Errol’s lamb was gorgeous, rather like my dinner guest.  I took Mr R’s advice on how long to cook it (an hour and 20 minutes at about 160 degrees) and it did make me laugh when he kept adding silly things to my hand written timetable showing when to start the Vincent Price’s Petits Pois a la Francaise (they take 45 minutes), when to put the roast potatoes in (he was in charge of these so gawd knows) and when to take the lamb out to rest.  Miraculously, everything seemed to be ready at the same time.  Dinner was scheduled for 3 and was on the table at just gone 5.  I guess that is the way it goes though sometimes.  Even with the best of intentions.

Keep your eyes peeled as I’ve decided to make Errol’s lamb dish the recipe of the month for June.

It’s so funny looking back over my blog sometimes.  The first time I cooked this on New Year’s Day 2008, my darling flat mate Gaby was in the first flushes of a relationship with Paul.  The second time I made it in 2009 she had just married him.  Ha ha!  I did have a laugh about my new year resolution of 2008 – “no involvement in 2008 with men that make me cry. And I mean it!” I will have to consult with Heather regarding the Review of the Year for 2008.  Our annual recap of the year’s events always includes the category, “who made you cry this year?” as well as many others such as “tiny things that have made life disproportionately better”.  I believe my fabulous shoe mender in Highgate made it onto the list last year.

After dinner me and Mr R. watched an episode of Columbo – it was effectively the first real episode (after 2 pilots) and Peter Falk makes an omelette.  He beats up the eggs and adds cheese and onions, then cooks it in a tonne of butter.    Mmm – yum yum – he looks as if he knows what he is doing.  It’s either very good acting or he was a good cook.  I suspect the latter.  I have only one recipe for him so far – Pork Chops and Vinegar Peppers – but I have yet to find Vinegar Peppers anywhere here in the UK.  Anyone know where I can get me some?  Or in fact, does anyone know what the hell they are exactly? I’m happy to attempt to make some myself in advance (I do love a pickle) but I need some advice…

Later in the first episode Columbo gets a hot dog while he quizzes someone useful to his investigation.  The hot dog stand is brilliant – it is shaped like a cartoon hot dog.  I will have to get a screen grab of it for Yinzerella over at Dinner is Served 1972 sometime or another when I work out how to do it.  I still owe Yinzerella a guest post about the momentous day when I got a firm grip on a Pizza Hut Frankfurter Stuffed Crust Pizza.  Oh YEAH!  WIENERS! Columbo likes his CHARRED apparently - What Columbo Likes to Eat

I think that Errol would have enjoyed one of those…

I made a Celia Johnson’s Chocolate Sponge Cake for dessert and it was mighty fine.

Next day we went to see this far, far underground in Belsize Park…

All of the above made me very happy indeed.  I am in an exceedingly good mood these days.  And I very much like a man who risks busting his knees doing an impression of Eden Kane, sends me a vintage Southend-0n-Sea postcard out of the blue and asks me what size my feet are so he can look out for some gold go-go boots that might fit me…

I think Celia would like him too…

S&E arrived with cold white wine ensconced in newspaper and a plethora of Dan Lepard Peanut Butter Cookies wrapped and tied in a festive fashion.  These were DIVINE.  Oooh, I must get hold of that recipe.  Perfectly formed, crispy and peanutty – yum.

The movie was Grey Gardens – the original and best (although I do love the Drew Barrymore fictionalisation too) and so I greeted my guests dressed as Little Edie.  I couldn’t find my leotard alas and had to do my little dance waving a feather rather than a small American flag.  The boys laughed anyhow, which was of course exactly why I was showing off.

As an appetiser I chose something from the film – liver pate.  If you know the movie you’ll know that it was probably a bit dangerous to eat anything in that house, and I was very pleased for once not to have to apologise for the untidiness of my flat.  It’s nothing compared to the Beale’s place.  At least I don’t have racoons.

