30 May - a rescued hollandaise and lamb with mint sauce

I had a fancy for a proper bank holiday brunch, so made up a batch of hollandaise sauce to go with poached eggs on toast and asparagus. Making hollandaise can always be a bit stressful, but using Nigel Slater's Appetite recipe as my guide, I usually get through. I use the yolk of one egg in a Pyrex bowl over a pan of gently boiling water, then whisk in about 60g cold butter, a few cubes at a time until it's all melted into a thick yellow sauce. I add a squeeze of lemon juice and a bit of salt and cover until needed. The problem usually comes when the eggs are cooked and the toast toasted ... when I go back to uncover and stir my sauce, it can, as it did today, split into a nasty-looking, curdled mess. Nigel's solution of adding a splash of cold water and whisking again, worked a treat as always! Unfortunately, all that rich sauce and eggs seems to have given me indigestion for the rest of the day ... probably serves me right!

Dinner started off with the jar of homemade mint sauce still in the fridge from the week before last, which I thought I ought to use up, so it called for lamb, again. I quickly sealed a couple of chunky, Welsh rump steaks in a frying pan, then popped them in the oven for about 8 minutes to cook through. I did some braised, French-style veg - a leek, some fresh peas and broad beans, softened gently in some butter with a sliced clove of garlic and some chopped mint, then I added a slurp of white wine and let them cook gently, covered for about 15 mins. Together with some new potatoes - briefly boiled, then squashed and roasted with some sea salt and chopped rosemary - and of course, the mint sauce. Spot on. Sorry, it's a bit of a blurry photo, but I was eager to dig in!

29 May - fried haloumi & steak and mushrooms

There were various bits and pieces in the fridge, but it took me a while to decide how to combine them for lunch. In the end, I went for fried haloumi cheese based on a Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recipe cut out from an old Guardian magazine - I used his haloumi coating and salad dressing which do complement each other perfectly. The haloumi is simply sliced and then coated in a mix of flour and paprika and fried very briefly - less than a couple of minutes each side - so simple, but the slight crispy coating really works. The salad dressing mixes a tsp of honey, the juice of half a lemon, a crushed garlic clove and some olive oil, whisked together. Our salad was some lamb's lettuce and pea shoots, cherry tomatoes, cucumber and sweetcorn. The salty haloumi and sharp lemony dressing taste fabulous together!

Dinner matched some portobello mushrooms from the vegbox with fillet steak - another great combination! The mushrooms were baked according to the Jamie Oliver recipe I did the other day, but without the goat's cheese this time. So the mushrooms are coated in a mix of thyme, garlic, chilli, lemon juice and olive oil, with a few more slices of garlic stuck into the top, dotted with butter and baked for 15 mins. Served with simply fried fillet steak, some spinach and potatoes.

28 May - chicken in cider

We had the rest of the vegetable tart for lunch with a few sauted new potatoes and a big dollop of mayonnaise - yum!

The recipe for dinner is based on another Nigel Slater, from an old Observer Food Monthly. I browned some chicken thighs in a pan with some oil and butter, until golden then removed them. I fried a handful of button mushrooms in the same pan, then added about 250ml of dry cider, returned the chicken and brought it to the boil. I turned it down, covered the pan and simmered for 30-40 mins. Then at the end, I added about 75ml of cream and a big handful of chopped tarragon. Served with a big pile of spinach cooked with some wet garlic and some asparagus. Really tasty!

27 May - the Muset

As usual, we'd left it a bit late to book a Friday evening meal out, but as I was flicking through the Eating Out West Guide, I came across a place we'd been meaning to try and was pleasantly surprised when I rang and they had a table. The Muset is a nearby restaurant that's been there for ages, but we'd never been to, partly because it's a bit tucked away and we always forgot about it. It's recently been taken over and revamped though and is now called The Muset by Ronnie. It's got a fairly ordinary interior and a simple, relaxed atmosphere, but the menu definitely pushes it into the 'fine dining' slot.

Straight away, it passed the 'bread test' with some delicious, fresh, warm fig and walnut bread. To start, I chose Jerusalem artichoke soup - it arrived as a big dish with an arrangement of pickled mushrooms and brown shrimps in the middle, then the waiter poured in the soup from a little jug. The flavour was just as impressive as the little flourish in the service!

For my main, I went for roast canon of lamb which came with pearl barley (I think), leeks, olives and anchovies. I was a bit thrown when the lamb really didn't taste like lamb at all! When I asked about it, apparently it's a cut of lamb that's particularly lean, so doesn't have the same fatiness and texture that lamb normally does. It was really interesting to have something completely different, but I'm not sure I really liked it and together with the slightly bitter flavourings of the barley and olives, it just wasn't my thing. I'm not going to let it put me off the place though, because there was really nothing wrong with it, just the wrong menu choice for me. And what with excellent service and lots more on the menu to try, I think we'll be going back.

