Roasted butternut squash soup (with added finger...)

After making myself and the house look nice I decided to cook! I've been feeling shattered and run down lately so my last trip to the supermarket saw me stock up on veggies galore. In my veg haul was a gorgeous large butternut squash, which I decided to turn into a spicy soup (and which resulted in me cutting my finger!). Here's what I did:

Spicy butternut soup

1 large butternut squash,  peeled and diced into one inch chunks CAREFULLY!
1 medium brown onion
1 clove of garlic
1 teaspoon of dried chilli flakes
850ml chicken stock
Salt and pepper

1. Roast the prepared butternut squash in olive oil in the oven, on a tray,  for about 30 mins at 180 degrees.

2. Finely cut the onion and fry gently in butter for ten minutes,  then add the garlic,  also chopped finely,  and continue to fry for a further ten minutes. Add the chilli flakes about 5 minutes before the end of cooking.

3. Once the butternut is cooked add it to the onion and garlic pan,  pour over the stock and whizz with a hand blender until the desired texture is reached. I like mine thick with some lumps,  so it's not like baby food!

It serves four people,  or three greedy pigs. Very tasty.

Our roots

This weekend I'm making a photo collage of mine and my husband's parents. I'm really excited to do it, because it's not photos of how they look now, instead it's photos of when they were in their early 20s. I thought it would be nice to celebrate the youth and enthusiasm in their faces; the idea came from looking at the photos with them and seeing the delight as they told stories about when and why the photos were taken.

There's my mum and dad in single photos, them both at their engagement party with my grandparents and one of my uncles and his wife, my husbands parents in single photos and together at a test shoot for their wedding pictures. There are only six pictures shown above, but I plan to add another photo of my dad, and one of Mum and Dad when they were expecting my elder sister. 

And here's the finished article! Very pleased!

Which part of your history would you capture in a collage? 

An abundance of tomatoes

My lovely neighbour has been contributing to my nutrition again, by giving me a bag full of tomatoes he grew himself.

"What's something interesting I can do with them?" I thought to myself. And then I asked Delia.

She suggested (via her website, via Google and the phrase "tomato tart"):

Roasted Tomato and Goats' Cheese Tart with Thyme

725g medium ripe tomatoes
150g soft goats' cheese
4 level teaspoons chopped fresh thyme
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
2 tablespoons olive oil
salt and pepper

The directions are:

To begin the recipe, first of all unwrap the pastry and place it on the baking tray (I rolled mine out to about twice the size - it just looked too thick). Then, using a sharp knife, carefully score a line on the pastry, about ½ in (1 cm) in from the edge, all the way around, but be careful not to cut it all the way through.

Now tip the goats’ cheese into a small bowl, add the crushed garlic, chopped thyme and a good seasoning of saltand freshly milled black pepper. Then give it all a good mixing and, using a small palette or other round-bladed knife, carefully spread the cheese mixture evenly all over the surface of the pastry, right up to the line.

Next, thinly slice all the tomatoes (there is no need to peel them) and arrange them on top of the goats’ cheese in overlapping lines lengthways; overlap one line one way and the one next to it the other way.

After that, season the tomatoes and then drizzle the olive oil and scatter the sprigs of thyme all over them. Bake in the pre-heated oven on the middle shelf for 55 minutes or until the pastry is golden-brown and the tomatoes are roasted and slightly charred at the edges.

If you are going to serve the tart warm, leave it to settle for about 10 minutes before cutting into squares.

I'll be serving it with a rocket-based salad and balsamic dressing.

**Update**

It was a roaring success! Delicious! Small warning - this is really garlicky, which is great if like me you love garlic and aren't too bothered but if you're not struck by garlic breath then halve the amount of garlic!

All credit to Delia Smith for the recipe.

What's your favourite tomato-based recipe?

Being a grown up

It's a bit rubbish really, isn't it?

Being the master of your own destiny's a bit of a double-edged sword in my opinion. It's scary; you have to make decisions and live with the consequences, but it's great; you are in control (largely) of what those decisions are and when you make them.

Life's offered me some opportunities recently, and to be frank, I took the wrong attitude. I got all excited and over-zealous and then fell into a bit of a slump for some, and for others I shot them down in flames and now regret being so closed-minded.

I've found over the years that being an excitable person can be a great thing - I think it's quite entertaining for others, nothing will beat the thrill of that excitement "bubble" you find yourself in, and its lovely to feel that you're sailing rapidly towards a great new adventure. The trouble is sometimes you can also get a bit carried away and forget there are others you need to consider, and that actually there's a reason you're not already doing what's on offer - in the real world you're not always able to sustain the enthusiasm required to achieve.

I'm trying to teach myself the following lessons:

1) Know what you want and who you are; don't get wrapped up in what others are doing, just remember what's important to you and what would change if you changed
2) Take your time; very few opportunities in life really are "once in a lifetime" or have to be taken up immediately, so make sure you're going to enjoy the journey as well as the end result
3) Listen to the people you love with an open mind. Sometimes what they're saying isn't really what they're saying - don't assume you understand the whole conversation by only listening to the first sentence.

What helps you to make the right decisions?