The boys have had a tough day chasing bunnies and killing rubber chickens.

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Bekijk de afbeelding op ware grootteIn a week where it has been announced that Albert Heijn holds 32.8% of the Dutch supermarket market, I will be found shopping at the Aldi and the local farmers market.

I am the worlds worst grocery shopper and I dislike it intensely. If you ever see a mean looking English Woman shuffling around the grocery store, muttering to herself and throwing dirty glances at people having a good old chat whilst clogging up the aisle with their shopping trolleys, odds on it will be me.

Necessity has made me into one of those people that has to do a weekly shop on a Saturday. I try to get in and out within half an hour but I rarely succeed. I get distracted way too easily by all the yummy things that the grocery store always puts in prominent places and I always leave with way more stuff than I have on my list or need.

Since I have time this week I have changed my tactics. I will be visiting the store on a daily basis to see whats on offer before I decide what I will be feeding the Family Clog.
Tonight I made the ol favorite 'Spag Bol'.

Ingredients

500gm Ground Augustine - pantry
Handful Fresh Basil
1 Onion
Handful Mushrooms
2 Garlic toes - pantry
1 Red Bell Pepper
2 500gm Passata di Pomodoro
Seasoning - pantry
Spaghetti

Cost = 2.69 euro's
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This is the beginning diary entry of how I will attempt to feed the Family Clog over the next 5 days spending only 50 Euros on provisions.

(It's never gonna work but it will be interesting to try it!)


I will admit that I have the free use of 'Augustine' and an over full pantry. But please bear in mind that our typical grocery bill for a week normally adds up to 180 Euros!

Augustine was the lovingly raised steer of Cloggy's side kick, 'Old Neighbour Dude', who was recently dispatched to greener pastures courtesy of the local abattoir. Unbeknown to me Cloggy had negotiated an 8th of his mortal remains against services rendered and these are now stuffing up my freezer. I returned home from the grocery store to find that I had no room for the pizza's, ice-cream and Jagermeister that I had purchased!

The bequest had also been given as a kind of good neighbours award which begs the question "What kind of neighbours did they have before we moved in?"  WHATEVER - Never look a gift horse in the mouth, as my Grammy might say.

 Smallest Baby Clog has now turned vegetarian on us all of a sudden!

If she craves meat after 2 days there are always Cloggy'schickens that are cluckin' around the homestead with too much of a confident strut. Just because they are rare breed doesn't mean they can't also be table fodder!

Here's a video clip, taken last summer, of the freezer content. He's a bit pissed orf because 'Old neighbour Dude' had put his water trough behind an electric fence, which still enabled him to get to drink, but stopped him from knocking his water over just for the hell of it.

I think I'll be only eating veggies as well this week!

 


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Another Saturday and Another Winter Competition Hockey Game.


Middle Baby Clog and his squad of pre-pubesent retro-bates (collectively known as Haackey Jongens C1) managed to haul their carcases out of bed in time for a 12.30 start, except Steijn who got a right chew out from General Cloggy because he arrived half and hour late for warm up - which began at 11.30.
This weeks victims, ermmm - opponents, were Bully JB2 who, very quickly into the game, scored the opening goal. The score stayed at 0 -1 for the 1st half with Haackey JC1 being unable to convert their attacking plays into goals.
 
As you may imagine General Cloggy was not best pleased and it looked as if a very heated half time talk was delivered to the boys during the break. One can only guess what was said in the dug out but whatever it was it  worked.

The Haackey boys stormed into the 2nd half taking no prisoners in their march toward victory. They played a calculated and controlled game building the attack from their defensive line, making full use of the field and won a penalty corner. This was converted by a fast sneaky slip left with the ball being played into the goal behind a disorientated keeper and the crowd went mad!. 1 - 1.

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10 minutes later a ball, played into space from the half line, found the stick of a Haackey forward who converted the ball into the goal high and right. 2 - 1. Soon after a 2nd penalty corner was won but the ball was stopped on the line by a foot from the Bully defense. A penalty flick was awarded and converted. 3 - 1. In the dying moments of the game Haackey refused to give their opponents any respite and a fourth goal, from open play, was scored. End score 4 - 1 Haackey.

