Salad Lyonnaise and a few other lovely things…

Let me start this post by saying thank you to Christine over at Abbey of the Arts. She set all her blogreaders a challenge; to write a response to the idea of blossoming at the start of spring be it a story, thoughts, poems and post it by Wednesday 28 March. The winner would receive a prize of her rather beautiful prayer cards. I thought about how I could respond and poetry seemed the way I could even dare to express my thoughts.  It took me a few days to form and I posted my poem last minute on the Wednesday. To my delight this morning I found out that Christine had chosen me as the winner! So thank you Christine!

My good friend Jo and her fiance Al should be coming round for dinner on saturday evening and I’m trying to plan what to cook for them. Jo can’t tolerate garlic – it makes her very unwell – although I’m not sure if onions are also the culprits too. I found this out when I cooked homemade beefburgers a while back and she had to leave in an awful hurry because she felt so ill….. Naturally, I’m scared stiff of poisoning her! Anyway, I am planning the menu for Saturday night and remembered living in Lyon. As part of my degree, not only did I spend 6 months in Italy but I also spent a semester in France in its gastronomic capital, Lyon. I ate very well whilst I was there. In the ancient quarter, Vieux Lyon, we used to go to this amazing ‘bouchon’ (traditional Lyonnaise restaurants) called L’Amphitryon to eat 3 course dinner including Salad Lyonnaise, Steak & Pommes Dauphinoise and Creme Brulee…… There were other, more rustic, authentic Lyonnaise items on the menu such as pigs trotters and brains but we were typically unadventurous English students who wanted cheap good food. L’Amphitryon never disappointed. I have decided to make Salad Lyonnaise as a starter for Jo and Al because it contains NO garlic!

For 4

4 free range eggs
Mixed crisp leaves incl. Frisee
Lardons, pancetta cubes or 4 slices of bacon cut into cubes.
Bread cut into cubes.
Olive oil
Dijon mustard
White wine vinegar

Using the bread and some olive oil, toss the bread cubes in the oil and grill or fry for a short while until browned and crispy all over. Set to one side for later. Plate up your salad leaves on 4 dishes. Fry the bacon cubes in a non stick frying pan and once crispy, take off the heat. Poach your eggs next; fill a saucepan with 1/2 pint of water, bring to the boil and add a tablespoon of white wine vinegar. Breaking each egg into a cup, slide the eggs one by one into the water and allow to cook until egg whites appear firm, about 4 minutes or so.  Whilst the eggs are poaching, mix the dressing. Use 2 tsp of mustard, a glug of olive oil and about 2 tablespoons of white vinegar. Sprinkle the salad leaves with the bacon, croutons and dressing. Then finally lift out each poached egg with a slotted spoon and balance it on the top of the pile of salad leaves. Serve!

This is such a delicious, satisfying salad. The French know how to make a mean salad. I’ll post another french salad up here soon.

Finally, this Saturday, with my mum and a friend, I’m going to the New Wine Women’s conference in Harrogate. Elaine Storkey is speaking and I am really looking forward to a day of good teaching and encouragement. Last year Michelle Guinness spoke and she was witty, entertaining and full of passion for Christ. It will be a chance to meet with God in a different way and I know that will be very refreshing. Can’t wait!

Blossoming

A season has been experienced
withdrawal, retreat.
The anchor sunk down in deep water,
whilst you weighted, stilled yourself
to rest.
A quietened mind and peaceful body.
A necessary interval
in the pattern of life.

Now the prolonged
winter of the soul is passing
and a new hope is due.
During the months of waiting,
being hidden in the heart,
prayers were lifted,
ideas incubated
roots nurtured and
healing accomplished.
What has lain dormant,
now sends ripples racing across
the surface of the water.

And in this instant, equipped
you stir like a coastal tide,
to action, to mission.
Skin, nerves, sinews attentive,
every limb luxuriating
in the first stretch of spring.
Emerging from hibernation,
invigorated,
each of us is ready,
to set sail
on a voyage of blossoming.

Spring Cleaning

How many of you forgot the clocks moved forward an hour?

