jamie oliver's chicken, olive and preserved lemon tagine

Tagines are made for entertaining: They are the glamorous face of stews and casserole, you can leave them to cook themselves, and even better they seem to primarily be made up from cheaper ingredients - preserved lemons aside of course.

This chicken version is also perfect for tonight's book club as it's completely lady friendly because the lemons give the illusion of being lighter than most tagines, keeping it fresh and packed with mouth-watering flavours. More importantly, given this club is entirely populated by women, there's more-than enough left over for my lunch tomorrow.

sources
chicken, olive and preserved lemon tagine - Jamie Oliver, Jamie Does..., or you can find it right here.

actual REAL book club

Blame it on me joining the ranks of the horny-handed sons of toil, rather than still being a wafty, meeja type, but I couldn't for the life of me work out what we were doing today. Despite being relatively recent in the catalogue of days I've lived, it's remained a black hole.

Until now, when my iPhone helps out (tis the tool all us horny-handed sons of toil use) by reminding me this week was Book Club, not last Thursday, when I originally blogged about it. Doh!

My conversations with Beth now make more sense in the context of it being today, not last week, but it does beg a new and intriguing question; what the hell were we doing last Thursday?

I haven't the foggiest...

thai-style salmon, broccoli, salad and new potatoes

'Twas the night before camping, and all through the house nothing was stirring, not even a mouse. And neither was a Milo, or even a babysitter - in this case Miss Angela Hazel White - both of whom were firmly asleep when we got home from Book Club.

This week we're at Beth's (or "The Boss' Wife" as she must now be known), for a discussion of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, which was a good deal more fascinating than the inevitable three-to-four hour tiresome discussion about school, despite only rating a measly two stars.

Much more welcome is Beth's thai-style salmon, accompanied by salad, broccoli, salad, and lovely, lovely children, one of whom was speed-reading Harry Potter, one of which made us dessert (pavlova) and another of which ate the dessert.

I suppose I was more cantankerous RE school chat as I wasn't drinking, and  knowing you've got an evening of school chat between 3-4 teachers requires a minimum of three bottles of wine for any non-teachers in the group...

peter gordon's fried halloumi topped with chilli, spinach, water chestnut, hazelnut, orange and sun-blushed tomato salad & beth's lemon and thyme drizzle cake

It's book club, but luckily our recent dalliance with Peter Gordon means we don't have to go through the usual "what shall we give the ladies" conversation. The question is though, which salad? Ana vetoes the courgette and chick pea one because she's bored of it, and the chorizo, olive and potato salad gets the elbow due to the presence of the spuds. Naturally in the end she throws her tiny weight behind anything involving halloumi.

As I've said before, the only issue with these dishes is the fact they involve a fair bit of construction, which should be fine, but I get distracted by wine and a discussion on breast enlargement, and take my eye off the ball whilst the cheese is grilling. Consequently it's slightly crisper than I'd like.

To balance the healthy first course, Beth comes up trumps with an amazing thyme and lemon drizzle cake, and we supply a massive punnet-load of raspberries from our super-abundant bushes. We even have real mint tea - crikey, it's like The Good Life, with Kendra in the Margot role of course...

sources
fried halloumi topped with chilli, spinach, water chestnut, hazelnut, orange and sun-blushed tomato salad - Peter Gordon, Salads: The New Main Course, p65
lemon and thyme drizzle - Mrs Bethany Gilbey, she's aces

book club: silvena rowe's slow-cooked lamb, spring onions, lemon and cherries

Once again we're faced with the classic book club dilemma of what to cook for a room full of women who probably won't drink much, and are all on some sort of diet or another. However, the clement weather proves inspirational and we revisit Silvena Rowe's spring-like lamb stew.

It has many things to recommend it: It looks amazing when you serve it up in a whacking great Le Creuset (my gran's in this case), cherries are incredibly du jour, and other than stirring through some parsley at the end, all you've got to do is lob it all in the casserole and leave it for about two hours. This gives plenty of time for Ana to finish the book, and me to surreptitiously eat crisps and drink a couple of brewskis in the kitchen whilst we wait for the ladies to arrive.

For the record, we read David Gaffney's Sawn-Off Tales which may not have been the most popular book we've read - only two stars from me. Sorry Kiki...

Food of the Milos
There's definitely a growth spurt in the air, and it's not Ana. We've suspected it with the amount of food going into him, but the ankle-swinging nature of most of his trousers have given us final proof. He'll be a teenager soon...
Breakfast: Chocolate Rice Krispies, toast and Phili;
Lunch: Ham, carrots, broccoli and mash, followed by custard;
Dinner: Big old bowl of rigatoni with chicken bolognese, apple and yoghurt.

sources
slow-cooked lamb with spring onions, cherries and lemon - Silvena Rowe, Purple Citrus & Sweet Perfume. Reviewed in Delicious, July 2010, p17

book club: roast lamb and chocolate & apple crumble

Just a quick one tonight as we spent a delightful evening out at Beth's chi-chi Putney mansion for this month's Book Club. To be honest I'm a bit wary after last time's school-chat fueled disaster, so I bring a bottle of preventative Red and give Ana the car key, however tonight is a triumph!