All the boys played an outstanding game which was enjoyed by the public but I have to say that Middle Baby Clog was awesome. Yes .. he made a few unforced errors but he more than made up for these with his work rate and technical skill - the kid commanded the right middle field giving his opponent no free space. Oldest Baby Clog umpired a solid game too.

A mad dash home and a quick shower - by Middle Baby Clog -  later, Family Clog were at the Cinema in Enschede for the 4.15 showing of Avatar 3D. It is an awesome movie which I strongly recommend even if you think you don't like that kind of stuff.
I can not remember the last time all of the Clogs were quiet at the same time for 3 hours in a row! We were going to go out and eat after the movie had finished but everyone was so stuffed with popcorn, nachos, candy and ice cream that we opted to skip dinner. Not very healthy but once in a while that's o.k.

 


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Its been one of those days when time just got away from me and my best intentions of inflicting another culinary master piece on Family Clog disappeared down the pan.


A combination of work and a knackered boiler scuttled my plans for making Coq Au Van, the recipe of which, I had found in the 'Four Seasons Cookery Book' written by Margaret Costa. Lack of time meant that I resorted in feeding the Clogs store bought Chicken Cordon Bleu, mashed potatoes and frozen pea's. What a let down. I did feel somewhat indignant as I watched them tuck into the overly orange chicken as if they had been deprived of nourishment for the last 96 hours.
 

                                                                       


                                                       Thursday - Coq Au Van

Failed attempt - I sacrificed a good dinner for warmth and hot water!


The Heating Engineer was very pleasant sort of chap who commended the Cloggy Residential Boiler in its efforts to provide us with heat and hot water over the last year but quickly followed up his praise with "It's completely Knackered and there's Bugger all I can do to fix it - you'd best get a new one and quickly"!

The Dinosaur is 20 years old and its fought the valiant fight but there comes a time when its better to chuck out the old and bring in the new. Cloggy is shakin in his boots not only in anticipation of the bill but also because I have known him a bloody long time too!

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Onion Johnny was the nickname given to the French farmers that used to sell onions door-to-door in England, Wales and Scotland. Dressed in striped shirt and beret, riding a bicycle hung with onions, the Onion Johnny became the stereotypical image of the Frenchman.



I love onions, always have done. I think they are value for money and the multitude of scrummy dishes that you can make out of them is endless. My Grandfather also loved his onions and ate a raw one every morning of his entire adult life stating that they had medicinal qualities. He was rarely ill but it was always wise to give him a little extra personal space in the mornings otherwise you would of been knocked out by his oniony whiff.

 



Downside of cooking with onions is that you have to peel them and chop em up and this leads to enevitable tears. There are many different solutions to this problem including putting a spoon in your mouth, wearing contact lenses, soaking the onions in water, chewing gum, sticking your tongue out, and (my personal favorite) wearing your kids swimming goggles to ensure an airtight seal around your eyes! None of em work - you just have to get used to the tears.

Today's recipe called for 2.5 Kg of finely chopped onions so I sharpened my knife and made ready the Kleenex .........

                                          Wednesday - Pissaladière

I filched this recipe from the book 'Simple French Cooking' book written by Georges Blanc and Coco Jobard. It involves making a dough base which is roughly 1.5cm thick and sweating the onions in a heavy based pan until they are translucent but not caramelized. Add the onions to the dough base and then place tomatoes, anchovies and black olives on top then place in a hot oven and bake for 30 minutes.

Was very yummy and there is a small bit left over for my lunch tomorrow. No sarky comments about the slightly darkish bits around the edge please, Raymond Blanc I ain't!


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In 1987 the U.S. National Pork Board, began an advertising campaign to position pork as "the other white meat" due to a public perception of chicken and turkey (white meat) as more healthy than red meat.


Since then various splinter factions of the campaign have been formed proclaiming that the likes of Possums, Squirrels, Cats and Babies are the other white meat. 3 of these options are very dubious and 1 is illegal. There more suggestions available via the Google search engine but they are just silly!

