apollonia

SNERT /EREWTEN SOUP, PEA and HAM.

The chef herself  Plony
Ingredients Serves 4

. 300 grams split peas
. 2 thin leeks
. 500 grams celeric root
. 1 leg of ham/hock (on the bone)
. 250 grams smoked sausage (1)
. Herb sprigs Parsley,celery
. Salt & peppers to taste

Preparation

First soak the split peas in salted water for a few hrs or over night.
Prepare leg of ham/hock add salt to taste, if required
Slice the leeks 1 cm very fine
Peel and dice the celeric root 2cm ,chop some celery leafs and add later to soup.

Cooking Instructions

After soaking split peas wash them under running water and allow them to drain then Cook for 20 Min's when cooked drain ,DO NOT USE . throw away split pea water, wash peas under running water whilst draining and allow to drain all water.

Boil ham/hock in separate pan for about 20 Min's. Remove ONLY the ham/hock remove all boiled skin and fat and and discard remove all meat from bone and chop 2cm.Do Not Throw Away the cooking water from the ham/hock.

Now sieve the water re-use it this removes all bits and  pieces from the stock, Now pour it in with split peas, and add the chopped 2cm ham and stir well, bring back to a gentle boil add the celeric 2cm , chopped celery leafs, add celery if you wish (optional), and the finely chopped leeks 1cm, let it all cook for a further 20 Min's. At this stage (if required)lightly mash soup to obtain coarseness of soup you require.

Smoked Sausage. Rook-worst

Bring water to simmer in small saucepan and heat smoked sausage for about 20 minutes remove from water and slice, time this to end when the soup is ready to serve. now add the smoked sausage as seen



serve piping hot with.....

Optional choice's

1. traditionally with pea and ham soup Rye bread and Cooked Cold Bacon

2. English crusty bread with or without butter,

Adjust any ingredients as you feel fit to if you cant get the exact ingredients adjust to your own taste buds for your own pallet.

I know when i get home i will enjoy , hope every body else does as well.hc

ryan

A Taste from France.

PROVENCAL CHARD OMELETTE
The Chef Himself Aged 9.

Ingredients. serves 6.

650g or 1/1/2lb Chard leaves without stalks
4 large tbsp olive oil
1 onion
6 eggs, salt & black pepper sprig fresh parsley to garnish

This traditional flat Omelette  can also be made with fresh spinach, but chard leaves are typical in Provence. Its delicious served with small black olives.

Preparations

Wash the spinach in running water several time then drain and pat dry place to one side . Peel and slice onion .

Heat half the oil in a frying pan add the onions and cook over a medium - lowish heat for about ten minutes until soft constantly stirring, now add spinach and cook for about another 4-5 Min's until leaves are wilted and tender. In a large bowl beat the eggs, season with salt & pepper, now stir in the onion and spinach mix and bind together .

Heat the remaining 2 tbsp of olive oil in a large clean frying pan heat medium - high heat, now you can pour in the egg mixture reduce to medium-low cover frying pan & cook for a further 5-7 Min's until egg mixture is set around the eggs and almost set on top, just till it starts to smell like it might start to burn as the bottom as the Omelette begins to brown,remove from heat & now place under grill till Omelette begins to rise, remove & sprinkle with grated cheese of your choice, place back under the grill and melt cheese in to mixture & brown to your own taste.

Can be served hot with chips beans etc, or allowed to chill placed in the fridge sliced and served cold with garnish, salad and a well chilled glass of wine. enjoy

Our search goes on.

Simply Organic


Well here we are now nearing the end of June how is our organic  journey going.

Its slow, but its good. When we first started out we sort of thought  as it's the healthy option of living  and as its popularity  is gaining ground it's  becoming  away of life for many,  we thought  it would be easy to find any Organic produce, but not so.

I know a lot of produce is easily available on the internet which we could easily purchase but don't want to be tied into the house  waiting for parcels to arrive all the time, besides we like to see and choose what we are about to buy.

We are now  beginning to find some produce locally for our every day lives, but  we still have a long way to go,  because we are now finding things reasonably locally  it has helped us decide to go totally Organic.

When we started this we had full stock cupboards these have to be  run down  first, you just can't throw it all out and start again from fresh to costly and very wasteful. We are sort of in limbo between two worlds at this moment it time.

While  doing even more research popping here and there and looking  we began  to relies just how big the lifestyle changes  were going to be, this  brought us to  our next decision,   (We have to do it in  stages).

These stages,  I will post as separate threads here as we struggle along day to day.

Hope you enjoy them.

Our first encounter

Simply Organic

It was early April 2013 we changed our living style to Organic foods and drinks from here on in, so we thought.  ha ha what a joke.

Prior to this date I had done some reading  and researching the internet looking at everything and anything to do with farm shops and organics  thinking we will go shopping and buy  our all our usual shopping but this time it will be all organic. ha ha.

OUR FIRST VISITS TO A FARM SHOP AND BUTCHERS.

Well,  a so called organic farm shop, and an organic butchers these were the first two visited. These two were a real eye opener, when we arrived at the butchers advertising for the past 20 yrs as an organic butchers.

When we arrived  we were the only two in the shop, I explained we were brand new to the organic life style  and had  found his shop  on the internet as being organic  and asked him can I assume all your product here in the shop are organic, his reply,  well it made me take a giant step backward, no sir it's free range so I asked for his version of organic and free range, well  free range is the next best thing  to being Organic all the  animals are all grass fed  but, I cant guarantee what chemical the grass may or may not have been fed, huh.

A butchers advertising organic produce and can not guarantee his produce as being  raised on an organic farm.

No thank you very much.

On our way home  we decided to visit the Organic farm we had found, that was  even worse, oh my goodness when we walked into the so called grocery section it contained  five wicker basket nothing else lettuces in three of the five baskets,  to empty to so badly  shriveled up  looked like they had been there for weeks  one basket had two  lovely looking lettuce in,  we were determined   the day was not going to a complete loss and we were not going home empty handed we bought one lettuce yippee.

We were so glad we did, it was absolutely  superb in taste  far far better that any other lettuce we had ever tasted.

What did we learn. 

Ask the questions first, This was  our first encounter with our new life style, because its says there Organic  don't take them at there face value.

Needless to say its to establishment we wont be visiting again.