Mixed results .....

So this week I have been getting back in to my healthy veggie cooking after Christmas's scoff-fest. My Christmas gift from my in laws was two vegetarian cookbooks that I had had my eye on for a while - Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian, and Verdura, Vegetables Italian Style by Viana La Place - and I was keen to get  started on their yummy recipes.

Last night, as promised, was my first attempt at gnocchi with a Sorrento style tomato and mozzarella sauce from Verdura.



 The gnocchi was a lot of fun to make, but the texture of the finished product was a little off and I am not sure why. Maybe I over- or under-under kneaded the dough? Perhaps the water wasn't at the right temperature? Should I have left them to dry a little longer before cooking them?




More research is required, I think, and a trip to a decent Italian restaurant so I can properly savour the real deal and see what to aspire to!!




My sauce, on the other hand, was delicious!! Just the right amount of creamy yet still healthy - yay! I was a little disappointed that the sauce seemed to separate on the plate - Hubby reckons it was because of the mozzarella - something else to research, I suppose! It didn't spoil the taste, though, and all in all I give this dish 5/10 with definite potential.



On Sunday night Hubby and I delved into our Madhur Jaffrey books (her Ultimate Curry Bible has been Hubby's go-to book for years) and created an awesome curry feast! I made Punjabi style Cauliflower and Potatoes (or Aloo Gobi, to give it it's proper name) with a yoghurt herb dip and home made chapatis. Hubby decided at the last minute that we should have something beany and saucy to go with, so he threw together a quick, yet utterly delicious, red bean curry.

The red bean curry probably needed a little longer for the flavours to settle and mix properly, but dear God, it was one of the yummiest curries I have ever had, and definitely something I will be having a go at in the future!!

My offerings were equally delicious! Now, if I had read the recipe for the Aloo Gobi properly I would not have filed it under healthy as the potatoes are basically shallow fried into chips (or fries, depending on which side of the pond you are reading this ...) I don't think I did this bit properly as even after extended cooking time some of the potatoes were a little undercooked, but still edible. I will definitely be boiling them next time as I don't see how frying them improves the final dish.

Anyway, once they were combined with the stir fried cauliflower and mix of ginger, turmeric, cayenne, cumin & coriander they were delicious!!

The chapatis were simple and fun to make, but they were a little crispy and brittle. I know my pan wasn't hot enough to start so this could be the reason, but I think also I could have kneaded the dough a bit better - I kind of cheated and used my Kitchenaid and i think there wasn't enough dough for it to work with properly. I am looking forward to having another go though, as they would be a great addition to our dinner table.

I'm going to give this meal 7/10 and I know I can get this up to a 9 or a 10 with some practise.

You can expect to hear about lots more meals from these books as I work my way through them, but I won't be able to share the recipes like I can when I when I find them on the internet - aside from being too lazy to type them out for you I'm fairly sure the authors wouldn't be too happy about me posting their recipes online!!

Well, I had best get started on my tasks for the day. I'm focusing on my organisation goal today and re-organising upstairs - in preparation for new year's eve I cleared up all the crap lying around downstairs and it is now all lying around upstairs - whoops!! If you don't hear from me by tomorrow I may be trapped under a pile of shoes in my closet ..... x

Hap hap happy new year!!! :-)

Happy new year, peoples!! I hope you all had a wonderful festive season! How did you bring in the new year? We toyed with the idea of going up to San Francisco again this year, but decided to stay home and have friends round instead - and I'm so glad we did as we had one of the best new year's eves ever!

The plan was simple - dress up like we were going to a really posh party, then eat, drink and be merry!

The girlies were all looking fabulous!








And the boys were looking terribly dapper! Hubby was particularly happy for an excuse to get his kilt out!






And I was happy for an excuse to get my posh dishes out and set the table up all fancy! I really don't do that as often as I should (what's the point in having a nice dinner set if you don't bloody use it?!?!) and have decided that this year I will be making more of an effort, but more about resolutions later ....

Heather brought some delicious crostini with avocado and bacon bits, and Cameron made his legendary jambalaya (which I was delighted to enjoy again for my lunch for the next couple of days!) I made a lemon tart but sadly it was a bit shit :-( It was really really bitter compared to the last time I made it, but most people ate up and claimed they enjoyed it. Thank you for lying!!

Heather was also in charge of champagne cocktails and much bubbly was consumed :-)

Midnight definitely did not find us setting off fireworks, singing Auld Lang Syne and generally being a public nuisance in the park at the end of the street. It was another group of piss heads - honestly  ...!! 

