It has taken me a year to join a library since moving to London, I have no idea why it has taken me this long, shameful! Now I have joined I am back to my old library habits of going for a browse and checking out books at a faster rate than I can read them.
My local library is a well lit haven, based in an old building and bursting with a great selection of books. I barely skimmed the surface but knowing I had to carry them back through the park sans tote bag I had to have limits.
I feel like people often forget their libraries and they also forget that they have lots of delicious recipe books which is a great way of finding new inspiration to cook. Cookbooks take up a lot of space and are an investment so it is great to be able to browse at your leisure.
This visit I found one that I couldn’t leave without, it was on brand for snacking and it would have been rude to not take it home.
Food mood board progress
After coming back from holiday and living off frozen fish from the freezer (not as grim as it sounds) I have returned to the food mood board I made at the start of the year to see what I haven’t made from it yet.
This week’s inspired dishes are:
Kale, leek and butterbean stew
Ricotta on toast
Spiced sweet potato salad
Admittedly I drafted this newsletter a month ago and it has been sat here dormant, I did indeed cook these dishes but quite a while ago.
The kale, leek and butterbean stew was a real comfort, I also added in a bunch of tarragon to it because this year I am obsessed with the herb. I think it lends itself so well to the kale and cabbage season at the start of the year, it makes potatoes even more comforting and gives me an excuse to roast a chicken. Plus the vegetable shop I go to sells Tarragon in an obscenely large bunch so you really do have to put it in everything.
Ricotta on toast is what I live off in the warmer months and I just wanted an early taste of that. It is not as good when you don’t have ripe peaches or summer tomatoes but I just needed the summer concept in my life.
When in doubt, roast a sweet potato and add everything in your fridge to it with a dressing to call it a salad. I love roasting sweet potatoes, the way they caramelise and crisp in the corners, this texture then goes quite spongy once dressed, taking on new flavours.
There is something truly comforting about spending a couple of hours in the kitchen which is generally how my cooking time goes nowadays. A couple of times a week I will spend a few hours cooking for the work days ahead and it is so therapeutic and satisfying knowing I will have lots of good food to eat when I get home late. I generally just get all the vegetables out and see how many I can use. One of my favourite fancy grocery purchases at the minute is radicchio in all its beautiful forms, this is something I used to hate but my taste buds have changed and I know seek out bitter leaves for adding a kick to a dish.
Snacks of the week:
It may be a frugal february but it is the little treats and snacks that keep me going. I went shopping with a friend and picked up a few new snacks to try. Some of these I inhaled before even taking a photo.
I can’t walk past a flying tiger shop without going in for a browse, I just love to look at all the frivolous knick knacks. My self control was on top form and all that I left with was a toasted bag of coconut, which in my opinion is an underrated snack. What I love about toasted coconut chips is that they are crisp yet some are chunkier so have more of a bite, they have a caramel taste to them because they are toasted and the pinch of salt just brings it all together. Are they incredibly dry? Yes. Are they addictive? Also yes.
Some of my favourite treats and snacks are found in marks and spencers, there is something about marks and sparks that will be forever luxurious to me. The haul this time was: mini eggs, swiss milk chocolate buttons, belgian chocolate raisins and blue corn tortilla chips.
Belgian chocolate raisins will always remind me of my mum and her friends who would have ‘girls night’ where they would have a table full of snacks and bottles of chardonnay. I was often at these girly nights and thought a table of snacks was the most wonderful thing. The chocolate raisins would come out as part of the dessert snacks along with butterkist toffee popcorn.
I love the combination of chocolate and lime, which you don’t often find but I have stumbled upon a chocolate I haven’t had before which had a lime flavour with a hint of sea salt. I was first attracted to the packaging but the product lives up to the aesthetics!
I have actually baked something too! It is so good I have baked it twice in as many weeks. It is a flapjack adjacent recipe from Nigel Slater, absolutely delicious and crumbled on yoghurt with fruit is an excellent breakfast. Oats feel like such a wholesome snack and when you add chocolate to them the comfort levels are off the charts. They also are a structurally sound portable snack which is a rare find in the gluten free world.
Library list:
I will forever love Nora Ephron for bringing You’ve got mail into the world. I am also deeply sad that she didn’t write more books than she did. This year seems to be the year of the re-read. This month I have reread Heartburn.
I also find some library books live the same life as an apple, you know that apple that you put in your bag with a vague intention of eating it during your day but it essentially just gets carried around with you, getting more bruised and inedible. Well I like to check out way too many books, carry them home, put them on a shelf and sometimes I just never want to pick them up until I carry them back to the library. This only happens to the books that just don’t tickle my fancy in the same way the handbag apple that has been stabbed by my keys.
The books that have not had that fate and that I have enjoyed so far are:
Heartburn by Nora Ephron
Really Good, Actually by Monica Heisey
Weather by Jenny Offill
My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite
Companion Piece by Ali Smith
My routine lately has changed and seems to be ever changing, I am trying to be less rigid and more flexible about it, more open to change. I used to read so much more when I had more free time and now I have been filling my free time with running and socialising again.
I have also found that I have been coming back to old habits as well as making new ones. I have taken up buying the Sunday newspaper again, it reminds me of being at home and I have been missing home a lot lately. It is not quite the same when you have to race each other to the puzzle pages, I get to selfishly do them all myself. There is something so soothing about reading a newspaper when you usually read everything from a screen.
Things that have been good recently:
Balenciaga on Disney plus, Haute Couture dramas are one of my favourites.
Seeing blossom pop up everywhere.
Going on little walks to get vegetables and tulips.
Going to Aire.
Entering my boilersuit era.
You had me at libraries!!! Love that you're back in the habit. <3
I’ve never read HEARTBURN and am excited to.