26 May - spring vegetable tart

When I've been away from the kitchen for a while, I often get the urge to cook something a bit more involved and time-consuming. I'd clearly still got a bit of a thing about eggs going on, so I went for a quiche/tart.

• Roll out some ready-made shortcrust pastry and line a flan tin (mine's a smallish 18cm tin). Scrunch up a piece of greaseproof paper, then roughly flatten it back out to line the pastry case - the scrunching makes it sit better - and fill with baking beans. Bake blind for about 15 mins at 180C and remove.
• Meanwhile blanch some fresh peas and asparagus for a few minutes in boiling water and leave to drain. And gently caramelise a sliced onion in a little olive oil.
• Put the onion and the vegetables into the flan case and pour over a mixture of two beaten eggs, about 75ml single cream, a few chopped fresh herbs (I used mint and chives today) and some grated goat's cheese (I used Parlick Fell).
• Sprinkle a bit of grated parmesan over the top and bake for about 30 mins until it's risen and golden on the top.

Breaking my usual rule about green leafy salad, we had lamb's lettuce and pea shoots with some cucumber, cherry tomatoes and roasted red pepper on the side. Really tasty and summery and even better because the whole place smelled of baking.

25 May - an omelette and chilli

After spending the weekend with Jo who has a couple of chickens in the garden, even though I didn't have any of their fresh eggs while I was there, they were obviously still on my mind today, so I had an omelette for lunch. I hate any runny bits in omelettes, so I always cook mine in a small frying pan and flip them rather than folding them to make sure all the egg's cooked. I threw in some cold potatoes, button mushrooms and lardons; a classic combination. For me, any eggy dish cries out for ketchup, but I finished off the last of the tomato and chilli relish instead - must make up another batch some time.

While I was away, Tris had made up a big pot of chilli con carne; his signature dish! And as we were both out early evening, it was perfect to come back to, heated up with a bit of rice and some fresh guacamole. I seem to make guacamole a bit differently every time - today, it was a mashed avocado, a crushed clove of garlic, the juice of half a lime, a bit of salt and a big handful of chopped coriander - a really fresh herby one that worked well with the rich chilli that'd been maturing for a couple of days.

24 May - fishcakes and minty peas

With flights now cancelled due to volcanic ash, it was eight hours by train from Perth to Bristol; sustained by a prawn sandwich, more Dairy Milk and smoothies!

Back home, the easy option was posh take-away; fishcakes and minty peas from Fishminster. We went for two fishcakes each, but then realised they were huge. We ate one and half each, putting the other in the fridge, but one would've really been enough.

23 May - wild weather

I was meant to be heading home today, so we went into Edinburgh for lunch before heading to the airport. When we got into the city centre, it was pretty wet and windy, so we dived into a cafe and stayed put. I'd come across Henderson's on my last visit, but hadn't actually been in. It's a vegetarian restaurant, bistro and deli. We ate in the bistro and I had Moroccan stew, which was meant to be served with couscous, but oddly came with rice. As a fan of vegetables, I'm always more than happy to eat veggie and my stew was good - chunks of vegetable in a tasty spicy sauce. But I never understand quite why veggie food has to have meat substitutes. The stew contained some rather unnecessary tofu-type stuff, which looked like yucky white blobs, tasted of nothing much and really didn't add anything. It didn't spoil a nice lunch though.

After that, everything started to go a bit pear-shaped ... the traffic back out to the airport was completely gridlocked and the wind and rain lashed down, bringing branches down all over the place. By the time we got there, my flight was coming up as 'gate closed' and the airport was in chaos; flights cancelled, huge queues of people not sure what was going on. It didn't look like I was going to be going anywhere, so Jo (who'd luckily hung on) said to stay on another night at hers. Listening to the traffic news on the radio, we found out there were roads closed all over the place, including the Forth Bridge and the motorway, so we stopped at a petrol station to fill up and stock up on supplies before a rather hair-raising and roundabout drive home, sustained by Dairy Milk!

22 May - Scottish smoked salmon

Another morning walk today took in woods, rumbling rivers and a hermitage, working up just enough of an appetite for lunch at Birnam Arts Centre; a really cool little community arts centre with a great cafe. My smoked salmon and cream cheese salad came with a huge pile of salmon and a really interesting salad; not just the usual dreaded lettuce, but tomatoes, cucumber, grapes, olives, orange ... and in a lovely, bright, airy foyer with a photography exhibition to mooch around after post-lunch coffees.