Ewan took his medicine very nicely and my first prescription seemed to be a great success.  Will be dishing out some more movie medicine soon…

The morning of the show was always going to be hectic as I had to make a Vincent Price Quiche, Dame Pattie Menzies Cheese Scones and Claudette Colbert’s Rice Bubbles Cream Meringues so I planned ahead and made a Diana cake the night before.  I was at Cathy and Sloman’s house, we were drinking copious amounts of wine, Cathy was baking pastry and I made a schoolgirl error.  I baked the cake at 250 degrees F instead of 250 degrees C.

In a classic example of back seat driving Mr Sloman said, “nobody ever cooks anything at 250 degrees F”.  Well yes, you may say that Mr Sloman but next morning I did the very same thing with my meringues.  Ha ha!

I had used up all my “mixed fruit” in the cake that burned but Cathy came to my rescue sending me out into the night with some lovely semi dried apricots and prunes.  I had one and a half cherries in my cocktail cabinet (not joking) and I threw in some raisins to make up the weight.  So there you go.  It was cobbled together and I was really hoping they would hit one of the cherries for colour when they took a slice out.  But whatever, second prize!

Everyone at the Horticultural Show was SO FRIENDLY and I had a long chat with the lady who won first prize about the various merits of gas ovens over electric.  The winning cake had pumpkin in it…

The recipe for Diana’s cake is here if you are looking in April 2013.   It’s GOOD.

(A tip of the hat to Barnflakes for the nice composite picture)

As a thank-you for being so nice, Mr R was furnished with a jar of James Mason’s Plum Jam that I’d made earlier in the week for the grand poobah of cooking and growing contests The Muswell Hill Horticultural Society Spring Show.  Cathy and I had been plotting and planning for weeks in order to enter as many of the cookery classes as we could and boy oh boy was it FUN.

So the Temple Big Pan came into its own once more last week and the kitchen was full of sugary plum and lemon aromas as I boiled it all to buggery and back.  Excuse my swearing but I am still laughing about the first time I made Bette Davis Marmalade and my mum swore (very rare).

And whaddya know it won second prize!

On the morning of the show I made a Vincent Price Quiche (2^nd prize), Diana Dors Fruit Cake (2^nd prize), some Claudette Colbert’s Rice Bubbles Cream Meringues (unplaced) and also entered some Dorothy Wilson Chutney (2^nd prize).  It was actually the chutney I was most proud of.  Firstly there were a LOT of chutneys to choose from, and secondly as most of the folks there are really gardeners rather than cooks, I should imagine they are very good at making all their allotment produce into chutneys.  Oh and yes, my Dame Pattie Menzies Cheese Scones won FIRST PRIZE.  Dame Pattie wasn’t a film star (she was a politician’s wife) BUT she sure knew a thing or two about cheese scones!

When I mentioned to Cathy that the members of the Horticultural Society might not have much respect for us because we are cooks rather than gardeners she said, “I’m not in it for the respect, I’m in it for the prizes!” which made me laugh for a long time.  But prizes she certainly got.  FIVE first prizes (not joking) and one second.  Of course, because of our friendly jokey rivalry on the day, I should point out that her second prize was in the cheese scones category – d’yougetme?!

Between us we got first or second prize in every category we entered.  The happiest day of our lives?  Possibly!

James would have been very proud of us.

On our initial blind date we arranged to identify each other by the books we would be carrying – him, a tatty copy of Saturday Night and Sunday Morning me, a book with a picture of Dirk Bogarde on the front, the wonderful “A Particular Friendship” which I heartily enjoyed and thoroughly recommend.

This is a beautiful collection of letters that Dirk sent to a woman he never met who lived in the States. Knowing nothing about the movies, she had stumbled upon a magazine article about Dirk’s house in Surrey and it happened to be a house she had lived in during the 1930s.  She wrote to him and they became penpals.  As penpals are one of my passions and Dirk was such a lovely writer the book was a big hit with me.  It seemed kind of fitting therefore to cook Dirk’s chicken for date number 2.

