Sundal Sunday

(I can see on my Dashboard that I'm getting close to 100 posts, which I really want to achieve (and beyond!) but some evenings the last thing I want to do is sit down in front of the PC again ...)

Anyway, here is a recipe I made last weekend: Sundal
It is supposed to be a snack of chickpeas, peanuts, coconut and other bits and pieces to spice it up ! We ate it as a meal instead with basmati rice. It was very filling !

Anyway, the best part was probably the fresh coconut. Jerry broke it open- the water inside was really sweet ! Then we had to prise out the flesh. I generally don't like coconut things- cakes at least, but I think that's because dessicated coconut is so dry, ugh! But the fresh coconut was really creamy. I also loved the contrast between the coarse hard hairy shell and the perfect white flesh inside- like snow !

Of course at the end we gave Pepe one of the halves of the shell to play with (after we took as much of the hair off )... and it has become her new favourite toy
1. it is nice and hard to chew on
2. it is noisy if she scuttles it along the floor-

3. if she has it the other way up it can make a handy crash helmet :)

Belated Brill's Birthday

Thursday April 23rd was my 29th birthday !

Naturally I took the day off work. In the morning I opened my presents off Jerry, which were all lovely and got to eat Tarte au Citron for breakfast in bed :)

In the afternoon I made a coffee & ricotta cake. It was my dad's birthday on the 22nd so I wanted to make a cake and give him half when we saw him today :)

In the evening we went on the Wheel



it was quite fun. We've been on a couple of times in the past, and normally go around Christmas-time, but last year never got around to it. I like to go at night and see the city all lit up :)

Because it was also St George's Day there were also Morris Dancers- which we would not have seen if we hadn't gone up on the Wheel :

Today we saw my parents for a meal. We were going to go to Ning, which serves Malaysian food and had Vegan options for Jerry. We walked up there for their Friday Lunch menu, only to find the place closed and a note on the door saying they had stopped Friday Lunches ! Oh well.
So we went to Red Chilli instead. Jerry & I have been there before, when we had 'Sichuan Mrs Spotty's Beancurd' which was amazingly hot ! This time we were gobsmacked when all the food arrived- there was so much ! We got takeaway boxes for the leftovers :)

'til next year... the Big Three- Oh !

Christmas pugging- recipe

Here is my recipe for Christmas Pudding, 2008 style. It is a loose adaptation of Nigella Lawson's in "How to be a domestic Goddess":

• 100g currants
• 100g fresh cranberrries
  
• 50g each raisins & sultanas
• 50g glace cherries, chopped
• 50g prunes, chopped
• 50g flaked almonds
  I wanted whole almonds which I'd have then chopped into slivers, but flaked was the closest they had in the supermarket
  
• 150ml rum/ Cointreau mix - I ran out of rum so maybe 100ml rum topped up with 50ml Cointreau- I thought an orangey flavour would be nice :)
• 1 Euro coin/s, cleaned
  
• 90g self-raising flour
• 125g white breadcrumbs
• 150g suet
• 1medium cooking apple
• 150g dark brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp mixed spice
• pinch of salt
• *** 3 large eggs. I have made my pudding vegan (so suitable for Jerry) so I have replaced the eggs with 3tbsp soy flour mixed with 3tbsp water, mixed to a paste. I have not tried to vegan-ise the recipe in this way before, so fingers crossed !
• zest of 1 orange
• 1.5 litre pudding basin

Nigella's recipe also includes dried blueberries, marron glace pieces and candied peel, but I don't like or just didn't get these from the supermarket. One of the great things about the recipe is that you can adjust it to your own tastes and what's available.

1. Soak the fruit in the rum overnight
   ***I didn't do this - I put the alcohol with the raisins, currants and sultanas in a pan and gently warmed so the fruit absorbed the alcohol
2. Soak the 1 Euro coin overnight in Coca Cola- to clean it ! Please feel free to use whatever coin you like- maybe bigger ones are better as they are easier to spot - less of a potential choking hazard :) I like using a Euro in the pudding as it's a gift of Good Luck for the coming year, rather than money which can be spent...
3. Mix all the ingredients together in a large bowl and then add the soaked fruit. Add the cleaned coin/s. I also wrapped mine in a piece of greaseproof paper.
   
4. Grease the pudding basin and put the mixture in.
   Now I'm not sure in previous years if I have halved the above quantities, because this year I seem to have enough for 2x 30 oz basins- I guess the in-laws will be getting one!
   
5. Cover with a piece of greaseproof paper in which you have folded a pleat, then boil or steam for 3 and 1/2 hours.
   I think mine got done for closer to 2 hrs as we were going to bed.
6. Rewrap the pudding and store somewhere cool until Christmas, then reheat in the same way- boil/ steam for another 3 and 1/2 hrs.