Extreme cooking
June 8
The good part about knotching up half a century is that I got a new horsebox. A blue shiny lorry to replace the Licquorice Allsort on wheels that was allergic to cold mornings.
The bad part was that I agreed, in a moment of lunancy that doesn't differentiate it much from any other to have a 100th birthday party for 70 people and cater it myself.
Is cooking Chinese food an extreme sport? From this day on catering for fewer than 50 will be a walk in the park:
Next time we do this I will:
a) Choose a simpler menu than to this one:
(MENU
Strange flavoured lettuce
Hot and numbing chicken
Fragrant braised mushrooms
Hot and sour cucumber
Man and wife beef slices
Celery with dried bean curd sticks
Lettuce wraps with prawn and Sichuan preserved vegetable
Spicy chicken with peanuts
Spare ribs with red bean curd cheese
Hot and fragrant aubergine
Green vegetables with garlic
Fragrant bean sprouts
Steamed rice in lotus leaves
Ginger and lemon cake with ginger ice cream
A selection of Swaledale cheese with quince butter
b) Not waste the day before making dumplings which never get served, nor spend hours on the seating plan and then change it at at the moment.
c) Not let Tim get carried away with the mojitos.
d) Not refuse to drink the mojitos - but down several and go to the pub
19 June 2010
I don't know how I managed to enter Honi for a dressage test on the same day as her ballet exam. It wasn't an insurmountable timetable until the satin ballet shoes went in the wash along with the leotard and came out two sizes smaller with a hole in the toe.
The good news was that I found an old pair of her cousin's, the bad news was that they were a size too big and did not have ribbons. I dealt with the latter quite simply by visiting Yorkshire Trading (okay I now know that real ballet ribbons are non slip but they did the job); and Honi managed to keep the shoes on on by completing the exam with her toes curled.
I was past caring by thay stage as I had escaped the steely glare of irate ballet teacher by making a (genuine) excuse that I had two ponies to plait.
Honi only made two errors in the dressage test which was good considering I suggested that she left learning it til after the ballet exam as I didn't want her to get the two confused. I wasn't really concentrating on that either as Tim phoned to say that he had discovered a wasps nest in the garden bench as was 'in trouble'. I phoned Sam to ask if Dad needed an ambulance and Sam said he would deal with it. I arrived back to find the house empy and was momentarily racked with guilt. That is til phoned Sam and found he was watching the football in the pub (are 15 year olds allowed in pubs to watch football) and Dad had gone for a run swollen face and all.
I added Rentokil to the 'to do list' that I keep in my head (most of the time anyway), poured myself a glass of wine and opened the fridge. It's a good job everyone likes fried rice.
.
June 8
The good part about knotching up half a century is that I got a new horsebox. A blue shiny lorry to replace the Licquorice Allsort on wheels that was allergic to cold mornings.
The bad part was that I agreed, in a moment of lunancy that doesn't differentiate it much from any other to have a 100th birthday party for 70 people and cater it myself.
Is cooking Chinese food an extreme sport? From this day on catering for fewer than 50 will be a walk in the park:
Next time we do this I will:
a) Choose a simpler menu than to this one:
(MENU
Strange flavoured lettuce
Hot and numbing chicken
Fragrant braised mushrooms
Hot and sour cucumber
Man and wife beef slices
Celery with dried bean curd sticks
Lettuce wraps with prawn and Sichuan preserved vegetable
Spicy chicken with peanuts
Spare ribs with red bean curd cheese
Hot and fragrant aubergine
Green vegetables with garlic
Fragrant bean sprouts
Steamed rice in lotus leaves
Ginger and lemon cake with ginger ice cream
A selection of Swaledale cheese with quince butter
b) Not waste the day before making dumplings which never get served, nor spend hours on the seating plan and then change it at at the moment.
c) Not let Tim get carried away with the mojitos.
d) Not refuse to drink the mojitos - but down several and go to the pub
19 June 2010
I don't know how I managed to enter Honi for a dressage test on the same day as her ballet exam. It wasn't an insurmountable timetable until the satin ballet shoes went in the wash along with the leotard and came out two sizes smaller with a hole in the toe.
The good news was that I found an old pair of her cousin's, the bad news was that they were a size too big and did not have ribbons. I dealt with the latter quite simply by visiting Yorkshire Trading (okay I now know that real ballet ribbons are non slip but they did the job); and Honi managed to keep the shoes on on by completing the exam with her toes curled.
I was past caring by thay stage as I had escaped the steely glare of irate ballet teacher by making a (genuine) excuse that I had two ponies to plait.
Honi only made two errors in the dressage test which was good considering I suggested that she left learning it til after the ballet exam as I didn't want her to get the two confused. I wasn't really concentrating on that either as Tim phoned to say that he had discovered a wasps nest in the garden bench as was 'in trouble'. I phoned Sam to ask if Dad needed an ambulance and Sam said he would deal with it. I arrived back to find the house empy and was momentarily racked with guilt. That is til phoned Sam and found he was watching the football in the pub (are 15 year olds allowed in pubs to watch football) and Dad had gone for a run swollen face and all.
I added Rentokil to the 'to do list' that I keep in my head (most of the time anyway), poured myself a glass of wine and opened the fridge. It's a good job everyone likes fried rice.
.
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