Recipe Tuesday: Hoisin Chicken Tray Bake

Sometimes, you just need comfort food: something easy, warming, filling and tasty.  This is one of those dishes.  I don’t remember how I discovered the recipe.  It may have popped up in my FB feed, in an ad for the Australian magazine “New Idea”.  Certainly, they’re the source of the original recipe, although I can no longer find it on their website.

This is my variation.  The original recipe did not have added vegetables or mixed grains, nor did it use whole chicken legs.  It used thighs, which are fine but a whole leg is more tasty, more sustainable AND gives you more bones for the stockpot later.  I’ve given quantities for both.  Our butcher charges £3.99/kg for legs, so approximately £1 each.

Ingredients

4 whole chicken legs (or 4 large thighs, or 8 supermarket thighs)

1 heaped teaspoon Chinese 5 Spice

1 cup basmati rice and 1 cup bulgar wheat (or 2 cups of either)

1 cup frozen peas

1 cup frozen sweetcorn

4 cups chicken stock (ie. 1 litre chicken stock)

4 tablespoons hoisin sauce (aka 1/4 cup measure)

1/2 cup peanut butter

2 tablespoons soy sauce

2 cloves garlic, crushed

2 teaspoons fresh ginger paste (or 1 inch grated fresh ginger)

1 large or 2 small sweet potatoes, cut into 1-2 inch chunks

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C.
2. Season the skin-side of chicken with salt and pepper. Sprinkle with five spice.
3. Heat oil in a large, flameproof, roasting pan or stew pot over a medium to high heat. Add chicken, skin-side down. Cook for about 5 to 6 minutes, or until golden brown. Remove chicken.
4. Meanwhile, combine stock, sauces, peanut butter, garlic and ginger in a large jug. Mix well.  (See note below)
5. Add stock mixture and rice to same, hot pan. Stir through the frozen peas and sweetcorn.  Bury the sweet potato chunks around the pan, under the rice.  Arrange chicken over rice. Bring to boil. Remove pan from heat. Put on the lid or cover tightly with foil.
6. Cook in a moderate oven (180C) for about 40 minutes, or until rice is tender and chicken is cooked through. Remove pan. Stand, covered, for 5 minutes, or until liquid is absorbed.

Notes:

• There will be leftovers!  There will certainly be enough rice for a stir fry, later in the week.  If you don’t want that, halve the quantities of rice, bulgar wheat and stock.
• The bulgar wheat adds additional protein and fibre.  (It has 8 times the protein and 4 times the fibre of brown rice.)
• You can use either crunchy or smooth peanut butter.
• Nobody has a large enough jug for step 4.  Mix everything that you can with enough stock to fill the jug, and add the remainder of the stock later, at step 5.

- Pam 

Recipe Tuesday - Apple Cake

Years ago now, a friend brought several bagfuls of apples into work to give away.  Gratefully, I took home a bag, stewed them, pressure canned them for 20 minutes, and later turned them into Apple Cake.  Last month, when another friend gave me apples from their tree, I was quite surprised to discover that I’d never written about the canning process nor had I written up the recipe!

This time around, I made two 16oz jars of stewed apple and then went searching for my recipe.   Since I am by no means an expert, I’m not going to go into details about pressure canning.  (My reference book for that is Farmhouse Kitchen, by Audrey Ellis, which was first published in 1973.).  However, it is time I shared the cake recipe with you.  

Note:  Because a 16oz jar contains enough for two cakes, all the quantities below are doubled up.  The quantities in brackets will make a single cake.

Apple Cake

Ingredients

1 cup oil  (1/2 cup)

2 cups stewed apple (1 cup)

2 cups castor sugar (1 cup)

4 eggs (2 eggs)

4 cups flour (2 cups)

4 tsp baking powder (2 teaspoons = "2 tsp")

4 tsp ground cinnamon (2 tsp)

Method

Preheat oven to 180C.

1. Line your cake tins.  I use 2lb loaf pans.
2. In the food processor, combine the dry ingredients.  Put the lid on and whiz for a few seconds to distribute the baking powder, sugar and cinnamon. Add the oil, stewed apple and eggs.  Process until smooth.
3. Distribute the mixture evenly between cake tins.  Bake for approximately 1 hour in the hot oven.
4. Remove from cake tins and cool on a wire rack.
   
   
   
   
   Yum!!
   
   
   - Pam

Recipe Tuesday - Baked Feta & Tomato Pasta

There is nothing like the taste of a freshly ripened, home grown, cherry tomato.   This year, we’re having a bumper harvest of them.  Fortuitously, someone mentioned an internet craze for baked feta and tomato pasta.  After a couple of sessions testing other people’s recipes, this is my version.  It feeds 4.

Ingredients

500g punnet of Cherry Tomatoes (or the largest you can get), washed

200g block Feta Cheese (get the proper Greek stuff, made with sheep/goat milk)

2 cloves garlic, crushed

80g jar salted anchovies in olive oil (or use a tin.  Don’t drain it.)

