Sticky Wicket

Bit of a funny Monday, brain was doing a go-slow and I couldn't seem to get going, not good when you're supposed to be producing decent food en masse!

All I managed the whole morning was sticky toffee pudding (good) and some pumpkin ravioli - bit pathetic for 4 hours to be honest and the ravioli was a monster mission, it made the tagliatelle of a few weeks ago seem like a non-starter, you've to roll it so much thinner, you have to be able to read the morning paper through it which means about 25 trips through the pasta roller, it must have been dizzy by the time I'd finished with it. Yummy filling, pumpkin roasted slowly (it didn't have an option since it was in my hands for the morning) with fennel seeds, garlic, a touch of chilli, ricotta and parmesan and then once the ravioli is finished and cooked, a touch of sage butter, not at all bad.

I woke up a little over lunch thank God, nothing like a few seriously strong cups of coffee to get you sorted. Afternoon demo was with Pam and there were some truly delish things on the menu for the day - our first introduction to squid and how to get them from slimy tube thing with many more legs than me to rings you can pan grill in garlic butter. And the fun didn't stop there, it was straight onto lamb and how to butterfly it, or in other words get rid of the whole leg bone, knee bit and all, so that you can either cut it up easily or stuff it and roast it or something. For us, it was about cutting it up and turning it into the most fantastic curry, fair bit of cream I'm afraid and loads of different toasted spices and lime juice and oh my, so good in the end especially with these two brilliant chutneys that follows - fresh apple and mint, amazing, and tamarind and banana, and then to really get the party started a hat trick of Indian breads - your good old favourite, naan, and two others, pooris which are new to me, deep fried and thus I'm sad to say, fantastic, and chapatis which are huge in East Africa and just totally delish.

The Middle Eastern theme continued with pears poached in saffron syrup and cardomom (just loved them, think I might add those to my final practical exam menu, yes I've still made no decisions and we have to submit them in a few days time), a prune dish which wasn't my best to be honest (not a bad thing considering the typical after effects of a prune eating session) and then our first introduction to filo pastry which I'm beyond pleased to tell you we don't actually make, I wouldn't know even vaguely where to start, the sheets are so thin you could use them as printing paper if you didn't have a ream of A4 handy. So it's just about using filo rather than producing it, the relief! We wrapped it around an almond orange mixture, not too shabby and then to complete the picture there were a few lassis to try which are chilled Indian drinks made with yoghurt and all sorts of flavourings and my taste of the day, ginger and lime lemonade or I suppose that should be lime-ade, just incredible and we all need to be drinking masses of anything containing ginger at the moment - everyone is sick and ginger really helps, it's a natural anti-biotic and I'm desperate not to get sick again so it's going to be ginger all the way!