A nice dinner - a weird lunch...

A word of advice if you're proud of your talent for using up leftovers - particularly when dinner one night becomes, with the addition of a few leaves and some tomatoes, lunch the next day. Thriftiness - in these bracing times - is only to be applauded. But beware - because what looks like promising thrift in the evening can sometimes turn out to be parsimony turned poison the next day.

For example - if you've roasted a couple of chicken thighs in the oven, then made an accompaniment of chickpeas warmed with sultanas, tomatoes, rosemary and watercress and tossed it in the warm chicken roasting juices with a squeeze of lemon - DO NOT, I repeat, just don't, throw any leftover chickpeas into a carefully prepared tuna and borlotti bean salad you've made for lunches for the rest of the week. It's a little known fact, but here it is, just for you so you don't have to test it yourself, tuna and sultanas just don't go. At all. I'm not sure if I don't feel quite ill. (And I now have to spend some time tonight laboriously de-sultana-ing my tuna salad for tomorrow).

Just thought I'd say...

PS: You might however keep said chickpeas to accompany the lamb chops you might be serving tonight. Now that would have been intelligent.

Another thing of beauty....

A quick update on the old veggie garden. Those at the back are broad beans (thank God they freeze), potatoes have come through and have been rather professionally 'earthed' (We still have no idea what we're doing - is this right? Have we earthed too high?), then the onions (nope still no idea when they're ready), then easy-pick rows of rocket, spinach, lettuce and the rather weedy weeds in the middle are the undoubtedly ill-fated cavolo nero.

But we're rather pleased with it. The rocket is of the straight edged variety rather than jagged, which made us somewhat doubt what we had planted, but those lettuces look almost professional!

And on the right next to some rather delicious clematis are our runner beans - as you'll see from the length of the canes, they have aspirations.

A rather nice thought for the day...

Did you know that the word 'polite' comes from the jewellery trade? When diamonds or jewels are said to be cut and polished to their absolute flawless best, they're said to be 'polite'. What a lovely thing to aspire to be - a flawless, polished diamond when you're being polite.

A thing of beauty...

I just wanted to exclaim over these fabulous 1920s coupe champagne glasses I bought for Pa for his birthday in a few weeks. My obsession with all things Bright and Young continues. I even went to the Cecil Beaton exhibition in St James (The ladies were indeed painted to the eyes); fabulous, and rather a private viewing, but none the worse for that. Devastatingly no postcards to be had, but I did get a catalogue and devour the images all the way home again, particularly the ones of Nancy Cunard and Gwili Andre - helped distract me from the grimness of Elephant and Castle as I passed through.

The Veg Garden - the saga continues

So MCD has planted out the cavolo nero seedlings - it's rather peculiar. Some of them have simply panted once, gasped for air and thrown themselves sideways on the soil in seeming despair at leaving the sunny harbour of the kitchen windowsill; some have taken it bravely on the leaf and stood up a little straighter, putting their stems into it with all their might; one has lost its head completely - why? how? - and a few haven't quite made up their minds. Such vacillation in the veggie garden.

However the lettuce is looking rather ravishing, as is the rocket, but my sorrel has been mysteriously - yet not completely - munched, which is terribly irritating - the leaves aren't even big enough to use yet - and can i find any slugs or snails...? none to be seen.

The runner beans have gone in today, wigwammed into a bucket - apparently we can't go wrong with those, they're child's play, easy-peasy - we shall see.

A new way to roast chicken, no damnit, the only way...

Take a big fat free-range chicken and smother it in goose fat, a lot of salt and some black pepper. Heat your oven to 150C and pop it in for at least 2 hours, when the skin should be golden and crisp, the flesh unbelievably meltingly tender and succulent, and the cries of joy as you bring it to the table bordering on the worshipful.

I served this, after a starter of mussels and clams mariniere, with a simple dish of roasted tomatoes, roasted asparagus, great great baguette, garlic mayonnaise and some little new potatoes par boiled, then smashed and roasted with rosemary and a bit more garlic. Oh and a few bottles of red. And then a few more....

Kentucky Fried Bunny - seriously, try it....

I loathe fast food. I loathe it in and of itself, i loathe how it purports to be the affordable alternative to 'real' food, I loathe the advertising, the plastic crap, the targeting of children and those living adjacent to the poverty line, the garish colours, the flavour combinations (even the fact that I have to write 'flavour combinations' makes me gag). You get the picture.

What I find most satisfying is simply to make my own - from burgers to kebabs, pizzas to hot dogs and even - if you can bear it - fried chicken. Loads nicer and doesn't get that peculiar leathery texture that the most famous brand seems to acquire an approximate 8 minutes after buying. This weekend - after a particularly French brasserie-esque meal - more about that later on the Saturday, Sunday felt like a day for dinner in front of the TV, eaten with our hands. But chicken I had none; well, I did, but it was remains of a roast for which I had plans, so I dug out a rabbit I had in the freezer, followed the same method as I would for chicken and, reader, it was F.A.B. I'm posting the recipe below - please please try it, adapt it and make it again and again. Even with chicken, if you must.

1 rabbit (I happened to have farmed; wild would benefit from the same treatment)
1 pot buttermilk + 100ml milk or 300ml milk
120g-ish of plain flour
Cayenne pepper or chilli powder
English mustard powder
1 egg, beaten
Salt and pepper

Join the rabbit. It's dead easy with a big knife, cutting off the 4 legs and then chopping the saddle straight across into 3 or 4 pieces. If you feel squeamish about this, by all means get your butcher/boyfriend/husband/Pa to do this, but I like a bit of butchery, I must say...

Cover the rabbit pieces in the milk or buttermilk/milk combination. The reason to do this is two-fold. It tenderises the rabbit now and results in a moister finish after frying. (I nicked the idea from Nigella - it works a treat for chicken too). I left it about 30 minutes, then I tipped both bunny and milk into a saucepan, brought it up to the boil with the lid on and left it simmering until the meat was cooked through. Took about 20 minutes, but just keep testing. You want no hint of pink.

When the rabbit is cooked, lift it out of the pan. Admittedly at this point in time, it's going to look a god-awful mess, but nonetheless, set the rabbit pieces on a draining rack to cool and soak your pan in washing up liquid and water! (That's very important - it's a bugger to clean, that pan, if you're not prepared.)

While the rabbit's cooling, mix the flour with the cayenne, mustard powder, salt and pepper in a freezer bag or such like. How much you use is up to you - how fiery you like your coating - I go for the idea of something devilled, so I used 2 tsp cayenne and about the same of mustard. Once the rabbit has cooled to about room temp, dredge it in the flour, dip it in the beaten egg, then dredge it in the flour again and place back on the rack, while you do each piece. You might find the flour seems to wear off or disappear a bit - just shake over some more, that's where the crusty bits come from.

Now obviously, you could deep fry this, but I don't have an electric fryer, I didn't have enough oil to put in a wok, so I just heated about 1 cm vegetable oil in my sauteuse (deep sided frying pan) and when sizzling, added the rabbit in batches, turning them when golden brown and deliciously crusted. They're not cooking through at this point, you're just making them look gorgeous, so they are done when they look appetising to you.

We ate this with a squeeze of lemon and some chips, some aioli (garlic mayonnaise - our current addiction) and a tomato-chilli salsa, which i made from some left-over roasted tomatoes, plus 1 fresh, some chill, worcester sauce and a squirt of ketchup for luck. It would be good with some spicy potatoes a la patatas bravas, like the Spanish, or I fancy the way the Greeks do their chips, with a light scattering of Kefalotiri cheese, if you can find it.

Never did a bunny meet such a good end.