63/1038 - Mum's red devil's cake

Australia celebrates World Teachers' Day tomorrow and so I thought I would bake a cake for the teachers at my children's school.

And what a decadent cake this is!

With more sugar, chocolate and butter than you can imagine, this is definitely not the snack for the dieter. Apparently Stephanie's mum did not usually ice this cake but I decided to up the fat content even further and top it with chocolate buttercream icing.

62/1038 - Jill's warm prawn and mint salad

We decided to cook our fish and veg on the barbecue for dinner tonight and a warm prawn salad sounded like a wonderful accompaniment.

The dressing for the prawns had a coconut milk base and was spiced up with fish sauce, lime, garlic, fresh chilli, sugar and ginger and then topped with shredded mint.

Once the prawns had been devoured, we discovered this was also a lovely dressing for barbecued fish. Definitely another keeper.

61/1038 - Gingerbread

As Stephanie wrote, "This is one of those dark, fudgy gingerbread cakes, not the chewy sort used for making gingerbread men or houses."

I love traditional gingerbread, but am now also a huge fan of this incredible ginger cake. Apparently it is lovely served with ice-cream or whipped cream but I think it stands quite well on its own.

Post script - Sincere apologies for this very boring post! I am so pleased I improved my storytelling as time went on. I believe the issue at this stage of the challenge was a focus on quantity rather than quality. In my opinion, not a great choice! 

60/1038 - Baked bananas with meatloaf

I have always wondered what this recipe would taste like and now that banana prices have come down (hooray) I thought it was time to try it out.

The meatloaf was very simple to make (and dead easy in a thermomix!) and was baked in the oven, bare at first and then wrapped in bacon. I didn't have any streaky bacon in the house and so I improvised, covering the meatloaf with short cut bacon secured with toothpicks. It looked a little bit like a very long, very pink echidna.

The gravy was rich and lovely, the meatloaf very tasty and I have decided that the bananas were an inspired addition, nice and soft and just a little bit sweet.

Post script: My husband and I have always joked that this is the worst blog picture I ever posted. Looking back at it more than eight years on, I am sure this is still the case.

59/1038 - Red cabbage salad

One of the things I absolutely love about this book is the number of simple recipes that take almost no time to prepare, but which occasionally provide me with flavour combinations I might not have discovered on my own.

This recipe took only a matter of minutes; the cabbage was sautéd with garlic and chopped anchovies, with a dash of red wine vinegar and pepper to finish. I used white anchovies which are fresh rather than cured, and have a milder flavour than the ones you generally see used on pizzas etc.

What I loved most about this salad was that the anchovy flavour was gently dispersed throughout, leaving no boring bits.

58/1038 - Warm broccoli and cauliflower salad

It was great to have the opportunity to use my shiny new Thermomix in a challenge recipe today!

This salad calls for the broccoli and cauliflower to be boiled but I like to steam my veg wherever possible. So out came the varoma and I was pleased to find that an entire head of broccoli and a head of cauliflower were able to be steamed together! Once steamed, they were dressed with oregano, olive oil, parsley, lemon and a lovely crack of pepper over the top to finish.

Definitely an afternoon snack worth repeating.

57/1038 - Asparagus soup

It has been a week since my last recipe, and the best excuse I can come up with is that my husband took the camera away to Phillip Island with him and I just couldn't bear to take mediocre quality photos of my creations.

So with that out of the way, I am pleased to report that this is a really lovely springtime soup. The only instruction I did not obey was the straining of the soup at the end. The asparagus I used were small and sweet and I did not find the consistency hairy at all as Stephanie indicated it might be.

I also left off the whipped cream that is served with the soup, but that was purely a health related decision and I am sure it would have been a divine addition.

And then there were 656...(a confusing title now that I have upgraded)

So it turns out my whiz bang spreadsheet is fallible after all. After a bit of a double check, it turns out there are actually 656 recipes in The Cook's Companion, not 655.*

I toyed with the idea of updating all of the previous post headers, but realised that would be an insane waste of my time.** Particularly given the fact that I am probably the only person who would notice the changes anyway.

