Saturday 30 June 2012

Tea: 30th June

A nice sea bass fillet and some then used up the last of last weeks veg.

This was mainly an Aubergine. Soften some onion and a celery. Browned slices of Aubergine in the oven. Them layered in a dish with the onion and a a tin of chopped tomatoes and some ripe vine tomatoes. Oregano and black pepper. And some grated cheese on top.

Baked in the oven. As was the fish. Really nice.

Snacks: 30th June

Some "Belgium chocolate tiffin" from a local company. Nice, but a bit too big.

Tiffin == Chocolate, fruit and Yorkshire Parkin.

Packet of crisps ( small) a bit later on as we didn't eat tea until 10:30

Lunch: 30th June

Bacon and egg sandwich. Bread is a sleepless white - ie a long overnight prove. Makes for a great tasting loaf and relatively easy to do.

And extra slice with some decent peanut butter.

Breakfast. 30th June

Pre-race day. So somewhat nervous.

An apple and some cheese.

Dinner: 29th june

Chinese takeaway!

And a little milky bar.

Friday 29 June 2012

Wednesday 27 June 2012

Dinner: 27th June

Sirloin steak, red wine and blue cheese sauce. Peas and cauli cheese from yesterday.

Bowl of rice pudding from yesterday. Nice.

Lunch 27th June

A side dish from tesco :)

Peas, leeks and pancetta. Butter/oil. And lots of salt.

Tuesday 26 June 2012

Breakfast: 27th June

At home for once!

Retro breakfast time. Left overs and a couple of rashers of the best quality bacon. Makes a difference.

Dinner: 26th June

Sausage and left overs! Didn't eat the spuds as too much.

And some rice pudding.

Monday 25 June 2012

Breakfast: 26th June

Another PI breakfast. Forgot photo. Much same as yesterday but no real tomato - extra tinned instead. Less scrambled egg. A sausage. Coffee.

3pts last night in total. Lots for me :), although all about 3.8% abv.

Dinner: 25th June

Norfolk Arms, Bloomsbury, nr Kings Cross


Very nice. A small gastropub with a few outside tables - great for a summer's evening

Small choice of beer (just two) but a very nice "Spanish" menu. A page of tapas or a page of more conventional starter, main and desert.

I went for the pork chop with borlotti beans, some green beans and patatas alinadas (can't do the accent).

Very good. Basically a chop in a bean stew. Rich flavour. Tried companion's lentils - had a very different flavour so not all cooked in the same base stock.

Tempted by starters and desserts, but will leave that for another day. Will hand this to the list of London favourites. Prices very reasonable for the location and quality. Service good too.

Lunch: 25th June

Canteen Hungarian goulash. Not a lot to report. Except that you had to pay extra for something green. Not an incentive.

Sunday 24 June 2012

Breakfast: 25th June

Yet another Premier Inn breakfast

Dinner: 24th June

A small packet of white chocolate buttons on the train

Pizza in hotel and some beer (2 pints and 500ml of cider spread through the day).

Puzzled why a pizza comes with garlic bread. That's not the future, surely.

A high gi carb day !

Brunch: 24th June

Left over pie from Friday's cheese and potato pie. With a couple of eggs and some wilted rocket.

Two mugs of milky coffee.

Saturday 23 June 2012

Dinner: 23rd June

Fillet end leg of lamb. Off to work tomorrow, so Sunday roast today. A bit pushed for time, and unexpected guests, so a bit rushed. Not my finest work.

Still a bit hungry after so had a snickers!

Red wine to drink. Nice.

Snack: 23rd June

Pub trip. Water in the land where beer is king. Tragic. And some crisps.

Lunch: 23rd June

A meat And potato pie from the butchers. Ravenous after swim and weights and yoga

Breakfast: 23rd June

Some left over veg from Thursday. Nice. And a milky coffee.

Friday 22 June 2012

Dinner: 22nd June

retro dining!


The grim weather put VS in the mood for some comfort food. So she wound the clock back to 1975.

