Happy New Year!

Hello, dear readers! I am so sorry I've been away for so long. It wasn't intentional, but this year I have steruggled a bit to get into the "Christmas Spirit" (whatever that is!) We spent a pleasant but uneventful time in the UK, and you can read about it over at the View from the Teapot - including my lovely, lovely present from Linda at Hey! Homewrecker who was my Christmas Swap partner.

My food highlights over the festive period included:

• a delicious solo meal of tapas at Lunya in Liverpool. I ordered chorizo cooked in red wine, patatas bravas, marinaded olives and red pepper houmous, which I scoffed with a lovely glass of rioja. It would have been better if Mr FD had been there (I could have tried more dishes!) but it was very enjoyable.

 

• what was termed "Raspberry Ripple" as a dessert at mum's Keep Fat Christmas Meal. It sounded amazing, but when it came it was more a retro dish of two slices of Arctic Roll, some defrosted frozen berries and a squiggle of squirty cream. Fine dining is not dead!
• sharing a meal with Mum in Southport. The food itself wasn't great (soup and a sandwich) but it was lovely sharing time together...I don't think I have chatted so much with mum for a long time.
• an amazing joint of fore rib of beef for Christmas dinner. My MiL's "companion" (boyfriend? partner?) ordered it and it was enormous!! There were only three of us eating it, and even with a third of it cut off and frozen before roasting the remainder there was still plenty to go round for several meals!! Mr FD and MiL did most of the cooking and the meal was a pleasure to share.
• The bread and wine at communion on Christmas Day. "It is not I who invite you to eat", said the Vicar, "but Christ..." Another wonderful Christmas meal! 
• A Wagamama's meal in Canterbury. Oh, we love Wagamama's! I had a new dish on the menu, Chu Chee curry, described as "stir-fried chicken and butternut squash in a chu chee curry sauce with peppers, mangetout and courgettes. served with sticky white rice and garnished with coriander". It was absolutely gorgeous!

  

• The lamb shank & root vegetable dish that we bought in Tesco and had for our New Year's Eve meal back here in France. It was really lovely - meaty, rich and gorgeous. Served with mashed potato and purple sprouting broccoli it made a very enjoyable meal for the last evening of 2012.

I haven't weighed myself yet - that pleasure will wait until next Monday, but I am sure I've put on weight. I ate a lot, drank a fair bit, and didn't do as much exercise as I'd planned - but still...there's not much to be done about it now! I bought a pair of "aspirational" jeans - I can wear them (just!) but to be comfortable, I need to lose a few kilos. That's okay - they are something to aim for. 

I'll be back tomorrow, when I plan the meals for the week ahead - I'll be back to my old friends, the Hairy Dieters, and using a new (old) book that mum gave me. More about that tomorrow. Until then, Happy New Year, dear friends.