1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil (the good stuff)

360g dried pasta

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 220C.
2. Put the Feta into a lasagne dish, arrange the cherry tomatoes around it, together with the garlic.  Pour over the olive oil, attempting to coat as many of the cherry tomatoes as possible.
3. Turn the Feta over, twice, to coat with olive oil.
4. Dot the anchovies around the dish and pour the jar’s oil over the contents of the dish.
   
   
   
5. Bake at 220C for 45 minutes.
6. Meanwhile, at the 30 minute mark, boil a large kettle or two of water, pour it into your largest saucepan and bring the water back to the boil..  Add a pinch of salt, then pour in the dried pasta.  Bring back to the boil again, turn down and simmer for the amount of time specified on the packet.  (In my case, 11 minutes.). Once cooked, drain and return the pasta to the saucepan.
7. After 45 minutes in the oven, the tomatoes should be cooked and the Feta browned.
   
    
8. Remove the lasagna dish from the oven, and mash the contents together.  Stir into the drained pasta and serve.

It isn’t pretty but, OMG, is it tasty!

- Pam

Recipe Tuesday - Blueberry Muffins

A few years ago, at the bottom of the garden, we planted 3 blueberry bushes.  This year, they’ve come up trumps!  Yesterday, DH and I harvested 1.6kg of ripe blueberries and there are at least as many still on the bushes.  While I am hoping to freeze at least a kilogram, this morning I decided to make a double batch of blueberry muffins.

(The above photo was taken after I’d removed 250g for the muffins.)

After flipping through some recipe books and the BBC Good Food website, I decided to botch together a recipe.  (Why?  Because most of the ones I looked at required the addition of yoghurt or nuts or bananas.). Anyway, it worked!  This is my recipe.  I made 24 - the doubled quantities are shown in brackets.

Blueberry Muffins

Makes 12 (or 24)

Ingredients

1/2 cup vanilla sugar*. (1 cup)

2 cups plain/all purpose flour (4 cups)

1 tablespoon baking powder (2 tablespoons)

1/2 teaspoon salt (1 teaspoon)

1 cup milk (2 cups)

1/4 cup oil (1/2 cup)

1 egg, beaten (2 eggs)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract (2 teaspoons)

125g/4oz blueberries (250g/8oz)

1 tablespoon plain flour

Method

1. Preheat oven to 200C (425F).
2. Line the cups of your muffin pan with either silicone or paper liners.
3. In a food processor or mixer, combine the first 4 ingredients and give them a quick whiz to distribute the salt and baking powder.
4. Add the milk, the oil, the egg and the vanilla extract.  Blend until combined.
5. Place all but 12 (24) blueberries into a bowl.  Sprinkle over the flour and stir with your fingers until all is combined.+
6. Gently stir the flour coated blueberries into the muffin mix.
7. Fill each lined muffin cup 3/4 full, topping them up as evenly as possible if there is muffin mixture left.
8. Top each muffin with one of the saved blueberries.
9. Bake in your preheated oven for 20-25 minutes.
10. Remove from oven and decant onto a cake rack to cool.

Notes

* Vanilla sugar is easy to make at home.  Just bury a vanilla pod in a jar of castor sugar and leave it for at least 3 weeks before first use.  Replenish the sugar each time you use it.  The vanilla pod will continue to give off flavour for years.

+ Dredging your berries with flour will stop them sinking to the bottom of the muffins.

Enjoy!!!

The Finishing Off Project

You may have noticed that I have a real issue where, if I don’t sew my knitting up and weave in ends immediately after finishing it, I never get around to it. A couple of months ago, I started the Finishing Off Project.  The first project finished was Audrey In Unst which had been lurking, waiting for buttons, since 2019.  I had them, so God knows why I didn’t finish it at the time.

I’ve worn this cardigan a lot since I finally sewed on the buttons in February.  Love it!

The second sweater finished was Sandrine, which still needs to be washed, blocked and photographed.  I finished the knitting on it on 1st October last year.  It just needed the ends woven in, the front panels secured together - to stop any gaping - and I decided to turn up the final 5 rows of the body and use them as a hem.  I’ve machine washed the swatch and decided this is definitely one to be hand washed to preserve the stitch definition.

The third sweater finished was When You’re Off Duty, which is a free pattern from the V&A.  The body was finished in February/March 2021 and just needed the sleeves sown on and the collar knitted.  (I did the collar in September 2021.)

