Tag: view from my window

Wild garlic buds

You know how some days you just long for something different to eat? Perhaps the weather is getting you down or the work you are doing seems rather tedious and your mind starts to wander….. you feel hungry (oh, how often I feel hungry. Goes with the territory of being a greedy old thing, I suppose) anyway, you feel hungry and you start to think of nice things to cook. A treat seems to be called for. Something to brighten up your evening…..

And then I thought of my wild garlic.

I’d cut away at the leaves the other week but I still had plenty of buds and as my mind was still unoccupied by pressing problems I started to think of how I could use the buds.

I’ve had them in a light tempura-style batter (but I didn’t want the fuss)

And in risotto (but I didn’t want to eat rice)

And I started to think about the shape of the buds….

Perhaps if I cosseted them in some butter, like tiny tender stems of asparagus…..

I could serve them with some lovely roast lamb. I had a lamb henry in the freezer…that would be quick. Forty-five minutes in a hot oven would get me a deliciously cooked piece of lamb and a few seconds in a pan and I could have the wild garlic ready.

Sometimes it’s worth letting your mind wander.

Besides the weather was awful

The rain was lashing down and if ever a day called for something tasty to cheer me, this was it.

Out in the rain I went and snipped away to get a good handful of slender stemmed garlic buds. I  got a few leaves as well as they would be lovely sauteed with a drop of cream as a base to balance the buds on. It doesn’t have to be like that of course… it’s just I had an abundance of sweetly mild leaves and some cream.

And I’m greedy. Have I mentioned that before?

So, a good handful of leaves

And some juicy buds … all I needed now was a knife, some butter and a pan or two.

Roughly chop the leaves while a knob of butter starts to sizzle in a pan

Then pop in the shredded leaves with a pinch of salt and let them saute gently.

A lovely dollop of thick Jersey cream makes a deliciously smooth and savoury sauce for the sofetened leaves.

Pop those tender buds and stems into more hot butter and quickly (very quickly) let them cook through.

And that was it.

My lamb was ready and all I did was serve those soft and buttery wilted garlic buds and stems over the lamb alongside a smooth and rich spoonful of creamy, shredded wild garlic leaves.

Remarkably delicious, though I say it myself.

The strangest thing I have ever done in a car

… well, I bet THAT got you interested!

Those of you who read this regularly might have noticed that I haven’t been posting as much as usual – that’s a combination of work getting in the way and a few worries at home. I’ve hardly done any cooking at all. My darling aunt is really quite ill, so I have returned to the grim North to see her.

I got up to the most marvellous sunrise and tried to think what it meant.. red sky in the morning?

Was that the bad weather portent.. or was it going to be good weather?  I set off muttering “red sky at night….shepherd’s delight… red sky in the morning…. oh dammit!”

I had a long drive…….

.. and yes, it started to snow… AGAIN!

By the time I was driving up this road, my most favourite road in the world, the road back into my village, it had snowed.

In two hours everything had gone from a normal wintry day, with no snow,  to thick snow

When I went to my mother’s house, what had been clear of snow, two hours previously, was now two inches deep.

I just wish it would all go away.

Anyway, back to the car thing……my aunt hasn’t been eating and as I would do anything for her, I asked what she could manage a mouthful of. She’s stuck in hospital, watching yet more snow whirl past her window  and marvellous though the NHS have been for her, they can’t possibly make dishes to order.

They have to cater for thousands every day and that means making stuff that appeals to the majority. That’s fine, in the main, but she was tired of yoghurts and jelly…. but she could, perhaps, manage a spoonful or so of creme brulee.

So, the devoted niece drove straight to Marks and Spencer and bought two little creme brulees. I would have made it myself but, quite frankly, I didn’t have the time.

That’s the packet, balanced on the dashboard of my car.

They looked delicious…but, and this was the big but… you had to put the sugar on the top and grill it to get the lovely brulee crunchy top.

Now, as I said, the NHS is truly marvellous but they just won’t let you wander into their kitchens and borrow a grill.

I had thought of that and I brought along (being a most resourceful niece – comes of being in the Girl Guides, I reckon) my kitchen blow torch.

They wouldn’t let me fire it up in her room, either. 

Risk of fire and all that.. so….

I sat in the car in the car park and brulee’d the little pot, balanced on my leg,  until it was golden and crunchy.

Was it worth it? Oh yes. My little aunt ate it all up… and the added bonus was that my car smelled divine!