The drinking and nonsense continued back at the house, and we called it a night at a very civilized 2am.

A huge thank you to Katy, Cameron, Heather, Jared & Erin for joining us for the celebrations - you all helped make it a very memorable night!! :-)

And now to those pesky new year's resolutions .... I hate calling them resolutions! Lets call them my goals for the coming year :-) They're actually mostly the same as last year's, with a few updates and a couple of new ones.

1) Topping the list again is diet and exercise! From a health point of view, Hubby and I still have some work to do on our cholesterol so this will be a priority this year. Cutting back on the vino will also be up there! 

From a vanity point of view, I managed to lose about 15lbs last year and I am almost back to my happy size - hurrah!! I still have another 10-15lbs to go, and a lot of toning up, so hopefully this year I can crack it. No, wait, positive mental attitude, young lady!! This IS the year I will get to my goal!!

2) Up next is my cooking. Ive made a lot of progress this year and have really enjoyed making new stuff. I shall continue adding to my repertoire and try and make some more complex dishes. I will also be paying a lot more attention to presentation - my offerings may taste great, but they almost always look like they've been made a retarded monkey! 

We will also be aiming to have a lot of dinner parties this year to give me an excuse to challenge myself, and also to get my aforementioned fancy dishes out :-)

3) My guitar and sewing machine are still gathering dust, unfortunately, and I will try and do something about that. We will probably be moving house in April so I will try and find a guitar teacher in whatever area we end up in and get serious about learning as it really is something I have always wanted to do! The sewing machine will probably continue to gather dust ....

4) My blog entries are still a bit sporadic, and the silences are usually just because I'm lazy or I've got so much to say that I don't know where to start! I do really enjoy writing the blog, so perhaps I will set aside an hour a day to just sit and see if I have anything worth telling you about?

5) A new entry for this year is to be less anti-social. This may seem strange to some of you who may know me as the life and soul of the party (or perhaps the crazy bitch who wont shut up?) but aside from a select few people, I generally prefer to spend my time by myself - and the more and more time I spend by myself the less and less I want to socialise. Don't get me wrong, I love my quality me time and I have certainly not run out of ways to entertain myself!! But I do need to make more of an effort to catch up with my awesome friends more often - yet another excellent reason to start having those dinner parties!! :-)

6) The final goal is to be more organised. This is a bit of a general one as it covers many areas. I always seem to be running around at the last minute trying to get things done. If we go on vacation I'm always up til 2am packing. Too often I'm ironing a shirt at 7.30am because there's nothing hanging up in the closet. I throw too much food out that has gone bad because I forgot it was in the fridge or lacked the imagination to make it into something interesting. I could list another twenty things right now that drive me mad which could easily be avoided if I was just a little more organised, but I wont bore you - I will just do better!!

Well, I think that's enough to be getting on with for this year! If you have made your own resolutions or goals then I wish you all the best in making them happen! I'm off to follow up on goal #2 as I am making gnocchi for the first time tonight, and hopefully #4 tomorrow when I tell you how it went. I might even throw in a quick #6 and iron Hubby's shirt for the morning ........

Laters ..... x

Bah humbug .....

I absolutely LOVE Christmas, but I utterly detest Christmas shopping! Every year I dream of being one of those super organised people who has all their pressies bought by the first week in December, yet every year I find myself running around at the last minute, doing battle in the mall with my fellow disorganised shoppers!

Shopping for friends and family back home is tricky as you end up assessing gifts for their postability (yes, I claiming that as a new word) rather than how much the person will like it, and that is not how i like to pick gifts. Last year I relied on Amazon (God love them!) and Marks and Spencer but still felt that my selections fell a little short of my usual standards.

This year, I have decided that I'm only going to do a mini on line shop for family (I cant leave them completely empty handed on Christmas morning!) and then bring back really kick-ass presents for everyone when we come home for a visit in June, ones that people will really enjoy and that I will be truly happy to give!

It's bloody miserable outside today, so I guess it's a perfect day to sit in front of the computer and get my on line shopping done, and maybe a little research on the rest so I can limit the time I have to spend at the mall this week.



It also felt appropriate to bust out my Oscar t-shirt! Hopefully I'll be feeling a lot less grouchy by the end of the day!!