21 May - a pub lunch and homemade cake

A morning walk through the most beautiful bluebell woods justified lunch in the village pub; the Pitcairngreen Inn - a very passable burger and chips. After a long lunch, we dashed back home through the showers for tea and a slice of Jo's yummy home-made banana and walnut cake.

20 May - wine and chat

Today, I headed up to Scotland for the weekend to visit Jo, an old friend who lives near Perth. After an afternoon flight into Edinburgh, Jo picked me up and we spent the evening catching up over pasta and a bottle of wine.

19 May - slow-roast lamb ... again!

Tonight was Book Club - a gathering of friends to chat, eat, drink and exchange a few books. We usually decide on a food theme and all cook something, and today's was 'seasonal spring food', so I offered to do lamb to go with everyone else's spring veggies. Because the food has to be transported round to a friend's house, it's easier not to go for something that has to be cooked and served straight away, which made nice pink, rare lamb tricky. So I went for the slow-roast option again, but this time with lots of herbs and garlic. The herbs on the terrace have been going mad recently, so I was happy to give them a bit of a prune to provide a big pile of rosemary, thyme and oregano to sit my shoulder of lamb on. I threw in a bulb of garlic, some white wine, a bit of olive oil and then topped up with water to about halfway up the lamb. It went in the oven for half an hour at 180C to brown the top of the meat, then down to 150C for about 4 hours, basting regularly and topping up the water when it boiled down too far.

Keeping with the home-grown herbs theme, I also made up some fresh mint sauce; a big pile of chopped mint, mixed with a couple of spoons of sugar and some boiling water to dissolve it, then 3 tbsp white wine vinegar when it's cooled.

The smell all afternoon from all those herbs was wonderful and the lovely tender, aromatic lamb went down really well with the book club girls. It was even better served with some great veggies, including Ros's delicious peas with cabbage and spring onions, braised French-style - have to give that one a go myself.

18 May - fantastic crab cakes

I always like the idea of homemade crab cakes, but previous attempts have tended to come out rather wet and collapsed into mush in the frying pan. So I was in two minds about whether to try out a Nigel Slater recipe from last weekend's Observer Food Monthly magazine. I was feeling quite enthusiastic when I bought the ingredients in the morning, but less so when I got to the end of a busy day and couldn't really be arsed with the hassle! I'm really glad I made the effort though because they turned out to be a real triumph - perfect consistency and really tasty, with just the right balance of crabbiness and zing. The pea puree was great too and worth the extra bit of time (and washing up!) it took to whizz up.

So for the crab cakes, I mixed together:

• 100g white crab meat
• 1 stalk lemongrass - chopped soft centre only
• 1/2 chopped red chilli
• small knob of grated fresh ginger
• zest and juice 1/2 a lime
• handful chopped coriander
• 1 finely chopped spring onion
• 4-5 tbsp fresh white breadcrumbs
• 1/2 a beaten egg
• 1 tbsp flour

Then I shaped the mixture into four little cakes and put them in the fridge for half an hour, as per the recipe.

When they came out, they were still a bit crumbly looking, so fearing another frying pan collapse, I redipped them in the rest of the beaten egg and then some flour in an attempt to keep them together. It was an inspired decision as it gave them a lovely crispy outside coating. So then they were fried gently - about 8-10 mins altogether. For the pea puree I just boiled a big pile of fresh peas with some sprigs of mint, drained them and whizzed both to a puree with a splash of olive oil and a hand blender. Served with a few saute potatoes, the result was really as good as anything you'd get in a restaurant ... even if I do say so myself!

17 May - disappointing chicken

This evening we were out at the theatre, so I had my main meal at lunchtime. I was having a busy day and didn't really have time to shop or think much about food, so when it came to lunch, it was just what was in the fridge. I decided to use the chicken breast I hadn't used in the stir-fry last night and the quick thing seemed to pan-fry it. To go with it I had more new potatoes and asparagus. To add a bit of interest, I made up some fresh mayonnaise but added a bit of extra lemon juice; to make it a bit more lemony and also to make it more the consistency of a sauce to pour over the asparagus. To be honest, the result wasn't particularly exciting, but well, it kept me alive!

16 May - leftover lamb and chicken noodles

The last chunk of Saturday's lamb was still in the fridge, so for lunch I cooked up some rice and peas, friend an onion and mixed it altogether with the cold lamb and a few spices. Not very attractive, but very tasty.

This evening's stir-fried chicken noodles were loosely based on a recipe from Ching-He Huang's Chinese Food Made Easy.