So there it is - 656 is the new golden, and neatly palindromic, number.***

* This post was written before I upgraded to the second and then third version.
** This is now done. In my defence, I am bored and currently locked in with my family due to COVID-19.

***The author reserves the right to discover further counting errors as this challenge progresses, although she is secretly crossing her fingers that this will not be the case.

56/1038 - Bok choy in hot and sour sauce

What a nice, simple recipe for a Tuesday night. The hot and sour sauce was fantastic, made from salt, sugar, cornflour, apple cider vinegar, soy sauce and rice wine. I decided to take the bok choy out of the wok and fry the chicken in the sauce which was absolutely fantastic. I was a bit heavy handed with the dried chillies which I quite enjoyed, but the boys ended up a bit goggle eyed and running for the milk. They still told me that the sauce was "awesome", so no harm done. Their tolerance for chilli is becoming quite impressive! 

Time to hit them with a good vindaloo I think.

I doubled this recipe which was lucky because it meant that we all got a good sized serve, but also that the chicken was well coated as it cooked.

Too easy and a great, simple sauce to add to my repertoire of things that make steamed vegetables taste good.

55/1038 - Spinach ricotta terrine with pear dressing

We had dinner with friends tonight and this was my contribution to the table. The terrine was very simple to make and is baked rather than pressed. It reminded me a lot of a very tall, very rich quiche.

The dressing was made from pears, olive oil, walnut oil and a splash of red wine vinegar. I think my pears must have been a bit on the measly side as I found the walnut flavour a bit overwhelming and had to add an extra pear to mine. The texture of the dressing was lovely and smooth and added tons of flavour to the terrine.

How exciting, 55 recipes down, only 600 to go!*

*Of course this was the case before I upgraded to the second and then third edition of the book! 

54/1038 - Cucumber as a cooked vegetable

Cooking cucumber was a first for me, and I must say I quite liked it! The cucumber is peeled, steamed and then pan fried with butter until you have a nice burnt butter sauce. Once the butter is sufficiently browned you throw in some lemon juice (which stops the butter from cooking) and some parsley.

Stephanie's recommendation was that this be served over either chicken or fish. We chose to throw it over some prawns which I thought worked quite nicely.

53/1038 - Fennel and potato fry-up

I think this might be the nicest way I have ever eaten fennel!

The fennel is pre-blanched and then fried with potato, bacon, fennel seeds, garlic and onion. It is difficult to see how you could go wrong with this recipe. The entire family absolutely loved it and there was not a left-over to be seen.

52/1038 - Coconut ice

I just love coconut ice and I made this batch specifically to bring some lovely colour to a party table. 

It was, however, almost a disaster. I put the mixture into a tin that was not quite big enough, and so the coconut ice was quite thick and deep which made it extremely hard to get out. After muttering a few choice words that I am pleased my children were not around to hear, I managed to get the majority of it out and in fairly well shaped pieces.

Disaster averted, it tasted like it was supposed to and provided a good hit of sugar for my guests as energy was flagging. 

51/1038 - Brutti ma buoni (ugly but good)

These little biscuits are like slightly chewy meringues flavoured with hazelnuts. They are aptly named because they are definitely not the most attractive biscuits I have ever made, but they certainly are yummy.

My special tip for anybody who makes these biscuits would be to NOT drop them all in a tin together expecting them to come apart easily. I was mortified to find a massive ball of biscuit when I pulled the tin out a couple of days after I had made them. With some careful prising I managed to pull them apart but I am thinking that a single layer in a long, flat tupperware container might be a better option next time I make them.

50/1038 - Old-fashioned almond bread

I was so thrilled to make this bread and have it turn out so well because it has always been a favourite of mine. 

The first bake takes the bread to a dense cake-like consistency which is then cooled and finely sliced. Lucky for me, I have an old laser cut knife that was perfect for a fine job such as this. The slices are then put back into the oven where they become golden and crisp.

Ridiculously easy and a yummy, not-too-sweet bite to have with a coffee.   