A not atypical dish to feed a family of seven. Cheese and potato pie: potato cooked in stock, with garlic, onion. And some cheese in it, and a bit on top. Basically mashed potato.

A few slices of corned beef and some spring greens, also cooked a the stock. I added a blob of mustard.

A couple of glasses of wine.

Nice.

Lunch: 22nd June

A bowl of vegetable soup (not home made). This was quite nice, once I got past the initial salt burn on the throat.

Then (more comfort eating to assist with technical writing) 4 cookies.

And some nuts - probably a couple of handfuls.

Thursday 21 June 2012

Breakfast: June 22nd

Big mug of coffee. Bowl of fruit and nut muesli.

Dinner: 21st June

A venison steak and some vegetables. Mainly what was to hand - Aubergine, onion, celery, garlic, ginger, fennel, chickpeas and tomatoes. Veg softened in pan then roasted in oven.

Rather nice.

Lunch: 21st June

A bit more comfort eating. And some commercial bread. And a piece of cake.

Breakfast: 21st of June

A valedictory repeat of yesterday. I like
Drinking water. And get dehydrated when I am away as it is surprisingly hard to get hold of water in a convenient fashion.

Home tonight, so hopefully I will cheer up.

Dinner: 20th June

least worst


Couldn't find anywhere nearby. And ankle too sore for walking. Excuses

Went for a pie and a side of veg to try
To get the colour quotient up a bit.

And a guiness. Tut tut

Supper: 20th June

A bit of emotional eating here. Also a spirit of enquiry. I had a rather nice cheesecake on Monday. As the prices weren't that different in this cheap establishment. So let's repeat the experience. Wow! Freezer burn! Dry! And fairly unpleasant. Got my sugar fix though. Oh yes, it was a sticky toffee cheese cake. And a second pint. Doombar this time. Tut tut.

Wednesday 20 June 2012

Lunch: 20th June

Funny little cafe on the campus A tuna wrap thing. Very salty.
And another handful of nuts from my own private nut stash.
The cafe was about to close, and there wasn't much choice.

Breakfast: 20th June

no buffet


PI breakfast - but ordering rather than picking things from a buffet. Which is a green light for a poached egg or two.I would have chosen more tomato and less beans. But I tend to have the inverse of what most people choose (saus,
Bacon and hash browns) as evidenced when the guy brought me the wrong one. I sounded a bit panicky when I said "that's not what I ordered".

Poached eggs were spot on though.

Tuesday 19 June 2012

Dinner: 19th June

Food Crime


Failed to eat any lunch. Too busy and choices would have been too poor.

Longish drive to Northampton and another premier inn. Away from the town centre, so too hard to go and find anywhere else.

PI is part of the Whitbread group. They are always co-located with a restaurant of one of Whitbread's food brands. These range from down market all the way to even more down market.

This was a bad one. key clues:
- Photos of food on the menu
- Everything yellow

How I hate myself. Anyway...
Went for the two least bad options
- the only salad on the menu (chicken and bacon)
- half roast chicken dinner. This tends to come with some non yellow vegetables and has a minimum amount of sugar over it

The killer is that these both of these come to a tenner. And both are main courses. Compare with yesterday - two main courses for the price of one.

And, of course, the portion sizes are far
far too big.

This is not "value". This is wrong. No one needs portions this size. And at this cost.

It means that the chicken will be some poor battery bird. And the bacon will be some nasty import from some Low welfare source.

Pigs are great. And it's hard enough to eat them at the best of times. I can just about persuade myself that it is worth it if I know they have had a good life, and are treated with respect during and after (see nose to tail eating)

This pig would have never seen the
Outside world. Fed lots of antibiotics to
Encourage growth at an obscene rate. And killed after a few months.

This is not good.

I really dislike leaving stuff (see nose to tail eating again and what your Mum said about starving children in Africa, or whatever). You should just eat what you need and not take any more.

Food crime. And I am as guilty as the rest of them, if not worse.

I also had a pint of beer when I should be on a two day off alcohol to rest the liver etc. but I needed it to make the food choices. Or something.

