Come dine with Katie!

Before we even started there was a strong gin, served with my very favourite thing in all the world: devils on horseback. The beautiful little smoked salmon blinis were just lovely, but nothing can beat a sweet-salty prune and bacon combination.

On to the menu...
Smoked mackerel pate with oat biscuits












Chicken breast stuffed with mozzarella and chorizo served with crushed new potatoes with herb butter, and vegetables. The herb butter on the potatoes were really delicious, I could eat a whole pile of potatoes dressed like this. The chorizo was just a little overpowering for the chicken and mozarella, but entirely delicious all the same.

Pink chamapgne and rhubarb jelly with ice cream. This was awaited with curiosity by everyone... would you be able to taste the champagne? Warmed on the tongue, the jelly fizzed a little, as if a dab of sherbert was hidden in there. The rhubarb lent a clean, sour note, and the clotted cream ice cream was definitely needed to counterbalance this with its sweetness. The two together were amazing.

Coffee and chocolates.
And what chocolates they were. Handshaped dark chocolate with nuts: no after eights for this lady!

Katie also entertained us royally throughout, but I don't need to elaborate on that. Let's just say I was better at conducting with a chopstick than I thought... and Andy looks really cute in a white bear suit.

andy's brekkie

Putting the cart before the horse, here is the breakfast Andy made for us all, the night after Katie's meal:

I don't often crave a fry up, but if I know Andy is in front of the oven then I know it's going to be good.

pheasant, not peasant!

Having mortally offended my male parent by forgetting to take my brace of pheasants at Christmas, I had to accept the penalty of a 50% reduction in his affection... and was given one, naked pheasant last weekend.

Lucky me! And twice lucky that I didn't have to pluck and singe it, either. Having a constraint can be much easier sometimes. The constraint was time, the solution was casserole.

I chunked up the bird, taking off the leggy bits and breasts, and chopped the rest of the carcass in two. I browned it all in oil then removed to a plate, then flash-fried some diced pancetta in the pan and set aside with the pheasant.

Next, two small onions chopped finely and two cloves of garlic, sweated down.

Pheasant back in the pan, a glug of marsala, half a diced up squash and a few choice carrots... some marigold stock and a random 250 ml or so of beef stock from the freezer, which I was sick of seeing in there. Finally, some mushrooms from our veggie box were cleaned and added whole. It cooked for an hour then sat and mellowed until the next day.

After some wonderfully awkward, quiff and two-left footed dancing, dinner was dead quick. The casserole re-heated quickly with a dash of cream, and served with date cous cous* and toasted flaked almonds.

The gent chose wine from the very tiny Tesco selection. The label tells me it is 'Caves Saint-Pierre' and a 2007 Cotes du Rhone. The gent told me it is a mixture of grapes and not just from one grape. Or the other way round, and this is good because it avoids the flower bomb effect. Or, fruit bomb. Of cherry flavour, was it -? Perhaps I should have asked *before* we drunk it :/

*cous cous aside: it happened to be wholewheat cous cous, to which I added cinnamon, turmuric, chopped dates and marigold stock