• Boil some dried noodles with some fresh peas - 5 mins.
• Stir-fry some chopped spring onions, half a chopped red chilli, some grated fresh ginger, a sliced chicken breast (just one for two people), half a sliced pepper, some quartered mushrooms and half a teaspoon turmeric.
• Add the drained noodles and peas, add a pinch of dried chilli flakes, 2 tbsp light soy sauce, 1 tbsp oyster sauce, 1 tbsp rice vinegar and stir together.

15 May - pork with creamy mushroom sauce

To finish a meaty weekend, I cooked pork loin steaks with a creamy mushroom sauce. I fried the pork, slightly coated in flour, in a bit of oil and butter. When just about cooked, I transferred it to the oven to keep warm, then fried sliced mushrooms and some sliced garlic in the same pan, added a good slurp of Marsala, let it bubble down, then added half a small pot of single cream. Not forgetting to add the juices collected in the dish the pork was warming in at the last minute. It's a favourite sauce combination and as usual, it was really tasty. Served with some new potatoes, asparagus and the last of the spring greens.

14 May - slow-roast lamb

With the FA Cup Final to watch on the telly this afternoon, it was the ideal time to do slow-roast lamb - popped in the oven at half-time, it was perfectly cooked for 8. This is a favourite recipe, originally from Waitrose Food Illustrated magazine.

• Slice two large onions and scatter in the bottom of an oven-proof dish. Add a whole bulb of garlic, split into cloves, but unpeeled, 50ml red wine vinegar, 150ml red wine, 50ml olive oil, a heaped teaspoon of rose harissa paste and some salt.
• Nestle a shoulder of lamb (c.700g today) on top of this mix and add water until the lamb's about 80% covered. Bring it just to the boil on the hob, then put in the oven at 180C for about half an hour.
• Turn the oven down to 150C and leave to cook for around 4 hours.

The resulting lamb is meltingly tender and falling to pieces on the bottom, but with a lovely crunchy crust on the top. The onions and garlic become really tender and jammy, but need straining out of the remaining liquid with a slotted spoon. I dollop the onion mix onto plates and top with a chunk of lamb (a mix of soft and crunchy bits), then serve it with some couscous, roast beetroot and pepper, and a splodge of minty yoghurt (just Greek yoghurt with chopped mint). It's a fabulous combination of flavours and textures and today was washed down with a bottle of bubbly to celebrate Man City's cup win!

13 May - classic pasta and more tea

Another classic spring/summer pasta lunch today; linguine with fresh peas and bacon, simple but always delicious. Then this afternoon I was in a local deli to top up my stocks of teapig teabags and I got talked in to trying yet another make of tea! Lahloo is another Bristol-based brand and as usual, I went for their loose-leaf breakfast tea. My first pot was a bit weedy, but when I tried again with a bit more tea and a slightly longer brewing time, it wasn't bad. I'll have to see if it becomes a regular in my collection!

Dinner was at a local Italian: Aqua. It usually does some good non-pasta/pizza dishes and I love their liver. But tonight I went for veal, that turned out to be a bit uninspiring and in a rather peppery sauce - just a bad menu choice, I think.

12 May - roast veg salad and garlicky chicken

When I was making the pasta last night, I bunged some bits of pepper and courgette that I wasn't using in the sauce in the oven to roast and I had them as a roast veg salad for lunch today, combined with some cherry tomatoes and served with some new potatoes and a few slices of mozzarella.

For dinner, it was another Nigel Slater favourite; chicken thighs browned in a frying pan with a little butter and some oil, then turned down, covered and cooked very slowly over a low heat for about 30-40 mins with some whole cloves of garlic and some thyme leaves. Then I took out the chicken, poured off most of the fat, put the pan back on a high heat and poured in a good slurp of white wine. I let it bubble, scraping up any bits from the pan and squashing the soft garlic cloves. Usually, I add a bit of butter at the end to make a really rich sauce, but today, still on a health drive, I just added a squeeze of lemon juice and poured it over the chicken - less rich, but lovely and sharp and garlicky. No potatoes tonight either, just a plateful of veg; spring greens (from the vegbox), asparagus and a few green beans.

11 May - with chives

I've got some fantastic chives growing out on the terrace, so today it was potato salad for lunch, just to make use of them! I made it with creme fraiche instead of mayo, just to be healthy, which was a bit uninspiring, but the chives made up for it. With some beetroot and egg salad to go with it.

Dinner was 'student pasta' - onion, pepper, courgette, some bacon bits and a tin of tomatoes all cooked up and served with pasta - more-or-less exactly the recipe I lived on as a student and still just as tasty.

