Cyril in My Kitchen

I'm positively brimming (my italics) with excitement, dear reader. Cyril Lignac, the French Jamie Oliver, is coming round to cook for me!! Ok ok, first of all I have to win this sandwich competition organised by the makers of luscious (worth a try) cream cheese Kiri, but surely that is merely a formality? Who, after all, could resist my triple-layer "Nutella, Marmite and banana" on polar bread special? It's been known to make a grown man (me) cry. It's certainly more original than anything Cyril himself has ever come up with. He "shot" to televisual fame by taking a group of unemployed people and teaching them how to cook (ooh reminds me of....oh yes, Jamie Oliver) and then set up his own restaurant called "15" (as did, who was it? Ah yes, Jamie Oliver). Ha, I hear you snort, I expect he'll be tackling school dinners next. Yes, that's right. Still, his recipes ARE different (more fiddly and restaurant-y than Jamie's, but not bad at all, particularly on the French classics). In the interests of fairness, I have an equal number of cookbooks by each, but my heart really belongs to Jamie. That said, however, he's not offering to come round and cook, is he? I wonder what I shall wear....?

Cooking by Numbers

Those of you who've been concerned about the contents of my fridge - and you are legion - will be relieved to hear I've finally found a solution. No longer do I have to worry about my rather haphazard style of food shopping - faced with the usual almost giddily eclectic selection of inredients, I now simply turn to the wonderful (my italics) Cooking by Numbers. Et voilà!! OK, it doesn't specify if those apricots are hunza or not, or if the chocolate should be Valrhona, and indeed there's no mention of champagne, but when you're lacking inspiration on a Wednesday night, it fits the bill perfectly. Try it and see... I particularly liked the description of Lemon Chicken - "Chicken partners up with its old friend lemon with crazy results" though it did come with the caveat "You are missing an essential ingredient: chicken". What a bummer! In other news, I'm off to London AGAIN this weekend, though for work this time, and will be having dinner here on Friday evening. I, of course, reveal that information in the hope that I'll be "papped" either entering or leaving the restaurant. Over to you!!

From the sublime to...

From the sublime to..., originally uploaded by rhino75.

...the ridiculous. Distressingly, these are the contents of my fridge. I'm thinking of running a "Ready, Steady, Cook"-stylee competition to anyone who can come up with a proper meal using these ingredients. The prize will be that you don't have to come round for dinner. There's also a special bonus prize for the person who can tell me why I have quite so many lemons. (Click on the pic to see all the labels).