There are five projects left on the list:

• Diagonal Pattern Shirt Blouse from Knitting in Vogue.  This jumper predates both Ravelry and my blog, and has been waiting for me to finish sewing on the collar for about 20 years.  Seriously, I’d forgotten it existed until I was looking for something else.  I restarted sewing down the collar earlier this week and I’m 99% done. All that’s left is to position the short edge of the placket and stitch it down.  However, I’ve just noticed a small hole on the back that’ll need fixing. No others - I’ve checked.  With the exception of buttons, this will be finished today.
• Entertain in This based on a pattern from the Lux Knitting Book 1936.  That’s been lurking since 2016.  I think it just needs the cuffs sewn down.
• Trott (aka Carmine).  I finished this one in December 2020.  It only needs the sleeves sewing up.  Seriously, I think I’ve been procrastinating because I know this is going to be a handwash only jumper.  I machine washed my swatch years ago and it shrank to the point where it wouldn’t even make a stubby holder.  I should be able to sew this one up tonight, while watching the Champion’s League Final.
• Acer Cardigan.  This was finished in 2017 and got worn a few times, but I always had a problem with aligning the button band.  Then I realised that I’d knitted an extra repeat on one front, so it was at least an inch longer than the other!  I’ve ripped out the button band, etc, but never got around to putting it back together.
• Deco.  Another one that was finished years ago (January 2015), which just needs press-studs sewn on and buttons attached.  I regret not doing button holes.  The button bands are knitted as you go, so I can’t frog them and add button holes now.

I hereby vow to have all of the above finished and wearable before I return to work at the end of July.

- Pam

Update on Me: Good News

Do you want the good news, the bad news or the really good news first? 

The really good news is that I had a PET scan on 8th April and except for a couple of non-reactive spots on my liver, the lymphoma was GONE!  I’ve had two rounds of chemotherapy since then, so those spots should be gone by now.  I even got to ring the bell to proclaim that I’d had my final round.

The t-shirt reads “Science is magic that works”.  True.  I’m living proof.  

Oh, and I get my PICC line out tomorrow - that’s the thing in my right arm.  I have my first follow-up appointment on 2nd July.  I guess this means that I’m officially in remission.

The bad news is that I really have lost all my hair!  

You can even see the scar on my scalp, where I was hit by a Number Board, which fell off the wall and landed on me in Grade 1.  It’s on the right of the back of my head.  I remember that it bled everywhere and that the GP glued my scalp together.  I so was disappointed not to get stitches. What 6 year old wouldn’t be?

The good news is that I’ve lost my excess weight and am down a dress size.  No, that wasn’t planned and I’m not really sure I should celebrate it, since most of it was due to the tumour occupying all the space my abdomen and making me feel full really quickly.  It was either the tumour or the ascites it induced.  (That’s fluid in the abdominal cavity.). Anyway, over the course of November, December and January, I lost two stone (28lb, 12.7kg). While I put on a couple of pounds once I left hospital, I now weigh 8st 12lb (124lb, 56.2kg) and have maintained that weight since February, without doing anything.  No dieting; no watching what I eat; nada; zilch.

What this weight loss means is that I’m back wearing clothes that I haven’t fitted into since the 2010’s, and that is something to celebrate.  This time last year, I couldn’t fit into the Science t-shirt above.  Now I can and I’m so glad I wore it when I rang the bell.

- Pip

Recipe Tuesday: Chicken Liver Pâté

One of the biggest mysteries of the past few years is “where have all the chicken livers gone?”.  OK, I no longer shop at a Kosher butcher - they closed - but I haven’t seen any in a supermarket for years and our local butcher has real problems obtaining them.  Lurking in the freezer are a goose liver from removed from the 2022 Christmas goose and a tiny duck liver taken from the Christmas 2023 duck, both just begging to be turned into pâté.  Imagine my surprise when DH phoned me from the supermarket on Friday - I haven’t been shopping since I started chemo - and told me they had chicken livers!  Yay!! Three 400g packets came home with him. Two went into the freezer and, on Sunday, I made the third into Chicken Liver Pâté.  It was yummy!

My recipe is based on one by Rachel Khoo, from her Little Paris Kitchen cookbook. She uses shallots, brandy and rabbit livers, while I used onions, sherry, chicken livers together with the duck and goose liver from the freezer, and made a double quantity.  You will need a food processor.

Ingredients

250g chicken livers

1 medium onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, crushed

1 tablespoon sherry

Pinch of salt

1 tablespoon Schmaltz or use olive oil

Method

1. Melt the schmaltz in a frying pan over a low heat.
2. Gently fry the onion and garlic, until the onion has softened and turned clear. 
3. Add the chicken livers.  Keep the heat low. Fry on one side for 2 minutes, then turn over and fry on the other.
4. Once the chicken livers have been turned over, add a pinch of salt and the sherry.  Stir. Fry for another 2 minutes.  Be careful not to overcook - they will toughen.  Test to see if they’re cooked by pushing down on one using the edge of a spoon.  It should break up easily and be brown inside.
5. Tip the chicken liver mixture into a food processor and process until smooth.
6. Decant into ramekin dishes, smooth down to give a flat top, allow to cool, cover with cling film and refrigerate until needed. Serve with good bread.

NOTE:  Traditionally pâté is covered with a layer of clarified butter/fat, in order to help preserve it.  I never bother but, if you wish to: melt 150g unsalted butter and allow it to cool for a couple of minutes. Skim off the white crusty layer, then gently pour the liquid butter over the pâté. Once cool, refrigerate and ensure the butter is set before serving.

