189: Cheese bubble and squeak, p391

No leftovers here - Christmas was spent as ever at a moveable feast of relatives' homes, so I made some mash and steamed some greens for these bubble and squeak patties. Never really been a fan of bubble and squeak but then boiled up cabbage and Brussels sprouts mashed up and reheated don't really do much for me. But with lightly steamed greens, and a good helping of Cheddar cheese, these were rather tasty... But they didn't make firm little patties which could be browned and turned easily in the frying pan, maybe I should have used some flour to soak up some of the moisture, or popped them in the fridge for a bit to firm up. Oh well! They were hot through and tasty, that'll do!

Merry Christmas everyone! Unbelievably - only four recipes to go!

184: Baked salmon, p234

I didn't have a 'vast piece' of wild salmon, but substituted with a couple of large fillets instead, which I wrapped side by side in foil, pretending they were a larger piece... Easy as pie this one, and we ate it warm (too impatient/hungry to wait for it to be cold) with lashings of homemade mayonnaise, and new potatoes. I wasn't going to buy a whole bottle of Pernod for 'the merest drip' to add to the mayonnaise, so I used vermouth as suggested by Maggie Don, who used the online version of this recipe, with vermouth instead of Pernod. Took c.20-25mins to cook through, but cooking en papillote (well, wrapped in foil at least) meant that the fish stayed moist. A light dish which I should have gotten done much earlier in the year - Spring or Summer, as in the book - rather than on a day of the year when we have a good four inches of snow on the ground!

183: Warm soused mackerel, p68

Last mackerel recipe ticked off the list - but not our favourite, unfortunately. The fish was beautifully moist, being soused in the vinegar and wine, and lovely herby flavours came through, but we both decided we prefer the crispness given to mackerel when grilled or pan fried, rather that letting the skin end up a bit soggy. Plus T hated the smell of the vinegar, thought it smelt like old socks, bizarrely (I didn't think it did, but the smell was very vinegary, almost eye wateringly). Hey ho. Lovely served with the sauteed potatoes, but again, one fillet was enough for each of us, not two as suggested.

Only 10 recipes left to go!!

181: Baked red mullet with saffron and mint, p124, and 182: Baked red mullet with pine kernel stuffing, p370

Oooh, a bit behind with getting these written up from the start of last week...

Okay. Red mullet. One of the most expensive fishes to buy? 'Buy grey mullet, it's much cheaper and really nice!' cried my boss when I moaned about the price, on more than one occasion... 'Yes but Nigel doesn't use grey mullet in the book, it's always red mullet that is specified, and besides, red and grey mullet aren't even related to each other' - so I'm not convinced I can substitute one for the other.

Anyway, back to the recipes. The first one called for four medium sized mullet to serve two people. The second called for four large red mullet to serve four people. Yikes. I decided to do as I've done in the past and cook even for one person for two recipes at the same time, then the hubby and I swap plates halfway through. Kinda silly but it saves a lot of money and gets the recipes done! Bit concerned about the lack of dinners left between now and Christmas/New Year, and the deadline for finishing the book!

I went to the excellent Sandy's, where they always have red mullet (all pretty big ones), and asked for two. The chap threw them on the scales and they came to over £22 together. I gulped and asked if I could just have one, and then tried to figure out if I could still do both recipes... Taking my one, fairly large red mullet home, I surmised that I could maybe bodge it by chopping said mullet in half (to give a head end and tail end - the pine kernal stuffing needs to be stuffed inside the fish, so this was the only way I could think of doing it) and baking each separately in the oven in my little oval Denby dishes.

The fish halves fit snugly in the oval dishes, and it worked just fine. Although it did look a little odd...

I have to say, the first recipe, with saffron and mint, didn't really bowl me over... but then it is supposed to be a light Spring day meal, not a depths of Winter dish! The saffron and mint were perhaps a little too subtle for the strong, meaty fish, or maybe I should have used more of each, but the fish was cooked to perfection (although it did need another 5mins in the oven, even chopped in half).

The second recipe was by far the better, with a lovely fruity, crunchy, interesting stuffing, which worked beautifully with the strong, meaty flesh of the fish. I'm not a big fan of raisins in savoury dishes, but here they worked a treat, although I did chop them up a bit smaller than they were whole, so they gave little bits of fruity, sweetness to the dish, not bigger lumps. Lots of scrummy Mediterranean flavours. Definitely one to repeat. Should we buy red (or grey) mullet again!

