OneGuyFromBarlick

Cottage pie tonight with veggies.

Bacon and egg butty at dinnertime, cheese and beetroot butty for tea. Butcher's Day today.

Chicken & choritzo paella tonight.

Wedgies, peas and meat pie for dinner, same for tea but with a steak pudding.
Kath delivered 5 large pots of beef dripping so I gave the deep fat fryer an overhaul. Deep clean and replacement of the dripping with four pots of new with one in reserve in the fridge.... I have to admit it was overdue!

Teriyaki chicken with potato salad and left over quinoa salad (a staple in our house!)

You are a brave man to admit to still having and using a deep fat fryer with Beef Dripping in it, Stanley. Most folk have been turned off such cooking methods. I haven't deep fried anything since the early '80s, and never with Beef Dripping. Bet it tastes good...but I would be so ridden with perceived guilt...I just couldn't do it.

Made a traditional Cornish "Hevva"/"Heava"/"Heavy" Cake today. I've been wanting to make one for ages, though neither of us eat sweet things so visitors will have to eat the bulk of it. Criss crossed the top in traditional style to represent the Cornish Fishermen's nets.
Must say...it tastes rather lovely. ( not unlike Welsh Cake but doesn't contain quite as much butter as those delightful treats. Ate my own body weight in Welsh Cakes when we spent a week in Wales...curse the woman who left the first packet of those in a welcome basket on our canal boat).

Not really Maz. Beef dripping is far less dangerous than most cooking oils, the saturated fat myth was exploded long ago and chips fried in dripping and drained properly have a smaller fat content than many convenience foods. Had chips peas and a steak pudding for tea last night. Dinner was baked beans and the last crust of the loaf toasted and cut into pobs.

I'm cooking roast veggies tonight to go with pork chops. There's potatoes, carrots, onions and beetroot roasting at the moment. The veggie garden has taken a back seat recently with what's happened to both Dad and Mum but I thought I'd pick a beetroot to roast. The one I chose was by no way the largest but after I had chopped off both ends and peeled it, it weighed 911 grams. The beetroot required it's own tray in the oven. There will be a lot leftover.

Oh dear, methinks a lot of beetroot relish coming up!!

Before I went in the shed I built dinner. Here's the spuds and carrots and the sausage and tomato 'casserole' on a very slow stove after sitting there for three hours. Just right.

There is truth in what Stanley has to say about dripping versus oil. Most oils whether mineral or vegetable develop "penetrant" qualities when hot, some are capable of this when cold, for example, diesel oil. The frying of chips is a good example, when fried in oil, a fair amount actually enters the potato, when fried in dripping the potato is cooked but without the same degree of penetration by the dripping, this enhances the flavour of the chips and imparts a pleasant crispness to its exterior. The only downside here is that "deep fat" friars are actually designed to be used with oil and not fat at all, this being due to fat having a shorter shelf life than oil, this requires that the contents are changed more frequently. Many of us who lived in the 1940s will recall having beef dripping on toast in the marked absence of butter, and I remember that it was not unpleasant! This could have been a part of my "Then and Now" topic as it is a good example of what we must now do because we are told that it is better for us, eat healthy, take plenty of exercise, do not drink over a certain amount of points, and do not smoke at all, just sit back and die of boredom!!!!

Peter is right about dripping, chips fried in it are not 'fatty'. Deep frying is a good fast way of cooking, it transfers high levels of heat quickly and efficiently. Try deep frying other veggies and even small cuts of meat before using them in stews. You get a different flavour. 'Cips' made with other veggies are good as well.
Spuds, Carrots and sausage and tomato for dinner and tea and then, as usual, I tipped what remained of the sausages on top of the last spuds and carrots, added frozen peas and brought to the boil on the stove as I watched TV. No cooking today.....

I feel it is more to do with the fact we live in a different climate and simply dont need to eat to generate body heat...physically and mentally we can not use/ face eating heavy fried foods.
I use an air fryer to cook the occasional shoe-string fries, but we wouldn't eat chips more than once every 4-6 weeks...roast spuds about the same frequency. ( cold potato salad more our style). I only buy a container of oil probably three times a year. I buy spray Olive Oil more often and just spray the pan to stop things sticking. I have a non stick ribbed griddle pan that I cook on mostly, and that browns and cooks without oil at all. Oil of any sort or form is just not a big part of our lives.

I used to love both beef & pork dripping on toast - the trouble now is that there is never enough dripping after the cooking of the joint.

The smaller the chip, the bigger proportion of fat to mass it picks up. They have more surface area so eat thick chips!
The sausage and veggie stew for dinner but pilchard butties for tea for a change. I made the filling by mashing a small tin of pilchards with salad cream and seasoning.

I drink tea almost continually. Whilst waiting for the kettle to boil today, I combined the contents of two curry powder drums, and mixed the two powders with the tea spoon.
I then stirred the tea with the same spoon. The resulting cuppa of course had a faint curry taste. Actually it was quite pleasant. I think this is called serendipity -


"the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way".

Or a senior moment!!
Potato & meat hash tonight with the cold brisket.

I've done a similar thing David. Once in a strange house I made a cup of tea in the dark, Tasted OK but different. I realised that the milk I'd put in was actually grapefruit juice....
Bowl of the sausage stew for dinner, egg and cheese butties for tea. One small helping of the sausage and spuds left....

i have a friend who presents her own herbal tea-bags for a brew...and I have occasionally ruined the moment by adding milk to her cup. Anything can happen when you get yapping....

I have a friend who does the same Maz/
Out tonight for a belated birthday meal - Wednesday feels better than Tuesday to go out.

Baked a loaf yesterday. Had the last of the sausage and veg for dinner and a man sized bacon, black pudding and fried egg butty for tea....

When |I was fruit and veggie shopping yesterday I got a bag of broth bits. Boiled them up with an Oxo cube and some additions. A bowl of veggie soup for dinner and tea. You can't get much healthier or cheaper tan that! Butcher’s day today.....

Went to the Four Alls Inn at Higham on Wednesday - a duck special was on the menu which is what hubby ordered, they have another duck recipe on the over long menu which is what they served - hubby thought it was steak and nearly sent it back. He said it was 'fair to middling'. I ordered home made steak burger which was not cooked through (the waitress tried to tell me it was the paprika they used!) The result was they did not charge for my meal - so saving them a bad report on Trip advisor!!
Tonight is plaice, new potatoes, garden peas and parsley sauce.

How disappointing, Moh.
We don't eat out that often ( apart from delicious Prawns and Chips that we buy on the foreshore and eat on the beach or seaside lawns), but we do have a nice place near us that does "two for the price of one" on Tuesday nights and we have been there a few times without being disappointed. They make money on the drinks though...they are expensive in relation to the meals...so we sip slowly! One good thing is it is within walking distance...

Potted stew butty for dinner and steak pudding, chips and peas for tea....

Slow cooked neck of lamb with a mix of veggies and mashed potato.