Pescetarian Penitence

Spring is springing

After a long silence when I was mostly not very busy, but very lazy, I am back to report on FH's and my new adventure - we are going vegetarian at home for Lent.  Whew.

I am, as you may have guessed, back from France after my Parisian adventures and have been living in a garrett in Battersea for the last nine months.  It's good to be back!

Veggie meal one

Beetroot, red onion and chicory salad

So Lent began yesterday, and if we eat like this for the next 40 days, I will be a happy bunny indeed.  I am beginning to feel like the main challenge of the month won't be not eating meat, but will be not eating my body weight in cheese.  Almost every delicious-looking recipe I look at is pretty cheese heavy...








So, we ate a salad.  A salad with pears.  Now, I am not a fussy girl.  I have long said that there are only three things that I don't like - Phoenix claws (also known as chicken feet), marzipan and pears.  Now pears can come off the list!  They're still not my favourite things (I'm not a fan of the texture), but macerated in gooseberry vinegar, I have to admit they are pretty tasty.

Beetroot, red onion and chicory salad

Feeds four

	Dressing ingredients
Five or so golf-ball sized cooked beetroot	1tsp Dijon mustard
Two heads of chicory broken into leaves	3 tbsp red wine vinegar
Two pears cut into large chucks	3 tbsp good olive oil
150g feta cheese	Salt and pepper
One avocado in chunks
Handful of rocket
Two red onions
6 tbsp gooseberry vinegar
150g walnuts
A good drizzle of honey
Four bulbs of garlic (whole, skin-on)

Preheat the oven to 180°

The avocados and pears will start to oxidise and go brown as soon as they are cut up, so I poured over  three tablespoons of gooseberry vinegar and left them to macerate.  This won’t stop the browning altogether, but will stop it a bit.

Cut the onions into wedges, put them in a baking tray and drizzle with oil.  Put the whole garlic cloves in the same tray.  Roast for 30 minutes.

Cut the beetroot into bite-size pieces, pop in a baking tray and pour over the other three tablespoons of the gooseberry vinegar; into the oven with it for 20 minutes.

Put the walnuts into a baking tray (I realise that there are lots of baking trays involved here) – try to use a non-stick tray for this, otherwise you might have some issues afterwards.  Squeeze over the honey and give it a stir to coat.  Bake for 10 minutes.  Once nicely caramelised, tip onto a plate to cool a bit.

Rinse the rocket, if necessary, and put in a large bowl with the chicory leaves.  Add the beetroot, pear, avocado, onions and walnuts.

Crumble the feta over the top.

To make the dressing, mix together all the dressing ingredients and squeeze the garlic out of its skin and mush into the dressing.  The dressing might taste a bit too tart when you try it, but keep in mind that there are lots of sweet ingredients in the salad itself.

Enjoy!  I would say to serve it with bread or similar, but I ate so much salad (who knew that was possible!?) that it wasn’t necessary.

No more bacons - sad face!

So far so good, then with the vegetarianism, but I am sad that there will be no bacon for breakfast this weekend.  For the last few weekends we have been eating the tastiest sandwiches for breakfast.  It's two slices of toast, one of them spread with chilli jam and one spread with garlic mayo.  Slice half an avocado and mush it onto the side of the bread with the mayo.  Fry up three slices of bacon until super crispy and delicious, then pour over one egg beaten with a little milk and seasoning to make a bacon omelette.  When your omelette is cooked up good, fold it up so it'll fit into your sandwich.  Sandwich and enjoy.  Enjoy one for me, too!