49/1038 - Honey madeleines

A madeleine would not be a madeleine without the distinctive shell shape. Luckily I didn't have to buy the madeleine trays myself as my mum has a set that she bought many years ago.

I took Stephanie's advice and rested the batter overnight and was surprised to find that it was quite firm when I pulled it out to use the next day. It certainly made it easier to spoon the batter into the tins which I had very liberally painted with butter and coated with flour.

Once cooked the madeleines fell straight out of the tin as they were meant to (hooray!) and were a hit with my guests, although I did manage to sneak one off the plate before they disappeared.

An encore performance is definitely on the cards.

My first, slightly more blonde, effort.
Still fabulous.

48/1038 - Janni's dolmades

Dolmades can be a bit time consuming to make but in my opinion they are absolutely worth it.

I am sure I take much longer than is necessary when filling the vine leaves, but I absolutely love taking my time and wrapping them as perfectly as possible. I find it very satisfying to see the finished pile of neat little parcels when the job is done.

Once they have been put together, Stephanie's version has them cooking in tomato juice rather than stock and so I was interested to see how they would turn out. I was pleasantly surprised with the flavour the tomato juice added and as usual, was pleased I had trusted the recipe rather than doubting it and sticking with a method that was more familiar to me. 

The only detriment was that being covered in tomato they were a little messier to pick up than usual, but as well as tasting fabulous I think the tomato made them look particularly bright and pretty on the plate.

47/1038 - Smoky eggplant purée

This turned out to be another lovely dip, but unfortunately fell a little short on the "smoky" element. Having an electric oven and stove top means that I do not have ready access to an open flame. I was planning to roast the eggplants over the chiminea instead, but at the time I was making this, the rain was coming down in buckets and there was no way known I was getting wet just to impart a smoky flavour into a dip.

I decided instead to slice the eggplant and dry fry it in batches which I thought worked rather well. I then blitzed the eggplant (less skin) with garlic, salt, parsley, basil, lemon, olive oil and pepper.

This was really lovely and was popular with my guests although as with the hummus it became the never ending dip and I have been happily munching my way through the remainder today.

46/1038 - Hummus

I used tinned chick peas for this recipe and so I know the result was not quite as good as it could have been. Probably due to this, I had to do a bit of flavour adjustment to the final mix. I also added my secret ingredient which is a dash of sesame oil. It adds an interesting flavour but you have to be very careful not to overdo it as sesame oil can be quite overpowering.

I am convinced my dips turn into magic puddings at parties. No matter how many people dig into them, there always seems to be a mountain left over the next day. I am certainly not complaining as I could live quite happily on raw vegetables and home made dip for quite some time.

45/1038 - Flaky goat's cheese biscuits

These biscuits have a lovely soft texture and quite a subtle goat's cheese flavour. Stephanie recommends rolling the mixture into a log and leaving it in the fridge for several hours before cooking, however I left mine in there for a couple of days which didn't appear to do it any harm. It was still very easy to slice and was definitely nice and firm!

Reports from guests at a recent gathering suggested that these biscuits were a hit. There was only one guest who did not notice that they were set on a cheeseboard and mistook them for shortbread. An easy mistake given their appearance!

44/1038 - Cheese straws

This is basically a cheesy pastry recipe that turns out lovely crumbly cheese straws. I think I may have cut mine a bit too thin (I really should learn not to doubt Stephanie!) and so some of them ended up a bit too crumbly.

They are very yummy, though and I am thinking I might make a nice vegetable soup in the next couple of days and crumble some of these over the top.

43/1038 - Miniature omelettes

I served up a very unusual dinner tonight. It started with lettuce soup, followed by these little omelettes and finished with chicken served with leftover apple, cheese and prosciutto salad. It worked in a very bizarre way.

As I have said before, I am not a great fan of deep frying and so I fried these in just a little oil. They still puffed up like they were supposed to, although I did have to turn them over to finish them off. The recipe called for a good pinch of cumin and I added about a tablespoon - I still think they could have done with more although I confess I am a HUGE cumin fan.

