So what have you cooked lately? (Year three!)

Lamb's meat (sp?) with spinach and creamy tomato sauce. DA YUM .

I am going to make tartiflette over the weekend with the last of my reblochon.

Oh and I made banana cake with banana (duh!), raisins and chopped walnuts. YUM-MY

Lamb faux-tagine last night and a ginormous dutch baby for breakfast this morning. I forget sometimes how excellent a cast iron pan is for baking things, but it only takes one crispy shelled creamy centered pancake to bring it all back.

I made my first 'proper" pancakes. I need a pancake pan as the one we have is too large. But 2 out of the three attempts were rather yummilicious.

Tartiflette in August, Aldo? It's one of my favourite things but I've always thought of it as very winter.

I had some reblochon, so it made sense. Also, using a very light white helps.

Tonight I'm making flan (vanilla and pumpkin) to bring to dinner tomorrow night. The caramel smell is all over the house.

My lunch today was a few strips of sirloin rapidly seared in oil with diced chilli and smoked garlic, mixed with cous cous and coriander, dressed with a bit of oil and lemon juice and stuffed into pittas, six minutes start to finish (the steak was the last thing I did).

That sounds delicious! Yesterday at lunch one of my fishing co-workers brought in a pile of salmon he'd cured from the last weekend's catch. I was already nuking something else up, but am ready to accept his generous sandwich offer today.

The flans (from Mark Bittman's World's Best Recipes) looked awfully wiggly at the 45 minute mark last night, and even still at the 1.25 hour mark. But we'll see how they are tonight. The caramel worked out well - I love watching sugar syrup transform as it heats up: grainy, clear and thin and small bubbles, thicker and weird quilted pattern of bubbles, giant almost fizzy bubbles, thick and golden and barely bubbling, then suddenly darker and thinner and boiling again and ready to coat a ramekin.

Oh man, I want to work in a place where my co-workers bring in piles of self-cured salmon...
Admittedly it would be a bit of a busman's holiday, but there you go. It'd be nice if the rest of them had a bit of enthusiasm.
Dinner was a quick fry up of chorizo, broad beans and onion, again with chilli and smoked garlic (from the marvellous Port of Lancaster Smokehouse, the best kippers I've ever had).

(also the purveyors of the best kippers, I should say)

I had some of his salmon on a slice of dark russian rye, smeared with sour cream and a bit of grated ginger - really really great. He's bringing in some more tomorrow! He declined to taste my air-dried ham, even after I didn't get botulism poisoning from it. I'll have to think of something else to make to pay back his kindness. It's cooling off enough here that cooking/baking sound appealing again.

I think I'm going to hit up my co-worker who has a near-industrial smoker (also, he's the ocean-fishing organizer) to smoke me some garlic, because that sounds excellent.

Maybe I'll make up some green corn tamales - they are labor intensive but I have a tamale steamer I've yet to try out.

pasta with kale and beet greens. i boiled the greens for a bit with some herbs, then sauteed them with onion, smoked bacon, and garlic and tossed everything together with balsamic vinegar.
the beets themselves are delicious. i roasted them on monday and have been eating them cold with various dressings. i think tonight is going to be sesame-orange-ginger.

Flan update: pumpkin flan was definitely not cooked through, dewatering the pumpkin would have helped. Both tasted great, but I think needed more eggs (recipe called for 1 egg + 1 yolk per cup of milk/cream - that makes a fairly light custard and I like my flans heavier and eggier to stand up to the intense caramel).

This evening I'll be attempting poulet au pot du bearnaise, basically a stovetop casserole with a soft-boiled egg vinaigrette.

My cooking has taken on a bit more of an agenda of late, as I'm gearing up to open my own gaff at the end of october (planning permission notwithstanding). So pretty much everything that gets cooked at home is fine-tuning dishes I'll be knocking out at the deli when it opens.

Matt, that's awesome! I will come eat at your place every time I'm in the UK :) Are you focusing on any particular stuff?

It's falling into place? that's great news, well done mate

Wow, Matt, that's awesome, congrats! Where's it gonna be?

Thanks chaps. I expect a visit next time you're north :)

Um, it'll be in Ormskirk ("A hotbed of nothing" - R. Fowler). It's been a couple of years in the planning and getting stuff into place but we're now just the stroke of a council official's pen away from actually opening (do not get me started on planning committees, they thought we were planning to be a wine bar so we've just had to restart the whole planning permission process). Once the change of use goes through then the lease on the site will be signed, we'll quit our jobs and get busy with sledgehammers.

The focus is on local as fuck, fish landed at Fleetwood, smoked stuff from Port of Lancaster, local meats and cheeses. It's a delicatessen with kitchen, so my business partner will be selling stuff in the shop whilst I'm knocking out meals upstairs. Platters constructed from the shop's stock, daily changing hot specials (for takeout also), cakes and what have you for afternoon tea (as a proud cornishman, I fully intend introducing a proper Cream Tea to the local heathens). Emphasis very much on the english though (admittedly my background is mostly in French/Italian so doubtless that'll creep in).

congratulations! i was going to say that i made a very nice beet and goat cheese thing last night, but that pales in comparison with your news.

Matt, that's so exciting!

Wow! ILCooking FAP/M (pint/meal) in Ormskirk, anyone? Good luck, Matt!

Woohoo! Matt, that's awesome! When will you know for sure?

I'm already considering how one might rig the OFM awards next year :)

Aw, you'll make me blush.

Basically all we're waiting on is the council's change of use coming through from the planning department of the local council. The licence is fine, the police are happy, the fire officers are happy, the disability access people are happy. The suppliers are ready, the contractors are ready, the staff are trained and waiting to go. The planning department were concerned about losing retail sites until we pointed out that we ARE retail. At which point they said "oh we've got you down as a wine bar". We said "eh? What on earth are you talking about? Wine merchants, yes, wine bar wtf?" and they said "well you'll have to start the change of use process again. So ner" and we smiled politely and said "of course" and plotted dark murder behind our smiles.

End of October, with a bit of luck.

fingers x'ed Matt!

Company pitch-in today, so whipped together greek potato salad (redskins, feta, chopped green olives, w/ olive oil/lemon/black pepper dressing), parsley/tomato/mint/couscous dressed w/ olive oil/lemon/sea salt, and a pan of brownies.

Marinated some top sirloin in lime juice, sriracha, and toasted sesame oil (no chipotles in the house and wanted some kind of spicy smokiness w/ the lime) for about 15 min, stabbing with a fork all over and flipping around 3-4 times. Dried off and grilled and was very spicily excellent.

smoked bacon & kale over pasta. the smokiness of the bacon is very overpowering, i may have used to much! hahaha like that's possible.

Mrs Coastaltown has just cooked plum crumble, which was throroughly fabulous. I'm susbsisting on butties at the moment, long work stint.

Happy culinary new year!

Oops look here instead. Stupid cut and paste.