Lockdown Day 7 (Tuesday)

LUNCH
baked potatoes
leftover red cabbage
mozzarella (from Lidl, very good) and tomatoes
hummus – see TRICK below

TEA
Made fairy cakes with the toddler – see ‘RECIPE’ below.

SUPPER
Shepherds pie – see RECIPE below.
Peas (frozen)

HUMMUS – TRICK
There are dozens of hummus recipes on the internet and I wouldn’t dream of adding to them, though I’d point you towards Felicity Cloake’s How to Make the Perfect Hummus.
Anyway the toddler rejects my homemade hummus which is dispiriting.
What she will eat though is any shop-bought hummus, mixed up with cooked chickpeas (or any white beans) from a tin or jar.
You need a food processor.
This has the advantage of reducing the overall salt content, making the hummus go further, and getting more beans into her (this counts as a vegetable!)

Experiment with the proportion, if I add too many chickpeas the toddler rejects it. I aim for about half shop-bought hummus and half chickpeas, whizzed up til ‘no lumps’.

You can then keep half in the fridge and freeze the other half – hummus freezes very well. So do any leftover chickpeas.

FAIRY CAKES – “RECIPE”

We didn’t even measure the amounts – I wasn’t planning to eat them…
About a tablespoon of butter
About a tablespoon of sugar
1 egg (I’m starting to be very conscious of how many eggs we use now the country seems to be running out)
About 2 tablespoons of self-raising flour
A dash of milk
Pink food colouring

Allow toddler to put ingredients into a bowl, mixing well between each one. (Use a very large bowl, stops too much slopping over the side.) Stir with huge enthusiasm, splattering the kitchen. Spoon into paper cases. Cook 8-10 minutes til top springs back. Let toddler eat all of them. (Made about 6)

SHEPHERDS PIE – RECIPE

Frozen lamb from freezer
Potatoes (including leftover potatoes from lunchtime)
1 onion
1 carrot
leftover pieces of tomato from lunch
flavourings – stock cube, tomato ketchup, worcestershire sauce

Peel and cut up potatoes and boil til soft.
Put onion and carrot into small cubes and fry gently in olive oil.
To save on washing up, ideally do this in a saucepan that can also go in the oven.
Whizz up frozen lamb in food processor into small pieces (not too fine).
Add to onion, cook 2-3 minutes stirring every so often.
Add water, not too much, to get the kind of sloppy consistency you want, remembering the mixture will get drier during cooking (I still haven’t managed to get this right, still trying.)
Add flavourings to taste – this time i used a beef stock cube (we’ve run out of any other stock powder), worcestershire sauce and about 1 tablespoon tomato ketchup. Add a bit of salt to taste.
If your saucepan can’t go in the over, transfer mixture to a pie dish.
Drain potatoes, mash and spoon roughly over the top. Add any leftover baked potatoes from lunchtime – scoop out the middle with your fingers and mash in.
Cook 15-20 minutes til very hot and bubbling.
We ate this with frozen peas.

I had a couple of friends checking in today on the phone and also had a family Zoom chat. I think the shock and unrealness of last week is wearing off, and everyone is realising that we’re in this for the long haul and trying to come to terms with that. I still can’t used to the quiet of the city – no cars, no planes, no crashing of bottles early morning from the pub, indeed no noise from the pub at all. No Sunday night live music. No voices from the street.

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