Laters ...... x

A weekend of wine :-)

Howdy folks! We're just back from our weekend in Monterey and had a fantastic time! We weren't sure if we were going to make it or not as Hubby is having a very busy time at work just now, but luckily he managed to get away!

The hotel, The Anton Inn, was certainly not one of the nicest places i have stayed, but it was cheap and clean and the beds were comfy so I wasn't going to complain!



We arrived around 8.30, and our partners in crime Eric and Rose had already checked in and were out collecting some pizza to have in their room along with a couple of bottles of wine - yum! This was the first pizza I had had since the first cholesterol test and dear God, it was amazing!!




We had a nice chilled evening catching up while Hubby did a little work, and were tucked up in bed by midnight :-)

We had a leisurely morning on Saturday and hooked up around 11.30 to head downtown. We had a lovely wander along the seafront and ended up at the Taste of Monterey wine tasting rooms where we got to try some delicious wines.




Now, I'm a bit of a peasant when it comes to wine tasting. I know what I like, but I have never really bought in to all the flowery descriptions of what the experts can taste in the wine, and I am definitely calling bullshit on the description for one of the wines we tried!! "Blackness followed by a barrage of tar, wet sand, leather, river stones, plums and smoked meat" Really? Really?!?!?! Luckily, it didn't taste as disgusting as it sounded!

After a quick peruse around their gift shop we set off for our next destination - another tasting room! :-) This one was Wine from the Heart, and if you ever find yourself in downtown Monterey please promise me you will go in and check it out!! It's a really cute little boutique wine shop, and we were thoroughly entertained by our new friend Vergudo! He took the time to go through the ins and outs of how to taste the wine properly and introduced us to the aroma wheel which provided much entertainment! Wet sand did not make an appearance, but we were amused to see things like cabbage, skunk, kerosene and many more on the wheel. I have to say, I think you're doing something wrong if you can smell any of those in your wine!

Sadly we had to get back to the car before our meter ran out, otherwise I think we would have spent most of the afternoon with Vergudo! By now it was after 2pm and we were feeling a bit tipsy so decided it was definitely time for lunch!! We went to the restaurant at the golf course near our hotel and had some yummy fish and chips - oh yeah, and more wine!



We were back at the hotel for the wine and appetisers hour, which turned out to be a huge disappointment. After all the delicious wines we had been trying all day, the cheapo crap they were serving did not go down well at all - even if it was free! - and I was expecting a little more than cubes of cheddar and grapes for the appetisers!

Not to worry - Eric and Rose had come prepared with a gigantic bottle of prosecco which more than helped erase the taste of grotty Merlot from our mouths!






We were very surprised when we polished off the prosecco so easily (No really! We were!!) and by now it was about 8.30 and we were getting hungry again so we headed over to An Choi, the Chinese across the road. This is another place you really should check out if you are in the area!! Hubby and I shared a shrimp and chicken chow mein and it was delicious, and Eric and Rose enjoyed their meals too. Plus, when Rose realised that she had left her purse there, the lovely man came over to our hotel and delivered it straight to her room - now that's what I call service!!

We polished off the last of our wine back in Eric and Rose's room, and not surprisingly, found ourselves to be shit faced so Hubby and I staggered back to our room and put ourselves to bed. A poor night's sleep meant that I was shattered this morning so sadly I missed out on the walk to the beach, but I enjoyed a quiet hour to myself reading my new book before we checked out and came home.

Once again, a HUGE thank you to Eric and Rose for an awesome weekend away!! :-)

Poor Hubby is back in the office already, and I suppose I have enough time to unpack before joining the ladies in the pub for the football in an hour. Better go and get some more coffee on too ......!!

Laters :-)

Balls .....

So, today I got the results of my latest cholesterol tests, and I have to say I'm a little disappointed. I really felt like I had made a good effort over the last three months, but my levels have not improved as much as I hoped - my total cholesterol has gone from 261 to 243, and my LDL has gone from 159 to 143.

As I write it occurs to me that I don't actually know how much it should have or could have dropped in this time frame (note to self - ask the doctor!) but I was definitely expecting more! Time to have a good hard think about all the changes I thought I had made, and perhaps a rather brutal assessment of what I actually did and what I need to do better ...

Hubby hasn't had his follow up yet, and I'm a bit more hopeful for him as he has been better at taking his supplements and eating his oily fish, and he has started swimming regularly while my attempts at an exercise routine are a bit hit and miss. He actually has to go to the doctor for his test (I just got my blood taken at a lab and the doctor emailed me the results) so I think I will tag along and prepare some questions so I can set some realistic goals and expectations.

