Weekend Catch Up

Goodness, I didn't realise it had been so long since I had posted. As usual in Oxford, it's a little bit nuts and I have sooo much to do. All the time. So, a quick round up, combined with some details about actual cooking I managed to do over the weekend!

Friday night I was at the Oxford Jewish Society. Friday night is the start of the Jewish Sabbath, and it's welcomed in with a traditional meal, as well as prayers over candles, bread and wine. I will, I promise, write a longer post about this at some point. We had a very traditional meal: chicken soup, containing noodles, chicken, carrots and kneidlach (matza ball dumplings) along with challah (bread thats plaited and contains egg), homous and egg mayo. Then roast chicken, potatoes, risotto and salad (ok, the last two are less traditional). Dessert was kosher cakes cut into heart shapes with fruit. All in all, a very nice evening.

Saturday seems like such a long time ago, I can't even remember what I had for lunch! For dinner, however, I decided to make my favourite quick dish: couscous salad with saute'd veg, chickpeas and harrissa dressing:

I always make my couscous with stock as well as water, and then I added some sumac before mixing everything else in.

I saute'd red onion, red pepper, leeks and mushrooms (really the only things I could get from Tescos on a Saturday night, but actually quite a good combination) in a pan, and mixed them through.

Normally I make my own harrissa dressing using spices (cumin, corriander, paprika), garlic, tomato puree and olive oil, but as I was in a rush and going out, therefore not wanting anything too spicy, I used a stir-through jar. Disappointing, the homemade is, of course, better.

But still it was good, shame my party was rubbish!

Sunday I thought was going to be spent entirely in the theatre, but I had a reprieve, so I went to JSoc bagel brunch, for bagels with egg mayo, and smoked salmon and cream cheese. It was really good - lots of smoked salmon.

I then made another of my favourite dinners, as I had time, not being in the theatre: Juliette-style fish pie. Just as I was finishing, I realised that I had forgotten to take a photo of it! But you'll have to take my word for it: it looked & tasted great!

I had bought some reduced smoked haddock during the week, and frozen it, so I defrosted a piece and poached it in some milk. Just quickly, for a couple of minutes.

Meanwhile, I made some mashed sweet potato, and cooked some sliced leeks and whole cherry tomatos in the oven. And I defrosted some spinach.

I combined it all: spinach (with some butter) and leeks on the bottom, then fish, mixed with some horseradish, then tomatoes, then mash. Lovely!

Weekend Non-Cooking

I haven't done very much cooking in the last few days, mainly due to work, and being home.

I left Oxford on Thursday, to head home before the weather got too bad to drive. We really can't cope with snow here, but then, it's so unusual, it's not something that's worth pouring resources into. Anyway, we all ended up home, so mum made pesto-topped salmon fillets, with couscous, roasted beetroot, roast cauliflower, and green beans. It was really lovely.

I used up the leftover couscous in a good salad the next day, but it was definitely lacking my harissa dressing. I'll have to make that soon, I love it.

Friday night is an important meal in the Jewish religion. We had decided to go all-out on cheese, and had both raclette and cheese fondue this week, as we'd had quite a bit of meat recently. Lovely, but not too much cooking. We had little new potatoes, gherkins & silver skin onions with the raclette, and cubes of baguette, filled pasta, and lots of raw veg with the fondue. Very filling!

On Saturday, we were at my cousin's Bar Mitzvah, which had a nautical theme, and lots of fish. There were a seleciton of canapes, but I only ate the sushi, which I love. The starter was French Onion Soup, with gruyere croutons, which was lovely, but quite messy to eat in smart dresses, and quite filling. The main was sea bass, topped with roasted grated beetroot, potato & mushy pea mash, and roasted veg. Dessert was plum crumble tart with ice cream, custard and mixed berries. All really good food.

Sunday lunch at home is always bagels, and my favourite kind are black bagels, followed closely by rye. On my bagels I like egg mayo, chopped herring, smoked salmon, herrings in sour cream, and particularly, cods roe. All of which we had on Sunday. I bought some extra bagels from the deli to bring back to Oxford, so I can have them here too.

I ended up staying for dinner on Sunday night, because of the snow, and mum was having people over for dinner, so I had some of their puttanesca pasta, and apple crumble.

I left after brunch on Monday, which was bagel leftovers. On Monday night I went for formal dinner in my college. It was our grad guest dinners, which are the nicest kind. The starter was smoked salmon rillettes, smoked salmon wrapped around what I think was salmon and cream cheese, served on bread and butter. The main was poussin - and we literally had a whole bird! It was lovely, but quite hard to eat at a formal dinner in a civilised manner! With it were dauphinoise potatoes, college's speciality, and broccoli. Dessert was pavlova. Overall it was a particularly good night at college, and I'm sorry I don't have photos. The only poor part of it was the veggie option, which was pastry with scrambled egg in, and asparagus on top. Didn't look great.

I was out for lunch today, and for dinner tonight, back to cooking tomorrow!