It was good stuff.  I couldn’t fit everything in my pot I did ask the butcher for the biggest chook he had – but it turned out fine.  It poached in the wine, with the veggies making a kind of winey mush in the bottom.   I made a few Joan Crawford Salami Sandwiches and stuck some Vincent Price’s Cheese Knots under the grill.  We drank 2 x Fairbanks No. 1 cocktails which created a kind of warm fuzzy cocktail hour and followed those with the bottle of Coume Del Mas 2011 that I bought at the Unbound event last week from the winemaker himself  – Richard Bray.  Look at me pretending I know about wine!

We then quaffed a lovely long bottle of red that Mr R. kindly bought with him and finished the brandy that didn’t make it into the Vincent Price Pots du Creme Chocolat. Lovely.

I’m now going to break the habit of a lifetime by NOT doing a kiss and tell but let’s just say Mr R was still here at 6 o’clock next day.  He has lovely manners and paid me tonnes of compliments.  My favourite of which was when he said I had a “superior posterior”.  My very favourite part of the evening was watching him demonstrate how low he can go when doing the twist.  AND he tuned my ukulele…

The chicken recipe came to me courtesy of www.dirkbogarde.co.uk which is a lovely, lovely website so do check it out if you are a Dirk fan, so much to discover there…  His chicken might be recipe of the month this month if I can get myself organised…

So just to mention that the wonderful Gin & It Magazine Issue 2 is out and I have something in it about the Fairbanks Cocktail (No. 2).  Originally featured in the most beautiful cocktail book in the world – The Savoy Cocktail Book – published in 1930.  It’s a bit confusing as there are two Fairbanks cocktails in the book and there is some debate about whether the first is related to dear, dear Doug or not, but we can be pretty sure that the second one is because of the little note which says: “We often wondered what Doug did it on.  Now that we know we are going to try and do it ourselves.”  And I say hell to the yeah to that.

So anyhow I rustled up a Fairbanks No 1 to test it last night – mmmm – very, very good.  Not too sweet (the lemon juice and vermouth cut through the apricot brandy) and will definitely be serving these tonight to whet the appetite.

Also on the menu: Vincent Price’s Cheese Knots, Dirk Bogarde’s Chicken Clermont and Vincent Price’s Pots de Creme Chocolat.

I am stupidly excited, and not just about the dinner…

So for once I thought ahead and got 2 portions of this out for me and Ptolemy and defrosted it in the fridge overnight, put an extra glug of wine in because I was scared the rice would stick and warmed it up in the oven.  Success!  Lots of compliments from Pt and I was very pleased to see that the chicken was moist, the rice was flavoursome and all was hunky dory.  It was Liz Taylor Meets Yotam Ottolenghi at the dinner table as I made the spinach salad from Jerusalem to go with it.  Yum.

There was much talk about dating.  Ptolemy has met a wonderful man through the internet and wants to help me do the same.  She picked out one for me from eHarmony and I sent him a message about Twiglets.  No response so far.  It’s been tumbleweed for me lately.  Mr Shoulder has disappeared and my meet up with the Bradley Wiggins lookeelikee seemed to go well but there has been radio silence since.

I have a couple of prospects though.  I spoke to one guy on the phone last night.  Anyone who knows me will know how remarkable this is, and I have a date tonight with a friend of a neighbour.  This one is a 100% blind date.  I don’t know what he looks like, I don’t know how old he is, all I know is that he works in a record shop.  So if you know about me and the phone phobia, you’ll also know about me and men that work in record shops…

I made the chicken back in November and here is the recipe.  Easy, delicious and freezes a treat.

We also had Serbian style Moussaka which was divine and Zhito which involved drying out grain on a tea-towel for hours, much consternation with a grinder and a spectacular cream whipping incident when an electric whisk went out of control.  I laughed almost as much as the time when Sanja burned a hole in her oven glove.