For once, I didn’t. But this morning, getting up for work, I felt it!! I missed that extra hour in bed. My tiredness is compounded by the fact I have driven over 400 miles this weekend so we could visit Dave’s family in Shrewsbury and go to a friend’s wedding in Cardiff (no.2 of 11….I think). Yet I cannot complain too much because last nights drive home was bathed in glorious sunshine most of the way and as we crossed the Pennines, the sun set, leaving a dusky twilight that was magical. Spring is finally here. On the news, there has been much said about the evidence that the weather is altered by climate change, that wildlife thinks Spring has arrived early. What I did notice on the route home were trees and hedgerows still in the spindly, bare, brown branched stage of regeneration. They are still waiting to bud. I wonder if this is a sign that the seasons are messed up.

Speaking of mess, now it is Spring, the time has come for Spring Cleaning. Our home is a disordered haven and I can’t pretend to love it’s shambolic state. I need help! I am naturally messy; I am a hoarder and find it hard to throw things away, I’m also a ditherer, incapable of making quick decisions. Things pile up – washing, dishes, rubbish, books. A problem with our house is the lack of storage space so items are left lying about because we have nowhere to ‘file’ them! My side of the bed is identifiable by the stacks of unread novels awaiting me. Keeping home clean and tidy is a discipline, even a spiritual discipline because in clutter there lies distraction. Moving house always puts me in a state because it’s a time of throwing away, tidying up and cleaning. The contract on our flat ends in August, so in much advance preparation and on the second day of Spring, I am going to make some resolutions for cleaning:

1. Any clothes that I haven’t worn for 6 months will go to the charity shop.

2. The pile of books by the door, meant for Oxfam, will have to go there asap.

3. Washing up after dinner to be done straight away.

4. Tidy up art materials as soon as I have used them.

5. To hoover, dust and clean once a week.

If you have any tips for cleaning, storage or being disciplined – please let me have them!

Sunday Scandinavian Trout

Dave and I were invited round to the lovely Lydia’s for Sunday lunch with her brother Josh and housemate Karolyn. If you haven’t met Lydia yet, then do because she is an amazing lady with a whole heap of stories about her life to tell. She works for a Leeds-based organisation that supports refugees and asylum seekers trying to access education, employment and training opportunities in the city and she is passionate about what she does. I’m always awed by how she does her job with such empathy and compassion and how she stays hopeful in the face of such suffering (prayer being the key!)- the experiences her clients have been through that she recounts are enough to give me sleepless nights. Lydia’s mum is Finnish and gave her the recipe for the dish she cooked for Dave and I; the reason why I have named the recipe Sunday Scandinavian Trout – taste this; it is delicate, tasty and so easy to make!

For 4 people:

A large side of Trout, filleted (around 750-800g)
Fresh dill
A large tub of single cream
Salt
Crushed black pepper

Preheat the oven to Gas Mark 5/ 200 degrees celsius. Place the trout, skin-side down in a baking tray and season with the salt and pepper. Chop or tear the fresh dill and sprinkle over the fish. Pour over the cream and cover the dish with tin foil. Put the fish in the oven for 20 minutes until the flesh is firm.

Trout looks similar to salmon but is even better!

Serve this with fresh steamed greens like Broccoli, boiled new potatoes and crusty french bread.

More questions for Lent: Scarcity

From Kathleen Norris: 

“If scarcity makes things more precious, what does it mean to choose the spare world over one in which we are sated with abundance?”

“What would I find in my own heart if the noise of the world were silenced? Who would I be? Who will I be, when loss or crisis or the depredations of time take away the trappings of success, of self importance, even personality itself?”

Kathleen Norris, ‘The Cloister Walk’

Grilled Pork served with a creamy Leek gratin

This is a truly decadent recipe ‘Porri Gratinati’ courtesy of a wonderful writer, Marlena de Blasi. It’s taken from her evocative book ‘A Thousand Days in Venice’ where she meets a blueberry eyed Venetian, falls in love and marries him, moving from America to live in the city. As some of you may know, Dave and I spent our honeymoon in Venice, the chocolate box city floating on the lagoon and it was magical. I read Marlena de Blasi’s book in preparation for our stay. Though we arrived in the heart of December and expected grey clouds, rain and flooding, the sun shone the whole week we were there, the skies were radiant blue and in the evening the sunsets were spectacular. We saw some amazing sights – the golden mosaics of the Basilica San Marco, early morning mass with priests as old as the hills, ceilings adorned with beautiful paintings of biblical stories in the Scuola San Rocco, winding medieval corridors and fabulous fish restaurants. Despite Venice’s reputation for tourist hell, we enjoyed relative freedom in the streets, wandered through Christmas markets, avoided scraggy pigeons and visited just about every church there was to see. We ate some amazing food, particularly at a restaurant near our apartment named Vini da Gigio (the owner has a massive wine cellar beyond comparison) where I ate pan fried scallops, Venetian style. Delicious! Prosecco, brioche (like croissants), pinot noir by the mineral water bottle from the local cantina, cappuccino that only an Italian could make, a cheese named Ubriaco (drunk) because it had been soaked in wine to preserve it, prosciutto crudo, monkfish grilled and served with buttery vegetables. Everything was so very good.

