Eating notes 2015

Fri 2 January 2015 It got to 38 degrees C today, so lunch consisted of avocado, tomatoes and untoasted bread. By dinner time it had cooled down to 30, so I cooked some black quinoa and made this Ottolenghi salad of quinoa, beetroot (roasted a couple of days ago when it was cool), parsley and mint, with some smoked ocean trout flaked through it. Very good.

Thurs 1 January 2015 New year’s resolutions are folly, and yet observe the power of the 1st of January – despite not keeping eating notes for about half of last year, here I am starting again.

I’m getting over mild pneumonia, so we didn’t go out last night. I’m going a bit crazy with my beloved hippy foods to try and counteract the handfuls of antibiotics I’ve been taking – it’s kimchi, unpasteurised miso, lacto-fermented veggies or yoghurt at every meal at the moment. In my urge to keep the gut microbes happy I’ve even tried kefir for the first time. I managed the first few swigs a couple of days ago only by dint of blocking my nose and thinking of other things. But now I’ve found a way that I actually really love it. In the mornings I mix up muesli, a couple of spoonfuls of plain yoghurt, a good couple of glugs of kefir, and a teaspoon of marmalade. This concoction hits some flavour pleasure point in my brain and I would happily eat multiple bowls of it. It’s also an excellent use of that marmalade I made last year that never set completely. BONUS.

I’m also having a go at sourdough. I don’t eat a huge amount of bread but would be happy to make my own once a week or so. What I really want is sourdough pancakes. When I was visiting Carolin and Dave in Merced a few years ago, we went and camped in Yosemite with some of their friends for the summer solstice. It was blissful and inspiring. One morning, Jon-Paul cooked bacon on a hotplate, and then brought out a container of sourdough pancake batter. He added baking soda to foam it up, then cooked the pancakes in the bacon fat. I don’t normally care that much about pancakes but the memory of these has stayed with me ever since. I know that the pleasure was at least partly in the company and the setting – but I’d like to have a go at making my own at last. This morning I set up two different starters. One is a simple water and flour starter, the other uses pineapple juice. We’ll see how they go.