6 April - the seahorse @ Dartmouth

With the long Easter weekend and my birthday looming, we headed down to South Devon for a few days by the seaside. We dropped in at my parents' for a birthday lunch for my Mum en route, then after we'd checked into the fabulous Kaywana Hall in Kingswear, we hopped on the passenger ferry across to Dartmouth for dinner at the Seahorse. I had some delicious chicken livers, roasted with sage to start - plump and melt-in-the-mouth. Then we both went for the brill steak with a clam sauce and spinach on the side. I have to say, although it did say 'steak' on the menu rather than 'fillet', I hadn't really expected it to come with bones and although it was nice, it was a bit fiddly. Sadly, we were both coming down with colds, so perhaps my tastebuds weren't quite as sharp as normal either. Even feeling a bit under the weather though, I couldn't fail to enjoy an espresso topped with zabaglione and a fresh mini doughnut on the side to finish - sounds a bit odd, but believe me, it was fantastic and drew a bit of food envy from diners on either side of us!

5 April - pork with mustard sauce

We finished a short week with some nice chunky pork steaks from Ruby & White with a creamy mustard sauce, some baby leeks, beans and new potatoes - simple but delicious.

4 April - a kitchen gardener's tantrum

I had a bit of a kitchen gardener's tantrum this morning, when I went out onto the terrace to find that a cat had poohed in my tray of lamb's lettuce, digging up most of the lovely little plants in the process of trying to cover it up! Of all the places it could've chosen ...

After initially throwing my hands up in despair, I steeled myself to rescue at least some of the lamb's lettuce and after giving it a really good wash, added it to a warm salad of roasted squash and mushrooms.

Supper was a slightly odd combination of tuna steaks with some lime mayo, French-style peas - cooked with butter and lettuce - and a few saute potatoes. Not a classic, but actually not too bad.

3 April - sausage and mushroom cassoulet

It was another one-pot stew tonight, this time because Tris was working late and I wanted something I could eat before I collapsed with hunger, then he could just reheat when he finally got in. I came up with a simple sausage and mushroom cassoulet from the Riverford website. The sauce was a little bit runny, but otherwise, it made a nice warming supper with some spring greens on the side.

2 April - goats cheese with figs and porotos granados

Rather inspired by the figs in my salad the other day, I had one of my favourite combinations for lunch today; goats cheese on toast with some fresh figs ... I just never get bored of it!

As I knew I was going to be out early evening today, I actually made up a pot of 'stew' for supper yesterday afternoon that could just be reheated when I got in. I tried another recipe from HFW's River Cottage veg every day - a kind of soupy vegetable stew called porotos granados. It's made up of pinto beans, squash, french beans and sweetcorn, along with stock and flavourings, and as the name suggests, it's South American (Chilean actually) in origin. Well, I'm not sure if perhaps I just didn't put in enough paprika, but I found the result a bit bland. The veg were tasty enough, but it did just taste like a bowl of boiled veg without much else to tie them together - definitely something missing in this one.

1 April - green coriander chicken

I wanted to make a chicken curry this evening, but thought I'd go for a new recipe. I flicked through Madhur Jaffrey's Ultimate Curry Bible and settled on a recipe for green coriander chicken. Apparently, it's a Kenyan recipe and it doesn't include any of the traditional curry spices - no ground cumin, coriander or turmeric here - but relies instead on just a basic combination of garlic, ginger, chilli and lots of fresh coriander. It came out wonderfully creamy and absolutely packed with flavour, definitely one to do again.

31 March - a day out in Bath

We had a day out in Bath today. It being a busy Saturday, I didn't expect to get into the petite Cafe Shoon, so was pleasantly surprised when we got a table. I had a delicious serano ham, fig and mozzarella salad - three of my favourite ingredients on one dish!

After a hard afternoon's shopping, I wasn't feeling like doing much cooking, so we picked up some lamb with mint and balsamic crust from Waitrose - you can't go wrong with some garlicky spring greens and rosemary roast new potatoes.

30 March - prawn noodle soup

After using up the last of the chilli on a jacket potato for lunch, I fancied something a bit lighter for supper. There was some pak choi in the fridge, so I went for a prawn version of the Asian-inspired noodle soup that I often cook.

• Bring about 500ml vegetable stock to a gentle boil, add some chopped red chilli and a smashed stick of lemongrass.
• Add some raw prawns and simmer until they turn pink, then some chopped pak choi and a sprinkling of fresh coriander.
• Season with a dash of soy sauce, fish sauce and fresh lime juice.
• Served spooned over some cooked noodles.
  
  

It came out with a great zingy flavour - really tasty, but fresh and light too. It must've been good because Tris couldn't resist slurping up the last dribbles in the pan!

29 March - couscous and a chicken pie

Lunch today was a simple couscous salad; with spring onion, cherry tomatoes, roasted red pepper, green beans and a bit of bacon. Then in the evening we were out at the Lounge for drinks with friends. I'd been a bit disappointed with their food lately, but I had a really good chicken and gammon pie with chips and creamy leeks - definitely back on form.

28 March - crispy pork and noodles

It was a lovely sunny day, so lunch with a friend was outdoors at Browns. I had a rather chewy hot chicken sandwich, but it was okay with plenty of mayo and a few chips on the side, and it was just nice to be eating outdoors.

Tris was out this evening, so I used up the remaining cooked pork belly with some noodles, loosely based on a Jamie Oliver recipe. I stir-fried some spring onion, chilli and sliced red pepper, then added the shredded pork and a sprinkling of five-spice powder and fried until it went golden and crispy. Finally, I added some sliced pak choi and a splash of soy sauce and mixed it in with some noodles. The result was really delicious - all that lovely caramelised pork fat and spices - yum!

27 March - pork belly with spicy rhubarb sauce

We had some slightly green rhubarb hanging around that didn't quite feel pink enough for crumble, so I decided to do something savoury with it instead. I googled "pork and rhubarb" and came up with a few recipes - the below is sort of a combination of several:

• Blend two large shallots, 3 cloves garlic, 1/2 inch grated fresh ginger, 2tbsp honey and 2tbsp extra virgin olive oil to a paste.
• Coat c.750g piece of pork belly with the mixture and put it in a roasting dish with c.300ml dry cider and a red chilli just snapped to release its flavour. Cover with foil and cook at 180C for 90 mins (maybe a bit less or a bit cooler as it rather dried out) - check and add more cider if necessary (I ended up using a full 500ml in the end)
  
• Uncover and add c.250g chopped rhubarb and cook for another 15 mins until the rhubarb's tender.
• Remove the pork to rest and discard the chilli. Then bubble the sauce gently on the hob, adding a bit of cold chopped butter to make it smooth.

The resulting sauce was quite stunningly tasty and really had quite a chilli kick. Served on top of the lovely tender pork belly (we only ate about 2/3 of the meat, but all the sauce) along with some spring greens and beans, it was absolutely top!