- Pam

Earth Day 22nd April 2024 - What On Earth Can I Do About It?

Global warming is now hitting home.  Dubai Airport closed last week because of flooding.  Dubai, and the rest of the Gulf States, received 18 months-worth of rainfall in less than a day on Tuesday 16 April.  Sea temperatures have risen 1.5C, causing mass bleaching of coral reefs world-wide, with knock on consequences for sea life and the human food-chain.  Spain has been experiencing a drought FOR 6 YEARS!

What the hell can I do about it?  Me?  One person.  Or my household of two????

I first learned about climate change and global warming when my flatmate dragged me along to the public session of a conference, in January 1989.  My takeaways then were: organic gardening; plant trees; recycling; buy unbleached paper products (preferably recycled); go solar powered; support wind farms; use public transport where possible,; drive fuel efficient vehicles but cycle for shorter journeys; and that the mainland Europeans were considerably better than Australians at this stuff.  

When I landed in Copenhagen 4 months later, and saw their rubbish bins with multiple recycling slots for paper, tins and plastics, I was convinced that the latter point was true.  Britain was a disappointment.  No segregated rubbish bins, to split genuine waste from recyclables.  It was 10 years before most local authorities offered households recycling collections for their rubbish.  When ordering office supplies in 1991, it was difficult to buy any recycled paper products - they just didn’t exist - and it took decades for things to improve.

It’s been 35 years since that conference in Australia, and Climate Change is now hitting home.  We can’t just blame governments - the largest contributing factors are the small, incremental decisions that individuals make.  What I’m setting out below are my thoughts, my manifesto, for the changes that we can ALL make to save Planet Earth.

1.  Do Not Waste

In 2020, when asked if he could give one piece of advice to future generations, Sir David Attenborough said “Do Not Waste”.  That is the essence of the Earth Day mantra:

• Reduce your consumption
• Reuse items instead of buying replacements
• Recycle everything possible

Think about it for a minute.  Pretty much everything else I’m about to write boils down into those three words.

2.  Don’t Waste Food

According to the 2024 United Nations Food Index Report quoted in The Guardian, annually about a fifth of all food produced on Earth is wasted, 600 million tonnes of which is wasted by households!  When you think that approximately 730 million people are going hungry every day, that means that the rest of us have to answer for one hell of a lot.

My suggestions to minimise food waste:-

• Meal Plan, so that the fresh food you purchase gets incorporated into the meals you are cooking.
• Turn leftovers into another meal.  Leftover cooked veg can be incorporated into a frittata.  The carcase of a roast chicken can be made into stock.
• Your freezer is your friend.  If you realise that you can’t use it before it shrivels up/turns to mush/grows exotic fungus, freeze it.  Or cook it and freeze it to eat later.  Unless you plan to use it within 2 or 3 days, freeze meat on date of purchase and defrost it in the fridge.
• Buy your fruit and veg loose, not wrapped in plastic.  They’ll last longer.  Produce stored in plastic tends to sweat and the sweat spots are the first places mould will grow, even if you decant them when you get home.
• Store food properly.  Bread lasts longer if stored in a plastic bag in the fridge.  Onions are best left on the counter.  Potatoes need to be stored in a dark cupboard, away from onions (or they’ll sprout). 
• Ignore “Best Before” dates.  They’re more indicative of the predicted lifespan of the packaging, than they are of the product.
• Ignore “Use By” dates.  If it smells OK and taste OK, then it should be fine to eat.
• Eat the whole animal.  If you are a meat eater, then don’t turn your nose up at eating offal. Haggis is delicious, even if it is made from liver, heart and lungs of a sheep.  Seriously, if you eat pâté, then you’re already eating liver.  Respect the animal.  It died to feed you.
• Compost the fruit and veg trimmings that can’t be eaten.  

3. Ask Yourself: Why Am I Buying This?

Do you need another lipstick or are you shopping just because you are bored?  Don’t shop for entertainment.  Whatever you purchase won’t fix the gap that you’re trying to fill.  If you do need to purchase an item, is it the best one for the job?  Does it fulfil all your requirements?  So many times, when we purchase something on the “it will do”; it never does.  Would something you already have do the job instead? 

Instead of trying to fit in with an influencer - who is paid to sell you things - work out what is important to you and to the person you want to be.  Devise your own style and stick to it.  Fast fashion is just flogging you badly made stuff, which won’t last.  Don’t waste precious resources trying to keep up with the Jones’.

4.  Drive The Most Fuel Efficient Vehicle

Do you really need an SUV?  No. Particularly not when, most of the time, there’s only one person in the car.  

Back in 2000, when I bought the Toy, the first priority was to get the most fuel efficient vehicle on the market. That was the diesel VW Lupo, although I bought the cheaper, “SEAT Arosa” version.  Toy averaged 62 miles to the Imperial gallon.  (That’s 4.5 litres, not the American gallon of 3.7 litres.)  Lucky-Car averaged slightly less - at 57mpg - but the replacement to the VW Lupo was horrible to drive, so I went for the Skoda version of the next model up, the Fabia.  

