I love a culinary challenge - Days 179 to 183

By the river Dão with Baby pug dog

I love a culinary challenge, and have certainly been presented one here. I hate waste, and free food is free food, so what to do?

We arrived ready to cook roast chicken for Mary and Mike before they left, and with some cubed pork that was going cheap!. Obviously I have a great store cupboard in Ted, staples and spices, but what I hadn’t expected was all the veggies that were growing here.

Mike had said in an email: There will be lots of asparagus & some cauliflowers, other greens & watercress if you like it, all bio, of course.

Four more eggs ready to be collected

Camembert with cured ham, asparagus, carrot, celery and bread

What we actually have here is: Eggs, asparagus, watercress, cauliflower, oyster mushrooms, sweet potatoes, espinacia ( like spinach apparently) rocket, lemons, oranges, broccoli, Swiss chard, some other green similar leafy thing, kohlrabi, mint, thyme, sage and tarragon.

We went to LIDL, as had to buy fruit for breakfasts, so smoked and fresh salmon seemed obvious things, (to go with asparagus) and then there were pork chops and chicken thighs going cheap. It’s just as well we hadn’t bought any eggs since Christmas, as we are trying hard, but not keeping up with the three egg a day average production. We are also not keeping up with the asparagus glut, despite trying our best and having varying amounts for seven of the last eight days!

It's not every day that you can hang washing out overseen by peacocks

Pork chops, cauliflower cheese, potato and sweet potato wedges

We started off with a pork stir fry with fresh broccoli, and asparagus and finishing up my little bits of pepper and courgette, so that was some good tidying. The following day was a weird sounding, but surprisingly good, salad of little potatoes, boiled and then quickly fried, with mushrooms, (oyster and button) and asparagus, on a bed of watercress with a poached egg on top (wish I’d had two as B did, but I was a little uncertain...) Classy smoked salmon and asparagus risotto, with stock made from the chicken carcass (with watercress garnish) was followed by BBQ pork steaks, the marinade for which I will never be able to repeat as there are all sorts of chilli sauces in the fridge and cupboard, with salads. Greek salad, as the half pack of feta, and the cucumber came with us, and a kohlrabi and carrot slaw with cumin and fennel seeds. Couscous, and the end of our beetroot. I also BBQ’d the last of the cubed pork from day 1 and it’s in the freezer, along with the strippings of the chicken carcass, waiting to be made into special fried rice, to accompany the lemon chicken and stir fried greens as recommended by Crystal.

Photo montage of peacocks one morning with our thoughts imagining what they were saying

BBQ pork steaks with Greek salad, watercress, slaw & couscous

I sent a message out, on about day 3, to Crystal (our Chinese representative), Manu (our Indian representative) and Helen (our vegetarian representative) asking for inspiration. I had ideas, but thought some help might be good! What I hadn’t quite accounted for was how much we actually had with us, as we then had to bake the Camembert, that I like to keep as a standby in the fridge, they have a long date on them, as does the readily available thinly sliced cured ham, so as I usually have carrots and celery for dipping all you then need is bread. Sadly they were coming to the end of their dates so had to go, with the addition of asparagus for dipping obviously!

Pork chops, with cauliflower cheese (with mushrooms, asparagus and sweet corn) and potato and sweet potato wedges was easy and homely. So last night a bit more of a challenge using the rest of the cured ham for eggs benedict with asparagus....6 eggs, in one meal. It was very luxurious, but did need two of us!

Baby dog and peahen hoover up a broken biscuit put out for the peacocks

Eggs Benedict with asparagus and cured ham

Tonight will be from scratch spaghetti carbonara (with asparagus?) and tomorrow butternut squash (bought to go with the roast) chickpea, kohlrabi and espinachia curry. We’ve then got a feta, mint and pea (ok, asparagus) omelette (thanks Helen) the Chinese banquet (thanks Crystal) and I did buy some steak going cheap yesterday.... all to be rounded off with a salmon and asparagus quiche, which we thought we’d have, to welcome Mike home.

If I’ve missed out anything obvious, answers on a postcard please!

Baby looking very much like ET having been put in the bike basket to see if we could take her for a ride. 

We took her for a tiny ride, but she didn't like it

It’s not just been me, Brian has baked two lemon drizzle cakes, made lemon dainty - a pudding my mum used to make and egg custard, and is just trying to decide when he should do apple crumble (with stewed apples that came with us from Tony and Nicky, in Scotland, in August, with proper custard. Oranges for breakfast and he’s also sliced and frozen a whole lemon for G&T! Anything else? Oh yes, egg and bacon sandwiches for breakfast/lunch....

So apart from harvesting ingredients, thinking about food, surfing the web for recipes and cooking, have we been doing anything else? In truth, not much, relaxing with Baby dog, who is a real equal opportunities employer, no favourites, won’t walk till we are both ready. She has a real problem when we get back from her walk and B goes over the bridge (which she does bravely do, but not every day, as it’s hard on little paws. We did watch a jogger carry his Labrador over the bridge on the weekend, wuss,) to get something from Ted while I prepare to walk at snail pace, with her, up the last big hill towards home. In this instance I usually win, but she’d quite happily wait. Today we thought about taking her for a cycle, but her little solid body was a bit of a squeeze in the basket, she did look like E.T. though. So B went for a cycle, while Baby and I went to look at the river, which I’ve wanted to sit and look at since we arrived. 

Spaghetti carbonara made from scratch (except for the spaghetti)

Selfie of Baby and Jackie while Brian went for a ride

The peacocks are funny, but trying to count nine can take all day, but it’s “hurrah!l when you do, they are a great warning system, though most of the time we don’t know what they are warning about! However, when B set off Ted’s alarm, intentionally, to see if I could hear it, I could, but so could the peacocks, who really started shouting, so no chance of missing that, even if inside watching TV, so that’s reassuring! We’ve had peacocks in the house and ticks on the Baby, all part of life housesitting? And now? Well it’s time to go and feed chickens, collect eggs, oh, and I must cut some asparagus...... Brian has just announced we can take some of this to the village shop, hurrah. Before our newly established routine (new to Baby, not to us) of a sundowner and crisps on the sofa on the veranda. There is a perfect spot for Baby between us, and she knows now, walk, bit of dinner prep and drink. She got very confused the other evening when walk was a bit earlier, I prepped, and then B started, she kept going to the sofa and looking at me with her big eyes!

Having to chivy peacocks up the path on our way back from walking Baby dog

Yesterday we decided to let the chickens out of their house as they like to chomp away at grass occasionally. No sooner were they out than the peacocks moved in....

...They seemed very comfortable, one up on the chickens perch, one eating the chickens food and daddy peacock just chilling out. We had to go in and herd them out as the chickens wouldn't go back in with them there

Today's lunch at the weekly market in Santa Comba Dão. A whole chicken cut up, mountains of fabulous chips, salad, bread and a half litre of wine, €13 for us both. We cycled the 25km round trip along the cycle way rather than drive the car!

Here's a little video of our cycle ride into Santa Combo Dão: