That'll be an oops then....

First of all thank you to Susan for my very special blog award. It was waiting for me when I got back from my little break in the BIG SMOKE. I will have to cosider who to pass this on to as the award is to be given to blogs that are either new or have less than 100 followers. I will think about this and post later in the week, watch this space...

What else? ... Agnes has been sick... it all started with a cold kitchen one morning and escalated ino having to do a re-light several times over a few days. Not convenient and quite a lengthy process. Yesterday it all came to a head and the doctor was called...

As you can see this doesn't look good..... However she was rebuilt and looks as good as new, especially as she was much easier to clean when a bit on the cool side. She can be a bit hot and fiesty at times...

Now we are all set, except not quite, as her thermostat is gone and a new one needs to be ordered. At the moment we are on manual control, a bit of a dodgy business.
The BIG SMOKE was fabulous.. no children, lots of good food including a visit to Maze. no photos though as  I thought it wasn't quite the done thing. We went for the early evening Wine -Flight menu. A safe option perhaps considering that the most expensive bottle cost a mere £1600. Needless to say we didn't try that one.

Oggled all the mad shoes in Harrods and agreed that even if we had the money we would probably give them a miss....

This pair was mild, honestly....
Hope you are all enjoying the beautiful weather....Speak soon love Helen xx

Pleasant, pheasant presents.

Some presents come wrapped and ready to enjoy, this one needed a little more work, the enjoyment being postponed just a little. The anticipation was all a part of the deal.





Some of you, I know would be put off by this whole process but as I grew up watching the real deal it wasn't a problem.
First undress your bird. Actually the recipe called for plucking which I wasn't about to do and opted for undressing followed by using the legs and breast only. (you'd think I was a bloke!)
Add extra ingredients such as these suggestions from "Snow Flakes and Schnapps" by Jane Lawson....





The result a very tasty roast matched beautifully with creamy mash and cabbage. A part of the pleasantness was the fact that I only got one complaint and that was from K, who in the food stakes, doesn't count.
I have sooooooo many recipe books and have decided to actually try out some of the recipes instead of sticking to the same old same old.
All in all a very pleasant pheasant!

The Cure

A few days ago Cath suggested that chocolate was the cure. Now as a decent upstanding professional from the NHS I couldn't believe this. So I kept going with the Brufen and Paracetamol and the sling. Progress was slow( to me anyway). Then a couple of days ago I turned to this.....



The effect was immediate, my arm is starting to get better, I believe...and so I had another look around and found this....



And this.....



And then sat down to this...it even matches my new mug!



Before trying very hard to get a decent photo of this.......







Thankyou Cath

Jelly and other Pursuits.

It has worked yippee!! Setting has been acheived. Maybe not everyone has will it or won't it moments when making jelly but I certainly do. Today I am the proud owner of several jars of apple and thyme jelly. Delicious with chicken, other meats and cheese.

I think they need some kind of fancy top, material like Kath Kidston or perhaps Ikea just to finish them off.