When I think of the number of times Lucky-Car drove through France or up to Scotland, carrying 4 adults plus their luggage, in one small car and still managed over 50mpg… Do you really need an SUV for the school run?  

5.  Do You Really Need to Drive?

The majority of car journeys within the UK cover less than 2 miles. Surely you can walk that distance?  Or cycle it?  Even in my lymphoma-depleted state, I can walk the 1.5 miles to the local Lidl in less than 30 minutes.  (We do that walk regularly.). 

If I lived in the Netherlands, I’d probably cycle everywhere.  When my current employer moved to their new office 7 miles away, the first thing I did was to check out potential cycle routes.  Sadly, there is no safe route.  Only the suicidal would cycle the last mile to the office, down a very busy, narrow country road.

What about public transport?  Surely this should be considered before driving?  I’m lucky to live in London, to have the Tube and reasonably reliable bus services.  Public transport is often not an affordable option in the UK.  You’d need a second mortgage to live in Reading and commute by train into work in London.  In other European countries, travelling by train is quick, cheap and reliable.  Sadly, not here, where 3 decades of privatisation have delivered nothing but higher prices, multiple cancellations and delays.  Most of the time, it’s cheaper to fly to Manchester from London than it is to take the train.

6. Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

Spend wisely.  Don’t complain about climate change and then use toilet paper pulped from virgin wood forests!  Buy recycled.  Consider what is in the products you buy and from where they came.  Don’t buy potatoes shipped from Egypt, if you can get ones grown in Essex.

Buy secondhand and don’t be ashamed about it.  Every antique is at least secondhand - if secondhand is good enough for Lord So-And-So, then it’s good enough for you.

7. Vote

2 billion people are going to the polls this year.  Vote for the candidates who will invest in infrastructure, make public transport affordable for all, change building regulations so that all new builds have solar panel roofs, force water companies to control sewage instead of discharging it into the rivers, etc.  Voting is your chance to choose someone who will do something!

- Pam

Recipe Tuesday - Mung Bean Curry

Tonight, I cooked something that I haven’t cooked since October:  Mung Bean Curry.  It used to be such a regular in my repertoire that for years I never had to check the recipe before I cooked.  In fact, I’m surprised that I’d never shared it on the blog.  

This is one of those recipes that came off the back of the packet.  I’ve been cooking it for 30+ years.  I don’t remember why we had a packet of mung beans in the cupboard - Dumbo, the long-ago ex, bought them and made something unmemorable with about half the packet -  but, I do remember noticing this recipe on the back and deciding to give it a go.  I saved that plastic packet for years and referred to it regularly.  Sadly, it disappeared after we packed up the kitchen for building works back in 2012.  This is from memory.

Mung Bean Curry (serves 4)

Ingredients

175g/6oz dried mung beans - not split mung dhal, but the whole bean

1L approximately of boiling water

1 tablespoon oil

1 medium sized onion, chopped

1 large clove garlic, garlic

100-150g mushrooms, sliced

2 peppers/capsicums, sliced

1 medium carrot, halved lengthwise and sliced

1 cup plain yoghurt

Spices

1 teaspoon ground chilli (or to taste)

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon turmeric 

1 teaspoon corn flour

Pinch of salt

Bulgar Wheat (see notes below)

1 cup bulgar wheat

2 cups boiling water

Pinch of salt

Method:

1. Start by cooking your mung beans:  pour them into a sieve and rinse off any dust with cold, running water.  Then place in a saucepan, cover with sufficient boiling water to ensure that there’s 2.5cm/1inch of water to cover the beans, bring to the boil and simmer for approximately 25 minutes or until soft.  Once cooked, drain the beans.  While the beans are cooking, get on with preparing the rest of the dish.
2. In a small ramekin, assemble the spices.  Add a couple of tablespoons of cold water and mix to a paste.
3. Heat the oil in a large saucepan or frying pan.  Gently fry the onion until it is soft and glassy.
4. Add the mushrooms, peppers and garlic.  Fry until soft.
5. Stir in your spice paste.  Fry until the aroma rises and then fold in the yoghurt.  Add the carrot and keep stirring, until heated through.  Switch off until the mung beans are cooked.
6. When the mung beans are cooked and drained, stir them into the curry mixture.  Bring back to the boil and simmer for 20 minutes.
7. Meanwhile, rinse out the saucepan used for the mung beans in hot water.  In it, combine 1 cup of bulgar wheat, with 2 cups of boiling water and a pinch of salt.  Bring back to the boil.  Cover and switch off.  Leave undisturbed for 15 minutes or until all the water is absorbed..
8. Serve.

Notes:

• My favourite “filler” these days is bulgar wheat, instead of rice.  Yes, it’s more expensive BUT it has 3 advantages:  1) it is even easier to cook (see point 7 above); 2) it bulks out to a larger volume than rice, so I only need to use 1 cup instead of 1.5 for 4 portions; 3) it has 8 times the fibre and 4 times the protein of brown rice!
• If you want to serve this curry with rice:  use 1.5 cups of white/basmati rice together with 3 cups of boiling water, cover, boil for 2 minutes, switch off and leave for 15 minutes or until all the water is absorbed.