Luckily I have not been having any cravings for steaks and cheeseburgers as they will clearly not being making any appearances in my diet in the near future, but I was looking forward to the occasional egg and a trip to the cheese counter again *sigh*

My results weren't all doom and gloom, though, as I now no longer have dangerously low levels of vitamin D - hurrah!! Yes, you read that right - I moved from rainy Scotland to California and got myself a vit D deficiency and had to take prescription strength liquid sunshine capsules for the last three months. Oh, how I laughed!

Anyhoo, I cant sit around chatting all day! We're off to Monterey for the weekend with friends and I have to get packed and organised. I'll tell you all about it on Monday

Laters ..... x

Adventures in Veggieland

So, back in September Hubby and I had cholesterol tests done and discovered that they were ... ahem .... a bit on the high side! Our lovely doctor gave us three months to start making the necessary changes and we have our follow up appointments in the next week or so.

Our diet needed a major makeover :-( Farewell, bacon. So long, steak. Ta ta, cheese *sob* 

In an attempt to maximise our progress we basically adopted a mostly vegetarian diet, which has actually been a lot of fun and I now find that I have pretty much gone off meat! 

Now, I'm not saying that I have given it up for good as I consider bacon to be less a meat and more of a basic human right, and there are many meaty meals that I would be devastated if I could never have them again (Hubby's BBQ chicken, Jared's tri tip, Cameron's jambalaya to name but a few ....)

But I have really enjoyed the challenge of trying to make interesting veggie meals that my carnivore Hubby will eat voluntarily!

Here are a couple of my successes from the weekend

First up is a curried butternut squash soup which I really enjoyed!

Last night I made a wild rice pilaf, which is probably the fanciest thing I have ever made in my life and I was really impressed!








I may even make it again for the dinner we are hosting on Christmas Eve, although as Katy kindly pointed out, no-one else likes Brussels Sprouts so perhaps i'll do some different veg, (and something meaty for everyone else to enjoy ......!)





I have made a few other veggie gems which will be making future appearances on the Kavanagh menu, and I will try and remember to photograph them and share them with you.

Oh yeah, and I'll let you know we get on at the doc's next week ....!!

Guess who?!?! :-)

Hello again, my lovelies!! I know, I know! I don't call, I don't write - basically I suck as a correspondent! But, as I sit listening to Nat King Cole crooning the Christmas Song and basking in the glow of my Christmas tree, I do feel the need to reconnect.

Hubby and I have been quite busy since last we spoke but I wont bore you with the details, as anyone who knows me has probably already heard all about them. (And if you are unfortunate enough to have randomly stumbled across this blog then you probably don't care!)

Instead, here are a few photos to show you the highlights .......

We spent another happy afternoon getting drunk in the sun at the Vintage Santa Clara wine event. For more info on that event see my post from last year.

Our first visitors from Scotland came to stay - hurrah!! It was soooooo awesome to have them here, and incredibly surreal! I wish they hadn't had to go home :-(

Halloween came around again and Hubby carved his first pumpkin.

After much research and debate, he settled on Jolly, the pirate fish.

Whaddya think?

Hubby also turned his hand to making our costumes and created these awesome jellyfish!

They were spectacular, but dear God, they caught on EVERYTHING and were a bit of a nightmare to lug around all night! But I guess no-one ever said it was easy being fabulous ... *sigh*

For Cameron's birthday we did a group trip to an idyllic place called Sea Ranch where we spent a wonderful weekend eating and drinking and relaxing

For Hubby's birthday we were in Austin, Texas, for the first Formula 1 grand prix at the new Circuit of the Americas track









Despite having to slum it in a Motel 6 *shudder*, and a disappointing early departure from the race for my boy Mark Webber (above) we had a brilliant weekend!

We were lucky enough to be invited back to spend Thanksgiving in Arizona with Eric & Rose's families, where once again we were spoiled rotten and generally had a wonderful time










A huge thank you to our hosts for your hospitality and generosity! :-)










And then, all of a sudden, it was December!! Not quite sure how that happened, but here we are!! We still  have a couple of wee adventures to squeeze in before the end of the year, and I shall do my best to share them with you, along with any other nonsense that pops in my head! (And we all know my head is full of nonsense .....!!)

Love and hugs and stuff, and thank you for reading!! :-) xxx