A Faint Hum / Roast Pumpkin & Goats Cheese Pasta

Sickness and exhaustion from my toddler’s nighttime antics have descended and taken over everything. My brain emits nothing more than a faint hum, reminiscent of the white noise that used to be produced by television sets before they commenced on their eternal entertainment existence.

I’m in no doubt how closely linked my mind, body and essence (soul? Spirit?) are. Rolling in negative thoughts quickly slows my mood, practising good principles of living (kindness, patience, love, self care) creates a lightness I feel from the very centre of my body. And physical exhaustion and sickness dull my senses, both physical and emotional, until I feel that everything’s under deep, dark water — heavy, weighed down and isolated.

The solution’s as immutable as the problem. Each day needs to be created from scratch: self care, refusing any nonessential activities, accepting any and all offers of help (a particularly difficult one for me), meditating both in company and alone, being useful to others to help distract myself, remembering that my thinking is compromised when exhausted, and the most important rule to follow is not to take myself so damn seriously… And repeat… And repeat…

It passes. It always passes. Sickness will fade and my son will sleep. And even in these days there are long moments of laughter and light — always as a result of time spent with others; particularly with those I’m coming to cherish as I risk opening my heart to the world.

Meals like this are perfect for these days. Pan roasted pumpkin with chilli and garlic is offset by a gentle, creamy goats cheese and tossed through pasta. It’s incredibly simple, while offering flavours that both comfort and dance. I sometimes squeeze sausages out of their skins into little balls and add to the pumpkin for the last few minutes of cooking. In other seasons, I exchange the pumpkin for zucchini and cook for half the time. Use the recipe as suits you best. I know I do.

Enjoy.

• 800g pumpkin
• 30g unsalted butter
• 1 tsp olive oil
• 1 – 2 cloves of garlic finely chopped, to taste
• ½ – 1 chilli finely chopped, to taste
• 400g spaghetti
• 4 tbl sp soft goat’s cheese (I use Meredith Dairy’s goat cheese infused in olive oil, but any soft goat cheese will do)

Chop the pumpkin into bite sized pieces, (very) roughly 1.5cm squared

Melt the butter and olive oil in a frying pan

Add the pumpkin, garlic and chilli and cook, covered, over a medium low heat for 10 minutes

Turn the pumpkin and cook for another 10 minutes, until golden and tender when poked with a fork

In the meantime, cook your pasta according to the packet instructions

Place a tablespoon of goats cheese per person into the bottom of each bowl

Drain the pasta and mix into the goats cheese

Add the cooked pumpkin to each bowl and serve

The Heavy Lifting of A Writer / Lasagne Al Forno

It’s Sunday night. It’s 5:50pm. I usually publish at 6pm.

I have 4 documents sitting open and full of words. None of them are speaking of publication.

It’s an interesting experience, to practise writing with an audience looking on. What was acceptable 6 months ago is unpublishable now. Whereas everything I wrote used to get published, now it’s common than a dozen drafts will skate through my fingers without the click I feel when something is right and worth pushing harder.

It felt for a while that the act of getting words from my head onto the page was the real challenge of writing. But I’m realising more and more that it’s really just the first ten percent. The real work is always editing.

In my case I always try and write about double the amount of words I’m going to want to publish and then I have a large amount to play with. Even then I frequently write whole new paragraphs and will sometimes rewrite eighty percent or more. More often than not, these days, the entire thing gets filed into drafts and won’t see the light of my screen again.

I know it’s a good thing. Borne out of an increased understanding of the words that have skittered through my mind for so long, and a quality filter that’s only just starting to come online, it seems to fit with all the suggestions and instructions given by the best writers in the world.

Back in September 2013, Graham Linehan (one of the great British television writers, with a biography filled with shows like Father Ted and The IT Crowd) wrote a brilliant blog post about rewriting and the pain that comes with trying to tell writers about it. In it, he writes that

Writing is rewriting.
Rewriting is not polishing.
Rewriting is heavy lifting.

I often have my editors (my husband and one of my best friends) tell me that a sentence, paragraph or whole post doesn’t work and I’ve been guilty of trying to explain why they’re wrong. But, as Graham writes, if you have to explain anything, you’ve already lost.

