Crappy cooking...

I'm having a week of it. At least the alliteration has returned, I guess that's something. No? Well, my back is bad again, I've resorted to Raul Esparza in Company to cheer myself up. I've also decided that "Marry me a little" if taken out of context has both the most beautiful sentiment and also is just stunning (although I concede Lauren, I hear the nasalliness - it's a word! - just before the final crescendo).

For the uninitiated... from 2007s amahzing Broadway production of Company... Raul Esparza singing Marry me a little (although I actually prefer "Being Alive" that would be too much of a tangent even for me!)

So crappy cooking, well it's more of a case of unattractive cooking. This week, I decided to make cabbage soup; I promise I'm not dieting, it's just the veg box people have decided to fill my box with brassicas - a one person box contained; broccoli, curly kale and a head sized cabbage. Nice. In my attempt to introduce some more vegetables into my diet (well you try being on co-codamol for 8 weeks and tell me how you feel!) and in response to the spat of chilly weather we've had this week I thought I'd make the soup I linked to here. In true thrifty, credit crunchy style I increased the quantity to use up all the brassicas, and froze half. However, I should probably have eaten some first. I'd also used my clearly honed cookery skills to know that adding some extra vegetables (carrots, broccoli, and cauliflower) would only enhance the flavour, and also substituted pancetta for bacon owing to the crapness of the local supermarket. However, that's a whole other post and the reason for the distinct lack of houmous in this one. But don't get me started. No, really don't.

Where was I? Oh yes, so I've merrily adapted the soup, and it looks, well, erm... green? So I decided to blitz it. Although not directed to in the recipe I thought it might perk it up a bit. So now I have well, erm... green sludge. With eyes closed and a deep breath I tasted some. Salty. Now, it's a family joke that I don't add salt to anything. But I do like the saltiness of things like bacon and marmite. We're talking sea salty. Oyster salty. And don't say potatoes, it already has potatoes in it. Not happy. In fact distinctly grumpy about the soup. But budget constraints mean it needs to be eaten. So far I've found that diluting the soup with boiling water before heating through tempers the saltiness slightly. Enough at least.

I decided that the soup needed bread. And I haven't made much (any?) bread since I moved into the new place. So last night I decided on my usual half and half loaf, with a few tablespoons of linseeds in (co-codamol again). Only I didn't think about the quantities I was using at all, just dumped them in the breadmaker and let it do it's job. And I ended up with a mishapen blob of bread. Nice. It tastes great. Yay! At least an improvement of the soup of DOOM there, but does look like the offcuts from a bakery or something.

So a week of crappy cooking... tonight I'm having Delia baked potatoes. Hopefully even I can't mess that up. Hopefully. And should I ever be able to find any tinned chickpeas, I'll post about houmous and pitta bread. Promise.

The weekend may hold some excitement, if the back permits I'm going on an outing to Borough market, so fingers crossed a report will be on it's way!