So. Beat that. Of all the things anyone has done in a car, I reckon finishing off a creme brulee is probably the strangest…

Unless, of course, you know different?

Crushed potatoes

Working full time is, as most of you will know, a pretty tiring business.

Working as a temp in an office is actually not that lucrative, so there’s always a fine line to be drawn between saving money and making things taste good.

This cold, dark winter seems longer than usual and it affects everyone’s mood. We get up in the dark, go to work in the dark and come home in the dark. If it’s not snowing then it’s raining or just bone-chillingly cold. The street lights come on mid afternoon and the freezing fog just hangs about.

I feel permanently exhausted and everything seems so much effort. Even cooking – my great joy – seems to be suffering. I want to come home and do the minimum…. the minimum, that is, until I have to eat it. I want something to cheer me up and make me feel marginally more special than a cold, dark and miserable Thursday warrants.

The answer is, of course, make something that takes the least effort imaginable, in the shortest time, with the loveliest taste.

When your mood is low then the thing to do is to get some potatoes… life always seems better when spuds are involved

The answer, therefore, is….. crushed and roasted (sort of) potatoes.

You’d be happy, I take it, with something that takes less than half an hour to make and serve? Some of those packet meal things take 40 minutes.. so something fresh and easy would be better? Surely?

So, you get some potatoes, peel them and cut them into manageable pieces… put them in a microwavable bowl with a sprinkle of salt and some water.

Put the oven on at 180 degrees.

Cover it with a plate and cook on high power for 6 or 7  minutes. (I say cover it with a plate because that is quicker and more economical than covering it with cling film and then throwing it out. Besides, that’s what I always do)

That’s just enough to mainly cook them but them still to keep their shape. Jab them with a knife to check there’s give in them.

Drain the spuds and put them on an oven tray… and get out your potato masher.

(Funnily enough, when I make mashed potato I won’t use the masher, I always use a potato ricer to make sure the mash is as smooth as can be. The masher is, however, perfect for part crushing the potatoes)

Now, don’t go mad. You aren’t mashing… you are bashing.

The potatoes need to be broken down around the edges… not flat, just bashed about.

Drizzle oil over it… garlic oil is good… as is chilli oil if you want your potatoes to have a bit of a bite … then shove them in the oven on a top shelf for ten minutes or so.

See how the littler bits have gone golden and crispy?

And the bigger bits have crisped up round the outside?

And there you have it… perfect to serve with (as I did) some roast lamb…. or maybe left over sausages, heated through, or maybe some roast chicken.

Sometimes, it is just enough to have a bowl of potatoes.

That really did take just about 30 minutes to make. 

And it really did take the edge off a bad day.

Breakfast egg and polenta and a new camera

When I made cheesy polenta  I made sure I had made enough for more delicious meals. My greediness makes sure I always make extra of everything. There’s something about leftovers that is so appealing….

I had plans for a small portion of it –  breakfast! I had a lot to do and I wanted a quick, really quick breakfast.

Apart from racing round the apartment to get everything looking lovely for the Bear’s return, I also wanted to play with my new camera, which arrived this week.

My lovely friend, L, suggested it for me and, on the grounds she has known me long enough to recognise just HOW inept I am at technical things and how much I need things to work properly and not torment me with wicked technical tricks, I bow to her superior wisdom and all round good taste.

She has had to put up with so much from me over the years, times  when I’d ring her wailing that the computer hated me and was deliberately ignoring me, me claiming that I was jinxed and that all computers and technical gadgets were only built to make my life a misery. There was one time she listened to me run over a particularly evil mobile phone…. I had been talking to her and was just enraged at what a rotten piece of equipment it was. It would cut out and refuse to do things, oh it was maddening. It wasn’t just me, mind you. These phones were notorious for being useless. Everyone who was unfortunate enough to have one hated them.

Because it was on a contract I had to keep it – unless it was broken beyond repair. I’d tried “dropping it” but it was always fine. It just carried on cutting in and out of conversations, driving me to distraction. That day it was particularly bad. In the end I pulled into a layby, jumped out of the car, put the phone under the wheel and drove back and forth over it. L was still on the other end…..I was certain this would kill the vile phone and then I could get another one…. but what happened? I got back out of the car, picked up the phone and heard L laughing.

Say what you like about that now-departed mobile phone manufacturer – the phones were rubbish, but by golly they were sturdy.

