Whinge and whine

Finished the Maeve Binchy book. It was nice, but she has written others that are by far better(in my opinion). There was a relationship that didn't seem like it would, or should, work out which she tried to tidy it up so it would be all happy endings. I won't say what or who in case anyone plans to read it and has not done so yet.

Dinner complications...... no wait, let me get to that in a minute. The comment issue has me more pissy than the dinner.

I have not figured around the comment problem on two blogs I like. So, Donna if you are reading this - I am very much enjoying your blog My Tasty Treasures. Your giveaway looks amazing, as does your chicken Marsala. I see you buy a much better brand of Marsala than we do. Does the better quality make a difference do you think? I made something similar to your dish and also used Marsala in a lamb recipe recently. When it hits the pan the smell is incredible. Makes you hungry immediately!

Also, another fun blog I can read but not comment to is Chez le Laquet! and so we will get around our communication issue by chatting this way.

I agree with you, the low energy light bulbs don't seem to be as bright. A trade off I guess. Loved the description of the farmers market. Doug says he'll stay with Simon at the ale stall.....sounds great. The pancetta fried up with a few veggies is definitely going on the list of things to try here. Yum!

Ok, the dinner. Well, I was going to give Nigella a one night break because I have been fairly diligent about knocking off the recipes in her book. So, since I had just acquired a Rachael Ray magazine and dog-eared a few promising recipes - thought I'd give the Tangerine Chicken a shot.


The main ingredients are chicken breasts, tangerine (obviously), Worcestershire sauce and more... So I decide I am going to measure it all out, chop all the veggies it calls for and do it as seen on cooking shows. When they are ready to toss things in the pan and stir and it's all neatly measured out.

I will admit to substituting boneless thighs for breast because we are just not great fans of white meat. It seems to dry out quickly. But no problem there as it is a matter of personal taste. I see that it calls for red onion. I thought I had a red onion. I did not.

Fine. I chopped a yellow one and figured it wouldn't make a huge difference. Next is two tablespoons of Worcestershire sauce. I look in the fridge at the two tall bottles in the door and one is malt vinegar for fish and the other is soy. I look and look....no Worcestershire sauce.

Now Worcestershire sauce has a bit of a kick. So now I'm thinking it won't taste anywhere near the same. But it's getting late and we live out in the sticks and a ride to the grocery store would take me 40 minutes round trip.

So, fine. I'll just make it with yellow onion and NO Worcestershire sauce. In the meantime I realize I am out of chicken broth so I shredded some leftover roasted chicken from the bones, tossed in peppercorns, bay leaves, celery, carrot, etc in a huge pot to make my broth.

I start frying the chicken in olive oil and then look around for the tangerines that I bought earlier in the day so I may grate the peel and juice two tangerines. Can't find them. I go out to the car to see if they fell in the backseat. Not there. Not in the hatch of the car.

I go inside the house, turn the heat off the simmering chicken and look again for tangerines. I am without three main ingredients and it's now 7:30 p.m. And the chicken broth is not quite ready. I am aggravated.

So we went for a pizza and watched some of season two of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Friday is our pizza night but....we had to improvise; so Thursday was pizza night.

The positive side is most of the veggies are chopped and I have the ingredients I need to finish up the tangerine chicken. By the way, the tangerines were on my desk at work.

Stay tuned for the Rachael Ray recipe..........