Incidentally, half a decent sized mullet, plus potatoes on the side and some tomatoes, was fine for each of us. The idea of having two whole mullet each seems a little excessive...

180: Roast duck with pancetta and potatoes, p372

I've never cooked a whole duck before. What an odd shape they are! This was a Gressingham duck, so a nice chunky bird, but they are rather... flat chested? And dumpy :)

The skin crisped up beautifully and I collected the excess fat midway through and at the end of cooking, so the potatoes wouldn't go too soggy. The potatoes directly under the duck did understandably go a bit soggy - in hindsight I should have pushed them out from underneath earlier in the roasting time, but they were delicious - meaty, herby, crispy in places, and cooked to perfectly.

The duck was a bit of a pain to carve, not being used to the funny shape of a duck (!) but I managed, just about, lucky we didn't have guests for dinner! Portion size was intriguing here - we had a bird which was slightly over 2kg in weight, which fed us both plenty for dinner plus enough leftover meat for another meal for the two of us (plus the carcass for stock), whereas the recipe specifies a 2.5kg 'duckling' - serve two people?! First of all, that's a jolly big duckling, and secondly - a bigger bird for only two people?? Wow!

This is supposed to be a festive pre-Christmas dinner - not exactly usual Monday night fare for us but time is pressing - so many main courses left, and not enough dinners to do them in if I'm not careful...

Only 13 recipes to go! 18 days left this year (albeit three are taken up with visiting rellies...).

163: Stilton, onion and potato pie, p354

I hadn't read this recipe properly until now and had for some reason been thinking this was going to be an actual pastry pie or perhaps layered slices of sauteed potatoes at best. As a result I was thinking this would be a bit of a meh, vegetarian heaven recipe, but it turned out to be... super lovely creamy cheesey oniony yummy mash potato - yum! Blue cheese isn't my favourite - I've always wanted to like it more, but always seem to find it too tangy and strong, so I wasn't convinced about using stilton - or having to buy a chunk twice the size of what we needed... but glad I did - on serving the cheese had effectively completely melted into everything else and the flavour wasn't overpowering at all. The onions went deliciously sweet and gooey, and the potatoes super creamy and buttery. Not a low cal option but the most lovely comfort food... It didn't quite pass the 'complete meal' test for T though, but with the addition of a couple of grilled sausages and some steamed greens, it made the grade. I think I agree with him. Yum.

161: A pot-roast pheasant with celery and sage, p25

Recipe six this weekend, and the shops are stocking pheasant again, now it's in season - hurray! Unfortunately they all seem to come wrapped in bacon, so after searching for a naked one everywhere, I gave up, bought one with the bacon, and peeled it off before cooking. Don't think it affected the flavour of the meat in the recipe though.

This recipe called for browning the meat and then cooking up the other ingredients in a casserole dish before putting it in the oven... after the disaster of the pot-roast pigeon where one of my two Denby casserole dishes shattered into pieces, with about two litres of ingredients and stock flooding the kitchen, and therefore me discovering that Denby dishes aren't hob proof (doh!), I very carefully used the second one for this - I really need a Le Creuset dish for Christmas - if I can find anywhere to store one!!

There wasn't an enormous amount of liquid in this so although I pushed the pheasant down as much as I could, it was mostly sitting on top of the other ingredients so I was worried the meat might end up a bit dry but it didn't seem to and after 40mins in the oven seemed to be cooked just right - cooked through but still a little moist. The potatoes were perfectly cooked, the celery still slightly crunchy, and plenty of lovely yummy, vermouthy, sage-y gravy. Yum!

154: Courgette and lancashire cheese crumble, p378

I'd not been looking forward to making this one... T was planning to be out for it, no matter what, so I needed to find some folk who like veggie food upon whom I could inflict it. It turned into a bit of a comedy of errors after I invited a group of friends round for dinner including one of the friend's new housemate who was moving in that day (Saturday).

We had hardly any food in at all and I stupidly thought, at least one of the three little grocery shops up the road will definitely have courgettes and Lancashire cheese. Everywhere has courgettes at the moment, you can't get away from the damn things. And I'd got Lancashire cheese confused with Leicestershire. Rats. Silly me. No courgettes and no cheese anywhere to be found, and I stupidly had left it too late to get to any more useful shops and manage to get the flat in order enough for the four visitors who were en route. Massive fail. Phoned one of the guests, who has a car, to see if he could pop to Tescos quickly for me, only to find out he had left his car at work, and was rather... hungover... Anyway, the darling man hopped on his bicycle and wove his wobbly way to Tescos.