So, L knows I need something that will be kind to me and take pictures easily. She doesn’t want to have to go through the saga of me shrieking in temper as something goes wrong. She knows I need foolproof. It has to take close ups of food and it also has to take horizon shots. L said the Canon IXUS 200 would be the one for me and there are all sorts of options – even (and this is a real plus point) even an option for fireworks!  If you have read this blog in the past you will know that our wedding anniversary is on Bonfire Night and we like to toast each other with champagne as we watch the fireworks going off from the city below us. Try as I might I hadn’t been able to take pictures successfully.

So, I now have a super-duper camera that even I, with my fumble fingers and low tolerance level for fiddling about,  can operate with some degree of success – all I have to do is learn how to use it.

That’s why I am up so early. I need to get everything ready for the Bear, I need to have breakfast …. but first, I just had to try the sunset setting. OK, so it’s dawn but it’ll be all right, won’t it? Same sort of thing?

 

 Isn’t that pretty?

Now, I really must get on. I like a savoury brekkie, rather than a cold one and I didn’t have time to make breadbuns so I could have a fried egg sandwich. I always feel that a weekend breakfast should include eggs somewhere along the line. I like them boiled, scrambled, poached, baked and best of all, I like them fried. I love the way the yolk dribbles out when you cut into it, all deep gold and glistening.

So……

All I had to do was heat, quickly, in the microwave, a few decent sized spoonfuls of the lovely cheesy polenta…. maybe a minute, if that. While that’s spinning round, I got out the frying pan and fried an egg.

The fastest cooked breakfast imaginable!

All it needed was a grinding of black pepper over it and a cup of strong black coffee to wash it down and I was in breakfast heaven.

Simple? Check.

Tasty? Oh yes.. oh very, very yes. Check.

Fast? Two minutes, so a definite check.

Economical? Oh, very much of a check.

Try it. It was delicious.

Saturday – snow bound breakfast

Even though it is the weekend, I still wake up before 6am, just as I do for work.  And, just as I always do, I go, quietly, upstairs to our kitchen to make coffee and look out at the city below us.

It’s been snowing again and even though we are right at the top of our apartment block and even though it is bitterly cold with the wind howling past, the snow is piling up against the windows.

I know I said I wanted to be snowed in but this is ridiculous.

This is not the morning for having a cold breakfast. This is the kind of morning that something like a fried egg sandwich, say, is just what is called for. White bread, all soft and giving, with a hot, fried egg, sizzling as it drops on to the bun, then oozing golden egg yolk down your chin as you bite into it.

There is, as there so often is, a problem…. we have no white bread. There’s time enough, though, to make some buns  – and, as an added bonus, putting the oven on will help warm the place up a bit.

As I get the flour out of the larder, I see there’s a recipe on the back of the Hovis bag. I usually make slow risen bread, bread that has some texture, taste and strength to it, but today I want soft, white rolls. I just want fresh white bread that will mop up buttery, eggy, tomato saucy dribbles…….

Good old Hovis, eh?

500g of flour, 25g of butter, 1 and a quarter teaspoons of salt, 1 and a half teaspoons of fast action yeast (that’s one sachet of the instant yeast),  300 ml of warm water and 2 teaspoons of sugar ( that adds flavour and thickens the crust, apparently)

Add the dry ingredients to the flour and mix them through (it’s the only way to make sure it all mixes evenly before you add the butter and the water) Then add 25g of butter – cut it into pieces so it is easier to deal with

Then, using the tips of your fingers, rub the butter through the flour – you need to get the bits of butter evenly distributed through the flour… just rub it through till there are no more big bits left

Then add 300 ml of warm water and stir it together.

I wanted to go and read the papers on line while I drank my coffee (that weighing and mixing everything together only took a few minutes) so I put it all in my mixer, with the dough hook and set it away to knead.

You can do it yourself, of course, but luckily… I don’t have to! I left the Kitchen Aid  whirring softly, at a gentle speed, for five minutes as I read about the widespread snow and the probability of more.

There you go… beautifully silky dough, ready to make into buns and let it rise.

A quick roll into bun shapes, then pop them onto a silicone sheet on a baking tray and cover them with a dampened tea towel to stop the dough getting a crust before it is ready to bake.  The buns need to rise for an hour or so before you bake them

But it was, still,  just after 7 am so there was plenty of time before I needed to make breakfast… and it was snowing again.