My youngest ate almost his bodyweight in omelettes so I think that constitutes another hearty thumbs up.

42/1038 - Simple carrot cake

As I was measuring out the ingredients for this recipe, it struck me that others might find it odd that I do not keep self-raising flour in my pantry. This is not due to a lack of space, but rather it harks back to an incident that occurred a couple of years ago.

My pantry is filled with ingredients stacked in Tupperware containers, which I prefer not to label. Instead I use a trick that my mum taught me many years ago, which is to cut the name of the item from the packet and slide it down inside the container so that it can be read from the outside. Not only does this allow me to rotate different ingredients through the containers, but there is something about the look of all the different colours and fonts showing through the containers that appeals to me.

This is, of course, a great system until a label gets lost. This would not be a problem if the contents of the container were obvious, however it is certainly a problem when the label is lost on a container of flour. By the time I noticed it was missing and was trying to figure out if it was self-raising or plain, it just happened to be the last container of flour in the cupboard and so the process of elimination was not an option that was open to me. I finally figured out which type it was by making pancakes with it, figuring that if they remained nice and thin then the flour was plain.

Clearly scarred by this experience, I made the decision that I would only buy plain flour from then on, and would convert it to self-raising as required. This is done by simply adding 2 teaspoons of baking powder to each cup of flour, and voilà, you have self-raising flour! If you don't have baking powder, you can also use 1 teaspoon of cream of tartar and 1/2 teaspoon of bi-carb soda to each cup.

I have made this cake a number of times and each time I have been thrilled with the beautiful, moist texture. The amount of olive oil in the cake not only makes it taste divine, but also means that the cake slides straight out of the tin with no need to grease it first.

Added bonus = 7 year old boy who loves the cake, hidden walnuts and all.

41/1038 - Cracked wheat and cashew salad with mint

Tonight's recipe represents my first foray into the chapter on nuts. This particular salad caught my eye, more than likely because I can't resist anything with mint, whether it be sweet or savoury.

I was true to the recipe except for substituting cracked wheat for freekeh which turned out very nicely, but required additional water and around 10 minutes of extra cooking time. The dressing (lemon juice, garlic, mint and parsley) was stirred through once the freekeh and cashew mix was cool and added a surprising amount of flavour.

I served it alongside steamed rainbow trout and roasted vegetables and, apart from the usual grumbles about the roast pumpkin, dinner was enjoyed by all.

40/1038 - Indian-style carrot fritters

The original plan for these fritters was to have them with dinner but somehow they ended up being an after dinner snack for ourselves and our guests.

The cumin, coriander, turmeric and cayenne pepper smelled amazing as we ground them together. I say we because it was very much an open kitchen last night which saw my guests working for their dinner and having turns with the mortar and pestle. It is possible that my friend Sue may now be stuck with the title 'Sue the sous' after all of the chopping and grating she did for me throughout the evening. 

The carrots and spring onions were held together with flour, egg and beer which made for a lovely, almost doughy texture. I am not big on deep frying unless absolutely necessary and so I fried these in just a fine layer of oil.

They went down very nicely with handfuls of fresh coriander and several glasses of champagne.

39/1038 - Silverbeet frittata

I love a good frittata and so I was pleased to discover this recipe when trying to decide what to do with a beautiful bunch of silverbeet.

There was a tense moment when I realised that the very large (and very deep) frying pan I had used to cook said frittata was going to impede my ability to perform a graceful frittata flip. I loosened the bottom as best I could, put a very large serving tray on the table, held my breath and flipped.

All's well that ends well. It was a well executed flip which is just as well because I have not yet decided what I will do when one of my recipes turns out edible, but altogether unpresentable.

Stay tuned.

38/1038 - Avgolemono - greek egg and lemon soup

This soup is very unusual and maybe only for lovers of lemon. My family were somewhat divided on this dish! I was in heaven (will make this one a regular for lunch I think) but my husband and my youngest could only manage half a bowl apiece. 