Meanwhile, a phonecall from one of the other guests revealed that the new housemate is vegan! And I'm halfway through making a main course with lots of cheese in it and a pudding which uses (pork) gelatine. Aargh. If I'd had a bit longer I'd have definitely made something vegan for everyone, hate making anyone feel 'different' and not as welcome as the others, but had a minor meltdown. But she was ever so sweet and adamant that she didn't want to be a problem and had a big pot of chilli beany stew which they could bring, which was fabulous. And we sent the Tescos-rescue friend a message asking him to try to find a vegan pudding :)

The others all arrived, but the Tescos-rescue friend was nowhere to be seen, until he called to say he'd gotten all the way through the supermarket, through the checkout, and... found he'd forgotten his wallet. Argh! At which point I told him to give up and just come on over - bean stew for all! But he managed to persuade one of the others to hop in her car and come and rescue him, and quarter of an hour later they made it back, with the rather fundamental courgettes and cheese. Phew! Quick finish off of the recipe, popped in the oven, and we could have nibbly bits and some lovely garlicky tear-and-share bread the others brought with them for a starter.

And the result? It was pretty good! A miracle - I was firmly convinced it was going to be horrid, especially after the farce of the rest of the evening... but it wasn't at all. The potatoes had turned to mush (not sure if that was how it should have been, but the extended delay mid-cooking might have made them squishier than they should have been) but the courgettes were al dente and the stock and cheese mixed in was scrummy. Not as much cheese in the recipe as I'd have put in, could definitely have been cheesier and I'm not sure it really needed to be Lancashire cheese rather than cheddar or something else, but the crumble on top really worked - added a completely different texture to go with the mushy crunchy veg underneath, and the walnutty-ness and rosemary came through really nicely. Definitely a goodie, and one to repeat in the future for veggie friends :) Not the vegan ones though. Although missing out the cheese completely would probably be good too.

Served with a very simple salad, rice, and (vegan) chilli beany stew :) 

Phew.

153: Roast fillet of lamb with anchovy and mint, p90

Not a fillet, made this with a boneless rolled shoulder joint (been sitting in the freezer since Tesco's delivered a near random selection of cuts of lamb which weren't the ones I'd ordered... So I didn't follow the timings given in this recipe, for a much smaller piece of meat. Worked well though - I gave the c.900g shoulder c.65mins in the oven at 180degC (fan oven) and then let it rest for a good 15mins before serving - with the marinade on the outside not burning to a crisp and the meat itself very moist and deliciously light pink inside. Lovely jubbly.

T (who keeps rolling his eyes at yet another lamb recipe, as he doesn't really like lamb very much) actually declared this the best lamb he'd ever had, so it definitely passed muster with him!

The new potatoes were good too - and ended up covered in deliciously crispy tasty bits of the marinade, left after the meat. Yum!

40 recipes to go! Will I make it by the end of December?? We're moving house middle of next week, so I might blitz a few more this weekend before another quiet chunk when I might not be able to do too much in the way of cooking. Only 11 done so far this month - must do more! Planning a couple of dinner parties/soirees once we're into the new place, which will let me tick off quite a few... fingers crossed!

147: Slow-roast lamb with chickpea mash, p62, and 148: Cheese-smothered potatoes, p17

Tescos delivered lamb shanks instead of another leg of lamb (as the recipe says) the other day, but the shank is part of the arm of the shoulder, and includes part of the leg, so that's not that far from being a leg of lamb, right?

Three and a half hours of roasting and I was worried they were going to be wrecked, as they'd got rather crispy on the outside inspite of the hourly basting with the juices - the juices were starting to disappear in the ether so there wasn't that much to baste with towards the end. But luckily it was just the outside, the layer of fat over the meat and the spice rub over it, and the meat underneath was  perfectly tender and the cartilage and connective tissue had melted away just as it should - much better than the last time I cooked lamb shanks...

