new look...

as you can see, I've finally upgraded my template and a little bit of decorating has been going on here. I was going to wait until I'd tweaked the new logo a little more, but I'm SO bored at work that I thought at least this would be a productive way to spend the afternoon (as opposed to staring at spreadsheets I don't understand)...

Main advantages of the upgrade are the hierarchical archive which will make it easier to find old posts, and the labels, so you can search by label. I haven't worked out yet how to make my links open in new windows, so you'll just have to right-click and open in new window for the time being, if like me, you prefer that way of doing things.

On the cooking front, things have been... um... experimental. I had spent some time between spreadsheets thinking up spring recipes. One of which was a beetroot and orange soup, served with toasted fresh herb bread and a poached egg. I thought the colours and flavours would be glorious. I invented some crazy prolonged method of making this soup. I decided - I don't really know why - to add a little cumin, coriander and nigella, to spice it up, and lemon to make the orange flavour more bitter. Result - it tastes like curried pickled beetroot and looks like purple sludge. I then decided to strain it, hoping it was just the baby food texture my palate was rejecting, but alas no, the purple juice that resulted tasted the same...

At least the herb bread was a semi-success. I will post about this some time when I've made it again in a less fally-aparty fashion...

I also experimented with a polenta cake, but realised too late I had too little ground almonds. Never mind, I thought, I'll just reduce the amount of almonds, and up the polenta. Result - a curiously crunchy cake. Not unpleasant but not really to be recommended...

And I've been working on a cheesecake. The first one was magnificent looking but so rich every time I ate it I got groaning stomach ache. The second, lighter but less attractive. Hopefully it'll be third time lucky then I can post that too...

Anyway, hope you are having more success in the kitchen than I, and hope you like the new look site...