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Tabouleh

Submitted by rory on Mon, 06/07/2009 - 13:23

Summary

Yield
Servings
SourceMadhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian
Prep time2 1⁄2 hours

Description

A Middle Eastern salad. As bulghur wheat is precooked this salad requires only soaking and no real cooking. You can serve it on a plate with other salads, such as bean and yoghurt salads or with whole aubergines (egg plants). In Lebanon, they like to pick up this salad with the crisp inner leaves of cos lettuce. It only takes 10 minutes to make but you need to let the bulghur wheat soak for 2 hours.

Ingredients

200gbulghur wheat (buy the small size if possible)
115gfinely chopped onion
250gfinely chopped parsley
3Tgood virgin olive oil
4Tlemon juice
1 1⁄4tsalt

Instructions

Bring 1 litre of water to the boil in a medium-sized pan. Take it off the heat and drop the bulghur into it. Cover and set aside for 2 hours. (The bulghur will swell and soften.) Set up a colander in the sink and line it with a clean tea towel. Empty the pan of bulghur into the colander. Gather up the ends of the tea towel and twist, squeezing out as much of the water as possible. Put the bulghur in a large bowl and fluff it out. Add the remaining ingredients - the parsley, olive oil, lemon juice and salt. Mix thoroughly and serve at room temperature or cold.

Notes

Great to eat at summer BBQs and the like. Madhur Jaffrey's book is available at Amazon here.

Red Mojo Sauce

Submitted by rory on Sat, 27/06/2009 - 07:11

Summary

Yield
Servings
SourceOrganic Gardening Magazine
Prep time5 minutes

Description

Traditionally this 'pesto' - sauce is served with new potatoes that have been roasted in their skins in olive oil. It is equally delicious when the potatoes have been steamed or boiled. Fresh rather than dried thyme is essential. Once you've got all the ingredients this is really easy to make - this recipe has become an essential ingredient at any summer BBQ at the McPherson's.

Ingredients

1tspcumin seeds
3clvgarlic
1tspsalt
2 1⁄2tsppaprika (or 1 dessert spoon)
3tbspolive oil
2tsplemon juice

Instructions

1. Toast the cumin seeds without letting them burn and grind them to a powder. 2. Crush the peeled garlic with the salt and then mix them with the ground cumin. 3. Add the paprika (1 dessert spoon or 2.4 teaspoons) and thyme and mix again. 4. Stir in enough olive oil (2 - 3 tablespoons should be about right) to make a fairly soft paste, and mix in the lemon juice to sharpen the taste. Taste it, and add a little more salt and/or lemon depending on what you find. If you want more of a sauce than a paste, stir in a little hot water and mix well. We've never done this and usually serve it straight from the pestle and mortar. 5. Mix the sauce with potatoes while they are still warm to take the edge off the raw garlic and to help the flavours blend.

Notes

The sauce will last in the fridge a few days (but we've always gobbled it up straight away!), and is just as good with rice or pasta, or fish, or chicken, or simply spread it on toast. We use it at our summer BBQs and is a hit with our family and friends.

Roasted Shoulder of Lamb

Submitted by rory on Tue, 16/06/2009 - 05:00

Summary

Yield
Servings
SourceRiverford Meat Box
Prep time3 hours

Description

Delicious and easy main course that is extremely succulent. It only takes minutes to prepare, however it takes 3 hours to roast.

Ingredients

1kgshoulder of lamb
2Tolive oil
1 bunch of fresh oregano
2Tlemon juice
2 cloves of garlic
1 glass of white wine

Instructions

Rub the shoulder with oil, lemon juice and seasoning. Scatter with crushed garlic (I added 5 cloves of wet garlic) and torn oregano and roast for 20 minutes at Gas Mark 7 or 220 degrees C before reducing the oven temperature to Gas Mark 3 or 170 degrees C, now pour in the wine (we actually used red wine and it was fabulous) and cook for a further 2 and a half hours - basting a couple of times and covering loosely with foil if it begins to dry out.

Notes

I took the foil off 20 minutes before the end of the cooking time and then left it for 15 minutes on another plate out of the oven to rest - it was delicious. The recipe called for herb couscous with preserved lemon, but we had it with potatoes cooked in the same roasting pan as the lamb. I served it with a salad made using home grown lettuce and cucumber and it was delicious with the meat falling off the bone. There is enough left over for the next day when I'll make a lamb salad.

Family Photo

Posted May 2nd, 2009 by rory
in

Below are various improvements to the only family photograph that we have.  Bill took it back in 2005, however he must have moved because the image in the original is slightly blurred - that is what I am trying to improve. 

I have tried various techniques in the Gimp and I think that with more work the grain merge technique looks the most promising - what do think?  I know it is too light but I think with more work I can correct this.  Which effort should I spend most time on?  I also tried cropping the image slightly in two of the images to remove the date...again what do you think?  I know that sharpening will enhance even the blurred edges so I think that's out and I will also reduce the reflections in the glasses.

Please note these images are very low quality, so please don't bother printing them.

piratebay.org

Posted April 18th, 2009 by rory
in

With all the coverage of TPB in the media at the present time perhaps now is the time to look at alternatives.  I know that TPB is not going away soon whilst the appeals process is ongoing and the servers have been relocated to the Netherlands (and alternatives will pop-up) - but take a look at oneswarm. It's available for Linux as well as windows.  I think some kind of anomynity giving client will be the future of p2p, whether it's oneswarm or some other piece of software - it will happen.

Oneswarm is a friend-to-friend 'darknet' file sharing protocol so will probably take off in university campuses first, you can watch a video here that explains oneswarm.