Saturday, 1 June 2013

Another Fish Pie, A BIG Salad & Two Meals Out! Tuesday to Friday May 29th - 31st 2013

Two meals out, and two 5:2 fasting days to make up for them... that's the way to do it!

Monday's pilaf was fasting day one... and Friday's Big Salad (not calorie counted, but only one meal that day) , with Wednesday's Fish Pie, reprising the Famous Winning Fish Pie of last Thursday being sandwiched by another Veggie Board and a Bray's Cottage Pork Pie at the Bell E17 (for the quiz where we came sort of somewhere in the middle....) on Tuesday and a rather nice day out on Friday, with coffee and cake at the Delaunay Counter on the Aldwych in Central London, then pre-theatre dinner at Boyd's Brasserie at Trafalgar Square before seeing Sean Hughes in Life Becomes Noises at the Arts Theatre - good little show that, I would recommend it.

So: from the top then:

Tuesday: Veggie Board and a Bray's Cottage Pork Pie at the Bell E17. We had this last week before the quiz and fancied it again. It's very good value and plenty for two.




We didn't leave much........ it is rather tasty ...




Wednesday: Another Fish Pie... equally as yummy as before, but I fancied a little bit plainer, so just coley, egg and big fat prawns this time. With Halen Mons smoked water adding that extra oomph.





Day out up Town...

Started out with afternoon coffee and Black Forest Gateau at the Delaunay. This is the BEST chocolate and cherry cake I have ever had I think. The cake is soft delicate and chocolatey and there is lots of cream and cherry in every mouthful.

Of course, if you don't fancy Black Forest Gateau in all its decadent retroism, you can have something else.. or maybe something else as well.... it's all very tempting.

 








Onwards then to dinner at Boyd's, Now I rarely take pictures in restaurants, as I don't want to look too bloggity to other diners, but it was early, with very few other people around us, so I made sure the sound and flash were off and snapped away.



So please excuse the slightly grainy pics, which were rather dark, so I've brightened them up a bit for here, but the dishes are as they came to table, not prinked and moved about. I really would be too embarrassed to do that...

4 Tapas style starters to share, then Bob had salmon and I had steak and kidney pie, all from the rather reasonable pre-theatre menu.






Sadly the dish we both really fancied, a chicken and tarragon ballontine was off the menu, and had been replaced with the steak pie. Which was ok but...



The meat was tender and well trimmed, but the pastry lid had been cooked separately and popped on top to serve. I HATE THAT!!! Most of the point of a pie is the melding of the pastry and the filling. If you cook them separately you just have a stew and a lump of dry, flaky stuff. Not a pie. And to be honest, something I would expect in a very ordinary pub, not a restaurant.

Look, this is the UNDERSIDE... no gravy.. nothing to stop it flaking into shards that stuck to the top of my mouth....


Rant over. Until next time...The chicken would have been much nicer I am sure.. :(


Friday: home and another fasting day. After eating quite a bit yesterday, I was starving today. It is quite odd, that eating makes you hungry the following day, whilst NOT eating you can happily have very little and be happy. Surely your stomach can't shrink that quickly!!

So a bigger plate of food that perhaps I should have had, but lots of green salad and no dressing except for a small spoonful of coleslaw.





And another week's dinners over !!




2 comments:

  1. I'm with you as regards the tops of pies. The hotel where I used to work would serve these topless pies for staff lunches and they used to make me grind my teeth then. It's no real effort to just put the pastry on the top of the filling and bake it - no worse than baking the pastry on its own! You can have them all ready to go in advance, but I suppose it takes longer in the cooking, as you can't just heat up a pre-baked pie like you can a piece of pastry.

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    1. and I guess it is easier to make a pot of the filling (a stew is what it really is...) and just dollop it into the dish for serving. But a Pie is a sealed vessel.. the aromas and essential oils etc should stay sealed underneath the pie crust. The filling should steam in its own juices, hermetically, with nothing lost.

      A pie is not a stew with a pastry lid :(

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