First off everybody had read the book, Five Little Pigs, which is a first for a long time, and not only did we all like it, we could discuss it for at least half-an-hour. We even managed to get into an argument about Love in a Cold Climate. It's like Uni all over again, apart from the fact we never did this sort of thing at college, which would explain our appalling degrees.

Heavyweight literary discussion over, Beth serves up a beautiful leg of lamb with cubed roast potatoes and the biggest mini-broccoli I've ever seen, followed by a chocolate and apple crumble.

I'm stuffed and not a little drunk...

book club: soup & salad

It's Book Club tonight, and to be honest it's a *complete disaster*.

Not culinary-speaking of course, apart from the fact I've suddenly realised we've served spinach in some form each time we've hosted Book Club: Spinach & Feta Pie in February (for The Road) and Thai-style beef and spinach salad (for Wolf Hall).

We kicked off with last night's beetroot borscht, which seems to go down so well even Ana eats it despite the vivid colour:


I think it's slightly too sweet, but next time I'll half the amount of Bramley apples. It's pretty warming to drink in the park at lunchtime FYI. Anyway, back to the spinach-theme, can you guess what's tonight's main course:


*Sigh*. However, more disappointingly we have a very low reading score, and rather than discussing the pulsating heat and angst of Bonjour Tristesse, or the elegiac The Leopard, the main topic of discussion is school, and general gossip with guest of honour, Hanne Signy Natvik.

And I missed the new series of Midsomer for this? Gahh!

Food of the Milos
He's on hyperactive form today, not only because it's a Julia-Nursery day, but because he's very very VERY excited about the arrival of Hanne and Kornelius. I get him out the door and on his bike using bribes in the form of marmite rice cakes and humzingers, before cheerios, toast & Phili, raisins and apricots. He had jacket potatoes, spag bol and cheese for lunch, and then a mini scoff Fish Pie for dinner before showering Kornelius with toys/water/balls/dancing and other random stuff.

sources
mozzarella, peach, basil and parma ham salad - Delicious, August 2005
beetroot and apple borscht - Delicious, March 2010, p40

thai-style beef and spinach & gazpacho

It's book club tonight, so after testing the water with Kendra on Saturday with STEAK, we opt for more meat to satisfy the masses. Well, the ridiculously dieted masses anyway. However before the beef, there's an elaborate Fino-style gazpacho to offend the office with.

Naturally the first thing you want to do when you get up (after you've warmed milk and definitely post shower) is to think about lunch. So whilst I'm munching cheerios and cinnamon and raisin bagels, I knock up a litre of gazpacho. I don't have time to sieve it, but it's still pretty good if a little garlicky. Okay, very very garlicky. Alright, it's so garlicky four hours after I've eaten it ana complains when I get home that I stink of garlic. Still, it is divine!



Several minty chews down we prepare to discuss Wolf Hall over a protein-and-salad-diet-friendly Thai-style beef and spinach salad, courtesy of the D Mag circa July 2007.



Sat in the garden once everybody has gone, drinking one more glass of wine and smelling the jasmine, it does feel alarmingly like a Saturday night. *Sigh*

Food of the Milos
Not being a school day, ana is presented with the usual entertainment dilemma. Merciful planning ahead means she spends the day in Surbiton at Melissa's, so Milo can run amok on her daughter's massive climbing frame and playroom. The usual breakfast is semi-consumed (cheerios, apple, apricots), before a hearty lunch of sausage, tomatoes, jacket potato, cheese and cucumber (which he didn't eat), followed by a 99 with a flake. With his main meal under his belt, he only fancies houmous, carrot sticks, cheese, avocado and raisins for dinner. Ana does manage to wangle a fruit salad down him of raspberries, blueberries and a peach on the basis The Wiggles eat fruit salad.

sources
gazpacho - Fino
thai-style beef and spinach - Delicious, July 2007, p130

book club & beans on toast

To reward your loyalty, today you're getting a BOGOF post - two days for the price of one.

This is mainly because we went out on Thursday and Friday, well Friday just did not happen for anybody.

So, Thursday night was book club at Kendras. On the menu tonight; roast chicken, salad, an amazing selection of anti-pasti (marinated artichoke, pulses - I can't remember K Kats, was it giant bulgar wheat salad or something?), and uber-chic mini-macaroons. Oh and a side-dish of paedophilia. I think it was best the book club we've had so far, mainly because we've all read the book. Apart from Beth of course.

Friday, well let's just say I can't be cracked tonight. For some reason we couldn't wrestle somebody into bed until 9, by which time The Mentalist interfered with my meal schedule. Ana doesn't wait and gets herself some beans on toast, and I don't even bother.

spinach & feta tart

Our first book club meeting tonight (The Road), so we entertain the ladies with a healthy tart and salad - so that makes four tarts at the table mu-ha-ha-ha!


Brilliantly nobody noticed I used the wrong pastry, and the only way you could tell was because the pastry was slightly stuck to the pie base. But as I was serving, they wouldn't have seen that. So with great literature discussed, and healthy meals scoffed, we finish off with a chocolate pudding. I imagine it's just like the Bloomsbury salons!

sources
spinach & feta tart - Delicious, April 2009, p30