The alternative way to slice vegetable.

Yesterday my mother told her friends that I was rich. My little daughter had said to her that 'mummy was making pancakes', which she translated as 'mummy is making packets.' !!

This is another one of those comforter dishes, and was made in commiseration of the (anticipated) Scotland defeat by Ireland in the Six-nations Rugby tournament yesterday. Scotland have gloriously lost every single match so far, and are on their way to collecting 'The Wooden Spoon'. Perhaps they may redeem themselves in the Calcutta Cup, the Six-Nation match between Scotland and 'the auld enemy' England, in March.

This dish is comfort food in anticipation that Scotland will loose (again) against Ireland in the Six-Nations Rugby tournament this afternoon.

This weekend I had one and a half surprise guests who brought with them offerings of meat; so I thought I'd share this lovely picture of my medium-rare sirloin steak with onions, pepper sauce, rice, spinach and avacado. Unfortunately in my mind this looks more like entrails on top of entrails, but I can assure you it tasted lovely. We fried the steak with seasoning and a little red wine; the pepper sauce was not home-made, but a half a ready-made packet that I had floating around in the back of my cupboard.

This dish was cooked yesterday evening for a fellow artist and occasional co-conspiritor on projects. It was served with garlic bread, rocket leaves, avacado and washed down with a crisp Pinot Grigio. Following our meal we watched 'The City of Lost Children' a film about an evil scientist who kidnaps children to steal their dreams. The film was directed by Jeunet of Delicatessen fame, and as you would imagine, was a darkly cinematic experience.

The meat on the left is Tafelspitz for which my dictionary only gives a translation of prime beef boiled. This you can find everywhere in eastern Austria. But the more important part is the pumpkin stew here as a side dish which makes a good main meal by itself. This style of Styrian Pumpkin I love and it was cooked for me by my mother on 45th birthday.
I didn't have the chance to ask her for a detailed recipe, so for the time being take this one