So I’m sitting here, my 4 pieces in front of me, and none of them are good enough. All of them need some old fashioned heavy lifting — I suspect most of them will be discarded into the drafts folder along with all the other unpolished little numbers that just weren’t good enough. Interestingly I find the process exhilarating, if I’m getting better at telling where the not-good-enough lies, may be there’s hope for my writing yet…

Speaking of the necessity in reworking, lasagne was my baking nemesis for quite some time. I could never get the ratios quite right and the pasta was often lost amongst my clear favouritism for the white sauce. I spent a few years stirring the meat and white sauces through fusilli pasta instead of trying to layer it up. Finally, after patience, practise and experimentation, I found the recipe that’s a favourite in my family, I make up a large batch and keep it in the freezer, always ready for a Friday night ‘can’t be bothered to cook’ dinner.

Enjoy.

• 300g lasagne sheets
• 1 tbl sp olive oil
• 60g parmesan
• 1 tsp nutmeg

Béchamel Sauce

• 725ml milk
• 75g unsalted butter
• 50g plain flour
• 75ml double cream
• 1 tsp grated nutmeg

Place the milk, butter and flour into a saucepan and whisk continuously over a gentle heat until the sauce simmers and thickens

With the heat as low as possible, continue to cook for 10 minutes, or until the sauce is your desired thickness

Take off the heat and beat in the cream and nutmeg

Set aside

Meat Sauce

• 1 tbl sp olive oil
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 500g beef mince
• 2 tsp basil, finely chopped
• 500g tinned tomatoes
• 2 tbl sp tomato puree
• Salt and pepper

Add the olive oil to a large pan over a medium heat

Once warmed, add the garlic and onion, stirring occasionally until soft, about 10 minutes

Add the mince and cook until browned before adding the rest of the ingredients and simmering for around 30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until most of the liquid has evaporated

Meanwhile, cook the lasagne in a large amount of boiling, salted water until al dente (if in doubt, follow the instructions on the packet but remove a minute before the instructions suggest)

I use large, 18x24cm disposable trays for my lasagne, it’s easier than having one of my baking dishes sitting in the freezer until we’ve finished a lasagne and I must confess I love the idea of less washing up to do…

Preheat the oven to 180˚C / 350˚F

Grease the baking tray with a tablespoon of olive oil and gradually layer on up — this is how I do it, but feel free to play around

2 ladles of meat sauce

1 layer of pasta sheets

Continue until all the sauce and pasta has been used

Pour the béchamel over the top of the lasagne and sprinkle with the parmesan and last of the nutmeg

Bake in the oven for 30-35 minutes until the top is bubbling and you can’t wait any longer

Unnecessary Humble Pie / Chicken & Leek Pie

A few weeks ago, I wrote a recipe for roasted garlic and pumpkin pie. In the comments, a woman whose blog I really enjoy wrote that she would like to make the pie, once she’d converted the ingredients from grams to cups.

I’m not sure what happened to me then. I definitely felt excitement that a blogger I admired was commenting, I’m aware that my ego’s been feeling a little fragile recently with some meditative work I’ve been doing, and my attention had wandered that day from keeping me mindfully right sized. But whatever the reason, I responded with a lengthy and unasked for piece of advice about why she should never use cups in her baking because grams were so clearly superior.

I had evidence (I’m pretty practised at backing up inappropriate behaviour with all sorts of good scientific proof — just read my piece on fundamentalism), and was wily enough to riff off a small joke at my own expense at the end. Like that would somehow undo the damage I was causing with my words.

Even before I hit the ‘respond’ button I had a feeling that this action wasn’t okay, that I should pause in my doubt and take some time. But, in my distracted state, the voice that usually stays my hand wasn’t there and I clicked my potential for humility away.

I initially wrote this piece humorously, and invented a conversation with a friend to try to make me seem more amused by the whole scenario than I actually am. But the reality, if I’m not mindfully careful, is that I stew over situations like these, where I could have chosen to step on the side of good living but instead I tumble into who I don’t want to be. My thinking can rapidly transgress far beyond the story that’s actually happening and tell me I’m no good, unloveable, idiotic. Everything becomes additional evidence of my ineptitude to survive in contact with others, and therefore proof that I should avoid everyone forever.

Once upon a time, I would have welcomed these thoughts as some sort of therapeutic exercise. This one small, foolish act could have been the beginning of a self-absorbed self-loathing enterprise designed purely to think about myself more, while deludedly telling myself that it wasn’t self obsession if I was thinking about being in the wrong. That I was figuring it out so I can be perfectly behaved next time, and that it was necessary, even essential.

Now, after ten years of walking a kinder, less dishonest path, I fully recognise that any extended thinking with me playing a role is not only boring self obsession, it’s also incredibly dangerous for a mind like mine that, if I’m not paying enough attention, finds deep bogs of obsessive thinking to wallow in.

So, with trusted friends, I look at the part of my thinking that’s led me back into the labyrinth of unhelpful reasoning and try to separate out the delusions of what I think I see, from the reality of the situation.

And then, once I think I’ve seen the reality – in this case that I wasn’t having my best day and was trying to stroke my own ego with total disregard for someone else – I see what I can do about mending any harm I believe I’ve caused, whether they remember, or care about the harm.

In this way, I stay free from the snatching snares of self, and have a chance at living peacefully for one more day.

On this occasion I deleted the comment, then sent my fellow blogger a private apology by email. A day later she responded, very kindly, saying that she had no idea what I was talking about as she’d never read my comment… I laughed for quite a long time at the realisation that even once I’ve done the work to get right sized, reality can still be just a distant dream in my fantasy-filled mind.

In the same vein, I spent years avoiding making pastry as it seemed too complex, too challenging and just too much hard work. Finally, I willed myself into making a pie very similar to the one I’m sharing with you today — which I’ve adapted from The River Cottage Everyday Cookbook — and was blown away by the ease at which it came together and turned into delicious, old fashioned flakiness. In this recipe it’s coupled with a classic chicken and leek filling. Freezable and easy to reheat in the microwave if, like me, you like that sort of easy cooking. You can fill these with almost anything savoury or sweet though, as long as there isn’t too much liquid.

Enjoy.

Pastry

• 300g plain (all purpose) flour
• a pinch of sea salt
• 150g chilled unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
• water and ice, in a glass

Filling

• 30g butter
• 500g leeks (about 2-3 leeks), trimmed and finely sliced
• 1 tsp roughly chopped flat leaf parsley
• 150ml double (heavy) cream
• 1 tsp seeded mustard
• 400g chicken, cut into pieces
• 1 tbl sp olive oil
• salt & pepper for seasoning
• 1 egg, beaten

For the pastry

Mix the flour and salt together in a mixing bowl before adding the butter and tossing until the pieces are covered with flour

Add enough iced water to form the mixture into a fairly firm dough (between 8 and 10 tablespoons)

Shape the dough into a rectangle with your hands, dust a surface and a rolling pin with flour, then roll the pastry away from you until the rectangle’s about 1cm thick

Imagining that your pastry is divided into three, fold the far end of the third towards you to cover the middle third before folding the third closest to you over the top

You will now have a rectangle with three layers of equal size

Quarter turn the pastry and repeat the rolling, folding and turning process 5 more times

Wrap the pastry in cling film and rest in the fridge for at least ½ hour

For the filling

Melt the butter in a frying pan before adding the leeks and parsley

Cook gently for 5-10 minutes until the leeks are very tender

Stir in the cream and continue cooking gently for about 5 minutes, until the mixture has reduced and thickened

Stir in the seeded mustard, and some salt and pepper, before leaving to cool

Turn up to medium high heat, add the olive oil to the same pan and, once warmed, add the chicken

Cook for a few minutes until the chicken is nicely golden coloured

For the pie

Lightly flour a working surface before rolling out the pastry to 3mm thick

Use a plate or tin (I use a loose-bottomed cake tin) to cut out four 20cm circles, I need to re-roll for my fourth circle

Spoon the filling on one half of the pastry circles and pile on the chicken

Brush the edges with a little water before folding over the other half of the pastry

Crimp the edges to completely seal

Place some baking paper onto a baking tray and the pies onto the paper

Brush the egg over the tops of the pasties before baking for about 25 minutes, or until the pastry is golden brown

Eat hot or cold

Sirens’ Songs of Sea & Sunshine / Cheesy Roasted Garlic & Pumpkin Pie {Gluten Free option}

I’m sitting at a softly polished red gum table, watching shadow-green waves whisper onto a white beach. We’re just north of the West Australian town of Mandurah, on holiday with my dad and his wife. With them living in Europe and us on the east coast of Australia we’re lucky that we get to see them twice a year, few are so blessed when they’re tens of thousands of miles apart.