10 May - tea and fishfingers

Today's foodie excitement was the arrival of tea in the post! I drink a lot of tea; about 6 cups a day on average and I like a bit of variety. That's not to say I go in for green teas or herbal teas or anything of that sort, I'm strictly a traditional, breakfast tea kind of girl. I don't even like smelly teas like Earl Grey. But there's still quite a range under the 'breakfast blend' label. I have bog-standard tea bags from Tea Direct that usually make at least my first two or three cups of the day - always made in a teapot, of course. Then, in order of strength, I have some loose-leaf ATTIC tea (a Bristol tea-shop) - quite dark with quite a strong earthy flavour. There are teapigs English breakfast teabags ... sorry 'pyramids', a bit subtler and lighter than the bog-standard teabags. Then there's Suki tea - today's delivery - another loose-leaf tea that's light and fresh and often makes my final cup of the day around about 5 o'clock. New with today's delivery were some Suki Belfast brew tea pyramids which I'd expected to be quite strong, but are actually really light and only need the tiniest dash of milk.

Dinner was fishfingers, mash and peas! The fishfingers weren't the frozen Bird's Eye kind, but fresh cod fishfingers from Waitrose - a kind of grown-up equivalent ... but just as fun. The peas were fresh, the first of the season, not quite British yet, but from Italy - lovely with plenty of butter and some chopped fresh mint.

9 May - fresh garlic mayonnaise and stuffed peppers

Lunch today was a classic combination for this time of year; asparagus, parma ham and a few new potatoes. To add a bit of luxury, I made up a batch of fresh garlic mayonnaise. A small clove of garlic sprinkled with salt and crushed with a knife point to a paste, then whisked into an egg yolk. Then olive oil (mild first, followed by some extra virgin) dribbled into the bowl, whisking all the time, until the mixture becomes so thick and shiny that it all sticks to the whisk. Then a squeeze of lemon juice brings it back to the right consistency - well worth the effort!

This evening was a bit of using up - one of the green peppers from the vegbox and the lamb mince left over from the weekend's burgers. I fried a chopped onion and some garlic, added some pine nuts, the lamb mince and then a couple of chopped tomatoes. I added some tomato puree, salt and a pinch of dried oregano, then piled the mixture into the halved pepper and baked it for about 25 mins. Served with some minty couscous, it made a tasty supper.

8 May - home-grown veg and a creamy chicken curry with a kick

Most of today was spent out on our roof terrace planting up this year's 'crops'! Last year, I made a rather tentative start at growing my own veg, but most things were a bit disappointing, I think partly just because I didn't grow enough of anything to yield enough worth eating. This year I'm being a bit more adventurous with French beans, mange touts, tomatoes, courgettes, spinach and a chilli plant, as well as all the herbs that are already thriving.

I think I'm a bit of a supertaster - that is, stronger flavours strike me as even more intense than for most. So I've never been good with anything very hot. I love 'spicy' Indian food, but I prefer it when I cook it myself and can control the amount of chilli that goes in. Today I cooked one of my favourite Madhur Jaffrey curry recipes which is usually relatively mild, with lots of flavour and just a bit of background hum from some cayenne pepper. A little while ago though, I got a new jar of cayenne pepper which is clearly much punchier than what I'd had before and which I haven't quite got used to yet. So today's gentle-looking creamy chicken curry had a bit more of a kick to it than I'd intended!

Madhur Jaffrey's Chicken with cream

• Sprinkle a couple of chicken breasts cut into chunks with some salt, 1/2 tsp cumin, 1/4 tsp coriander, 1/4 tsp turmeric and 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper - less with hindsight! Mix and leave for about an hour.
• Fry the chicken pieces in some vegetable oil to brown, then remove with a slotted spoon.
• In the same pan, fry a chopped onion, then add a paste comprised of two crushed garlic cloves, the same amount of grated fresh ginger and a splash of water.
• Stir in 1/2 tsp cumin, 1/2 tsp coriander, 1/4 tsp turmeric and 1/4 tsp (?) cayenne.
• Add a chopped tomato and stir and mush to a paste.
• Take the pan off the heat to stir in 2 tbsp natural yoghurt - too much heat at this point will make the yoghurt split. Then add 100ml water, some salt and the chicken.
• Bring back to the boil, turn low, cover and simmer for 20 mins.
• Remove the cover, add 1/2 tsp garam masala and 2 tbsp cream and bubble until the sauce is thick and creamy.

7 May - burgers and rhubarb cake

A rather rainy day saw me pottering around doing a bit of cooking. After a fairly meat-free week, today I fancied something meaty and what could be meatier than homemade burgers.