The oven went on at 230 degrees and when the dough had doubled in size… in those buns went for half an hour so so…

Oh they were lovely! The kitchen was warming nicely, the smell of baking bread was filtering downstairs to wake the Bear….. beautiful little plump, white breadbuns emerged from the oven… time to get the breakfast ready

There are some lovely free range eggs from the farm shop….

some butter to spread on those warm buns….

a squirt of tomato sauce…..

Breakfast bliss…….now that was an easy way to happiness.

Lentil and Chorizo Soup

The Bear and I live on the top of a hill, which is, itself, at the top of a series of hills. We look down on the city below us and the view is always fantastic.  We have a park at the side of the gardens and it is always a good place to walk around.

In the autumn we go blackberrying and in the summer it’s a beautiful place to sit in the sun.

In the winter?

Incredibly beautiful, isn’t it?

You wouldn’t think we were just a mile or so from the city centre.

Being so high up means the snow is thicker up here and it stays longer. It also means that when I finish work, I try and go straight home to avoid getting caught up in any bad weather. And THAT means I haven’t been going to the supermarket.

I haven’t even walked to our nearest shops, because that means a walk  involving coming down from where we live… down these steps

So I need to cook from what we already have.

I always keep the store cupboard filled with things that will last and tonight I started to think about soup.

There’s always a large jar of red lentils .. so they would go in… as would that lovely big onion.

In the fridge I found some pieces of chorizo

and in the cupboard a tin of sweet smoked paprika.

Right then… I was off. Onions chopped and sauteing gently in a dessertspoon of oil, with a teaspoon of paprika

Then, time to add the red lentils. They are not only tasty, they are packed full of protein.

Four scoops… that’s about 300g.

Two pints of water and stir it all round. That needs to bubble away but it really doesn’t take long for the lentils to cook.  Add a stock cube or some stock granules for flavour… this is going to be the quickest and tastiest soup you have ever made.

I have some dried Kashmiri chillies so one of them goes in… they are quite sweet and mild in comparison to other chillies. If you are cooking for children, then you could, if they don’t like chillies, just miss that out.

Remember that chorizo? Cut slices off each of the pieces and dry fry them over a gentle heat.

This lets the oil seep out gently, which you dress the soup with later, so whatever you do, don’t just throw it out.

See this? This is the secret that turns this tasty soup into a deliciously rich bowlful.

We are cutting our calories and that means cutting fat. But look at the label – it is skimmed milk.  No fat in there, or at least none to speak of.

You have enough liquid in there so adding milk powder adds to the taste, without diluting the taste or the consistency. The milk makes it taste rich and creamy.

Two big scoops of Marvel and then take out the dried (but now beautifully soft) chilli… and then whizz the soup to a silky smoothness. Taste it and adjust the seasoning… maybe a pinch of salt and a grinding of black pepper?

Into the soup with the chorizo (chop the big pieces) and stir it round… pour over the glossy red oil

And there you have it.

Red lentil and chorizo soup – about two pints of  spicy loveliness. Packed full of protein and very little fat.

And the cost is minimal ….. both in pennies and calories….. there’s under 300 calories a serving in there.

All made from store cupboard ingredients and bits from the fridge. I feel so very virtuous… and also full and warmed through. 

EDIT FROM MY DESK :

Lovely chunks of chorizo, smooth and creamy soup…. 

Life is good.

(Oh and the snow photos were taken by The Bear. He’s good, isn’t he?)

Macaroni Cheese

Well… it’s cold outside…. I wake up and go to make coffee

… it’s been snowing… and more snow is forecast. If this is the morning

What will the evening be like? I want to be snowed in.

I know I have enough food for an army and I can think of nothing better than being made to stay in. It wouldn’t be my fault, would it? Just imagine the bliss…. not going to work, just tucked up, nice and warm, looking down on the city below us. 

We have an enormous sofa and it would be so lovely to be sitting, curled up with the Bear, both of us clutching a lovely bowl of…. what?

I want something savoury and soothing… soft and warming….. comfort food at its finest. And then I thought of macaroni cheese. That would be perfect – pasta, all soft and oozing cheese sauce, the top crisped and brown… I dare say an Italian would look on this with horror but it is truly an English dish now.