Breakfast: 19th June

PI cooked breakfast


Kitchen working again. So a cooked breakfast. Sometimes I might go for poached or boiled eggs. Depends how switched on the staff appear.

Glass of cranberry juice and a mug of coffee.

Monday 18 June 2012

Dinner: 18th June

the Last wine bar and restaurant, Norwich


A quite enjoyable meal, as I ended up having three courses.

Bread (not bad) and oil and a beer

Starter was hot smoked salmon on a sweet potato blini.

Pork and beef meatballs, with linguini

A side of oriental vegetables - basically a bit of stir fry with hoi sin sauce. Didn't go with the main course, so ate them separately.

Then a slice of amaretto cheese cake. And 3 small chocolates.

Lunch: 18th June

Working through lunch. So more fruit and nuts.

Breakfast: 18th June

Premier Inn Continental


No electricity in the kitchen. So no hot breakfast. So more fruit. Had a yoghurt too. Which I don't usually do.

I never have bread or cereals. Never liked them. And, as it turns out, they aren't any good for you. Who would have thought it. I don't mind a high quality muesli, but in the hotels it is just sugar and sawdust. I sometimes have porridge. But obviously not today.

Sunday 17 June 2012

Supper: 17th June

fruit and nuts


4.5 hour drive to Norwich on which I ate a big handful of nuts, an apple and a banana. Going to have a glass of wine now too. A Rioja.

Dinner: 17th June

Lasagne


A bit of a father's day treat. Defrosted a portion of lasagne. Left it a bit too long in oven :( This is a favourite. The recipe has been perfected over the years. Takes a while to make, but perfection is worth waiting for. Thanks VS! Had the Cos lettuce with it. Now for a 5 hour drive.

Breakfast: 17th June

Mackerel


The last of the raid on Morrisons reduced fish. A mackerel for 69p. Another threatened species, mind. Simply done in a pan with a piece of sourdough, a tomato and some Cos lettuce. I give the skins to my kitchen helper.

And a fish oil tablet. The only supplement I bother taking. Not sure if that is even worth it.

Secret eating: 16th June

Well, this is supposed to be a food diary, with a bit of honesty. I also had a few glasses of wine. Probably too many. And a snack of a packet of crisps and a snickers (or marathon as we still call them).

Saturday 16 June 2012

Dinner: Saturday 16th June

Fish Pie


Given that cod is, almost, an endangered species, how come it was less than the price of farmed salmon? Dunno. But the price of some cod pieces was even less. So got half a kilo to make a fish pie. Loosely based on a Delia recipe. Used the fish and the scallops and three boiled eggs. A bechamel sauce with a bit of flavouring - fish poached in a bit of milk, lemon juice and nutmeg and some gruyere. Mash potato topping and some more gruyere. Very nice - had a second helping. Then a bit more. Peas and asparagus for veg.

Afternoon Snack

Half of her Twix and a slice of bread. This was a sour dough from Morrisons. We don't usually buy bread from a super market, but this promised on the wrapper that it had been left to naturally prove. Wouldn't rush to buy it again, but it could have been a lot worse.

Breakfast: Saturday, 16th June 2012

a light snack at 7am


A handful of almonds.  And some white coffee.  Was going for a swim, so didn't want too heavy a stomach. A couple of big cups of milky coffee.

Lunch: Saturday 16 June

Scallops, done a bit like Moule Mariniere.

Got some cheap scallops in Morrisons.  Morrisons is probably the best supermarket for fish.  Thought they would make a nice lunch.  Knob of butter and some olive oil in the pan on the simmering plate.  Then chop a red onion, a stick of celery and some fennel fairly small.  

Soften in the pan.  When soften transfer to the boiling plate, get a bit of heat into them.  Then add a glass of white wine so that it issues.  Drop in the scallops.  Cover with a lid.  Steam for a minute or so.  Remove the scallops, let the wine reduce a bit.  Then tip into a bowl, add the scallops.

Would I do it again?

Worked quite well - but too much onion, and not enough fennel.  Half a glass of wine would have been better.

Didn't bother with any seasoning, wine and onions is fine.