• Fry a small chopped shallot gently in a little olive oil with a teaspoon of caraway seeds - cool slightly.
• Mix together c.300g lamb mince (for 2) with the shallots and caraway seeds, some chopped mint and salt. Shape into two burgers.
• Fry the burgers gently - c.10 mins altogether.
• Put a slice of goats cheese on each burger and either grill or pop in a hot oven to melt.

Served with homemade chunky chips, a beetroot and broad bean salad and some homemade tomato and chilli relish - lots of favourite flavours all on one plate!

The rhubarb cakes come from a recipe my mum sent me years ago, cut out of a magazine. I'm not a great cake baker, but this is more like a fruit sponge pudding, so doesn't need to be quite so light and fluffy. The recipe is for one big cake, but I make it in muffin tins to make individual little cakes. The first two are served warm with a splosh of cream, the rest go in a tin to go with a cup of tea over the next few days.

100g butter
100g caster sugar
1 tbsp demerera sugar
1 egg
100g self-raising flour
a pinch of cinnamon
25g ground almonds
c. 300g rhubarb
splash of orange juice - the recipe calls for orange zest, but I didn't have an orange today

• Lightly butter a 6-hole muffin tray (I use a silicon one) and sprinkle a little bit of demerera sugar in the bottom of each.
• Chop up enough rhubarb to give a single layer in the bottom of each hole - about 3-4 pieces. Chop the rest of the rhubarb into 1cm pieces and mix with c. 20g of the caster sugar.
• Cream together the butter and the rest of the caster sugar, then add the egg.
• Fold in the flower with the cinnamon, a pinch of salt and the ground almonds.
• Mix in the rhubarb sugar mix, then a slurp of orange juice to make the batter a bit smoother/runnier.
• Dollop the mix into the muffin tray and bake on 180C for about 30-40 mins.

6 May - a vegbox and the Lido

Continuing my recent food supplier theme, today was my first organic vegbox delivery for a few weeks. I've been getting an organic vegbox delivered from Riverford every fortnight for about 6 years now. Generally, I think it's a really good idea and I do love my veg, but I do go through phases where I suffer from "vegbox fatigue". Although I like most vegetables, there are certain things I'm less keen on and sometimes I get boxes that I just feel like I'm just trying to "use up" rather than enjoying. Back around Feb/March time, I had a few particularly uninspiring boxes in a row - it isn't a great time of year for veg anyway - so as I was going to be away a lot through April anyway, I paused my deliveries for a while.

Sadly, today's box didn't quite rekindle my excitement. It contained asparagus, spring onions, peppers and rhubarb which are all good, potatoes (not new ones) and carrots, which are unexciting but okay. But then it contained a huge lettuce - now I don't eat lettuce at all, so poor Tris is going to be ploughing his way through salad for lunch for quite some time to use that one up! And then a big bag of spring greens ... I quite like greens occasionally, but having just ploughed my way through three servings of greens in the past week using up a big bag from the supermarket, this time, their arrival provoked a rather sinking feeling! I think I'm going to have to go back to making up my own box for a while - which requires a bit more planning and a minimum order, but ensures I don't get stuck with more stuff I don't really want.

Friday night often means a meal out and this evening we went to a local favourite, the Lido; as its name suggests, a swimming pool but with a great cafe and restaurant too. The food was fresh, different and delicious as usual. We both had wood roasted scallops with herby butter to start; a bit tricky to eat without splashing butter over yourself, but fantastic with some fresh bread to mop up the leftover butter. Then roast pork with a romesco aioli - a sauce made, I think, of nuts, garlic and peppers and then mixed up into a kind of mayonnaise - difficult to describe, but absolutely delicious!

5 May - sea bream from Fishminster

Today, I was frequenting another local supplier; Fishminster is an upmarket fish and chip shop with a fresh fish counter just round the corner. I like fish, but I tend to avoid cooking it because I'm a bit squeamish about it when it's raw and I don't like handling it. Add to that the fact that supermarket fish is completely tasteless and it'd rather slipped out of my repertoire until recently when this new fish shop opened. It's a nice little fish counter that isn't too daunting and contains lots of nice clean fillets to choose from.

So dinner was a couple of lightly pan-fried sea bream fillets dotted with a bit of truffle butter and served with roasted asparagus and new potatoes. Simple, but good.

4 May - bread & cheese and chicken noodles

A few months ago a new bakery opened just a few doors down from us tucked away on the little back lane the runs along one side of our house. It's called Hart's Bakery and it's a one-woman operation run by baker, Laura Hart. I don't eat a huge amount of bread, but I like to support local businesses, so I ventured in and I've been trying to go back regularly because the bread and the pastries are really good. This morning, I got a wonderful wholemeal and sesame sourdough loaf and had a couple of slices for lunch with some melted goat's cheese and a bit of salad on the side - yum!