It was so simple and made from only four ingredients; chicken stock, rice, eggs and lemon juice. (For the record, I never include salt and pepper when I list ingredients). After an initial taste we all agreed that some garlic chives would set the flavour off nicely, or as my eldest proclaimed, "It needs something to make it more savoury."

Clever boy. Very, very yummy indeed. Ooh and look at that! Only 1,000 recipes to go...

37/1038 - Gratin of pumpkin

My boys do not like baked pumpkin (weird I know) and so before making dinner tonight I thought I would forewarn my eldest that there was going to be baking involved. "That's OK mum", was the reply, "but can you take the plastic off the pumpkin first please?" At least now I know it's just the skin they don't like!

This recipe is essentially baked pumpkin topped with fresh breadcrumbs which end up lovely and crunchy. Stephanie gives the option of using either rosemary or sage as the flavouring herb. I chose sage, partly because our sage plant is beautiful and blooming, and partly because it is a herb I feel I do not use often enough. I was lucky enough to score a couple of crunchy sage leaves on my plate and was very pleased with the choice I had made. 

For two little boys who have always complained about eating baked pumpkin, there were certainly no complaints about dinner tonight. Although it was probably because I remembered to "take the plastic off the pumpkin" first.

36/1038 - Chilli con carne

I was a bit nervous about how this dish might turn out given that I fell short on borlotti beans by a third and had to make up the difference with cannellini beans. Thankfully, it turned out quite nicely and I think my decision to make this a day prior to eating definitely gave the flavour a chance to seep through.

Not a show stopper, but a good hearty meal that went beautifully with some steamed rice and a pile of vegetables.

35/1038 - Gratin of mussels

I am sure I say this every time I cook mussels, but this has to be the nicest mussel recipe I have ever tasted! This assessment was undoubtedly helped by the fact that we were STARVING by the time I got this on the table due to some chocolate lettering I was spending a lot of time trying to perfect (see previous post). In fact we were in such a hurry to start eating that I completely forgot to add the parsley. I didn't notice until we got up from the table and I saw my forgotten little green mound sitting on the bench. As my Dad always said, if that's the worst thing that happened to me today, I had a pretty good day.

The sauce was made of shallots (I used red onion), garlic, diced carrot (loved the carrot!), tomatoes, tomato paste, lemon zest and the wine and juices left over from the steaming of the mussels. This was topped with breadcrumbs and my best olive oil and put into the oven to cook.

We still have no idea who ate the little bonus crab we found inside one of the mussels. I will have to make this again, not only so that we can try it with parsley, but also to prove that we can eat it slowly and like a civilised family, rather than one who appears to have not seen food in a month.

34/1038 - Orange caramel syrup

I offered to be on cake duty for a party I am attending tomorrow and decided to buy the cake (chocolate mud, yum) and spruce it up with my own orange icing. I was not convinced that orange juice and icing sugar would produce a strong enough orange flavour so I thought I would experiment with using Stephanie's orange caramel syrup as the base flavour instead.

I am so glad I did.

The syrup is simply toffee (boiled water and sugar) mixed with orange juice to stop it from going hard. What you end up with is a rich syrup that tastes like intense orange and burnt toffee all mixed together. I mixed it with icing sugar for a lovely and glossy as well as intensely flavoured finish.

As I write this I am enjoying a bowl of orange quarters drizzled with the leftover syrup, which is ridiculously yummy. I didn't quite lick the bowl but came very, very close indeed.

32&33/1038 - Pan-fried fish with browned butter sauce & Tomatoes provençale

My fabulous food day started with lunch at France-Soir in South Yarra where I ate a week's worth of calories including a mouth-watering crème brûlée which I can never seem to resist at a French restaurant.

I was keen to continue my food journey this evening and so for dinner I thought I would team these two recipes together, fairly sure that they would complement one another. Success! The fish with lemony, butter sauce and capers went beautifully with the crunchy garlic and breadcrumbs on the fried tomatoes.

Probably a bit more oil and butter than I am used to having in one meal, but it tasted great so I didn't mind a bit.