Enjoy!

- Pam

Update on me

I have Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma.

It started with a bleeding stomach ulcer, in May. I had a gastroscopy at the end of June and a CT Scan in August, which were followed up with a second gastroscopy, an MRI and another CT Scan in December.  The ulcer was situated on a small lump in my stomach.  Until the start of November, I felt well and healthy; after that I started getting sicker and sicker. I was diagnosed at the end of December, based on biopsy results from the second gastroscopy.  On 17th January, I was so ill that I was admitted to hospital for almost 3 weeks.  Poor DH was by my side for the whole thing.  He was worried sick and only left my hospital room to go home to sleep.  (After I was discharged on 5th February, he was so knackered that he slept for about 20 hours.)

I’m still shocked at how sick I was.  I realise now that I was close to death.

As well as being a lump in my stomach, the lymphoma was in my liver, kidneys, right shoulder, chest and pancreas. I had no energy, no muscle tone (I’d struggled to climb the stairs at home), no concentration, and was swollen with fluid in my legs, abdomen and lungs.  At one point in the hospital, I was carrying 20kg (44lb!) of excess water.  The hospital even put me on oxygen. I wasn’t hungry and struggled to eat.  Over 3 months, I lost over a stone and a half in weight. (That’s 21lb or  9.5kg.)

I had my first round of chemo in the hospital and immediately started feeling better.  The miracle happened two weekends later, when I woke up on the Saturday and suddenly felt “normal”.  I had energy and an appetite, and could knit and read, neither of which I’d been able to do for weeks.  Ironically, the night before, I’d been so deeply asleep that the nurse struggled to wake me for my obs and nearly called a code. (I was dreaming and he’d been incorporated into my dream.  It was only when DH’s voice cut through the dream that I woke up.)  I was discharged the following Monday.

My treatment is 6 rounds of chemotherapy, consisting of 4 separate drugs, on a 3 week cycle.  I had my third round last week and, beyond chemo screwing up my tastebuds - again - I’m feeling good.  Seriously, my biggest frustration is that I can’t taste coffee.  My taste for it does come back towards the end of week 3 in the chemo cycle, so it’s not permanent but meanwhile I have to drink tea.

Of course, it’s not just coffee that I can’t taste at this point.  The lack of taste applies to most proteins, making meals tasteless or just taste of one ingredient, e.g. vinegar in Hot & Sour Soup (which should taste of chicken and didn’t).  It’s totally off-putting.  I can, however, taste Vegemite.  Yesterday’s snack:

Other side effects that I’ve experienced are peeling skin and, of course, beyond a few determined strands, I have lost most of my hair.

Still have my eyebrows and eyelashes though. (NB:  I had the length cut off, a few days after my diagnosis, and donated it to the Little Princess Trust, who make wigs for little girls undergoing chemo.  Might as well make something good from my situation.)

I’ve been home for 5 weeks now and spend my days watching television, knitting, listening to podcasts and reading. We go for a walk every afternoon and I cook dinner most days.  I go to the hospital every Monday, either for blood tests and a dressing change to my PICC line or those plus chemotherapy.  A chemo day is at least 5 hours long, so I have to make sure I have enough to read.  I’m working my way through Dorothy L Sayer’s Lord Peter Wimsey novels in publication order - although initially I reread Gaudy Night - and am currently on book 6, Five Red Herrings.  

Work-wise, I’ve been signed off sick for 6 months by the hospital, so will return to work at the end of July.  I’m still burning up my sick leave at the moment and won’t be on Statutory Sick Pay until April.  It’s £116.25 per week, which isn’t much - less than the UK half minimum wage.  Fortunately, we have plenty of savings so can easily cover my share of the bills.

- Pam

2023 American Road-trip - Stop 2, Savannah

After last weekend’s NASA trip and witnessing a rocket launch, on the Sunday we headed for Savannah.  As the only driver, the Lost American is a complete hero, because the drive to Savannah was terrible; three thunder storms accompanied by torrential rain.  Several times, the traffic ground to a halt when you could barely see the vehicle in front of you.  

In Savannah, we stayed in the old part of town, on East Bay Street, a short walk downhill to the restaurants and bars along the river.  How do I describe Savannah?  It’s a cross between Kensington and New Orleans, built on a river bank with a major port upstream from the city centre.  

Yes, you can enjoy your pre-dinner drinks on River Street, while watching container ships traverse the river under their own steam.

For dinner, we went to the Fiddlers Bar and Grill, where I had oysters, mussels and the first flounder I’ve encountered outside Australia.  Yum!

After dinner, we wandered a bit through the old town, before heading back to our hotel.  There were trees dripping with moss, gaslights, and even a bar with a cricket picture on the wall:

My first gas lamp:

Next morning, we did a trolley bus tour, which combined history with tourist stops, including a stop outside the only remaining house in Savannah to have intact slave quarters (now a museum). 

