31/01/2012

Crazy day today - our little girl has been teething and had her 16 week vaccinations this afternoon so combined this made a pretty unhappy baby tonight. She did however treat me to a 45min nap late afternoon which allowed me to prep dinner! Good job really as it took 2.5 hours to cook!

I managed 3 Delia recipes - Hungarian beef goulash, dwarf beans and mash with sour cream and chives.

The meat was beautifully tender and the dwarf beans, which were in fact green beans, I will definitely be making again - simply tossed in olive oil with some chopped garlic yum.

Now I am praying the wonders of calpol means I'm not up every hour tonight...

Oh and a little update one month in:

63 recipes down, 11 months and 486 recipes to go. That's just over 44 recipes a month

29/01/2012

Well after being quite scared by the prospect of so many recipes so little time... I went a bit crazy today with a grand total of 5 recipes!

For starters (although eaten for pud!) I made a lemon layer cake layered with lemon curd and whipped cream. Then for tea we had moules mariniere, with proper chips and aioli using the mayonnaise recipe. Was gorgeous but not eaten til 9pm thanks to our teething little girl who was struggling going off to sleep bless her.

Time for an update

Well at 4 weeks in I am 55 recipes down, that leaves me with 338 days to cook another 494 recipes. Eek!!

26/01/2012

Well dinner tonight didn't go as planned but I did still manage to have Delia recipes for breakfast and lunch.

Breakfast was fried egg on toast. Egg was fried in lard and a bit greasy for my liking, I prefer my eggs fried in frylight spray!

Then for lunch I made a nice Greek salad, with black olives and feta.

25/01/2012

Well today I braved two brown rice dishes - for dinner and pudding!

Firstly for dinner we had baked spinach with brown rice and cheese, really lovely but a massive 2 bags of spinach made 3 portions. The crunchy cayenne breadcrumb topping was really good too.

For pud we had brown rice pudding with prunes and apricots topped with some Greek natural yoghurt. Nice but very heavy!

24/01/2012

Tomorrow nights tea a day early in honour of burns night - punchnep soup served with sour cream soda bread. First time I've cooked turnips and it was really tasty. Surprising how much sour cream Delia uses... Something I never used to use.

23/01/2012

With the other half of my jointed chicken I made chicken in BBQ sauce... Except it was more of a Chinese sauce than a BBQ one, quite appropriate for Chinese new year!
I served it with brown rice, lentil and mushroom salad which was really good - I'm starting to realise how much I like lentils I think.

21/01/2012

Had a really productive day! Hubby took the baby over to see his family so I had a few hours of complete me-time. Something I haven't had at all since having her. So I treated myself to a long soak in the bath with a glass of wine, as well as a nap and some quality time in the kitchen!

So firstly I jointed a chicken into portions ready to make 2 meals, and made a tasty stock which has gone into the freezer. It was an adaptation of Delia's chicken giblet stock but using the carcass instead.
I then made spiced chicken, staining my fingernails rubbing the turmeric spice mix in! Served with pilau rice.

I also braved my first steamed pudding - a wholewheat syrup sponge. It was ok, but the syrup didn't really ooze like it should have and the sponge batter did manage to leak out all over the steamer - oops! Also I misjudged the timings so it wasn't ready until after 10pm... Oh well we live and learn!

Recipe update... 3 weeks down and 47 recipes made. 502 to go.

18/01/2012

For lunch I made myself the courgette and tomato gratin. In hindsight this probably wasn't such a great idea. For starters I didn't start making it until really late as I took the baby out for a lunchtime walk, secondly I skipped Delia's tip of drying out the courgettes before cooking them as I didn't have time... So it ended up really watery. Still tasty though!

For tea I cooked pork chops in a cream and mushroom sauce which were really nice.

I also made the lemon surprise pudding which was lovely and tangy

16/01/2012

Made Delia's spaghetti carbonara (but with penne as you can see!). I was quite dubious as I often make carbonara to an authentic Italian recipe but Delia's was really similar and very scrummy

15/01/2012

The most delicious meal out of the book so far! Braised steak in a green peppercorn sauce, served with creamed parsnips - both were gorgeous!

This was supposed to be last nights tea but we had a day out to the mumbles in Swansea and after a bitey cold day at the seaside all I fancied was fish and chips so that's what we had!

13/01/2012

Eek Friday the 13th! Well nothing scary happened luckily!

Tonight I made Delia's meatloaf and served it with her potato salad which was lovely with a tangy dressing rather than claggy with a mayonnaise dressing

12/01/2012

Well last night I made a scrumptious soup - smoked bacon and lentil which I had for my lunch today. It was nice and salty from the bacon and gorgeous and creamy from the lentils.

Then for tea I made baked fish with sour cream and capers, served with sautéed courgettes. We don't eat a lot of fish but this was really good, and the caper sauce was really nice and tangy. I used frozen haddock fillets.

Short absence

Sorry for my absence from here... I have been cooking just not blogging! Combination of being super busy with the baby and falling out of the habit! Well here goes...

11/01/2012

Well last night for tea I decided to try out the scone pizza. Base was a bit different to what I'd usually make but much easier as didn't require any proving. Good job it was easy to make as the portion to serve 2 was tiny so I had to make another one (either that or I'm particularly greedy when it comes to pizza!). Strange as it went against the large portions which seems to be the trend in Delia's book so far!