31/1038 - Chocolate self-saucing pudding

It was off to a friend's place for a roast lunch today and I was on dessert duty. I sat up in bed last night with the orange bible and worked out what I was going to make, going to sleep rather proud of myself for being so organised and not leaving the decision until the last minute.

I woke up this morning raring to go...until I realised that you actually need to have more than four dates in the fridge in order to make a sticky date pudding. This minor crisis was averted when I discovered this nice and easy self-saucing chocolate pudding recipe. All I needed to do was throw the ingredients in a bowl ready to cook at my friend's place, because the only way to serve a pudding like this is straight out of the oven and bubbling like crazy.

This pudding is very similar to those we have made in the past, except that Stephanie's version includes chopped walnuts, an addition I will definitely use again in future. The nuts were yummy and stopped the pudding from being overly sweet.

30/1038 - Buttered grated beetroot

After a tiring but fun day at my nephew's birthday party, tonight's dinner needed to be two things; quick and easy, and most importantly, full of vegetables to counterbalance the amount of fried and sweet party food the four of us consumed today.

What better way to eat a steak, than topped with a pile of bright and buttery beetroot. This recipe was as simple as putting grated beetroot in a saucepan with butter and cooking it for eight minutes. The only downside is that I am now sporting a very pink right hand due to the fact that my stash of clean rubber gloves seems to have been depleted. 

I am already eyeing off the leftover beetroot which I know will be a lovely addition to my lunchtime salad. Very, very easy recipe but highly recommended.

28&29/1038 - Egg and bacon pie (with home-made shortcrust pastry)

Now that the weather is getting a bit warmer, my chickens have moved into crazy egg laying mode. This recipe was on the menu tonight purely because it required 11 of them and I needed a way to bring down the egg count in the fridge. The thing I love most about these freshly laid eggs is the incredibly firm whites which don't run all over the place like older eggs tend to do.

A side benefit of making this pie was that it required home-made shortcrust pastry which meant knocking off two recipes in one go. Pastry is fun to make if you have the time and I am very happy that I do! The result was incredible.

I am pleased to report that no yolks were broken in the making of this recipe as the eggs needed to be laid whole on the base of the pie. I learned a nifty way of cracking the perfect egg while reading a book written by one of my culinary heroes, Jacques Reymond. He advocates the cracking of eggs on a flat surface rather than the rim of a bowl, and since I have changed to this method I have successfully avoided those nasty little bits of splintered shell that used to plague my cooking. My husband has now been converted to this method, but not before smashing egg after egg on the table, telling me all the while that the method must be flawed. He has since learned to be a bit less heavy handed.

This was definitely another recipe I was thrilled to discover! I love this book even more now and just hope it doesn't fall apart before I complete the challenge. Fingers crossed.

27/1038 - Beef bourguignon

I have a certain level of respect for any recipe that takes up an entire page in this book. 

Beef bourguignon (affectionately known by some of my friends as beef boogie boogie) was actually quite simple to put together, although slightly painful for me as I had to keep swapping everything from one pan to another due to my Le Chasseur not being electric stove top friendly, and my enormous frypan not being oven proof. Given that this recipe moves from the stove top, to the oven, then back to the stove top, my kitchen looked like a bomb had hit it by the time dinner was served.

It was worth it though! The sauce was so decadent, full of butter and bacon. We went through a good amount of bread after the meal as it would have been a crime to leave any of that lovely sauce on the plate.

26/1038 - Quick apple cake

It has been one month to the day since I decided to get intimate with one of my largest cookbooks. I was going to say my heaviest cookbook, but I have just discovered that The Silver Spoon tops it by around 600 grams. I know, I really do have too much time on my hands...

So with 26 recipes down, it appears I am on track to complete this challenge in a little over two years. I ever so briefly considered imposing a deadline on myself, however I am convinced that a deadline would only serve to add an element of stress and would most certainly remove some of the fun, so I will stick with my moseying strategy which I think is working well so far.