Our little family landed a few days ago and I sat at this same table — unpacked bags scattered across the floor, still grimy from the plane journey — and marvelled at the horizon’s caress of sea meeting sky, the sun scattered kisses on the water and the waves rolling wearily in from a journey far greater than ours.

Our week since has been predominately 20 metres either side of this table. On one side, the sea with it’s warm waters and gentle waves, a perfect introduction for my toddler son. On the other, luxurious beds and bathrooms, a siren call to this tired mum. We swim in the early mornings and late afternoons, greeting and farewelling the sun from the sea each day. During the day, we read, write, play cards, talk endlessly, cook leisurely meals and lose ourselves in something as close to the perfect form of a beach as I can imagine. I think even Plato would have been impressed with this heavenly offering.

As I write this, it seems nature’s in the mood to show off — a school of dolphins cavort in the shallow waters ahead of me, and two pelicans dance in the sky above. It’s the sort of scene I would constantly google to dream about when I was 23 years old and working 14 hours a day in the middle of a finance market trading floor in a windowless, poorly converted car park in central London.

My father’s house here has a beautiful kitchen and I’ve been immersing myself in ferociously expensive Miele appliances. They produce meals that hum with celestial flavours and textures. If I could dig his exceptional oven out of the wall and somehow convince my airline to accept it as hand luggage, I may well risk my relationship with him to do so…

I made this pie while watching my father and son jumping waves together last night, and served it with a simple salad just as the setting sun disappeared from view. All our food this week has been of the relaxed, undemanding, stretch-or-starve variety. I’d read about roasting garlic cloves inside pumpkin a while ago and wanted to try the technique in a recipe that would really showcase the flavours. Thick slices of red onion with lots of thyme and sharp, salty cheese complete this simple and utterly delicious filling.

Enjoy.

Pastry ingredients – for a gluten free pastry, the recipe I adore and swear by can be found by clicking here

• 250g strong plain flour
• 1 tsp fine sea salt
• 250g butter, at room temperature, but not soft
• about 150ml cold water

Filling ingredients

• ½ pumpkin – weight about 1kg
• 2 ½ tbl sp olive oil
• 1 bulb of garlic
• 1 red onion, roughly chopped
• 2 tbl sp fresh thyme leaves, plus additional sprigs to garnish
• 115g cheddar cheese, grated
• 100g pecorino cheese, grated
• 1 tbl sp milk
• salt and pepper

Making the pastry

Sift the flour and salt into a large bowl. Roughly break the butter in small chunks, add them to the bowl and rub them in loosely. You need to see bits of butter

Make a well in the bowl and pour in about two-thirds of the cold water, mixing until you have a firm rough dough adding extra water if needed. Cover with cling film and leave to rest for 20 mins in the fridge

Turn out onto a lightly floured board, knead gently and form into a smooth rectangle. Roll the dough in one direction only, until 3 times the width, about 20 x 50cm. Keep edges straight and even. Don’t overwork the butter streaks; you should have a marbled effect

Fold the top third down to the centre, then the bottom third up and over that. Give the dough a quarter turn (to the left or right) and roll out again to three times the length. Fold as before, cover with cling film and chill for at least 20 mins before rolling to use

This recipe makes about 750g and you only need 375g for this recipe, so keep the rest in the freezer for recipes like The Imperfect Kitchen’s blueberry and lemon pastries!

Making the tart

Pre heat the oven to 200°C and, using 1 tsp of the oil, grease a pie dish measuring 28cm

Scoop out the seeds from the pumpkin and rub all over with ½ tbl sp of the oil

Break the bulb of garlic into cloves (leave the skin on the cloves) and mix in a bowl with ½ tbl sp of the oil

Place the cloves in the pumpkin cavity, then place the pumpkin cut side down on a baking tray, so that the garlic is enclosed under the pumpkin. (Easy way to do this? Place the baking tray, upside down onto the garlic-filled pumpkin and turn the whole thing over)

Deeply pierce the pumpkin 6 or 7 times with a sharp knife and bake in the oven for 1 hour, until the pumpkin is soft

Meanwhile, heat the remaining oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 7 to 10 minutes, you want the onion to be well coloured but still with a bit of bite

When the pumpkin is ready, spoon the flesh into a bowl and discard the skin. Squeeze the garlic from their skins into the bowl and mash thoroughly with a fork

