It’s never too late to turn it back around

It has been a whole year since I decided to break from being a vegetarian! You may remember my mini series on my conversion. And what a year of discovery it has been.

I have rediscovered lamb – my favourite before and after being a vegetarian. I also love ham, and chicken. And roast beef!

But we’re still not eating it very often. Most meals we eat are vegetarian still because it is cheaper, I know what I’m doing, and actually we just like the recipes. I’m not a big fan of bacon or sausages and still keep a bag of Quorn mince in the freezer. I have, of course, learnt how to cook meat. I’ve now roasted pork, beef and chicken. And it opens up a whole variety of dishes I can eat if we go out.

And how will we celebrate? We’re trying a recipe recommended by a friend called Rapid Ragu. I think it’s a Nigella recipe. It has lamb mince and pancetta in it – fancy! And we’re going to have chicken twice next week. A meaty week to celebrate a year of meat-eating!

NB Another James Morrison-inspired title! I’m trying to do this for each title until we see him live!

James Morrison in the morning…

Further to my driving post earlier this week, I had to collect something from work today so drove in. The journey was fine. But the fun bit was listening to James Morrison on HeartFM. I had no idea he was a guest on the Breakfast Show and even sat in the car in the car park at work so that I could listen as much of the interview as I could before I had to be at my desk! Hubby thinks I’m like a teenage girl… Two weeks until we see him in concert!

NB Title of post is a badly sabotaged first line from a James Morrison song… Which one?

London driving

I’ve blogged briefly about driving in London before, but as a friend and colleague passed her driving test today (well done again!) I thought I’d share a couple of not-so-pleasant driving stories from the last ten days.

I don’t drive very often, hubby normally drives. But after a wander around Trent Park recently, hubby’s toes got very cold so I offered to drive home. On the short drive, a big 4×4 drove up close behind us and pulled out to the right as if trying to overtake. Of course there was no room for him to overtake, he was just annoyed that I was making him do 30mph, also known as the speed limit. Eventually there was room for him to overtake and he zoomed off, only to get stuck behind another law-abiding citizen!

This weekend we took a load of recycling to the local recycling centre and the speed limit is 10mph there. So I did 10mph, much to the annoyance of the drivers behind me. I don’t imagine many people do the speed limit there. When leaving, the car behind beeped his horn at me because he wanted to go straight on at the roundabout and I was turning left. There was no room for him to go straight on obviously because I was in front of him, and although I couldn’t turn left immediately somehow this was my fault!

Now whilst it is amusing to wind up drivers who insist on breaking the law, it is just that, the law! But it’s not just that. It took me a while to get past second gear and then 50mph when I was learning to drive. My first experience of driving on the motorway filled passengers with fear because everyone else drove a lot faster than me! When we bought our first car after two years of marriage, and I hadn’t driven for two years, hubby had to take me to a car park to practice driving.

My point is that I was a fairly nervous driver when I was learning and lacked confidence. So when people drive close to me or beep at me, my confidence automatically drops. I imagine this is part of the reason for beeping. I’ve found that many beeps are because of impatient drivers who want to break the law rather than checking if another car is coming over a country bridge, for example. It’s dangerous, people! And mean!

Ah, Sicily

I really enjoyed the Sicily Unpacked series on BBC2, as you might have guessed. The final episode started on Etna. They were able to go much further than we were because it was too dangerous – a week after we left the volcano had a mini eruption which closed the nearby airport.

They briefly showed Agrigento which is amazing – a stretch of Greek temples which are some of the best in the world outside Greece. When we were there it was really hot and there’s hardly any shade!

I would love to see a series by Giorgio on Sicilian food. It was interesting to see the art but I think if it had all been about food maybe we’d see more of the island. And I think Giorgio is brilliant! As hubby pointed out, what I really wanted was for them to replay our holiday!

Sicily Unpacked episode 3

Last week’s episode was great and included gelato! Gelato is amazing and I recommend having a look for a gelateria in your area. It doesn’t beat real gelato but it’s still pretty good.

