A relatively easy drive home in the sunshine via the Riverford Farm Shop. This is the farm shop of my dreams! It has everything you would want in a farm shop- the veg is organic, the meat counter is fresh and local, and the selection of grocery, cakes and bread is unrivalled. We filled the car up to the brim and drove back slowly!

One of the purchases was this wine, opened as a welcome home treat, poured into some new glasses acquired in Bude!

This wine was truly delicious, worth watching out for.

You will know how much we like our curries and spicy food, and this week has been relatively Spice free- so I set to work on changing this for dinner, using the new Rick Stein India book as inspiration.

First up was a summer vegetable curry. Quite dry this is more of a sauté of summer veg in mustard seeds, cumin seeds and curry leaves. Alongside this I made a dal, and this is the recipe.

Tarka Dal (courtesy of Rick Stein, India)

200g chana dal

2 medium tomatoes, chopped

1 medium onion, chopped

4 green Chilli, slit open

2 cloves garlic, peeled

Small handful of curry leaves

1 tsp salt

1/2tsp turmeric

Tarka:

2tbsp vegetable oil

1 tsp black mustard seeds

2 shallots, chopped

4 dried red chilli, broken up

15 curry leaves

Handful fresh coriander, chopped

• put the dal into a pan and cover with 4cm water. Add the remaining dal ingredients, bring to the boil, them simmer for 1 hours until soft.
• mash up with a potato masher to break up, but do leave some rough texture in.
• for the tarka, heat the oil in a frying pan and add the mustard seeds until they pop. Add the shallots, chilli and curry leaves and stir for 2-3 mins.
• Spoon the tarka over the dal, sprinkle with coriander and serve.

I have tried alot of different dal recipes but I think this will become my favourite. I loved the texture and flavour, and it was lifted by this tarka added at the end. Delicious!

Actually the veggie curry and the dal would have been enough but we had bought some chicken Supremes from Riverford and had some Bangladeshi curry paste, so I rubbed the paste into the chicken and roasted at a high heat in the oven for 20mins.

No rice here, simply some flatbreads to soak up the juices. And there is a good leftover amount for my late night dinner once back to work!