“…we can establish the venerableness of the dish we call macaroni cheese from the following recipe which must have been introduced from Italy… into the court cookery of Richard II [1367-1400]. Macrows. Take and make a thin foil of dough, and carve it in pieces, and cast them on boiling water, and seeth it well. Take cheese, and grate it, and butter, cast beneath, and above as for losenges, and serve it forth.’ It was apparently not made in England during the next few hundred years, but it returned from Italy in the eighteenth century…when Elizabeth Raffald published a very good recipe entitled “To dress macaroni with Parmesan cheese.”
—Food and Drink in Britain: From the Stone Age to the 19th Century, C. Anne Wilson (p. 252)”

So, macaroni… lots of it

Into a pan of boiling salted water to bubble away until it is cooked. Now real Italian pasta meals are served al dente but this is macaroni cheese.. it is going to be baked after this… it is going to be soft and gorgeous.

While that is cooking, get started on the cheese sauce… you need good butter, some cream

some onion and some cheese. I had a big slab of Farmhouse Cheddar just  asking to be used

Now, I always add onion. I like the contrast between the slight roughness of the pasta and the smoothness of the onion. It lightens it up just a fraction.

First thing is to chop the onion and gently saute it in butter until it is translucent

When the macaroni is cooked, drain it and put it into a lightly buttered dish with a knob of butter to melt over it

and then stir in those soft onions

Now back to the sauce – melt two tablespoons of butter and stir in two tablespoons of flour.  Season it well with Maldon salt and fresh ground white pepper.

You need to cook the flour properly so stir it round until it all comes together then start stirring in a mixture of milk and cream

It becomes a smooth and silky, glossy looking sauce.. which is when you add the cheese

If you have some parmesan or Gran Padano then add that, too… it adds an extra hint of cheesy sharpness

Stir it all round till the sauce becomes smooth again and then… well, then  you pour it over that glistening bowl of macaroni and stir it round so all the cheese sauce can seep into the macaoni, filling the little tubes…

An extra grating of the two cheeses on the top makes a lovely, golden bubbling crust

All that needs now is maybe 30 minutes or so in the oven at 175 degrees until the top is browned and you can smell that it is ready.

In that time, plump up the cushions on the sofa, pour a couple of glasses of wine… look out of the window and be glad you are warm inside…..

Look at it…….

Of course, a true romantic like myself likes to make sure the Bear feels loved. Well, with macaroni cheese, a tomato sauce heart, a glass of red wine and someone to cuddle with on the sofa, he definitely feels loved.

That was lovely…we were in our top floor apartment, with three walls of windows, watching  the snow whirling about all around outside,  while we were inside with the  best comfort food in the world.

What could be better than eating a bowl of that with the one you love?

So simple and so right for days like this.

Cold, dark December

I  get up in the morning in the dark, I drive to work in the dark, I leave in the dark and get back in the dark.

Sometimes I wonder if the world has ground to a halt and it is permanently dark outside.

Last night everything was shrouded in fog  as well as being dark…..

view from my window

I’m tired and I can’t think of what to cook – well, I can think of lots of things but they all involve me being around to cook them.

I might have to drive back to the North at short notice, which will mean there will be no cooking going on…. there will be, perhaps, reviews of the delights of hospital sandwiches and what kind of coffee can be had from a clapped out machine in a corridor.

So, if you don’t hear from me,  think of me and the family and say prayers for my digestion…..

5-a-day fruit smoothie

The Met Office is amazing, I’m sure. And if I was out at sea I would value their shipping forecasts… actually, I love them when I am at home – there’s something so soothing about listening to the litany….

“Forties Cromarty:
Mainly north or northwest 3 or 4, increasing 5 or 6 later. slight, increasing moderate later. Occasional rain. Good becoming moderate or poor.

Forth Tyne:
North or northeast backing northwest 3 or 4, increasing 5 at times. smooth or slight, occasionally moderate later. Occasional rain. moderate or good”

What it actually means, of course, I suppose I could puzzle out but it’s enough for me to hear it. Good work, men at the Met.

 But what about yesterday’s forecast? What about all the warnings of minus three degrees? Freezing fog and bitter cold and ice? Reports of road gritters on standby?

I went to bed, thinking about what to cook today, anticipating there would be a need for warming and sustaining food, maybe porridge first thing and something with dumplings later on… and got up to this…

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That’s not freezing fog. Nor is the temperature below freezing. Looks quite bright, actually.

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So, I think,  we will have a fruit smoothie for breakfast.

