Love is Shellfish.

Valentine's day has been and gone, (not that we really give a toss) and as you may have guessed, the boy and I showed our devotion at the weekend with some gourmet offerings.  On Friday I made moules mariniere.  I challenge you to find a better way of showing you care.  Flowers?  Chocolates?  Sickly little teddy bear holding a lacy heart?  Try standing at the kitchen sink for an hour, scrubbing mussels and scraping barnacles in icy water; now that is true love.  It was worth it though, the mussels were plump, firm and orange, no stringy, watery creatures here.  The simple, classic sauce, consisting of shallots, garlic, white wine, butter and parsely set them off beautifully.  We accompanied the steaming bowl of shellfish with some frites and french bread and another glass or two of sauvignon blanc.  So French we could have been in gay Paree.

The boy returned the favour on Sunday with a slow cooked beef in Guinness stew, flavoured with thyme and served with new potatoes and brussel sprouts.  I felt rather jaded, due to the rubbish, rainy weather, and spent the day watching films and reading, with the comforting aroma of the stew permeating the house.  Cosy.

As an aside, I'd like to share a link with you to a couple more food and drink related blogs I have discovered lately.
http://hungryhollowaiians.tumblr.com/
The hungry Hollowaiians is a good old London friend of mine and a couple of her buddies, trying new recipes weekly in a Monday night supper club stylee.  The recipes are created, reviewed and costed in an easy to follow manner.  Rather different to the chaotic, rambling nature of this blog.  But that's why you like me, right?

http://coldcounter.co.uk/
Cold Counter is the project of friends of above London friend, executing a genius idea.  As the blog says; "We try the UK's obscure cold drinks, so you don't have to".  With tongue firmly in cheek, an ever expanding range of the strangest sodas in the country are dissected.  Best of all they take submissions.  I have a can of Red Thunder hanging around somewhere, courtesy of Aldi...not dared drink it yet though....