Completely mix the onion, thyme leaves and cheeses with the pumpkin mix and season well with salt and pepper

Roll out the pastry on a lightly floured board

Cut out a circle about 33cm in diameter and place in the pie dish, cutting off any overhanging pastry

Prick the base all over with a fork and bake for 15 minutes

Remove the pastry from the oven, spoon the pumpkin mixture into the pastry and spread to fill evenly, add the thyme sprigs as garnish and a final grind of salt and pepper to the top

Brush the edges of the pastry with milk and return the pie to the oven for 5 to 7 minutes to let the pumpkin warm through

Serve immediately

Sleepless Sleep Training / Baked Chicken, Lime, Chilli & Mint with Spiced Rice

It’s nearly 8 at night. My husband’s out for a few drinks with a friend after work and I’m sitting, laptop perched on my lap, listening to my son softly call out to me,

“Mum, Mum, Mum, Mum, Mum, Mum, Mum, Mum, Mum, Mum, Mum, Mum”

I try to tell myself it’s just the mantra he’s using to sleep, as if all near-two year olds have a grasp of meditation and the power of repetition. Really it’s the beginning of a regime that I’ve been trying to not use since he was born.

I know there are arguments about children’s sleep habits, how to get them to sleep, how to keep them asleep, how to resettle. And a wonderful article from a frustrated Mum here. I’ve heard them all, I’ve practised them all fervently except one, and have spent nearly two years promising myself that I wouldn’t be a parent who lets their child cry it out.

In case you’re not a parent, or were blessed with sleeping children and never had to know, there are two main schools of thought around sleep for children.

The first one is the softer, let them know you love them, school of thought. It swings from co-sleeping, to resettling a distressed child and leaving the room when quiet but still awake.

The second is a tougher, they’ll be happier in the long run, school of thought. You leave your child to cry, for varying intervals of time, until they learn to fall asleep on their own.

While I was still pregnant, I had bought the most popular ‘leave them to sleep’ books and was convinced that was the path we were going to follow. I had drawn up a timetable in appropriate colours and downloaded apps that would support our self-settling journey.

Then he was born.

The overpowering and profound love I felt was so all encompassing, the thought of him enduring any pain at all seemed completely out of the question. I threw all of my hard-studied beliefs about tough love out of the window the moment his tiny fingers curled around mine and claimed me as his.

We’ve done every one of the soft techniques to try to get him to sleep. We’ve even done some of the softer tough-love techniques. Nothing has ever worked.

Now, finally, with almost 2 years of 3 to 6 hours of broken sleep a night, I know that I can’t do it any more. I desperately need sleep. I’m an increasingly poor parent and person and I can’t imagine continuing in this way for the foreseeable future.

This might seem ridiculous, either to those who don’t have children, whose children slept, or to those for whom the tough-love approach was easier. But it’s always devastated me to hear my son weeping, as he is as I write this. I often end up weeping alongside him, lying on the sofa as a wall separates me from him in his cot.

I’ve read everything. And I do mean everything. I’ve spoken to everyone, from well-meaning friends and random people in supermarkets, to numerous sleep professionals. We’ve done two sleep schools. He just doesn’t sleep. Ever.

And as much as I loathe to succumb to tough love, it’s seems the only option left open to us if I want to re-find my sanity.

He’s been crying for 15 minutes now. It’s ratcheted up in the last 5 minutes and now he’s really devastated. It’s awful and I’m getting weepy. I so badly want to go into him and gather him up in my arms and rock him to sleep, it’s a physical ache.

I have to keep asking myself, “what’s the worst that can happen?”

And really, what is the worst? He threw up a couple of times earlier on when we tried to be tougher. Apart from that, it’s just that he sounds broken, but I know logically he’s not. There’s no doubt that he’s loved absolutely.

It’s been 20 minutes. It feels like 2 hours. I finally turn on the baby monitor to see how he’s going and it’s worse than ever. So I’m giving in for now. I’ll try again later tonight. 20 minutes is pretty good for a first time. We’ll get there.

It’s 10 minutes later. He’s fast asleep, safe in the knowledge that Mum’s there. His little face softened in sleep after the first 5 minutes of gulping great sobs and holding me as close as he could, like I might fade away if he let go. It’s those moments, when he’s still sobbing and clutching me tight in fearful relief that I wonder whether my need for sleep is greater than his need for comfort. No matter how severe my sleep deprivation, the mother side of me thinks, “may be it’s not that bad.”

