A snowy, snowy day: we only ventured out briefly to buy newspapers and look at all the snowmen on Twickenham Common, very sweet!  I spent part of the day updating ‘My Library’ page- quite nerdy really but for the first time I have a list of all my books in one place.  May be it’ll make it easier for Colin when buying me presents as he can see what I’ve already got….. hint hint hint.

Soup was called for to warm us up.  I saw a recipe for a bean soup with chorizo in it, but didn’t fancy chorizo so I’ve adapted the recipe to keep the paprika flavour without the oilness.

Roasted Red Pepper and Tomato Soup with Borlotti Beans

1 large red pepper

6 large tomatoes

salt & pepper

2 tsps paprika

olive oil

1/2 litre vegetable stock

1 tin borlotti beans

• heat the oven up to hot.
• chop up the pepper and tomatoes and place on a baking sheet.  Sprinkle with salt & pepper and paprika and drizzle with olive oil.
• bake in the oven for 40 mins until soft and slightly browned around the edges.
• pop the veggies into a food processor and blitz, or blend with a stick blender.  Pour into a pan, add the stock and beans and heat through.

It was lovely and warming on a wintry day.  We ate it with some good bread, a couple of sausage rolls and 2 cheeses- a Montgomery Cheddar and a Shropshire Blue.  Lovely.

For dinner we had a pheasant!  They were on sale at the butchers in Twickenham so I thought I’d test out Colin’s new love of game (well partridge and quail!).  I braised it in a large pan  in the oven, covered, with new potatoes, celery, sage and white wine, for about 45 mins until cooked through. I then took the lid off to let it brown while I cooked some carrots.  I really liked it- the bird was still juicy and the celery, sagey, winey juices were delicious.  Colin, however, enjoyed the taste but was not so keen on the texture of the pheasant so only ate a bit of it with lots of the veggies.  I’m pleased he gave it a chance though and I’d definitely try the recipe again with some chicken breasts or some little quail men.