Today's recipe was the quick apple cake which smelled amazing coming out of the oven. I love the little chunks of apple which give the cake a lovely, surprising texture. I decided not to ice this one, so as to keep it fairly healthy for the kids (and my husband's) lunch boxes. To be honest, this cake is so nice it is probably best left plain anyway.

25/1038 - Baked beans

Such a yummy recipe I can’t believe this is only the third time I have made it. Actually I think I can safely blame this on the fact that the beans require soaking overnight, which I always forget to do.

The best part of today’s cooking adventure was that the beans required a four hour stint in the oven, which meant I got to use my beautiful cast iron pot that I sadly tucked away in a cupboard when we upgraded to a ceramic cooktop. Contentious I know, sometimes I feel like I am the only person in the universe who actually prefers electricity over gas on a stove top. 

Many hours after I began cooking the beans (borlotti if you were wondering), I was raving to the boys about how much they were going to love them. I was very surprised when they told me that the beans appeared to be lacking in flavour (or words to that effect) until I took a mouthful and realised I hadn’t completed the final step. These beans are just not the same until you add treacle! I am pleased to report that once the yummy treacle was added the comments around the table were much more enthusiastic.

If these beans did not take so long to cook (and require soaking the night before) they would certainly be a more regular addition to our dinner menu.

24/1038 - Pressed tongue

I promise this will be the last of the tongue dishes for a while! This recipe actually called for three tongues which was the reason for my multiple purchase last week. When I brought them home and realised each tongue was the size of a baby's leg, I decided to split them amongst three recipes rather than having a pressed tongue in the fridge that would serve a small army. My family have been very supportive but I suspect even they may have a tongue limit.

This third and final tongue required poaching and skinning like the first two. I must say I am becoming quite nifty with the skinning knife and only managed one small slash on my index finger this time. I wish I had a dollar for every time my husband walked into the kitchen with a stricken look on his face saying, "You will take a finger off one day!" I like to use the biggest, scariest looking knives for best effect.

The stock the tongues were poached in was supposed to "jelly" after cooking but mine didn't, so I added some gelatine to help the process along. The jelly, tongue and mounds of parsley, garlic and orange zest were forced together in a terrine press overnight. I sliced the tongue rather than putting it in whole, and must confess I completely forgot to add the ham as I was racing against the clock to get this finished before picking the kids up from school.

We had slices of the finished terrine with dinner tonight and I was surprised to find that the jelly was quite nice. My youngest was not so sure and asked for his jelly to be scraped off. Given the amount of tongue he has put away this week, I could hardly complain.

23/1038 - Margaret's potted tongue

When I first took on this challenge (and before I decided to share my progress publicly) I could not decide if I would be prepared to cook every recipe in the book. There were at least five chapters that made me squirm at the thought of touching, cooking and eating the ingredients. I decided I would probably cook everything I liked the look of and then let the challenge peter out quietly. After all, nobody would know any different and my kids were hardly going to complain about missing out on the opportunity to experience tripe for the first time.

I was casually sharing this thought with my husband and he responded with, "Surely Stephanie would not include recipes in her book that did not taste good." I spent a good amount of time pondering this information, whilst at the same time wondering when the role of rational, wise advisor had passed from myself to my husband. I went back and told him I thought he was absolutely right and that I would be completing the challenge in it's entirety after all. He was of course over the moon. Not about the challenge of course, it is just such a rare occasion that I tell him he is absolutely right about anything. I think he may have even written the date down.

So this brings me to today's recipe, potted tongue. I started off by poaching the pickled tongue (reminds me of a tongue twister, pardon the pun), and then whizzed it up with the ingredients you would expect to be married with pickled meat - mustard, butter, ginger, nutmeg, worcestershire sauce, cloves and of course a dash of cayenne pepper. Very yummy indeed and great on toast.

In my wildest dreams I did not imagine I would ever make potted meat of any kind, except possibly when I was young and into anything written by Enid Blyton. I am fairly sure Dick, Fanny, Jo and Bessie packed potted meat into their picnic basket on a number of occasions.

I think these old fashioned characters were on to something.

