thing I liked about this book was that all of the recipes worked. I knew I could trust them all.

Maureen: Other than the yogurt and blueberry recipe. But we don’t eat yogurt too much, so that’s OK.

Kirstin: For my first Gordon book I’ve used, it was uncharacteristically useful. I might consider buying another Gordon book.

Maureen: It was quick. They were 30 minute recipes without being called 30 minutes. I also really liked how it was laid out, with each page cut into thirds, so you could have a starter, main and dessert from three different parts of the book all on the same page.

Kirstin: Wasn’t that brilliant. More books shoudl do that. It was fantastic.

Maureen: I would recommend it to people who don’t have many cookbooks and who don’t like to cook that much.

Kirstin: This is a good one to give to people, because everybody would find something they would use. The desserts were very doable. Most dessert recipes I get a bit scared of, but I wasn’t scared of those.

Maureen: I liked the looks of the chocolate fondant recipie you made, so much so that I went out and bought Le Crueset ramekins. Well, I was celebrating passing my citizenship exam, so I bought them to celebrate.

Kirstin: Any excuse to buy Le Crueset.

Maureen: Any excuse to mention the fact that I passed my test.

Kirstin: So, Maureen, have you enjoyed your first month on Cookbook a Month?

Maureen: Yes, very much. The thing I really liked about is it forced me to make different things during the week, rather than the same 10 standby dishes that I always do. My family really liked that too. I liked this book. It’s like the elusive Holy Grail: finding the recipe that you can make quickly on a weekday night that your family likes and is easy.

Kirstin: It’s a great book.

“Bresaola with Rocket and Parmesan” and “Blueberries with Honey, Almonds and Yogurt” from “Best Menus”

Maureen: As you can see, I found the bresaola. It was not easy to find. I struck out at Drings (though they said they usually do have it), Waitrose, the Cooperative, Sainsbury’s, Ocado and Marks & Spencer.

Tim: Where did you find it?

Maureen: At the most excellent and our most favourite Italian delicatessen, Gennaro’s in Lewisham, of course. I knew they would have it. I went after I passed my Life in the UK Citizenship test. (Editor’s note: Please excuse the blatant self-promotion, but hey, can you tell us how many members there are in the Welsh General Assembly or how many members there are in cabinet?)


Tim: What do you think?

Maureen: It’s very nice, but it hardly qualifies as a recipe. I’d call it a shopping list. Gennaro had a great tip that Gordon didn’t include. He said to be sure to put lemon juice on the bresaola. So I put lemon juice on the beef and then again on the rocket once I put it on top. What did you think?

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“Skirt steak with spicy potatoes” from “Entertaining at Home”

Kirstin: It’s a bonus post! But I couldn’t get skirt steak. The butcher said I should have ordered it.

Phil: It’s just a cheaper cut than fillet, though. And you got fillet.

Tom: Is skirt steak thinner? Because I still only cooked it for one minute each side, like the recipe says. So it was rather rare. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Or was it too rare?

Jen: If you’re doing it with a thicker cut, you could probably do it for longer. But I like a really rare steak.

Phil: No, not too rare at all. I think the chilli could have been extended to the meat, though. I really liked the chilli with the potatoes.

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