caretaker

Chowder; potato, leek, carrot, onion, bacon... all the usual suspects, used half a big sprig of rosemary, some garlic. They had litres of half and half on for.. well, half price ($1 +.25 recycling) so cheap like borscht, (maybe cheaper).
Added a can of clams, what the hell. Clam chowder. With cheddar and Ritz crackers.

BristolUK

Sausage egg and (actifry) chips. Yum.

caretaker

Spicey chicken thighs and rice, baby romaine and blue cheese dressing. I just got a bunch of texts informing me that I won 2 beef roasts in absentia in the Friday meat draw at the Hungarian Club, (first time winning meat there and on a single $1 ticket too ), so I should be eating well for a little while.

BristolUK

That sounds a log way to travel.

caretaker

I was going to make beef stew, then changed my mind and decided to get out one of the French pots and have ragout' instead.

Oink

Beef stew, very old skool.

As it was raining we ordered a chef's special and a New York pizza from the firewood pizza place.

BristolUK

I'm never sure what to call them - Pork Picnic Shoulder it says, but sometimes they're advertised as this and it's something very different in the store. Google it and you get three different types of image.

Anyway, we call it Ham because it's more ham in colour and taste than pork.

Usually mother in law boils it in brown sugar and water or maple syrup instead of the sugar.

But we heard of an "American habit" of doing it in regular pepsi or coke. So Sunday we did it using Pepsi. It worked.

Yesterday I used some leftovers to make Ham Alfredo.

caretaker

Kebabs: Marinated beef, mushrooms, onion, red bell pepper.

caretaker

I had a substantial lunch and took stock of supplies; the white rum I don't like, a suspect bottle of decent Argentine malbec free from the bar, an apple, limes, brown sugar, orange juice, I decided to cook Spanish food for supper tonight, something called sangria. The nutritional value may be suspect but I can vouch for it's potency.

BristolUK

Another recommendation for the Actifry (post 1803)

I made some 'chips' with carrots and a few smaller chips with spuds. The carrots don't take so long to cook.

I cut the spears off some asparagus (for tomorrow) and made use of most of the remaining parts of the stalks, about half of which I would normally dispose, adding them to the carrots and spuds in the actifry.

Served with a breaded chicken burger, but the veg was soooo good we could easily have just eaten that.

The carrots were heavenly, the spud chips very good and the asparagus stalks were delicious.

caretaker

Good tip! I assume it would all be good in a normal deep fryer...

BristolUK

Easier to clean the actifry though

caretaker

While in Dollarama I noticed they now have small cans of Mario's corned beef, little ones for $2, perfect for making 1 meal's worth of corned beef hash. I had to do it.. In 15 minutes I'll drain the chopped potato and carrot and chill it in the fridge for a bit then sautee the onions and corned beef and go to town mixing it all together, fried egg on top mandatory. Frank's hot sauce as well.

[QUOTE=BristolUK;12259033]Easier to clean the actifry though /QUOTE]
My Bravetti isn't bad until I start cooking chicken or fish, etc in it. If I only just use it for chips I can go 2 - 3 months, (depending how often I use it), and probably only add 1/4 cup of oil. Once you deep-fry oysters, that's it, (I prefer to pan fry them anyway).

BristolUK

I can relate to that. So long as the chips come out 'clean' looking it doesn't seem to matter how dark the oil gets.

We'd get to the point where we'd think it might be about time for an oil change so we'd cook chicken in it and then change it.

But we gave it away when the Actifry was brought home.

caretaker

I don't have a problem (meaning it doesn't happen), with oil getting dark for a long time as long as I'm just making chips, then if it gets dark I change it. It just takes a little planning; if I've been using my 1.5l fryer to make chips twice a week for a month or 6 weeks then the oil still looks good, but if I want to make anything battered (mushrooms are a fave), fish and chips or shrimp or chicken then it's going to want changing sooner. Give it a sniff.
They let me walk back into the kitchen in a bar in Oaxaca that was like walking into a cave, it was low and arched and covered in soot. I thought it smelled a bit dodgey too but went for it and they made what might be the best little tacos ever. [It was a Restaurante Michoacan which at the time I think was a franchise of bars for Michoacan beer.]