So why this dish today? It’s super simple, which is essential for an offline brain. It’s also (most importantly) completely delicious as each flavour speaks clearly and elegantly for itself. Finally, it’s very healthy and low in fat, which helps my brain and body keep functioning as well as possible on so little sleep.

Enjoy.

Chicken

• 4 chicken breasts
• 4 large red chillies
• 3 limes
• 20g mint, leaves and stalks
• Chilli flakes for serving
• Plain yoghurt for serving

Rice

• 1 cup basmati rice
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 (5cm/2 inch) piece cinnamon stick
• 2 green cardamom pods
• 2 whole cloves
• 1 tablespoon cumin seeds
• 1 pinch salt
• 2 ½ cups water
• 1 small onion, finely sliced

Pre-heat the oven to 180˚C / 350˚F

Place the rice in a bowl with enough water to cover, set aside for 15 minutes to soak

Meanwhile, tear off 4 squares of tin foil

Place a whole chilli on each piece of foil

Take the chicken out of the fridge and put each chicken breast on top of each chilli

Zest and juice 2 of the limes

Put zest and juice from ½ a lime on each chicken breast

Cut the mint stalks to about the same length as the chicken breast and place 5g inside each foil parcel, on top of the chicken

Season with salt and pepper

Wrap up each parcel and place in a baking tray while you prepare the rice

Heat the oil in a saucepan over a medium heat

Add the cinnamon stick, cardamom pods, cloves, and cumin seed

Cook and stir for about a minute, then add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally until translucent and soft, about 7 minutes

Drain the water from the rice, and stir into the saucepan

Cook and stir the rice for a few minutes, until lightly toasted

Add the water to the pot, and bring to a boil

Cover, and reduce the heat to low

Put the chicken parcels in the oven

Simmer the rice for about 15 minutes, or until all of the water has been absorbed

Let stand while the chicken finishes

Pull the chicken out of the oven, open the parcels and remove the mint and chilli, before placing the open parcels back in the oven for a final 10 minutes

Serve the chicken with the rice, chilli flakes and yoghurt – either remove the foil before serving, or let your eaters pour the delicious juices all over the rice themselves.

In the Comfort of Lemon & Rosemary Roast Chicken

I’ve felt the slow fog of exhausted depression steadily envelop my mind the last few days. My son’s sleeplessness, already legendary amongst family and friends, has taken a large turn for the worse the past couple of weeks and I’ve finally reached the point of barely functioning. I spent all day in bed yesterday, the impending shame of no dinner on the table being the only thing that got me groggily moving during late afternoon. I feel almost totally numb, like a heavy blanket has been gently tucked around my brain.

Depression and I fought monumental battles during my teens and early twenties. A quote on my phone at that time from the great wartime British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, read

“Never, never, never give up”

One of my great fears is to be pulled back into that half-lit existence, with an insurmountable glass wall rising up between me and the rest of the world. Where I can see people but can’t connect in any meaningful way, and the loneliness cripples my soul.

Logic tells me it’s currently exhaustion not depression but, like an alcoholic’s home in the bottle, my mind’s misguided safe place is the grey zone I can’t will or intellectualise my way out of. A deeply frustrating and scary position for a wilful semi-intellectual like me.

I’m doing what I can, based on my experience of actions that work. Calling appropriate people who can listen and advise without judgement or meaningless platitude. Going for walks and gentle swims. Allowing myself to rest, with permission not to feel guilty. Meditating. Actively not comparing myself to the rest of the world who currently seem so functional and obviously more competent than me in every way. Finding laughter wherever and whenever I can. Watching beautiful videos like this one, based on a poem by Shane Koyczan

I’m assured that all I need is enough rest and self-care and, unlike depression, it will pass rather quickly.

And in the spirit of self-care and comfort, I chose to make a roast chicken recipe that I‘ve been gradually honing for over 15 years. Roast is unbelievably easy to make, because even at the best of times I’m all about getting the most bang for my buck. It’s one of my ultimate comfort foods; juicy, delicate, crisp skinned and comforting. Here, where it’s currently warm, it’s delicious with salads and a fresh baguette. In the colder climates (hi guys!) throw some peeled root vegetables in the pan for the last hour or so of cooking. Save the chicken carcass and any root vegetable peelings in a bag in the freezer to make delicious homemade stock (recipe on the Imperfect Kitchen’s Facebook page if you need one). Nothing could be easier, tastier or, for me at this time, more comforting.