For dinner I used up the last of the cold chicken along with the remaining spring greens in an Asian noodle soup.

• Simmer c. 750ml chicken stock with a smashed stalk of lemongrass and half a chopped red chilli.
• Then add the shredded chicken and season with a dash of dark soy sauce, a small splash of Thai fish sauce and a small squeeze of lemon juice.
• Boil some noodles as per packet, then drain and stir through a dribble of toasted sesame oil.
• Steam the finely shredded greens.
• Pile the noodles in the bottom of deep pasta bowls and pile on some of the greens.
• Stir in some chopped mint, coriander and Thai basil into the "soup" and pour it over the noodles and greens.

It could perhaps have done with a bit more 'soup', but it was wonderfully tasty and fresh.

3 May - chicken soup and peppers with chickpeas

Don't you hate it when you burn your mouth on your first mouthful of something? Today I managed to burn my tongue on some soup before it was even out of the pan! It was actually quite a nice homemade chicken and mushroom soup; with stock made from the weekend's chicken bones, some of the leftover chicken, the last of the Portobello mushrooms and just a dash of cream. Rather spoilt though by singed tastebuds.

Dinner was one of those made-up dishes that's sort of a combination of bits of half-remembered recipes. I wanted to continue the (mostly) veggie theme and had a fancy for something with a Mediterranean/North African feel. So I roasted a couple of peppers, then fried up a red onion with some garlic, added a few slices of cooking chorizo (the non-veggie bit), a can of drained chickpeas and half a tin of chopped tomatoes. Then I peel and sliced the roasted peppers and added them at the end. I served it with some couscous and a dollop of Greek yoghurt mixed with some crushed garlic and fresh chopped herbs (mint, coriander and chives) and topped with a few lightly fried pine nuts. One of those really tasty, satisfying combinations that seemed to work really well.

2 May - Sri Lankan greens, dahl and rice

Trying to come up with a way to use up the rest of the spring greens from Saturday, I found a Sri Lankan recipe for 'spring onions and greens with coconut milk' from High Fearnley-Whittingstall in Saturday's Guardian magazine. I used coconut cream instead of milk simply because it comes in a smaller carton and I didn't want to open a whole tin of coconut milk just for a splodge.

2 cloves garlic - sliced
bundle spring onions trimmed, left in big chunks
150g spring greens - shredded
1tsp curry powder
c.150ml coconut cream

Gently sweat the garlic in some groundnut oil for a couple of minutes in a large pan. Add the spring onions and fry for a couple of minutes, then add the greens and stir until they're wilted. Then stir in the curry powder and add the coconut cream and simmer for five minutes.

As the greens didn't seem quite substantial enough on their own and I wanted to stick with the healthy, veggie theme, I made up a bit of dahl to go with them using a favourite Keith Floyd recipe (from Floyd's India):

100g red lentils (rinsed and soaked in cold water for an hour)
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 tsp cumin seeds
a red onion, finely chopped
one garlic clove, crushed
grated ginger (about equal to the garlic)
1/2 tsp chilli powder
1/2 tin tomatoes

Cook the lentils with the turmeric and some salt in just enough water to cover until they've absorbed most of the water. Heat some vegetable oil in a frying pan, add the cumin seeds and then the onions and fry for a few minutes. Stir in the ginger and garlic with the chilli powder, then add the tomatoes and mix together. Finally add the lentils, mix it all together and simmer gently until you're ready to serve.

With some simple basmati rice, the whole thing made a really tasty, substantial meal. The greens had a lovely subtle creamy flavour, although they were perhaps a bit crunchier than I'd like and I wonder if shredding them a bit more finely would have been better.

1 May - Portobello mushrooms & simple pasta

Lunch today was a variation on a Jamie Oliver recipe for Portobello mushrooms. I mushed up a clove of garlic, some thyme leaves and a bit of chopped red chilli together with some olive oil and lemon juice. Then brushed this all over a couple of big Portobello mushrooms, dotted a tiny bit of butter on the top and put them in a hot oven (2ooC) for about 10 minutes. I then added a couple of thick slices of goat's cheese on top and popped them back in for another 5 minutes to melt the cheese. The result, as always, was absolutely delicious with a handful of new potatoes to soak up the juices - a real favourite!

Dinner was a simple bowl of pasta - linguine with shallots, pancetta, asparagus, a squeeze of lemon juice and a sprinkling of parmesan - I think my first 'repeat' dish so far.

