Last night, our central heating system became possessed and started growling. This morning it began snarling, then went into a full on whining howl ... and then went dead silent.
Yeah, kippered fan which brings the lot to a halt.
So, tonight we're at the mercy of the elements in a stone house built in the 1820s and temperatures just below zero.
We have one halogen heater with one bar dead, two fan heaters (might as well sit around a match), but the star of the show is the solid fuel burner in the main room. It doesn't half heat up the house, chimney breast, so the bedroom is nice and toasty, downstairs is actually warmer than usual, but the other bedrooms, dining room and kitchen are freezing!
I swear ... it was warmer in Iceland!
Anyway, dinner, and we had a comfort dish ...
I made up a "bake" of Atlantic coley, leek, celery, mushroom, garlic, asparagus, cabbage, mashed potato, chive, cream and mature cheddar.
Folks looking for a recipe should understand that this was a "use up" dish made from whatever I had around. The focus for the bake is some tail-ends of coley fillets, diced; everything else was simply whatever I could pluck from the vegetable store.
So, that's the ingredients for the coley bake ... just warm it all through in a frying pan, tossed in goose fat.
Meanwhile, some potatoes are boiling away for mashing and a couple of eggs boiling.
Once mashed, fold in the rest of the ingredients and tip out into an ovenproof dish, more cheddar over the top, sea salt, black pepper, chopped hazelnut crumbs and re-bake in the oven.
Set a good handful of chopped kale steaming and fry off a couple of halibut steaks. This should take about 8-10 minutes.
Serve out with a good portion of the coley bake, alongside which the steamed kale and halibut steak can sit. Garish with the boiled egg.
Gorgeous!
Thank God for thermals, that's all I can say. So, should I carry on with cold thermogenesis and have an ice cold plunge bath this evening?