Enjoy.

• 1 tbl sp vegetable oil
• 1.8kg chicken, the best quality you can afford
• 125g unsalted butter, softened
• 6 sprigs rosemary
• 1 lemon
• 6 cloves garlic, peeled
• a large pinch of coarsely ground pepper
• a large pinch of sea salt

Preheat oven to 190˚C

Pour the sunflower oil into a large baking dish and place it in the oven while it warms

Finely chop the leaves from 3 sprigs of rosemary

Squeeze the juice from the lemon but keep the lemon carcass

Finely chop 3 cloves of garlic

Mix the butter with the finely chopped rosemary, lemon juice, finely chopped garlic and pepper

Rinse the chicken with cold water, inside and out, and pat dry

Carefully push your fingers between the chicken skin and meat, opening a space while making sure not the break the skin

Push the butter mix into the chicken underneath the skin, trying to keep the coverage even

Rub your greasy hands all over the outside of the chicken, making sure to get into all the little crevices

Sprinkle the salt on the chicken skin and gently rub all over

Store the lemon carcass, 3 whole cloves of garlic and 3 sprigs of rosemary inside the chicken

Remove the pan from the oven and put the chicken in the pan

Return the pan to the oven and cook the chicken for 80 minutes (20 minutes per 450g). Baste every 20 to 30 minutes

Once the chicken has cooked this long, turn up the heat to 220˚C and cook for a further 15 minutes

Leave to rest, covered loosely in tin foil for 10-15 minutes before serving

Oven-Baked Chorizo and Cherry Tomato Risotto {gluten free}

I didn’t much like you at first. Your clothes were always fashionable, your friends were in magazines, you only read the sports pages and were seen in all the right places.

I read French literature and loved documentaries. I’d just start knitting and my friends strongly debated the environment, politics and whether they best related to Sam or Toby in West Wing.

You made me laugh though. And sometimes, when the conversation sat in just the right light, I wanted to touch your hand, regardless of the logic that kept me still.

We became friends. You dated models and socialites, never longer than three months. I thought you were shallow and teased you for getting away with something a woman never would. You never commented on my dates, my jokingly woeful stories whenever anyone else asked how the poet/professor/musician turned out.

We both liked computer games. We both wanted an old-fashioned life; marriage, children, a house.

I made you laugh. You began to email me about old-school television and the new Woody Allen. I started asking if your team won and how your friend’s television career was coming on.

On Christmas Eve you sent a text from a paparazzi-infested club as I was curled in bed with a new book. You asked me out, but I couldn’t date a colleague, and still held tightly to the logic that kept me from reaching for you.

You resigned from your job and asked me again.

After six weeks you told me that you knew. It would be us. No more you and me. Just us. I raised my eyebrows at you and told my rapidly melting cynicism that we could never last.

After six months you asked me to live with you. I laughed and shook my head before moving in a few weeks later. Then repacking my bags during a panicked morning and creating a scene about how ludicrous we were. You waited until I calmed down before holding me gently in your arms.

After two years you flew me overseas and to the top of a glacier. It was you and me and the pilot. He took photographs as you proposed. I cried and laughed and forgot to say yes until you asked again.

Your suits are fashionable, your friends are in magazines, you read the sports pages. I knit, I read French literature and still think I’m Sam, but have aspirations to one day be Toby. We make each other laugh all the time. And sometimes, when the conversation sits in just the right light, we hold each other and our son. No more you and me and him. Just us.

A cheerful and simple meal to be eaten with all those you love.

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 350g cherry tomatoes
• 1 red onion, finely chopped
• 300g risotto rice
• 1L hot vegetable stock
• 3 sprigs fresh rosemary
• 250g chorizo sausage, cut into 1cm chunks and quartered

Preheat oven to 200c (400f)

Pour the olive oil into a large roasting tin before scattering the cherry tomatoes and red onion.

Roast for 10 minutes.

Add the rice, stock and rosemary.

Return to the oven for 20 minutes, or until the rice is tender and the liquid has been almost absorbed.

