Squeeee-DINK!

Soundtrack to the day: Steph MacLeod and Sam Williams (both well worth a listen!)

Well yesterday I returned to an old friend...

Ah, decaf americano, how I have missed thee.

Suitably refreshed, I bought my mystery ingredient:

Can you guess what it is?

No?

The clue's in the title: it's squid ink!  Or, once it's gone through the D:Team perception filter, squee-DINK!

Now what might I possibly want that for?  Well, I've been making my own pasta lately, so some is destined for that (but not until I have gloves; don't fancy ending up with blackened, squiddy mitts).  I also bought some squid, and a little goes a long way with squid, so much of it is in the freezer now.

Incidentally I also had the most expensive haircut of my life.  It was fine, but not worth THAT much.  I was in shock.

But yesterday I made...

Arroz Negra!

Or black paella as it's also known.

Delicately fishy and ever so easy to make as well as being cheaper than you might think, it was a bit of a winner.  And it goes like this (for two greedy people):

1. Fry plenty of garlic and some spring onions
2. Add 300g paella rice and stir around for a few moments to get nicely cooked in
3. Add 450ml fish stock and the contents of the squid ink sachet.  Do not get it on your hands/clothes/cat/children
4. Mostly cover and leave at a gentle simmer for about 15 minutes
5. Check on it, remove the lid and add more water if needs be
6. Once the rice is pretty much done and is sticky with very little sauce, get going with the squid
7. Fry the squid rings in a really hot pan for just a couple of moments.  Err on the side of undercooked to avoid getting rubber rings
8. Serve.  Try to avoid getting cat hair in it.  Ahem.


Which was very exciting and paved the way for today nicely - fish being brain food and all.

D:Team were given the choice of what to study this term from a carefully selected list and went for Proverbs, so we kicked that off this evening.

Let it not be said that I waste time on unnecessary graphical flim flammery.  Ahem.

Reading Proverbs is like wandering around a town of cartoon characters; one moment you're chatting to the fool, the next you're listening to the voice of the Woman Wisdom or spotting the sluggard hiding behind his door (the lions! The lions!)  Each person in Proverbsville is listening to the voice of one of two people:

Either you're listening to the Woman Folly, in which case you will end up on the path of folly which leads to... death!  Or you're listening to the Woman Wisdom whose words lead you onto the path of wisdom which leads to... life!

Over the next few weeks we will be looking at some of these characters as they make their way through Proverbsville and find out who they're listening to and what effect that has had on them.

Step-by-Step Fish Pie!

I found myself with a glut of parsnips, plenty of leeks and some unspecified white fish.  It might be pollock.  It might not.  For illustrative purposes only, here is a pollock.

We caught these on a fishing trip off Tresco a couple of years ago and had them barbecued for tea.  The fish for the pie came, rather more prosaically, from Asda.

And so, to the pie:

1. Make sure every pan you own is available for use and that the dishwasher is empty.
2. Poach fish in milk with salt, pepper, ground mace and a bay leaf.
3. Remove fish to a plate, use poaching milk to make white sauce.
4. Cook leeks in butter.  Abandon pretence at this being a health food.
5. Boil parsnips until soft (to a given value of softness; these are parsnips after all.)
6. Mash parsnips in food processor with plenty of butter and milk until creamy.  Think not about your waist line.
7. Put fish and leeks into baking dish, pour over white sauce.
8. Pipe parsnip mash on top, sprinkle on parmesan cheese.
9. Put in oven on timer to be ready for tea time.
10. Hope for the best.

Now I can sit down and have a think about things that are coming up while the kettle boils.

This afternoon I need to come up with some exciting ideas for camp, re-outline some Proverbs stuff for D:Team and write a talk about Ehud for Enigma.

Ehud was one of the judges of Israel, found, (strange enough to say) in the Bible in the book of Judges.  Judges tells us of the time between Israel settling in the land God gave them and the time of the last judge, Samuel, whose responsibilities included announcing the selection of the new King.

The judges were not people in the legal profession, but rather simply leaders who took charge in some or all of the nation of Israel, and their time in charge follows a very particular pattern; a downward spiral.

First off, the people would forget God and rebel against him, often by abandoning him and worshipping the gods of the surrounding nations.

God's response to rebellion against him is that of any good parent - he meters out punishment to show his children where they have gone wrong.  He allows the people that surround Israel to come in and overrule them.  They prove invariably to be harsh masters who make life hard and difficult for Israel.

After an amount of time (in the case of the story of Ehud, 18 years!) the people would finally cry out to God for help.  God is not a petulant father, he always hears the cries of his children, and so he would act...

... and raise up a rescuer, or judge, to save the people.  Hurrah!

The judge would bring peace to the region for the remainder of their days.
But on their death the people would abandon the LORD again and the whole thing would start again, only worse.  Worse rebellion, followed by punishment. They eventually cry to God and he rescues them with a judge and all is well until the death of the judge.

Rebellion, punishment, crying out, rescue, death

Worse rebellion, punishment, crying out, rescue, death

Yet worse rebellion, punishment, crying out, rescue, death

The rebellion gets worse and the personal qualities of the judge deteriorate likewise.  The downward spiral starts with Othniel, and makes its way through the suspicious cowardice of Gideon, the frank immorality of Samson and ends with borderline civil war and the indictment of the end of the book: that everyone did as he saw fit.

Doesn't it just make you ache for a leader, a judge, who will not be a moral dirtbag, but even more than that, who will not be held by the power of death.

Now who might that be, do you think?