Tonight is sadly the last episode, but is probably going to be the best (in my opinion!) because they are going to Mount Etna. We went there on holiday and our hotel was on the east of the island which is famous for oranges, lemons and pistachios, so Giorgio can produce something amazing!

What the BBC says…

In the final episode of the series, Andrew and Giorgio take the pulse of contemporary Sicily, experience the change that is sweeping through the island, and find out how the future of it is linked to its ancient past.

Over the last 100 years, Sicilians have seen their beautiful island sink under the weight of corruption, recession and the mafia. But today, Sicily is experiencing a renaissance and celebrating a rediscovery of their unique ancient heritage.

Andrew and Giorgio visit Mount Etna, the tallest active volcano in Europe, and explore the rich vegetation of its foothills and the dramatic moonlike craters of its upper slopes. Etna truly is a great beauty with a seductive dark side, just like Sicily.

During this journey our presenters will meet the ordinary people really trying to make a difference in Sicily. Ciccio the fisherman who retrieved a statue dating back 2300 years from the sea. Called the Dancing Satyr, rather than sell it to a private art dealer, he generously gave it back to his town so that his fellow Sicilians can enjoy the riches of their past. Likewise, a little museum in the small town of Aidone successfully reclaimed the spectacular Morgantina statue of Demeter – as old as the frieze sculptures on the Parthenon – from the Getty Museum in California.

And it’s not only art that is experiencing a resurrection on the island but agriculture too: the wine, that only 20 years ago was considered only good enough for blending vats on the continent, is now one of the most fashionable in Europe and is being exported all over the world.

Andrew and Giorgio also visit the magnificent villa of Romana del Casale in Piazza Armerina where they get a chance to help restorers, in bringing back to life exquisite mosaics some 1800 years old!

Combining old traditions with contemporary trends is a current very much behind a lot of the success stories emerging out of modern Sicily. One the most exciting examples is Accursio Craparo, a Michelin starred chef, taking the best of Sicily’s food traditions and putting an ingenious modern twist on them

Andrew and Giorgio finish their journey round Sicily back in Palermo. Here they meet Prince Bernardo Tortorici, whose family have been in Sicily since the 12th century. He confirms the renaissance of Sicily that our presenters have witnessed on their travels, but insists Sicilians must not rest on their laurels. Sicily will have a brilliant, bright future if Sicilians cherish and believe in their island’s great beauty, and most importantly nurture it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01b320c

Gift tags

I know I said that Christmas was over, but I did a little Christmassy thing last night – I made Christmas gift tags.

There’s a website called Instructables which has lots of cool, quirky ideas. I ‘like’ it on Facebook so different ideas come up in my News Feed each day. Sometimes they’re a bit random but sometimes quite good! Earlier in January they suggested making gift tags out of old Christmas cards, complete with instructions.  You could use any cards really – birthday, thank you, etc.

I remember making gift tags out of Christmas cards with my mum but we just cut out the design on the card. This way seemed a bit more funky because if you use a uniform pattern, you can’t guarantee getting the whole design. So last night when hubby was sorting our recycling (we don’t have much between us so he only does it every few weeks), I decided to give our Christmas cards a new lease of life.

I made them slightly differently to the Instructables instructions. I cut the first card into the shape and size I wanted and used that as a template for the others – easy. It turns out the tags are about 7.5cm by 3.5cm. Then I hole punched each tag and put some string through them. So this Christmas you could receive your Christmas card again!

 

Frost

The weather has finally turned! It seems we’ve so far managed to get off lightly this winter, in the south that is.

I got quite excited on Saturday when we went for a walk in the afternoon and large portions of grass were still frosty because we’ve just not seen much frost. I love how pretty the frost looks on leaves and logs like a Christmas card.

And it’s lighter for a tiny bit longer in the evening now. Hopefully we’ll see a little bit of snow soon…