Add the chorizo, cover with foil and bake for another 5 minutes. This allows all the flavours to steep in each other as the chorizo gently steams.

Remove the foil and rosemary.

Serve immediately with lots of cutlery and prepare to spoon-fence each other for the last skerricks.

 

http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2014/03/18/daily-prompt-thats-amore/

In The Moment / Pumpkin, Avocado & Goat Cheese Salad {gluten free}

I watched my son’s eyes fill with tears today as another toddler pushed him away from the open door of a play house. He’s rarely so tender and fragile but today was just that day. I contemplated for the first time that the child who owns my heart will have a future that includes loss and sorrow.

I wasn’t bullied at school. For a while I thought I was because there were girls who sometimes hurt my feelings. But I was someone whose feelings were always easily hurt and I gave back my fair share of wounds. It took me some time in adulthood to allow those girls to be the children they were, and for me to be the child I was. I find my life is happier for the forgiveness of both.

But there were girls who were bullied. Not many – we were generally a kind, well brought up group; heavily stamped upon by conformation and fear of authority – but enough for the stain to show. I knew those girls, was friends with some of them, self-appointed protector for a while, for all the good it did anyone. I watched self-esteem fracturing in their eyes, the wearing down of spirit that the petty cruelties of school-life heaped on them.

The thought that my child could be bullied one day, might already be headed that way, brought a punch of anxiety. I immediately started wondering which magical parenting formula I could discover or concoct to spare my boy that anguish. I know that, to be a good parent, I have to allow him to tumble at times, but at each point I find myself thinking, “Not here. Not now. Not him.”

I shook the fear off pretty quickly. He’s 20 months old and about as happy and social as a child can be at his age. But was left with a soft ache all day for the pain I’m not going to be able to spare him, and for the pain I do spare him that causes more harm than good.

Clearly a day to be as mindful of the reality of the present as possible. No good planning his adult therapy sessions before he’s attended kindergarten.

So, a recipe reminder that both life and food work better with a gorgeous balance of textures and tastes.

• 800g pumpkin, peeled, deseeded and chopped into bite size pieces 
• 25g unsalted butter
• 1 tsp olive oil for cooking
• 300g baby spinach, rinsed
• 50g pumpkin seeds
• 2 avocados, flesh scooped out and roughly chopped
• 6 tbl sp soft goat cheese
• Juice and zest from 1 lime
• 2 tbl sp avocado oil or good quality virgin olive oil
• Salt & pepper, for seasoning 

Melt the butter and olive oil in a frying pan and cook the pumpkin, covered, over a medium low heat for 10 minutes.

Turn the pumpkin and cook for another 10 minutes, until golden and tender when prodded with a fork.

Place on a paper towel to soak the excess oil and leave to cool slightly.

Make a dressing by mixing the juice and zest from the lime with the avocado oil, salt and pepper.

Place all ingredients in a salad bowl and gently mix them together.

Serve immediately and find untold joy in the moment.

My City / Lime & Vanilla Chicken Skewers {gluten free}

I first fell in love as my taxi drove down the beach road, dusted with sand and bookmarked in palm trees.

Something in this city called out to me then and has intoxicated me ever since. Something undefinable. Something glorious.

It’s so beautiful here.

The drives at night, over the bridge from the airport, when the city sings with light, and spears of human endeavour pierce the sky.

Graffiti-laden alleys where layer over layer of rebellion and passion in vibrant colour cry out their challenge to the suit-clad business district less than a street away.

Restaurants joyfully spilling onto footpaths, tables with milk-crate seats filled with laughter, friendship and serious coffee, and a lifestyle that inspires all three.

I wanted to be doused with it then, I am soaked in it now. The jaunt has stuck and I’m still utterly in love.

A sunny, joyful meal to be shared with as many as possible.

• 1 tbl sp olive oil
• 1kg chicken breast, cut into bite sized pieces (about 2cm squares)
• Juice & zest from 1 lime
• 1/2 tbl sp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla bean paste
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• Bamboo skewers, soaked in cold water for 20 minutes

In a large bowl, combine the olive oil, chicken, lime zest and juice, salt, vanilla bean paste and garlic.

Cover the bowl and place in the fridge for 2-3 hours.

Skewer the chicken and cook on a hot frying pan or barbecue for about 2 minutes on both sides.

Serve hot with salad and plenty of panache…