10 September - fresh figs and a lamb curry

I got some lovely big, fresh, Turkish figs in the supermarket this morning. So lunch involved some fresh bread from Hart's Bakery (@ Ruby & White) with the figs, some bresaola and a tomato and basil salad.

We fancied a curry, so I flicked through Madhur Jaffrey and cooked up some lamb do piaza with some spicy green beans and rice. As usual, the sauce rather curdled, but it was still tasty.

• Fry one and a half finely sliced onions until starting to brown. Remove and drain on kitchen paper.
• Put a cinnamon stick, 3 cardamom pods and 3 cloves in the same oil.
• Add about 250g cubed lamb to brown, then remove.
• Fry 1/2 finely chopped onion, then add some garlic and ginger paste (made from a couple of cloves of garlic and a lump of ginger, both grated and mixed with a little water).
• Add 1 tsp coriander and 1/2 tsp cumin and stir.
• Gradually add 2 tbsp yoghurt and stir to incorporate. I never manage this without it curdling, even taking the pan off the heat.
• Return the meat with a cup of water, a pinch of cayenne pepper and some salt. Then bubble away gently for an hour or so.
• Return the fried onions and half a tsp of garam masala.

31 July - halloumi, curry and greengage jam

On a lovely hot summer Sunday, we lazed around and had a late lunch of fried halloumi and warm tomato salad.

Yesterday, Tris had brought back a big bag of greengages from the French market in town - part of the Bristol Harbour Festival. Unfortunately, lots of them turned out to be split, so needed using quickly. After a bit of online searching, I found a very simple recipe for greengage jam and decided to give it a go - having never made jam before.

• Put 750g of whole greengages in a large pan with 150ml water and a whole vanilla pod. Bring to the boil and simmer gently for 30 mins until really soft.
• Off the heat, stir in 650g sugar and a tiny knob of butter (c.8g), stir and return to the heat.
• Boil hard for 10 mins and skim off the stones that have risen to the top.
• Keep boiling for about another 10 mins, remove the vanilla pod, allow to cool a little, then spoon into sterilised jars. This amount filled two standard size jam jars and two smaller jars.
  

I wasn't sure initially whether the final result was a bit runny, but once it had cooled properly, it had set to a nice jammy consistency and tasted really rather good. I'm not a big jam eater, so I might have to think about giving at least one of the jars away, but I'm sure we'll get through the rest.

Tris was in the kitchen this evening, cooking up a really good lamb curry from Anjum Anand's Indian food Made Easy. We had it out on the terrace with some beans from the garden cooked up with ginger and spices. A great end to the weekend!