Practice Makes Perfect!

Today has been a glorious warm sunny day. Apart from having to go to work at a place where the sun doesn't shine, this afternoon has just got better and better!



On the way home I picked my wife up from work (after dropping her off to work at some ungodly hour this morning) and once we got home we had another visitor. As the weather was so nice, my wife trusted me to attempt to cook on the BBQ again!



This time I paid attention and waited for the flames to die down before I started cooking. I then tried a technique that proved to be successful! As soon as I put food on the grill, I kept turning it over and over every minute. This way I got the food to be thoroughly cooked without being cremated! We even enjoyed eating the food in the garden, washed down with a nice glass of wine, or beer, depending on personal preferences.



I took a couple of pictures of the event, and I am also attempting to upload this blog from my mobile phone for the very first time!

Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Who said BBQ's were easy?

I was persuaded by my wife that instead of cooking a nice dinner for our guests, it would be a good idea to have a BBQ instead. So I rummaged through the shed, and dug out the trusty old BBQ grill, dusted off the cobwebs, and gave it a thorough good clean. "So far so good" I thought. The weather was a bit blustery, and overcast, but there was no sign of rain yet.

My wife and daughter were busy in the kitchen preparing the salad and the drinks. So now all I have to do is light the charcoal, and cook the food. "Easy peasy" says I. "Learn from my one other attempt last year to use a BBQ. Now what did I do wrong last year? I remember! I tried cooking the food before the coals had died down, and consequently the grill was too hot and cremated everything". So determined not to make the same error, I lit the coals one hour before the guests were due to arrive.

After about 20 minutes, the flames died down and the BBQ looked ready to start cooking. So being a bit cautious, I put a couple of items on the grill to see if if they would cook without being cremated, and discovered that it was still too hot. I then made my first mistake. I left the grill for another 40 minutes!

The guests duly arrived, and I went to check on the BBQ grill. To my dismay, all the coals had burnt down and there was hardly any left! I probably had about 10 or 20 minutes left before it went out. In a panic, I added more coals, and soon enough, up it flared again. Now it was too hot again to try cooking. The guests were here, hungry. My wife wanted me to start cooking the meat. I tried to cook the food without cremating it too much by putting the food round the edge of the grill. Even there it was still too hot. So by the time the food was cooked on the inside, it was well and truly burnt on the outside!

My wife suggested that she put some water on the BBQ coals to cool them down, but thankfully, she thought maybe it wasn't such a good idea, as it may put the fire out completely. Instead she kept the guests happy with topping up their glasses with the various alcoholic beverages of their choice.

With the alcohol taking effect, the burnt food became a little more edible than normal. By the end of the evening, everyone had thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

At the end of the day, I had to clean the grill, myself, and wash my smoky clothes! I also have the dubious task of eating the remainder of the cremated food the next day!

Today was the first day of my holiday. Although I seem to have had jast as busy a day as if I had gone to work! As the weather was actually fine, I embarked upon sanding down and painting one of the window frames, that has been patiently waiting for my attention since last year!! I actually remembered not to take my shirt off in the sunshine, like I did last year, so only my arms got tanned a bit, instead of my back looking like a lobster fresh out the pot!

I then attempted to cook dinner for the family. Mashed potato, easy. Done it before. Frozen veg, the microwave did what it was supposed to do! It was the smoked haddock that became the challenge for me today. Now normally I would simply put the haddock into the oven and bake it and have chips with it. So instead, I dice the fillets into cubes, finely slice some onions, and place the haddock onto the onions in a pan. Added, milk, crushed pepper, and mustard, and cooked slowly for about 10-15 minutes. Removed the haddock and onions and then added flour and spring onions to the sauce. Thickened up the sauce and poured over the haddock and onions. Finally added some chopped parsley for garnish. All that effort, to make a different dish, and it wasn't all that brilliant. I need to put more Oomph into the sauce next time.

Finally as a treat I sat down and watched this film, which I have seen before, but I still like to watch every now and then.