 



                                                Tuesday - No Brainer Pork Chops and Mash

There's not much you can do to murder a pork chop so The Family Clog need not have looked so nervous as I prepared this evenings dinner.

I raided the January edition of 'Delicious' magazine for the basis of the recipe but chose to make a few changes due to the Baby Clogs palettes and cost of ingredients. I must of made the right changes as the dinner table this evening was silent apart from 'Happy Homer Simpson' type noises emanating from Middle Baby Clog - that boy sure does enjoy his food - and plates were scraped clean.

Basic Method;
Pork chops were rubbed with olive oil and seasoned and placed under a hot grill until nicely brown on both sides and served with slices of pre-prepared Garlic, Herb and Cracked Pepper Butter.

The mash was made in the normal way but I added a mixture of warm milk and cream that had been infused with fresh Thyme. To the mash I also added finely chopped raw andijvie (a kind of chicory) and red onion, better known in Swampland as Stamppot.

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nullI went to school in a period when home economic classes
were compulsory and the TV Chefs of the day were the likes of the 'Galloping Gourmet' and 'Fanny Craddock'.

My teacher was a red haired witch, called Mrs Morgan who, ultimately, gave up her quest to teach unruly offspring of  the Mods and Rockers Era basic fundamentals of cooking and went into politics for the local Labour Party in a Conservative borough.

She was a tough old bird and conducted her classes with a Narnia ice queen like rule. If you made the mistake of wearing nail polish to her class a withering glance, over the top of her black horn rimmed glasses, made you slouch up to her desk, where she kept a bottle of acetone and a basket of cotton wool, and remove the offending lacquer.

Did I enjoy her classes? NO!
Did I learn anything? HELL YES!

One of the first things Mrs Morgan taught us (and YES I remember it clearly) was how to make a Roux Sauce. I won't bore you with the details but from that day onwards I have always made a perfect roux - no lumps to be found with no sieving or whisking necessary. Milk, Flour, Butter and seasoning are the basic ingrediants and if you want to get fancy you can infuse the milk with herbs and other such malarky.

The use of Butter in cooking, these days, is frowned upon due to all sorts of discovered dietary blah-de-blahs but,  in my opinion, God would never of created the Cow if he had thought that an unsaturated fat/ low cholesteral product would be a suitable replacement.




Monday - The Ultimate MAKEOVER  Macaroni Cheese

I took the recipe from Februarys edition of the BBC Good Food magazine where they had given a nutritionist free reign to redesign a comfort food classic.
The task that she had been set was to make a low fat, low salt, alternative whilst still maintaining the wholesome flavour. The girl worked hard trying many different combinations of low fat cheeses, low fat milks, low fat creams, herbs, veggies  and no butter but had to resign in adding tomatoes in order to sell the dish on "providing half of the daily requirement of vitamin C"  in place of taste.
She did suceed in reducing the fat, saturated fat and salt content of the dish by half and proclaimed that we "can now enjoy this warming dish with far less guilt"!

It looked real pretty but its taste was so bland that even the dogs had to sniff it twice before they wolfed it down and my dogs don't bother to sniff the sh1t from Cloggys Chickens before they eat it! They have a very refined palette.


 

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I remade the dish using the time old roux recipe (WITH BUTTER), taught by Mrs Morgan, and added the tomatoes, spring onions, garlic, mustard powder and other banned ingredients that the nutritionist had included/excluded in her makeover and the results were pretty outstanding.

Moral of this story - If the recipe requires a roux sauce then never try and replace the butter!

I served the dish up with fresh baked bread rolls and a green salad with a honey and mustard dressing.


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It is a truth universally acknowledged by my family that when I get bored I cook!


There are 3 significant factors that have contributed to my present fit of boredom.

The first is the weather, snow is pretty and fun for a while but the continued arctic conditions that we have been experiencing in Swampland over the last few weeks is beginning to grate on my nerves.
The second is the economy, no-one has any money and if they do they are holding onto it. In my line of work, which is making sure stuff is built and delivered on time, the recession has hit hard and assignments are thin on the ground.
The third is that all the hockey has been called off due to a layer of snow on the astro turf. Normally at this time we are well into pre-seaon training and test games. 