30 April - roast chicken and a broken timer

The culinary news of the day was less about the food and more about the sad demise of my timer. It was a frankly rather naff plastic timer in the shape of an apple, but it was given to me as a birthday present by a friend a couple of years ago and I've become rather attached to it. So when I twisted it round rather absent-mindedly as I was cooking dinner this evening, I was horrified to hear the crack of plastic and find half a timer in each hand! I did try and fix it back together again, but a couple of little bits had snapped off inside, so it was RIP apple timer!!

Back home again, we've started a new 'regime', to try and lose a few extra pounds gained over the winter and no doubt not helped by the frequent eating out over the past week or so. It was roast chicken for dinner, but rather than slathering it in butter as I usually do, today it was just drizzled with olive oil, a scattering of thyme leaves and a squeeze of lemon juice - with one half of a lemon stuffed inside the bird, the other thrown into the roasting tray. Then halfway through cooking - estimated without the aid of my timer! - I threw some unpeeled and slightly squashed garlic cloves in too ... I've learnt not to put them in from the start because they just dry out and burn to a crisp.

When the chicken was cooked, I took it out to rest, poured the oil out of the roasting tray, then popped it on the hob. I added a slurp of wine, stirred up the sticky bits from the bottom, squeezed the lemon and the garlic cloves and let it all bubble up to make a wonderfully rich, sharp gravy. Served with boiled new potatoes and some spring greens, it tasted every bit as good as the usual buttery version.

29 April - a barbecue in the garden

Today we left Cornwall and stopped off at Tris's Mum's in Budleigh Salterton on our way back. The sun was still holding out enough to spend most of the day lounging around in the garden and to finish the evening with a barbecue. As well as the usual sausages, we had pork tenderloin, cut into chunks and marinated in lemon juice, creme fraiche and mixed herbs. It came off the barbecue looking a bit black, but it was absolutely delicious and really juicy - definitely an idea to copy if we get round to a barbecue on our roof terrace this year.

28 April - pasties and a final meal out

Despite nearly a week in Cornwall, we hadn't yet had any pasties, so that was rectified on our last full day down here. We drove along to Penzance and whilst buying a few bits in a clothes shop, asked the assistant where the best place to buy pasties was. She named one of the local bakers without hesitation and another customer immediately joined in to second the recommendation. So we took their advice and bought a traditional steak pasty for Tris and a chicken one for me. Now, as someone who doesn't like pepper, I don't usually get on well with pasties and I was hoping that the chicken might be less peppery. We set out to walk along the beach to St Michael's Mount and stopped halfway for pasties on a rock. I have to say that my pasty was good and the creamy chicken filling would've been great, but for a liberal dose of pepper ... oh well, I'm just not destined to be a pasty-eater. It was another lovely sunny day though and the walk was great, with a stop for afternoon tea in Marazion.

In the evening, we'd booked into another Mousehole restaurant, The Cornish Range for our last dinner. I'm not sure whether it was just because we'd been spoilt with such good food all week, but it was a bit of a disappointment. It was a nice enough little restaurant, but the hollandaise sauce on my sole had definitely split and ended up as a pool of melted butter in the bottom of the dish and the sauce with Tris's sea trout was rather watery. It felt like they were perhaps trying to be a bit too adventurous with nicely cooked local fish but accompaniments that didn't quite hit the mark. We did have a bottle of really nice local wine though; Atlantic Dry, a really lovely crisp white from Camel Valley wines - definitely one to look out for.

27 April - a pub lunch in Mousehole

Continuing the trend for lunch out and supper back at the cottage, today we had lunch at one of the pubs in Mousehole - the Old Coastguard is a pub/hotel with a great restaurant and more fab views out to sea. I'd gone in thinking fish, but couldn't resist the crispy pork belly - it was simply served with mash and some grilled courgettes, but really tasty. Tris went for Thai green crab linguine, which looked a bit of a mush, but apparently tasted great. Could've sat with our coffees on the terrace all afternoon.

Supper was about using up the contents of the fridge in an egg salad, but after a heavy lunch, just what we needed.

26 April - tapas at Porthmeor beach

We ventured into St Ives in search of a lunch with a view and found a perfect spot at Porthmeor beach cafe - which as its name suggests, is right on the edge of the beach with great views. I think we'd both had some sort of seafood salad in mind, but ended up with fishy tapas instead which absolutely hit the spot; cajun squid with aioli, salt cod croquettes, fried halloumi with crushed peas and pomegranate (a surprisingly yummy combination!) and aubergine salad. plus some bread with roasted garlic - mmm! Another lovely long lunch in the sun with a glass of wine ... this is what holidays are all about!

Dinner back at the cottage was pan-fried chicken breasts with a simple cream and tarragon sauce, some beans and new pots.