22/1038 - Afternoon tea orange cake

With friends coming over for afternoon tea, this cake seemed the perfect choice for a sweet snack.

It was really light and yummy and best served warm which I discovered quite by accident. I misread the recipe and added the orange zest to the cake mix instead of the icing but it was a happy accident which only enhanced the flavour of the cake.

After one sitting there are only 2 small pieces left, and given there are four in our family, I am already anticipating the mad scramble to the cake tin after dinner. I am still quite a lot bigger than my children so I should be a shoo-in for a second piece.

21/1038 - Braised tongue with madeira sauce

Yes you heard right, we had tongue for dinner tonight!!

It tasted a lot like corned beef and as long as I kept my mind off what I was actually eating it was really very pleasant. We had a lot of fun poking the raw tongue and grossing each other out before I thought I should start acting like an adult and actually cook the thing.

I covered the tongue in stock and cooked it in the oven for a couple of hours. Once it was cooked and the skin had been removed it looked a lot more appealing and a lot less like a hairy, bumpy tongue. The madeira sauce was absolutely divine, although technically not a madeira sauce as I used port instead, which Stephanie suggested as an acceptable alternative. I thickened the sauce with some cornflour which made it rather like a winey mushroom gravy.

I was so proud of my family for eating this, and couldn't believe it when my youngest told me that we must have tongue again! Lucky for him I had the butcher pickle three tongues for me this week so expect to see me working my way through the tongue chapter over the next couple of days.

19&20/1038 - Mexican ceviche (with fresh tomato sauce)

I am sure ceviches were invented with the lazy cook in mind. Chop up the fish, tip it in a bowl of lime juice and throw it in the fridge for a couple of hours until it is "cooked". Drain, toss in a few more ingredients, and voilà you have a meal! It was almost that simple tonight, except that one of the ingredients in this version is Stephanie's fresh tomato sauce, so I had to use the oven after all. 

I was true to the recipe except for swapping mild chillies for Jalapeños to give it a bit of extra kick. To my amazement the boys ate every bit and there were no complaints about the heat or the number of tomatoes on their plate.

The bonus of the night was the left over tomato sauce which I plan to slather over a poached egg or two in the morning.

18/1038 - Sweet and sour lamb

On the menu tonight - a simple dinner that would not require a trip to the shops. I confess I did have to dash to my mum's place for a handful of raisins (and a coffee of course!) but other than that I had everything I needed for this yummy sounding dish. 

I decided to tip some moghrabieh (Lebanese couscous) in with the lamb while it was cooking so it could soak up all the lovely flavours. The moghrabieh balls are quite large, about the size of the little balls you find inside a beanbag, and so I needed to add quite a lot of extra stock as I went.

It was a good call - the result was absolutely delicious.

17/1038 - Carrot soup with orange

Living in the house of flu this last couple of weeks has had me craving healthy food and lots of vegetables. This could well be the brightest, happiest looking meal in the book! It certainly made everybody smile when I served it up.

I have made this soup before but I don't remember it tasting this fresh and sweet. Given that I do not always have leeks in the fridge, I may have substituted the leek for an onion last time, which I will never make the mistake of doing again! 

I finished the soup off as Stephanie suggested, topped with orange zest, carrot tops (very interesting flavour!) and a splash of beautiful extra virgin olive oil. Fingers crossed it chases the last of the flu germs away.

16/1038 - Fudgy chocolate mousse

But wait, there was also dessert!

This is fudgy chocolate mousse - my youngest insisted that his be topped with cream and peppermint crisp. Turns out the munchkin was right - it was much better with the topping.

Big yum.

13,14&15/1038 - Lasagne (with home-made pasta & bolognese sauce)

It was my youngest's choice for dinner tonight and as expected he requested lasagne, his all-time favourite food.

I added some pan fried grated carrot, seasoned with nutmeg to the béchamel sauce layer (with his approval of course!) The home-made pasta was spot on tonight (hooray) and the beautiful Parmesan that we picked up recently topped the dish off nicely.

Everybody came back for seconds.