I love to give the Bear a smoothie to start his day with – it’s a brilliant way to get extra fruit and vegetables into his diet. I always have a bag of frozen fruit in the freezer, either for putting in his porridge as a treat or for making desserts or smoothies with. We always have banana and yoghurt… and there’s always juice…

I started off making his smoothie with fruit juice to loosen it and then discovered that vegetable juice was a brilliant way to get more of his 5-a-day in… and V8 has just so many things that a Bear would balk at… look at them all

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And do you know what? He doesn’t even notice!

So first of all, get some frozen fruit… half a glass full is about right.

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You’ll need yoghurt, a banana and some juice

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Put the fruit into the blending jug and add a couple of spoonsful of yoghurt

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and a good sloosh of V8

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Then blend….

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….. look at how it all goes together…..

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Then pour.

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And does he know he is drinking spinach and carrots and tomato with his fruit smoothie? No, he doesn’t. Everything blends together beautifully – the fruit and yoghurt are all he can taste. The V8 stops it being too sweet, really. It is a great improvement on the days when I added fruit juice.

Has he got his fair share of  his 5-a-day? Yes, he has. 

And does he  enjoy it? Yes, he does.

Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit…………… ragu

While I was in the north and at the butcher’s, I spotted some rabbit

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£2.20! I bought that and started to think of things to make with it. Because the rabbits are wild they have very little fat on them but they are high in protein… a very delicious meat but they need to be cosseted in order to get the best from them. I thought a lovely rich ragu, slowly cooked until the rabbit was tender and served with pasta would be gorgeous.

What you will need is rabbit, of course, carrots, onion, some streaky bacon, a couple of bay leaves and some peppercorns. You’ll need either fresh tomatoes or a tin of the lovely Italian plum tomatoes, some wine, garlic and some butter.

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 I got the bay leaves from the tree on the balcony

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You will need pasta to serve it with – I make it when I have time but just buy some if you want to.

It was the weekend so I had the time to do this….. first of all, if the rabbit isn’t jointed, then do it now. Mine was, so that saved me a job. If it isn’t then you need to take a sharp knife and carefully cut through the joints. If you have poultry shears snip down the ribs. Get it into roughly evenly sized pieces.

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Heat your casserole and some oil and then start to brown your rabbit. What you are about to do is get the meat ready and make a delicious stock that you will add to the tomato sauce to pour over your pasta.

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While the rabbit is browning, get the rest of the stock ingredients together

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Chop the carrots and onion, get some black peppercorns and add that to the browned rabbit. Add some water – don’t entirely cover the rabbit – and see all the lovely browning caramelisation mix with the water already……

 

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Just leave that to simmer quietly for an hour and a half or so until the rabbit is tender and falling off the bone.

Now get cracking on the ragu…..Bear Bars and Rabbit ragu and tagliatelle 053

Usual routine… chop the onion, start to sweat it gently…

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Never put the garlic in with the onion as it burns too quickly.. so while the onion is gently softening, chop the garlic

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Then the bacon… chop that and add it

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Once that has started to cook down, add the tomato. Chopped plum tomatoes in a tin are fine… excellent, in fact. You should always have tins of them in the cupboard.

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The juice sticks to the side of the tin so pour some red wine in and swish it round… then pour it in

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Well, you might as well get the last of the tomato out and you don’t want to dilute the delicious ragu with water, do you?

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Now that, too, can simmer for a while…..

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See how rich it is looking?

Back to the rabbit…..

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See? It is tender and starting to come away

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Get it out and put on a plate.. don’t throw the stock out! Look at how the wooden fork can gently pull the flesh away ….

Meanwhile, strain the vegetables from the stock.. you don’t need them but you do need the stock

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Boil down the stock with a good old slug of vermouth for a few minutes so it reduces slightly then add it to the ragu…. I decided to blitz it as I wanted a smooth base to go with the soon-to-be shredded rabbit

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Start shredding the rabbit… well, you don’t need to shred, it just falls apart when you pull at it

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Do watch out for the bones though.. a rabbit always seems to me to have more bones than are necessary… look at them

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Still, you get a lot of meat for your £2.20

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Then, add the lovely, tender, delicate rabbit to the gorgeously smooth sauce

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Stir it round.. that rabbit need to be covered in the sauce

While that is gently simmering, get some pasta ready

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And then…? Well then you put the two together…

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That is something I will be doing again. There was enough rich and tasty ragu there to easily feed 6 of us. Pity there was only the two of us……. don’t you wish you had been passing and had called in to share?