This combination of factors has left me twiddling my thumbs and diving for the cookery books.

Cloggy and the Baby Clogs have taken my renewed interest in all things culinary with good spirit and only role their eyes at each other when 'they think I cant see them, they should know by now that I SEE EVERYTHING!

Now .... I am not gonna attempt a 'Julie & Julia'  style monologue but until the weather or the economy picks up, or I get bored of cooking too and find something else to fill my time, I'm gonna be writing about my Kitchen Nightmares.

                                         Sunday -  A proper beef & mushroom pie

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Couldn't be arsed to make a roast dinner, there is always way too much washing up involved, so opted to make a pie instead. The fact that pie making produces more washing up than a roast dinner has been duly noted!




Ingredients;- Beef, Carrots, Onions, Mushrooms, Bacon, flour, sugar, stock cubes, water, herbs and - my favorite - Beer.
Method;- Brown off the beef - Sweat the onions and carrots - Chuck the flour and sugar into the carrot/onions, stir it and then put the beef back in - Add the beer, stock cubes and hot water - stir it - add the herbs and bung it in the oven for 2 hours - fry the bacon bits and mushrooms - take beef out of oven and add bacon and mushroom - leave it to cool - Make pastry - Make pie - Cook it in oven for 40 mins and serve with somethng seasonal and green.

It was a great pie - very tasty!

 

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A Weekend of 'FIRSTS' for Knobbly Clog.



First Hockey Games ..... not that he noticed much as he was too busy chasing his tail.

On Saturday the Winter Hockey Competition kicked off a bit later than planned due to snow on the astro turf. The 2 youngest Baby Cloggys had games with General Cloggy at the helm providing the strategy and cunning tactics for the both teams.

Youngest Baby Clog and her team (Haackey Meisjes D2) were playing on a full field for the first time ever! This skirmish was at 'Bully' in Oldenzaal and nerves were high as Haackey was a man short. The opposition were over confident and fully expected an easy win but they underestimated the fanaticism of General Cloggy and his squad of tiny Banshee's. At half time the result was 0 - 0 but in the second half Haackey stormed ahead and secured a resounding win of 4 - 1. Youngest Baby Clog scored a fantastic goal from a penalty corner - a power shot from the top of the circle.

Middle Baby Clog and his team (Haackey Jongens C1) have been promoted to the 'sub-top' division and are using the winter competition to try out new games plans and field positions. Their regular coach is taking a well earned sabbatical over the winter break and has left them under the tender care of Cloggy for a few games. General Cloggys tactics have involved placing the boys into a higher age group for the winter competition and also changing all of their field positions with the forwards playing as defence and the defence playing as forwards.
Yesterday they played their first game against 'Twente' Jongens B2 and I have to say it was one of the best games I have ever seen them play. The boys from 'Twente' were giants and watching the 2 teams line up for the start of the game I must admit that I was a little nervous on behalf of the Haackey boys but my angst was unwarrented. Middle Baby Clogs team danced their way around the the giant opposition and logged in a 4 - 1 win. General Cloggy was resplendent in his coaching and was grinning like a Cheshire cat as he walked off of the field.

First Walk

Knobbly Clog was taken for his first 'big boy' walk this afternoon and I dressed him up suitably for the cold weather conditions. The Baby Clogs were unamused by Knobblys attire and told me that I was making the mutt into a 'meitje' but DAMN IT  I just don't care, he looked cute. Tonight he will curl up on my pillow and sleep the sleep of a well contented little puppy!
MANY THANKS  to the Wonderful Ladies at "Bibi Klamer" for designing, making and sending his little doggy coat, they not only make great clothes for kids but have an eye for designer practical doggy wear too! Here's a link to their website if you are curious;- link


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Overview

Lucky Cluck


Your chance to name Cloggys chickens
Good Grief Cloggy has FINALLY chosen names!
See the Blog on 24th December for details.

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I know it says Munster, Germany but I have found that this weather station gives the most accurate forecast for my corner of the Netherlands.

Twente tourist info



Site is in Dutch but easy enough to navigate
and I am always happy to translate.

HC Haackey




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