 On other stops, there was an actor who addressed us in creole before explaining its origins, and a 17th century gentleman who explained how Georgia gained its colonial charter (the original inspiration for the colony was to rescue impecunious gentlemen from debtors’ prison). The tour was the only time slavery was mentioned to us while we were in Savannah.

This building is the courthouse, which is under reconstruction after the roof collapsed, bringing down two floors with it.

NASA, Cocoa Beach and points north

Last Wednesday, this happened:

We dusted off the passports and headed to Miami, to stay with our friend “The Lost American”.  Thursday was a recovery day and then, on Friday, we headed off on a road trip through the South.  

First stop was Cocoa Beach, where we stayed at a hotel that was originally owned by seven of the Mercury astronauts.

  

Saturday, started with watching the sun rise over Cocoa Beach, ended with watching a rocket launch from the same spot, and was mainly spent at NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre.  It can be summed up in one word: WOW!!!

NASA was a long day but worth every penny of the $75 admission fee.  Seriously, I have a gazillion photos but nothing can sum up the awe you experience when you’re face to face with a space shuttle or walking beside a Saturn V rocket or standing in the viewing gallery of Mission Control, watching footage of the team going through the checklist before an Apollo mission blasted off, using the consoles that are directly in front of you. 

We got lucky with the rocket launch.  Weather had delayed SpaceX from launching earlier in the week, so it got rescheduled for 2350 on Saturday night.  Standing on Cocoa Beach in the dark, looking towards Cape Canaveral, we had to hope that it wouldn’t get delayed again.  Suddenly, there was a bright light to our left:

All was silent until the rocket flew overhead, trailing its launch sound, like a cloak behind it:

Wow!

- Pam

It was such an unusual cold

I spent most of this week in our Glastonbury office.  This was my first visit since the first week of December 2019, back in pre-Pandemic times.  Ironically, it had many echos of the first:  on both occasions, i met up with the same colleagues, but, this time, I was travelling alone, whereas on the previous trip, I’d brought “The Stray Australian” with me, a colleague from Sydney.  We stayed in the same hotel, as did the Regional Finance Business Partner, who I had dinner with on both Tuesday evenings.  Last time,  on the Wednesday afternoon, I developed a tickle in my throat so wandered over to the nearest supermarket after dinner, to buy some whisky to kill the cough.  This time, ditto.  Last time, I drove back to London on the Thursday afternoon, feeling more and more ill, dropped the Stray Australian back at the office, then went home to bed.  This time, I drove home on Friday, my tonsils making their presence felt..

Last time, by the Saturday, I had a sore throat.  It didn’t help that that was the day of my choir’s carol concert but I soldiered through, my voice cracking on some of the high notes.  I also soldiered through at work. I had a lot to learn from the Stray Australian before he went home on the Thursday, so couldn’t stay home.  Then while I was feeling like death warmed up on the Monday, I got asked to take on a role in our Huntingdon office: someone had resigned, timing it with holidays to give less than 2 weeks’ notice.  (Seriously, I was sitting in the office contemplating asking to go home to bed, when I got called into a meeting room.) 

Symptoms appeared in stages.   I developed a drippy, runny nose; watery, like a dripping tap.  The scratchy, swollen throat went on and on.  My larynx was on fire for days.   A week later, I could have drawn the cartilages within it, it was that sore.  Christmas came and went, and we spent the week of New Year in Normandy.  I was cooking dinner on the Tuesday (New Year’s Eve) when I realised that everything was tasteless.  On the Thursday, I woke up in the middle of the night, feeling crackles in my chest.  A couple of slow, deep breaths and they went, not to return. That was the last symptom, to appear.   It took a couple of weeks for my sense of taste to return - now I have to salt everything, (where I never did before) - and it took months for my vocal cords to recover.  

 I am 100% certain, now that it was Covid.  We know now that the first official variant ulcerated the vocal cords of those who were intubated, hence the damage to my own vocal cords, and all the other symptoms tally.  I know who I caught it from: a colleague in a meeting on the Friday before I went to Glastonbury.   It swept through her office and through ours, before Christmas 2019.  When Covid began getting publicity, we sat there ticking off the symptoms.   Of course, there was no testing then, so it can’t be proved now..  (By the time I did have antibody testing, I’d been vaccinated twice, and tested positive once, via a PCR test in October 2020.)

This time around, well, yesterday’s lateral flow test was negative for Covid.  The tickly cough has declined a lot and my nose is snotty, not dripping water.  I think we’re safe to say that it isn’t Covid this time, but I doubt I’ll be at rehearsal tomorrow evening.  I’ll take another test on Tuesday, before I go to the office.

 My name is Pam and I had Covid before it was famous.

Today is the start of the rest of our lives

Happy New Year!

