Sarah Discovers How to Eat – Progress Report #5 [October]

Facts & Figures

It’s been 153 days… and I’ve done 168 recipes. This means I’m doing 1.09 recipes a day.

But you know what, I just realized that my recipe rate, the figure on which I’d been basing my progress, is all bullshit. See on the sidebar on the right-hand side of the screen, the “About” section? I’ve written “385 recipes in 365 days”… meaning I’d need to do 1.05 recipes per day in order to get through them in time. So, as long as I do more than 1.05 recipes a day, I’m fine. When I started the project, I counted 385 recipes in the book, but as I’m going through it I keep discovering new recipes, hidden in sidebars, as suggestions and so on. So the actual number of recipes in the book is probably closer to 400. Which would mean I’ve probably fallen behind… ah crap.

Well, if I’ve done at least 200 by the mid-point (i.e. end of December), then I figure I should be fine. I hope.


Hits

Fairycakes (Feeding Babies and Small Children)
Beef Stroganoff (Fast Food)
New Potatoes with Truffle Oil (Weekend Lunch)
Rice Pudding (Weekend Lunch)
Lamb with Garlicky Tahina (Fast Food)
Chicken with Morels (One & Two)
Linguine alle Vongole (One & Two)
White Tiramisu (Cooking in Advance)
Children's Couscous (Feeding Babies and Small Children)
Ratatouille (Cooking in Advance)
Translucent apple tart (Weekend Lunch)
Apple and Walnut Crumble (One & Two)
Scallops and Bacon (One & Two)


Misses

Er… if I had to chose a “miss” it’d probably be the pea orzotto – but that’s only because the stock I used sucked balls. Massel stock cubes rock, but their liquid stocks obviously suck. The orzotto itself was fine.


My progress

So those 5 kilos I gained still haven't gone anywhere... not that I'm getting any complaints, thank-you very much. Mmm'hmm. But I just had a flick through my older posts and realised that I bitch about my weight / exercise / lack of motivation quite a lot. In fact, I think I'm almost starting to sort of sound like a Bridget Jones type of character - YUCK. There's nothing I hate more than that self-obsessive, microanalysing chick-lit bullshit, which is so pointless and never actually gets anywhere. So, I've decided to stop bitching about that kinda stuff here and just get on with it.

In terms of cooking, I realised that I still haven't totally overcome my pork aversion. I'm fine with bacon, but I've yet to cook any of Nigella's hams or pork roasts. There are four hams and three roast porks in the book. I have to get cracking on them if I don't want to arrive at May next year, with one week left on the project and seven pigs to slay.

I also want to entertain a lot in the next few months to get through more recipes (and because entertaining is fun!). Exams finish on the 21st of November (thank God!) and then I have 3 months of freedom, in which I am just gonna cook cook and cook! If you want a special Nigella-meal made for you, book in early!

xox Sarah