It has actually been a weird day. Back to work after two days off to a fair bit of catching up and some sad news about someone I knew through a former workplace. Then a good diversion with a somewhat punishing exercise class online, and the best intentions of making dinner afterwards. I was going to make a harissa and black bean ragout with butternut squash (Sabrina Ghayour again), I thought I had all the ingredients and I'd be able to do it after my online exercise class. Instead, it went like this:
1: Have good intentions.
2: Realise you're not sure you can be arsed after class and a fairly busy day at work.
3: Also you don't have the ingredients in after all - those are dried beans the recipe calls for, and you only have tinned. Maybe you can work round it. Read the recipe again.
4: Decide to make something else, remember that there's chorizo in the fridge.
5: Decide to make this from the Guardian, but roughly halved, as last time you made it you realised it really does feed four, generously.
6: Find the butternut squash in freezer, eyeball amount of it and the chorizo, decide that'll do and throw in oven at 200C, not having paid attention to either the recommended temperature or the time.
7: Chop the onion and pepper, but don't bother with the finely chopping aspect. Soften gently as instructed.
8: Briefly consider reducing the amount of garlic as other amounts are halved. Leave it and the spice level the same as the original (apart from the bay leaves, the ones in my cupboard came from a friends' garden and are HUGE)
9: Carefully weigh paella rice and make stock to proper half amounts.
10: Is it time to take the squash and chorizo out of the oven? Look at it. Not quite.
11: Stir paella rice, paprika, garlic, bay leaf and tomato puree in and leave to toast for a minute.
12: Realise you forgot to get the chickpeas from the cupboard and that you don't have actually have a half size tin of chickpeas, shrug, use them all anyway.
13: Take squash and chorizo out of oven, add to rice mixture, pour in stock, stir. Chuck chickpeas on top.
14: Put lid on and put in oven. Check temperature in recipe, reduce oven to 180C.
15: Wait half an hour, take it out, leave it for a few minutes to rest. Eat.
16: Realise that halving a recipe ostensibly for 4 people would easily feed 3, and feel good about both leftovers for lunch and the amount of garlic and carbohydrate you've just eaten.
1: Have good intentions.
2: Realise you're not sure you can be arsed after class and a fairly busy day at work.
3: Also you don't have the ingredients in after all - those are dried beans the recipe calls for, and you only have tinned. Maybe you can work round it. Read the recipe again.
4: Decide to make something else, remember that there's chorizo in the fridge.
5: Decide to make this from the Guardian, but roughly halved, as last time you made it you realised it really does feed four, generously.
6: Find the butternut squash in freezer, eyeball amount of it and the chorizo, decide that'll do and throw in oven at 200C, not having paid attention to either the recommended temperature or the time.
7: Chop the onion and pepper, but don't bother with the finely chopping aspect. Soften gently as instructed.
8: Briefly consider reducing the amount of garlic as other amounts are halved. Leave it and the spice level the same as the original (apart from the bay leaves, the ones in my cupboard came from a friends' garden and are HUGE)
9: Carefully weigh paella rice and make stock to proper half amounts.
10: Is it time to take the squash and chorizo out of the oven? Look at it. Not quite.
11: Stir paella rice, paprika, garlic, bay leaf and tomato puree in and leave to toast for a minute.
12: Realise you forgot to get the chickpeas from the cupboard and that you don't have actually have a half size tin of chickpeas, shrug, use them all anyway.
13: Take squash and chorizo out of oven, add to rice mixture, pour in stock, stir. Chuck chickpeas on top.
14: Put lid on and put in oven. Check temperature in recipe, reduce oven to 180C.
15: Wait half an hour, take it out, leave it for a few minutes to rest. Eat.
16: Realise that halving a recipe ostensibly for 4 people would easily feed 3, and feel good about both leftovers for lunch and the amount of garlic and carbohydrate you've just eaten.
I love Claire Thomson's recipes. They will take this kind of absent, knackered cooking and still be well worth it. I also absolutely approve of your approach to garlic.
ReplyDeleteI think it was absolutely the right decision!
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