Monday's Menu megamix

I'm back. The cold is all but forgotten (except for the occasional annoying cough).

To be honest I can't remember a lot of what we ate the week before last, but looking at my collage, we enjoyed a spring vegetable risotto (peas and broad beans courtesy of our garden), an omelette, roasted lamb shanks and root vegetables on couscous with minty yoghurt, and home made lamb souvlaki the next day with the left over lamb, hummus and more minty yoghurt. We also headed out for lunch one day for roast duck, pan fried beans with pork and dumplings. They were good.

During the week I had off we enjoyed:

Monday: Steak with pumpkin, asparagus and mini radishes from our garden.
Tuesday: Mushroom, bacon and pumpkin risotto.
Wednesday: Chicken wings with sausages, sage and onion.
Thursday: Frittata with pumpkin, asparagus (from our friend's garden, it was so sweet) and walnuts.
Friday: Penne with cream, peas and bacon.
Saturday: A birthday dinner in northern Tasmania for Rob's father. We started with dips and bread, Rob made Nigella's marinated ocean trout (she uses salmon) with capers and gherkins. We moved onto roast beef fillet with Cafe de Paris butter, new pink eye potatoes, steamed carrots and parsnips, fresh broad beans and peas (the last four veggies from our garden) and a green salad. The birthday cake was a chocolate roulade with cream and raspberries.
Sunday: After snacking all day we ate a simple salad of rocket, pumpkin and pine nuts.


Rob sent me some gorgeous photos he took of the spring grass at the hut, with the dogs wrestling in the foreground. If I can I'll load up a movie made of the images...but in the mean time here is my favourite.

Monday's Menu

Rob and I had a long weekend, which was lovely. We headed up to Launceston to visit Rob's parents, and take them out for dinner (to belatedly celebrate his mother's birthday).

We had delivered some fresh oysters and a bottle of Champagne to have before dinner, (felt like teenagers prepping for a big night out with drinks at home!) We then headed to Novaro's, which is a small Italian restaurant. We enjoyed a bottle of Chianti, whilst snacking on some Ligurian olives. Rob and his mother had ordered a slow cooked lamb rump on a mushroom risotto, his father a Quail salad and I ordered the duck. I love duck, but we rarely cook it at home, so if it's on the menu it makes choosing quite easy.
The others meals came out first, they looked pretty good, but then mine arrived, it was half a duck! The duck was probably more Asian in style, flavoured with star anise and soy, it sat on a bed of red cabbage and apple, although I didn't think of as a common accompaniment to duck, was excellent. The duck meat was nice and moist, and after skipping lunch I managed (with a little help from Rob) to finish it all!

What else has been on the menu?
Monday: Fennel, rocket and orange salad, with leftover beef.
Tuesday: Tomato, vegetable and meatball soup.
Wednesday: Carbonara.
Thursday: Stir fried vegetables with noodles.
Friday: Dinner at Novaro's.
Saturday: Seafood paella and apple and fruit mince crumble.
Sunday: Beef short ribs with baked potatoes and rocket. I also made a big batch of cauliflower soup, which was really tasty- I will share that recipe later this week. Rob also treated me to pancakes with poached rhubarb and blood oranges for breakfast.

Monday Menu

So I think you know we love good food, but on holidays we always visit Rob's family, and they take food to another level. We stocked up on supplies before heading away, Italian sparkling wine, a kilo of French cheese, some buffalo mozzarella, four loaves of bread. So we feasted on fresh tomatoes, basil and mozzarella on bread, a leek tart, and baba ganoush out on the deck at Rob's sisters house. Then headed inside for roast beef, duck ballotine, poached salmon, potatoes, stuffed peppers and mushrooms, onion gratin and salad.
After a short interval, beautiful slow roasted quinces, halva ice-cream, chocolate tarts and harvest cake appeared.
The next day we were sent on our way with a box of figs from Rob's parents. Pink and luscious, they make April a favourite time of year.
What else have we eaten over the week? BBQ'd ocean trout served with silverbeet. Pasta puttanesca. A simple paella. Pasta with fresh tomatoes, basil and lemon oil. Figs stuffed with Fetta and pine nuts and wrapped in prosciutto. Rib-eye steak with baked potatoes and mini zucchinis.
A delicious week.

A Duck Dinner

We’re on holidays at the moment- and we’re not going anywhere! Well, that’s if you don’t count Launceston.

We headed up to my stay with my in-laws for a few days. Nigella hates the drive but loves the place- she knows it as the “house of duck”, and it lived up its name.

My duck hams have been hanging in the fridge for last few weeks; we sliced them thinly to eat on the deck (in some rare sunshine) with a pretty bottle of sparkling Rosé. Moving inside we had our main course of confit duck marylands (Rob had been cooking them slowly in the oven all afternoon- then a quick crisp up at the end) served with our broad beans and some little carrots. For dessert, I’d made a Blancmange served with raspberry sauce.

Nigella hung around hopefully- giving us this look- she did get a few pieces of the duck ham and a little confit. Spoilt thing, she would only eat her own dinner, chicken drumsticks if we slathered them in duck fat!

I always enjoy our visits to the “house of duck”- our time is mostly spent deciding or discussing our next meal and preparing it together. We did visit the Niche market, I’m meant to be buying Christmas presents for all my family but sadly I keep finding things for myself. Opps. We walked Nigella around Windmill Hill Park and visited her doggy cousins. We went for a Sunday drive to visit a vineyard that my father-in-law helped start, and where Rob spent a lot of time as a youngster, a trip down memory lane for them all: remembering neighbours, where certain vines were grown, who planted which trees, building the winery. Drove away with a car full of Christmas bubbles.

Sadly we ate our duck dinner too quickly for pics- but we did make a salad the next evening with one of the duck hams- what’s your favourite way to eat/cook duck?