Served with the cheese-smothered potatoes, which were easy peasy, and must have been virtually calorie free... not... and the chickpea mash, which T described as 'revolting', and refused to eat after trying a teeny bit. I kinda had to agree with him on that, it wasn't very nice... glad I divided the recipe in half so we didn't have enough for six... :)

138: Cabbage with orange and juniper, p385, and 139: Potatoes with duck fat and garlic, p377

A Christmassy veggie side and potatoes to go with the pork served for dinner tonight. I made a full batch of the cabbage, foolishly, using a whole (small) red cabbage. I'm going to be eating it all week, since T almost certainly won't... Enough to serve 12 as a side, not 6, but anyhow... :)

The juniper berries weren't too overwhelming which was a good thing and the lemon and orange juice added a lovely citrusy zing which stopped the cabbage being too dull. Not sure about the function of the celery, didn't really add much, but the apple was a good thing and onion always is.

I cheated with the potatoes. The recipe says duck fat, and I used goose fat. Well, I needed it earlier in the year for a recipe, and bought a jar, which has been sitting untouched in the fridge ever since. I didn't really want to go out and buy another jar, this time of duck fat, which would also sit untouched in the fridge... so I cheated... duck/goose, how different can the fat taste? Is that cheating too much?? The garlic knocked your socks off - only one clove, but still, immediate repetitions all through dinner, curious! I wasn't sure about sauteeing the potatoes in so much fat, they took forever to cook and then suddenly started to brown which was a bit alarming, and I had to drain them on kitchen towel before serving. But they were rather tasty...

So the pork was served with the red cabbage and sauteed potatoes, with some gently sauteed baby courgettes on the side, and delicious gloopy winey oniony gravy. Yum! Finished off the strawberry water ice, and some more of the melon sorbet for pudding.

126: Baked lamb with tomatoes and rosemary, p285

A lovely, super easy, throw it all in one dish and bake meal this - essentially roasted vegetables and potatoes, with the meat put on top halfway through so the juices run down onto everything below. Very tasty too - the rosemary came out really strongly. The lamb neck was delicious - tender and sweet, and I always find neck much less fatty than other lamb cuts, so was pleased that's what was specified in this recipe. 30mins was a bit too long though, not much pinkness remained, I should have checked it earlier but then the potatoes might not have been done. Ho hum. Definitely one to repeat.

122: Roast pork with grapes, juniper and Vin Santo, p308

Parents visiting for Sunday lunch today, so followed the Nigel souffle-opener with another four recipes from the book...The fat on the pork loin wasn't scored and it was really difficult to cut into it, even with my sharpest sharpest knife, grrr, so the spice mixture ended up kinda rubbed all over the meat and balanced on top :)

Was a bit hesitant about the juniper berries, can't stand the taste of juniper (yes, that includes gin too therefore...) and this smelt very junipery during cooking, but luckily the end taste wasn't too strong and overpowering. Although it was definitely there... And the dry marsala - yum! Definitely a good thing, and combined with the grapes (which were pretty blackened by the end of the cooking), made the most amazing deep, rich, tasty gravy. Served with roast potatoes as per the recipe, and the baked onions and lemon mint peas as in the next couple of recipes...

120: Braised oxtail with mustard and mash, p63

A little visceral, this one...  Hunting down an oxtail, I found one rather quickly in Waitrose, who apparently have a range of 'forgotten cuts' - well done them! A bargain too, under a couple of quid for a whole oxtail. People seem to be incredibly squeamish about the idea though - the number of 'eughs!' and 'yuck, really??' responses I got when I mentioned I was making this, you'd have thought I was cooking a rat. Stupidly anticipating an oxtail to be long thick lump of meat, at the meat counter I was momentarily taken aback by the fact that the 'oxtail' sign was sitting on a little pile of neat, medallion-like rounds, before realising that they were all different sizes, about 1/2 inch through to 3 inches in diameter - and are of course each of the vertebrae of the tail, already chopped apart and ready to cook... doh!

An easy stew to throw together, and with the addition of a whole bottle of wine (no stock!) and the mustards, really meaty and rich and scrummy. After 2 1/2 hours, the meat was falling off the bones, and the next day, as per the recipe, I finished it off and served it with creamy mashed potato. The meat was lovely, but a little thin on the ground, and a little slimy still for T's liking, so maybe a bit longer in the oven to reduce the collagen down a bit more might have been a good idea.

116: Bream with lemon and anchovy potatoes, p245

Another fishy first - seabream! Quite a fishy tasting fish, but meaty white flesh and not too many bones (hurray!). A very simple recipe, baked in the oven, and 15-20mins was spot on timing-wise, the fish was cooked perfectly. The real 'recipe' bit is the potatoes, browned a little on the hob, with lemon and anchovies added, and then cooked in the oven swimming in stock, which braised the potatoes, making them extra tasty, and turned into a lovely rich lemony, meaty gravy to serve with the fish and potatoes. Served with steamed green beans, a very nice Saturday night supper to have whilst watching a movie on tv.