This recipe is not Venetian as far as I can tell; Marlena de Blasi cooked it to seduce her man when he first visited her in the USA. When she told him what she was cooking, he said he didn’t like ’porri’ so she said they weren’t leeks but scallions. When he tried it, it was so delicious, he never looked back.

Grilled Pork with creamy Leek Gratin: 

2 pork chops or steaks

½ tablespoon unsalted butter, for greasing
about 6 medium-to-large leeks, green parts trimmed off, white part split, thoroughly rinsed, and sliced thinly into rounds
250g mascarpone cheese or if you’re feeling virtuous, use  half creme fraiche & half marscapone
½ teaspoon grated nutmeg
½teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
fine sea salt
70ml grappa or vodka
30g grated fresh Parmesan cheese
 

Preheat the oven to 200°C/400°F/Gas Mark 6. Grease an ovenproof dish with the butter. Season the pork with a little salt and pepper and set aside.

Place the prepared leeks into a large mixing bowl. In a smaller bowl, combine all the remaining ingredients, except the Parmesan, and mix well. Scrape the mascarpone mixture into the bowl with the leeks and, using two forks, evenly coat the leeks with the mixture.

Spoon the leeks into the dish, spreading the mixture evenly. Scatter the Parmesan over the top and bake in the oven for about 20-30 minutes, or until a deep golden crust forms.

Whilst the gratin is baking, heat a skillet/griddle pan on the hob until very hot and grill the pork until cooked on both sides. As you serve the gratin, place the meat on top so the grilled meat juices mingle with the creamy leeks. Make sure you serve with lots of crusty bread for mopping up the remaining sauce.

If you want more fabulous recipes, read Marlena de Blasi’s books!

Healing

Last Sunday, a guy named Mike from the local Gateway church came to speak to St G’s on the subject of healing. Very interesting.

Normally these talks, often evangelistic in manner, switch me off – there is a way in which some evangelists communicate that somehow grates against the ’stiff upper lip’ Brit in me. I think it is important to be discerning about these things, making sure that I’m not being manipulated into an emotional frenzy. However, Mike was different. He was broaching a subject that middle class British people battle with; miraculous physical and mental healing by God, done today. Biblical. Westerners struggle with this because we possess great resources that allow us to ‘handle’ many of the ailments that life throws us. If we are ill, we call the Doctor, buy the painkiller or go to hospital. We have distractions galore through the internet or TV and so the miraculous, instead of being our story, seems a tale found in the bible and doesn’t seem relevant to us.

Mike, discussing healing, was straight-talking, challenging and practical. We are all called to be a part of a community, to pray for healing for one another. He gave simple advice, following what Jesus did in the gospels. If you notice, when Jesus prayed for people to be healed, there were no eloquent prayerful speeches. Jesus just said what it was and what it should do, see Mark 1 v.21-28 and v.40-42 for just two examples, there are many more to be found in each of the gospels. Simple.

People were healed that evening. Mike had prayed before coming to our church and had recieved words about people suffering from anxiety, from absorption problems in their intestines, for stress and much more. One girl could not eat without being in pain and having to lie down but she was prayed for and now can eat. Another guy trapped in anxiety feels that he has been freed from many of his worries and has experienced God in a new way.

Me? Well I had no physical symptoms in need of healing but I had to suspend my disbelief, my fear. Before my eyes, people were healed. Seeing others meet with God is life-altering. A tiny glimpse of the enormous power of the Almighty. It wasn’t a time to be sceptical or cynical, it was a time to pray for more of that life changing spirit of God.

The challenge now for our church community is to keep praying that we would step up to what God is calling us to.

Visual DNA

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™