62: A crisp salad for a cold day, p343

Have been slacking again, I'm afraid - a long family weekend, a conference abroad for much of a week, and returning home to find there's no food in the flat, let alone Nigel-style food, makes for a poor show. Must step things up again! (Ignoring the fact that the next two weekends are chocka too... weeknights it is then!). Order has been restored, with the arrival of half of the contents of Tescos being delivered yesterday, including such goodies as lamb steaks, lamb chops, a chicken, pork spare ribs, chorizo, new (green) garlic, kaffir lime leaves, taleggio cheese, etc, ready for some serious Nige'ing (To Nige: I Nige, You Nige, He/She/It Niges).

This was a bit of a cop-out, but I needed lunch to take in for work... Simple enough salad, crisp as the title would suggest, and cold day provided (where has May gone???) although I felt this could have been optional... It was fine for a lunch but didn't knock my socks off (more chilli needed, I think...), and although the very gingery and shalloty dressing was rather nice I'm sure it hung around a little more than was perhaps welcome...

I must also confess, I had the missing ingredient problem again. Halfway through preparation (more than halfway actually) I found that the coriander plant had died and gone to the compost heap in the sky some weeks ago, and what was masquerading as coriander on the windowsill, tucked behind the flat leaf parsley, was infact... another pot of flat leaf parsley. Why have I got two pots of flat leaf parsley? More importantly, what kind of dufus can't distinguish between flat leaf parsley and coriander?? Me, clearly. Embarrassed. But a quick google made me feel better, apparently they can look VERY similar... :(

So we ditched the coriander and imagined fresh coriander sprinkled on top whilst eating it. I did consider walking into town during lunch to get some coriander... but ditched the idea. Maybe it would have lifted the end result from being a fine lunch to something scrummy. Maybe... but for now it was just a good leftover user-upper.

56: Bean shoot salad with corianer and mint, p378

Jeepers!! I only used one chilli instead of two, and left it all for 5mins, not 15mins, and this was darned fiery!! Served with garlicky chilli prawn linguine, this made enough for at least four as a side dish. Can't think of an enormous amount to say... crunchy, tasty, but not the most substantial or filling of dishes so don't think I'd make this as a main course on it's own.

42: Thai fishcakes with a deep sweet dipping sauce, p114

Back to the scrummy little patties again last night - how many more can there be?? This time much lighter ones, made with haddock, and they held together absolutely fine, contrary to the recipe which said they'd be quite fragile. Wasn't sure about the sauce to start with, incredibly gingery and hot (I did leave the chilli seeds out, inspite of the recipe, but it was still rather strong...), but it worked really nicely with the fishcakes. Served with basmati rice and the rest of the spinach salad from Friday.

33: Prawn and coriander rolls, p94

Another bottle-misidentification mistake tonight - rice vinegar was actually another bottle of white wine vinegar. Damn damn damn. Got to have a good look at what's in the cupboard and what's not... Annoyingly I can picture the label on the bottle of rice vinegar, and could have sworn it was there, but knowing me it ran out a couple of years ago and the bottle went in the recycling...

Not bad at all these, but still not a patch on the pork patties... Oddly, inspite of being chiefly king prawn, and containing no potato and just a smidge of flour to help bind them together, they had a strangely potatoey texture, more like traditional fishcakes. More chilli and lemongrass I think next time. The sauce was a bit sweet for my taste on its own but drizzled over the rolls and accompanying noodles worked much better.

The enormous iceberg lettuce which has been taunting me from the fridge for its bland wateriness, and which was purchased particularly for this recipe, was finally pressed into service, but we only needed about a third of the thing and now I've got to think of something else to do with the rest... And no, Kingsley the bunny cannot have it as bunnies cannot eat lettuce, it makes them sick, with horrid stomach cramps, and they can die. So there. Bet you didn't know that. Plus Kingsley is such a fusspot, I'm sure he'd think it was below him to eat such a thing.

I always remember my dad telling us how iceberg lettuce was developed specifically for McDonalds, for its texture and shelf-life in the fastfood business. Yum.