All over the world, people woke up this morning full of resolutions and good intentions.  Within a few weeks, they’ll feel let down and discouraged.  All the hoped for miracles/changes of behaviour will have vanished.  Why do we imbue January 1st with so much importance?  Given that our time on earth is finite, every morning offers the same promise: 24 hours in which to make a difference.

I reckon it’s just a point in time to focus the mind.  So what will I endeavour to do this year, to change or make a difference?  Here are my resolutions.  It’s 2023 so I am aiming to complete 23 Challenges:-

1. Read 23 books.
2. Use up at least 23 balls of yarn by knitting or crocheting them into items.
3. Use 23 new-to-me recipes and make dishes that I’ve never attempted before.
4. Go to the cinema at least 6 times.  (I get "free" tickets via my bank.  Might as well use them.)
5. Go to the theatre 4 times.
6. Restart my running and run in an organised 5k race.
7.  Continue with my 15 minutes a day Duolingo.  (I'm currently on day 943.  Started in 2020.)
8. 23 sessions of weight training.
9. Socialise 23 times.  This doesn't include the weekly pub quiz, RPG sessions, etc, that are already in my calendar.
10. Blog at least 23 times.
11. Spend an hour per week for 23 weeks, writing that book.  
12. Do 23 singing lessons/practice sessions resulting therefrom.  (My voice and breathing haven't recovered from Covid in December 2019.  Yes, I had it before it was famous.)
13. Make 23 phone calls to family and friends, just to catch up and chat.
14. Replace Lucky Car.  I have no choice.  At the end of August, the border of London’s ULEZ - ultra low emission zone - will be extended to include all of the outer-London suburbs.  He’s diesel, 13 years old and does not comply.
15. Go on a “proper” holiday, overseas.  We haven’t had one since the start of the Pandemic.  Destination TBA.
16. Continue doing the Fashion on the Ration Challenge on MSE.
17. Not buy any yarn in 2023.  This excludes the one skein that was ordered before Christmas, but won’t be delivered until next week.
18. Finish and sew up all my knitting and crochet WIPs or frog them.   I think there are 8 in the queue, including a couple of cardigans that just need buttons sewn on.  (This excludes the jumper and two pairs of socks currently on the needles.)
19. Dust off my sewing machine and sew a suit.
20. Complete at least one embroidery.  
21. Have 23 gardening sessions, where I do more than look at the weeds and lament.
22. For 23 weeks, spend at least an hour tidying up.  I am not one of your naturally tidy people, I want to change that. (I can put a pen on an empty table and, 10 seconds later, it’ll look like a bomb has hit it.)
23. TBA

Yes, that’s right.  I haven’t got a 23rd challenge yet.  I’ll come up with something….

Got it!  Number 23 is to reduce my Podcast queue from 639 to under 200!  God knows how it got to be so high.

- Pip

In which PipneyJane goes pattern shopping

In John Lewis, I fell victim to some pale grey yarn:  Manos Del Uruguay Fino, in the colourway “Silver Teaset”.   It’s 4-ply, 70% Merino wool, 30% silk, in a 100g (450m) hank.  Three hanks purchased, which will be enough for a jumper.  Not cheap (£70.50 in total) but I’ve saved money all year for a blow out like this.  6 coupons spent.

My reason for being there was to browse the pattern books for a suit pattern, so that I can make a suit from the wool fabric I picked up at that charity fabric sale in ?July. OMG was I disappointed!  The last time I did a serious browse for patterns was a decade ago.  Do you remember back then, when there were several different pattern books laid out on the counter, one for each pattern company?  Well, now, there is one book.  I always knew that Vogue and Butterick patterns were owned by the same publisher, apparently they also own Simplicity and McCalls.  No New Look pattern book.  No Burda, just that one pattern book to look through.

I flipped through it in growing disappointment.  Virtually no suit patterns - I can recall only one (didn’t appeal) - no capsule wardrobes, and only one picture per pattern to display the garments.  (How the hell am I going to know what the top of that dress looks like, if you only display it with the jacket on?).   Seriously, there was NOTHING suitable for the office and nothing I would want to make.  Did I miss the memo saying that nobody has to dress professionally for work anymore?

John Lewis Oxford Street also had virtually no fabric.  (No suiting.  What a surprise?)  Last time I was in there was pre-Pandemic.  The Haberdashery Department is only 1/3 of the size it was then, and about a tenth of the size it was in the 1990’s, when I worked around the corner.   The lady who rang up my yarn sale told me that “nobody makes a summer dress anymore”.

It looks like I’m going to have to find the bag of paper patterns I purchased in the 1990’s.  Hopefully, there will be a suitable suit pattern in there that I haven’t cut out - since I’m a totally different size now - which I can use/adapt to my current style.  There may be a possibility that I’ll find something at the Knit & Stitch Show at Ally Pally next month, but unlikely.  (I had my arm twisted by a friend to go to the show; the same friend who was too sick to come along yesterday.)

Anyway, the above yarn purchase brings my total spend to 69 coupons, leaving 7 for the rest of the year.  

Wish me luck.

- Pip