On the Saturday after I had a lovely time DJing for a local art gallery.  I am a big fan of local business and I really love the little street in Muswell Hill – Avenue Mews – that houses the gallery and a couple of vintage clothes shops.

The Local Gallery was having a special event for the opening of a new exhibition of wonderful photographs of Paris in the Sixties by photographer Alan Scales.

I took along my 1960s French suitcase record player to spin some 78s.  Here I am with Alan and my Teppaz (purchased from another favourite local business, the awesome Audio Gold in Crouch End).

I had lived in Muswell Hill for over a year before I even discovered Avenue Mews and have since bought several frocks from Cha Cha Vintage which is a gorgeous vintage emporium.  They regularly have street parties and are all very good eggs.  Lou – married to Matt who runs the gallery – is a brilliant cook and she sent me home with a big box of cakes and some of her handmade Granola.  Yum yum.

All of the above is really to say that on this Silver Screen Sunday* I am totally in love with the human race and all the wonders of art, music and human generosity.

Now I am off to make a Jimmy Stewart Chicken Pie for dinner tonight.  Life is wonderful.

Oh I almost forgot, I made Sopa Poblano and it was so good I decided to type up the recipe so here it is.  I have never seen fresh Poblano chilis here in London, or ones in cans (if anyone knows where I can get some please let me know) so I use dried Poblano peppers that I get from (sorry to swear) Tesco.

Vincent Price’s Sopa Poblano (Chili Poblano Soup)

1 tbsp cooking oil

1/4 lb lean pork cut into small cubes

½ medium onion, chopped

1 ear fresh corn, kernels scraped from cob

1 chili poblano, thinly sliced

1 small zucchini (courgette), thinly sliced

3 tablespoons tomato puree

1 quart chicken stock (I use about 1 litre)

1 ripe avocado, peeled, seeded and diced

¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese

Heat cooking oil, add pork and sauté over medium heat until pork is browned, stirring frequently.

Add onion, corn, chilli, zucchini, tomato puree and chicken stock.  Simmer for 20 minutes, or until vegetables are tender.

Just before serving, add salt to taste, the avocado and Parmesan cheese.

(I didn’t take a photo so this one is from the time I made it during the Vincentennial Cookblog project).

Thanks Vincent!

I just found this on YouTube which features Vic in his underpants and me with very short hair.  Oooh, I loved that blue shiny dress.  And what happened to that leopard print swing coat?  Ha ha – happy days.

Barry Evans by The Dylan Rabbit

The pie took me most of the day to make but it was a big success.

Boris Pie topless…

and with the lid on…

We were 4 hungry archivists and we ate the lot between us.  There was much discussion about the rent going up as Vic and Corinna live in the same block of flats as me and they too have had a massive rent hike.  Shall we stay or shall we go now?  The idea of moving all my junk again fills me with horror.  I’ve been here almost three years and I haven’t unpacked yet.  Mind you, if I do move, it is possible that I will find the things that Vic and I keep accusing each other of pinching when we split up.  Where is that brilliant metal peanut that opens up and you put peanuts in?!  Where is that little lion’s head you put on the front door to welcome visitors to your home?  Where is Vic’s Yogi Bear money box?

In an attempt to get some kind of grip on my financial situation I have bought a copy of my friend Michael J. MacMahon’s book “Back to the Black”.  I am going to follow every step within to see if I can afford to continue living in my Palace of Solitude.  I’m going to do a guest blog spot each month detailing my attempts to tackle my debt so if you want to hear my virtual tears you can check those out at the Back to the Black website.

Record of the week this week is Elkie Brooks.  Someone very drunk recently told me I looked like her.  I was really chuffed and as I was pretty drunk myself busted out with Lilac Wiiiiiiiiine all over the pub.  Love the internet – within 3 days I had the 45rpm in my hand and now I am playing it virtually every day and fantasising about being able to play it on the ukulele.