In My Kitchen, February 2016

So it is February.  I hope your are settling into 2016 and ready to guess what is in this little jar above.  (The answer is at the bottom of the post.)  It is busy here with school starting last week and being back to work and trying to sort out the year and a to do list. 

Over the school holidays we cleaned out some cupboards including the glass display cabinet with some of my good glasses.  The Waterford crystal champagne glasses (not in this picture) were shamefully dusty.

We also cleaned up all the egg cups and put a few out to the op shop.  Sylvia went through a phase of eating lots of boiled eggs but hasn't had one for ages.  Upon seeing her fun egg cups she asked for a boiled egg.  They say boiling an egg is a simple thing to do but given that I have never eaten a boiled egg, making them does not come naturally.

Sylvia did not think I boiled the egg long enough (8 minutes from the start of bringing cold water to the boil with eggs the fridge seemed to be what I remembered doing) so no more eggs have been boiled.  Which suits me.  These days I do not have eggs in the fridge all the time.

My mum bought this gorgeous cut out fairy tale set for Sylvia for Christmas.  We had fun with it during the holidays.  I am not sure why the prince has blutak over his face.  You are welcome to share your guesses.

My mum gave me some apricots off her tree.  They were lovely fresh but there were a lot and they were quite ripe.

So I made them into stewed apricots.  Just a dessertspoon of sugar, a splash of water, brought them to the boil and simmered a couple of minutes until they looked soft.  I am not good at keeping them whole when I stew them.  They tasted amazing.

I was so pleased with my stewed apricots that I decided to stew up some soft peaches.  Which was not a good idea while supervising Sylvia and my niece in the bath.  They were forgotten and very very burnt.  I could have cried.

We visited a kindergarten friend of Sylvia's who is living in a small unit.  Her mum has an amazing garden in a tiny piece of land and had so much silverbeet that she gifted some to me.  It went into a soup like this one.

One of the significant moments of January was when David Bowie died.  I decided to make shepherd's pie which apparently was one of his favourite dishes.  I used up some frozen black beans, fried cabbage and old sweet potato.

It was a great stew but I never got the potato on top.  It was either too hot or too late or probably both.  We loved the stew with rice and in wraps.

Lots of meals in our kitchen have been made with wraps.  These ones I made for Sylvia's lunch have vegemite.  I have stuffed them with salad vegies, leftover stew, vegan omelettes, dips and the truffle mayo that I got for Christmas.  And now they are going into Sylvia's lunch box.

It has been a strange summer.  Lots of hot weather but only a day at a time.  Which is not so bad if there is rain or a cool change at the end of the day.  We have been eating lots of salads.  This soba noodle salad is a favourite. 

We are also very partial to some home made lemonade or limeade in the hot weather.  I have been buying bags of limes from the Odd Bunch table at Woolworths.  It is a campaign to sell fruit and vegetables that are not quite right and charge a bit less.  This lemon-limeade was very refreshing.  Sylvia took a bottle to a friend's place when she went for a sleepover.

How's this for a meal to use up odd bits and pieces before heading away for the weekend!  This bowl food was our meal before we went to Torquay.  Brown rice, wild rice, chickpeas, red capsicum, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, spinach, corn and carrot almond sauce.

Did you guess what was in the picture at the top of the post?  It is gold salt rocks in a grinder.  It is actually a photo from our long weekend in Torquay.  It amused me as a topsy turvy pictures because life often feels different on holiday.  And here the salt was gold, the lamington was pink and the noodles were blue (with spirulina).  The lamingtons are long gone, we had some noodles tonight with the above soba noodle salad dressing and I am looking for a way to feature the salt.

I am sending this post to Maureen of The Orgasmic Chef for In My Kitchen.  It is an event where bloggers around the world share what is happening in their kitchens.  Please head over to Maureen's blog and visit some other bloggers or even join in (by 10th of each month).