The Weekend that Wasn't

Well - that's just me grinching about a weekend that seemed to be more incursion than recreation. How was your supper on Friday N.B.? I ate three mini-sausage rolls. Eeerrrggh. Still, a much needed Saturday night in provided good cooking opportunities. First on the schedule of events was a spinach and lamb curry. This was quite a quick curry - I know it's kind of a contradiction in terms but the difference was lamb fillet, sliced thinly and pan-browned in batches before being added to the rest of the ingredients. I had some initial problems with stewing but solved them by just turning up the heat. The curry had a fabulous list of spices: garlic, fresh ginger, chilli powder, cinnamon, cloves, cardamon pods, coriander, cumin, tumeric, garam masala and brown mustard seeds. Add onion, spinach, butter-milk, sour cream and - just for kicks - some cherry tomatoes. Ultimate Saturday-night-in-comfort-food but it doesn't photograph well. Definitely in the brutti ma buoni cateogry. Incidentally, did you know that the whole "Me Man." (beating of hairy chest) "Me eat incredibly hot curry!!" started in the 18th century in the East India Company? After sweating profusely in the pursuit of testosterone-flavoured victory, the employees brought it back to England and a chicken curry recipe appears in Hannah Glasse's cookbook (THE ART OF COOKERY, Made PLAIN and EASY; which far exceeds any THING of the Kind ever yet Published) of 1747. Apparently, by the way, this recipe book was so popular and so good that people assumed it was written by a man. Yup. 

Just because I could, I then decided to make a hot dessert for one. I poached/steamed a peeled, cored pear, scooped out the middle and stuffed it with brown sugar and raisins. Then I cut a piece of puff-pastry a bit bigger than the pear, brushed it with cream, set the pear on it stuffing-side down and baked it. God pears are fabulous.  They taste like Autumn and they're so sweet that they caramelise in their own sugars. 

Today was spent baking a pie but I'll enlarge on that tomorrow...pictures above.