The Tuesday with cooking class

 Hi,

Highlight of the working day might have been the lunch visit to Machete with Juliet and Barb as a part of the scone assessment programme.  Machete held its own - as I knew it would.

What a great way to finish the day.  Headed home with Mike - he cooked tea for us.  And then we headed to WHS to get started on the dal cooking night.

Machete with Juliet and Barb

We made 4 different dal dishes and some yummy dal fritter things.  Our fritters didn't work because our pan didn't get hot enough.  But the fritter batter was so yummy I just know the fritters would have been awesome.

Spices

Curry leaves and chillies

Cooking in action

Scrumptious cooking

Headed home via the supermarket to stock up on cat food for the long weekend.  Ange and Sally are taking turns to see the cats.

Yay.

Finish work today.  Go home and pack.  Go to sleep.  Wake at 12.30am and head to the ferry.  Sleep in the queue.  Sleep on the ferry.  Wake up in Picton and have brekkie with Iona and Col and then head south.

I am excited to see SH1 north of Kaikoura.  I haven't been there since the earthquake changed that landscape.

Also happy to see Iona and Col and Toby and Tessa and everyone.  :-)  And have some time off work.

Woot.

Have a good Easter.

Love,

Angela

The Tuesday with cooking class

 Hi,

Fairly busy day at work - but worked from home (WFH).  That does mean laundry gets done - so there is a benefit to working from home for the house duties.  :-)

In other WFH news - the cats really wanted attention from me.  Hahah.  Moxley would not leave me alone for ages.  And even Smudge wanted to smooch at one point.

Moxley wanted a lot of attention

Sleepy Moxley

Happy to eat my first feijoa of the season.  Mmmm.

Even Smudge wanted smooches

Sally was busy so couldn't make the Indian cooking class.  Mike came instead.  We were the last ones there because I read the quantities incorrectly on the class list of ingredients and had to stop off at the supermarket for more whole cream milk.  Oops.  But the instructor had turned the electric elements to high so we had nuclear heat for our cooktop.  Our food worked out well.

Spices all laid out

Sag paneer - we even made the paneer

We made paneer out of the whole milk.  It was amazing and we're totally doing that again at home.  Yum!

We also made onion bhaji - or the instructor made it and we dropped it into the hot oil.  And it was so good!

Next week is dhal week.  Mmm.

Back home fairly early compared to last week.  I think Mike and I were home by 9.30pm.  In bed and fast asleep.

Moxley snuggles

Wednesday morning is a cracker

We're both working from home today.  Yay.

Have an awesome day.

Love,

Angela

The Tuesday with the first evening for my cooking class birthday present

 Hi,

Work was busy.  Mike got home early with the car all fixed up.  New radiator hose and nice new glycol filled up.

Headed to collect Sally at 6.45pm to head to our cooking class at Toby's old school.  Got there early and followed the cooking instructor to the classroom.  She told us to pick a spot with a gas hob.  Yes - good plan although one of our burners only had a nuclear setting.  Hahahah.

Spices.  And salt.

We're ready!

We made a corn curry with a beautiful sauce.  And promptly put the whole corn cobs in it.  Seemed a bit weird.  But we're going to eat that tonight when I get home.

Corn curry sauce getting made

Mix, mix.

Scary chaos!

The woman taking the class is lovely and teaching us how to cook using taste and smells and how it looks rather than following a recipe as such.

This meant sometimes it was a bit chaotic.  Like:  what did she say?  Lucky Sally is efficient and totally professional at this sort of thing.  The biggest mess was when the instructor came to our spot and added extra water to my sauce and skooshed water all over our floor.  I had to grab the mop for that one.

Sally tidied as we went.  I think everyone else was envious of my cooking partner.

We also made a corn breakfast dish.  Yummy.  And a corn pancake.  Yummy - but I don't think it cooked properly.  Weirdly like burned on one side and half cooked on the other.  Maybe it is a thing?

Anyway - finished up at 2130 and took Sally home. We're making sag paneer next week.  Woot!  Mike said Sally can come again in his place.  Choice! Back to our house and in bed by 2215.  

Slept well.  My back, which was dodgy all day, magically is much better this morning.  No idea how that happened.

Bus in.  Work again.  Gorgeous morning.

Corn brekkie food

Corn pancake

Nothing on after work today.  Going to head home and eat corn curry.  Yum!

Thank you for the present, Mike.

Have a brilliant day.

Love,

Angela