113: Kipper patties, dill mayonnaise, p48

Hmm, don't like smoked fish, and kippers might just be the smokiest of smoked fish... yuck. But these were duly made (recipe halved), and served to the hubby, who loves smoked fish, thank goodness, and I tried a little bit. Not sure about blitzing the potatoes in the food processor (I used my stick blender, since it was such a small amount), as it makes them release all the starch, resulting in a thick, gluey consistency which is really quite horrid. The patties were gooey on the inside and threatened to break up into gloopy little dollops during frying, and they were too soft to risk blotting the excess oil on kitchen towel after frying, ick. I think I'll stick to mashing the potato up with a fork/masher... Hubby liked them very much, and they weren't horrid at all, just smoked fishy, so not my thing :) But the dill/garlic/mayo was scrummy, v nice indeed!

72: Mustard chops, p129, and 73: Lamb chops with lemon and mint and potatoes crushed into the pan juices, p155

Doubled up this one - five lamb chops in the pack, so did three with the mustard, and two with the lemon and mint. Efficient me! The mustard recipe makes a very simple marinade, whereas the other makes an oil in which the chops are pan fried, and I took the decision to pan fry the mustard chops instead of grilling in order to save on using everything in the kitchen at once... Unfortunately this meant the pan juices mixed a little, but I think we got the idea. The mustard recipe was nice but, much like the roast squash, not really anything that wasn't fairly intuitive... The lemon and mint was definitely the more subtle of the two, and the zing of the lemon juice and zest cut through that soft, sweet, fatty taste that lamb has very pleasantly. Served with the crushed potatoes of the second recipe, and steamed baby spinach, as suggested by the first recipe. Happy hubbie, and happy tummies all round.

** I definitely took a pic of these - but it's vanished from my phone! Disaster! **

43:Dal and pumpkin soup, p4, and 44: Spiced roast potatoes with yoghurt and mint, p42

Dinner party with another set of girlie-friends tonight - and one is a vegetarian, whilst several of the others quite like to eat veggie food, so thought it would be a good opportunity to get some of Nigel's veggie curries out of the way - esp since T doesn't really consider a meal without meat to be a meal, or much like curries...

This soup made a very easy starter which went down well... I made it a few days before so just heated it up before serving. A deceptively mild start with a tangy kick to it, with the ginger and a little chilli not blowing your socks off, and the sweetness of pumpkin (butternut squash). Bit naughty of me but I did miss out the fried onion topping, as I had so many other recipes to juggle tonight - the kitchen is tiny, and with hardly any worksurface, so it all got a bit frantic...

The potatoes were super - lovely yellowy mildly spicy roasties with crispy oniony, garlicky, chilli bits on top, and a drizzle of homemade yoghurt and sprinkling of mint leaves on top. Definitely worth repeating in the future.

Served with the potatoes were two curries and homemade naan breads...

34: Pan-fried sausages with cream and mustard mash, p325

Yummy yummy! Nice and simple one for the end of the week, after a few days without having done any recipes - first week in new job and a lot to get done, so it's been a bit tricky. I was going to get three done yesterday as some rellies were coming round for dinner but it didn't happen in the end so it was looking like it wouldn't be a very productive week... oops.

But this was easy peasy, just bangers and mash with lots of mustard and single cream essentially, and served with some rocket, tomato, and balsamic dressing. Good Friday night comfort food.

Oh, and an interesting but slightly gross and embarrassing aside... I found a pot of single cream at the back of the fridge, unopened, but with a 'best before' of '10th Dec 2009'. Only 2 months out of date then... A sniff and a taste, by me, and by T, and it seemed fine... and indeed it was. Hmm... it was unopened, but still... 2 months??

30: A herb and barley broth to bring you back to health, p41

Don't really need to be brought back to health, but hey, can't beat a bit of broth... uses up lots of veggies too, which is useful because I slightly over-bought in Tescos yesterday and the fridge is overflowing...

Essentially stew without the meat, very similar in delicate sweet taste to the lamb stew earlier this month. I'm not sure that the specially-purchased goose fat really adds that much, but c'est la vie...