Pic is of hubby's which had the suggested topping of thinly sliced mushrooms. I went for much stronger flavours on mine - a bit of crumbled Stilton, some anchovies and capers. Unfortunately I didn't have any olives which would have been rather tasty too!

09/01/2012

Comfort food and use up of leftovers was on the cards... With the leftover mash from Friday and some of the remaining cabbage I bought on new years eve.
So we had a gorgeous tea of bubble and squeak cakes with baked beans and a fried egg. Although the fried eggs weren't a la Delia as she recommends using lard which I didn't have, so ours were cooked in frylight spray as we're not fans of greasy eggs.

One week on...

Well a week on and so far my little project is going really well!

Tonight I cooked Irish stew with parsley dumplings, which was gorgeous. The dumplings were cooked in the juices from the stew, and started to caramelise, delicious! First time I've made dumplings too so I was really impressed.

For pud I made apple and raisin (well actually it was sultana) crumble with Delia's variation on crumble topping using half flour, half muesli. I really enjoyed it but hubby not so keen as he's not a fan of stewed apples. He liked the crumble topping though!

So this is my 8th day and I'm 29 recipes down. Pretty pleased with that!

07/01/2012

Bit of a long day - shopping trip which including a mid-aisle tantrum from our daughter with her being sick all over her dad! And disappointment at tesco not stocking mussels for the second time I've looked (dying to make moules mariniere), but that will have to wait.

So instead I made the egg and lentil curry served with mushroom rice. To be honest we both found it a bit rich with the eggs. The rice was really good - I'm usually addicted to my microwave rice steamer so cooking rice in a pan hiding with the lid on for 15mins was a bit scary but Delia is right, it really is a foolproof method.

06/01/2012

Had a lazy day yesterday cooking-wise, and ended up with a cheeky takeaway for tea! I did make the all in one chocolate cake, which today I covered and filled with Delia's chocolate and sour cream filling.

Had a delicious tea - sausages braised in red wine served with mash mmm proper winter food!

Day Four

Well today was spent nursing a sick husband as well as a poorly baby (who was up all night again), so the natural remedy was a steaming bowl of soup for lunch! Leek, onion and potato soup, very yummy.

Dinner was macaroni with leeks and bacon (but using penne as suggested) and involved me trying the very scary all in one white sauce technique. I've always made my white sauces starting with a roux but I'm pleased to say this worked perfectly.
I served it with the hot herb and garlic loaf, very yummy.

Day Three

Had a bit of a busy day today so not much time to cook! Included a trip to the docs for my daughters 12 week jabs. Pleased to say she's been good as gold so far, and her cold seems to be getting a bit better.

Anyway I did manage to stick to a Delia dinner - her chicken paprika served with salad leaves dressed in her vinaigrette. Really tasty!
Pleased the thrifty side of this seems to be working, a £3.30 chicken has made two meals for two, plus I've got the carcass to make a tasty stock.

Trouble is I wanted to use the leftover sour cream from the chicken paprika for a fish dish but can't find any capers... Hmm where to buy capers?

Day two

Well our baby girl has steadily improved through the day so we're hoping her cold is getting better and I did manage to get some cooking done... As well as eat last nights dinner!

For breakfast I made a delicious batch of lemon pancakes, which we actually ended up eating about 1pm.
I then baked a batch of poppyseed rolls and lemon curd cupcakes. The rolls turned out well although I made sure I did knead them properly which I'm usually a bit lax on. The lemon curd was a bit tricky and I did end up with some scrambled egg crumbs in there, although they were unrecognisable once cooled.

Dinner then was last nights reheated! Firstly I had to joint a chicken for the first time - very tricky! I used a combination of a carving knife and kitchen scissors... I'm definitely not much of a butcher. Using the chicken I made coq au vin, and served with creamed potatoes and fried cabbage with bacon - a huge success as my husband has never liked cabbage.

Dessert was creme brûlée yummy

So grand total after day 2 - 14 recipes down, 534 to go

New Years Day supper

Well I thought I'd treat us to a three course meal for New Years Day, although with a newborn things never go to plan...

For starter I made marinated mushrooms, which I served cold as the recipe suggested, but it would have been much nicer warm.

Then we never got round to the other courses as our baby girl was poorly with her very first cold so she had a really bad night poor thing. So supper ended up being cheese and crackers at about 10pm!

So on day one I am five recipes down, 543 to go

Lunchtime

Well here's lunch on day 1 - ham croquettes made from leftover Christmas ham and using my Kenwood mini chopper (another Delia inspired purchase thanks to her Delia cheats book). Served with raw spinach and watercress salad (with the addition of rocket leaves too), interesting dressing using sherry, something I would never have tried but really tasty!

Although I did eat mine cold as I was on baby feeding duty!

Happy New Year!

Well it's day one of my new 2012 adventure, cooking all the recipes out of Delia's Complete Cookery Collection.

Day started off great - no hangover as we were in bed by 11 (looking after a newborn is tiring!), but then our baby girl decided to sleep through until 6am rather than 4am for her first feed, then gave us a lie in until 8.30. So no excuses today!

So I kicked off my project with breakfast - eggs en cocotte or baked eggs, with the addition of some crumbled goats cheese and a splash of cream. Neither me nor my husband had tried baked eggs before and our verdict is delicious! Really creamy but hey it's New Years Day so everyone deserves a bit of luxury!