Sunday, August 07, 2005

Recovery

Can someone please tell me what happened to Low-Fat August? First, there was the compulsive licking of the bowls when I made the rhubarb ice-cream on Friday night...

...then on Saturday, the braised pheasant and pig’s bum for lunch (but technically this is ok, I’ve allowed myself “one full-fat meal and pudding per week”)...

...and then that night, a slice of the chocolate malteaser cake, which I made for my friend Adri’s graduation dinner. I’m ashamed to admit that I had a quite a bit of the icing and the leftover malteasers whilst I was making it, even though I’d been saying earnestly to anyone who’d listen, “I’m not going to eat the any of that cake! I’m being healthy this month!”

...and after the dinner, we went out for a few drinks and then onto a club. When I came home at, like 4am, having had a couple of drinks and nothing to eat for the past six hours, I saw the rest of the Pig's Bum and custard sitting on the kitchen bench...


The perfect amount of custard

...and I ate it before going straight to bed.

DG: omg how orgasmic does that look!

Mmm’hmm.

This morning (or afternoon, rather), I woke up, regretfully hungover (partly from the alcohol, but mainly from the food), and determined to have a more virtuous day of eating.

I had one portion of the vegetable curry in vegetable sauce with rice that I made on Friday. And because I had all the ingredients in the fridge, I also made the raita that Nigella suggests to go with. It was very yummy, and comforting because of the warm spiciness and carb-content, but not as calorifically stratospheric as traditional hangover fare (mozzarella in carozza, souvlakis, pancakes etc).

I eased myself into the day with this and an episode of Arrested Development.


Vegie curry, raita and skim-milk coffee

And onto dinner…

82. Salmon marinated in Den Miso (Low Fat)
83. Brown Rice Salad (Low Fat)


As I previously mentioned, I marinated the salmon on Friday night. The marinade is a mixture of miso paste, sugar, sake and mirin, cooked on a medium heat for 20 minutes. The marinade itself is very thick, and difficult to spread on the fish – I was almost ripping its flesh! But after a couple of days steeping, it softens, and a bit of liquid seeps out, so you can spread it on the fish more evenly. All you have to do then, is grill it!

I actually cooked the rice for the brown rice salad (a suggestion in the Low-Fat chapter) in the afternoon, with the intention of having a stash in the fridge for weekday lunches. But after smelling the cooked rice’s delicious, earthy aroma, I realized it would go perfectly with the salmon! To turn cooked brown rice into a salad, Nigella-style, you add soy sauce, mirin and dashi (I just used bottled soba-sauce for ease – it’s the same thing), spring onions, coriander, mint and sugar snap peas.


Brown rice salad


With den miso salmon

This was absolutely delicious! The fish is very strongly flavoured, but it perfectly complemented the plain-tasting rice salad. (You’d need to add a lot of soy if you wanted to eat the rice by itself). I can’t believe I got my family eating brown rice!

Dad: Wait, you say this is low fat?! WOW!

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