18th July 2023

Today I found myself doing lots of cooking which is really not normal for a weekday but as I sit typing this I feel chilled and happy, the kitchen really is my happy place. 

I have lots of cherries still from cherry picking Saturday and need to get them into the fridge before they spoil.  Sounds simple enough except my fridge is packed. Not helped might I add by the huge Tupperware container of peppadews that is in there.  When we were last in South Africa I bought a 3kg jar of them as we use them to make peri peri sauce, the last time I made a batch of peri peri sauce I used maybe only a quarter of the tin. So the best thing to do?  Make more peri peri sauce of course.  Whenever we make a batch of sauce we have a queue of people out of the door asking for a jar so I made a double batch in my thermo today, I made 6 jars and 4 jars have already been claimed.

In the fridge also were some plums I bought on a whim last week at the butchers.  I knew if I did not eat them or use them soon they would be gone and with fridge space at a premium I decided to make jam. Because, well, why not. I am out of strawberry jam and so it seemed sensible to replace with plum jam.

Then lastly, last week we found a tomato and ancho chilli pasta dish which looked fantastic and we both wanted to try.  It was nice but it reminded me of the slow roast tomato pappardelle only was nowhere near as good (although to be fair it is a fantastic dish). I like trying new dishes and to be honest don’t mind if it didn't turn out as nice, it reaffirms then that my usual dish is the best it can be - at the moment at least.