Although I’d quite like to move to the Highlands one day, a sunny clear day in Broughty Ferry makes me love where home actually is.
The Tay Bridge in the distance with the jack-up rigg that is often a feature at the docks.
Broughty Ferry is so nice in the sunshine, the firth glistens but most of all the buildings along the front here just look so nice, although as you can see I didn’t get them in my photograph ;)
How to make cous cous more exciting! It doesn’t take much for me as I love cous cous just with some veggie stock. This baffles a few people who think I should be adding numerous extras but just the stock flavour is normally enough for me. But stuck in the position tonight of forgetting to defrost my fish and it being nearer 6pm and my tummy grumbling I came up with this:
So fish stock with 150ml of water, spinach, red onion, small tomatoes, spot of garlic salt, cous cous, soy sauce, low fat natural yoghurt, paprika, tomato puree and topped with aubergine. Stick in the oven for however long (I did it too long so… haha) but take out around half way to add some goats cheese to the top. Yum!
My friend who commissioned me to do a Dog Portrait emailed me a lovely pic of my model with her drawing!
Isn’t she gorgeous? She looks like a happy customer to me :) She’s a little older now than she was in the photograph I referenced but I still think you’d know that was Mistie. She’s so cute!
My wardrobe doesn’t really factor in spring, or autumn. I generally go straight from winter to summer to winter again. I’m all about winter boots and wooly scarves, then sandals and summer scarves. With this in mind, I met my friend for lunch last week and realised my jackets went from “to keep me cosy” to “just a thin layer to shield a light breeze”. Neither of which I wanted on a day that one would be too warm and the other not warm enough. At the end of last year I got a lovely purple blazer in the New Look sale, so in an ideal world I’d have 2 of them – one for interviews and one for dress casual. Sadly New Look had nothing similar that I could find. Baring in mind I have no income at the moment (goodbye savings) it was a trip to Primark.
After looking around for a wee while I spotted this jacket reduced from £15 to £11! It was available in a few colours – a lilac grey, navy, brighter pink coral.. but this one caught my eye. My friend said it would match my blonde hair and I thought it would match my love of all things coral for the summer. The more I look at it the more I love it, and it has pockets which is always a bonus. The top/long vest is also new, an Asda purchase from the week before. Because I’m 30 going on 16! I couldn’t resist the cute cat print and the coral/salmon shade. But I figured it would be good for lounging days in the hot weather.
It’s been a week or so since my last update. Sometimes life takes over and my internet time reduces drastically. Something I have made time for these last couple of weeks however is healthier food. I’m not on a diet as such, just attempting to motivate myself into not eating crap and also eating more fruit and veg. This has involved a lot of fruit smoothies and also the odd veggie one. I’ve been reading up on raw diets to get inspiration, although I am not at a stage where I want to do one 100% – not really at a stage where I want to go vegetarian (again)!
My other problem is I’m not really in the know when it comes to cooking. I stick to what I know, or what is easy. And neither is really very adventurous. But at the moment I have been eating a lot of fish so have been experimenting with what I’d call a fish soup. My own version of a chowder!
The first one I did in my mum’s slow cooker which we are loving! I was aiming for a sort of curry and can’t quite remember what I put in there. The fish itself was Hake, which I’d never seen before, let alone tasted. But it is yummy! The second time I prepared it in a saucepan because I wasn’t organised enough for the slow cooker (or cooking at all tbh!) and it involved the hake, red onion, mushrooms, tomatoes, garlic, fish stock, chilli flakes, a spot of paprika and a splash of lemon juice. The third time was again in the saucepan, but this time it was salmon. Again it involved red onions, mushrooms, tomatoes, garlic, fish stock and a splash of lemon juice – but this time I added wine and cream! OMG delish! No recipes followed, I just winged it and hoped for the best!
I’ve also tried a green smoothie. I was reading up some recipes but as I don’t really do recipes (I’m normally missing a few ingredients) so mine included spinach, celery, blueberries, orange juice and a splash of soya milk. Actually really tasty! They also taste healthy, which is a nice feeling. Tonight my cooking adventure was an aubergine pasta bake. Not that adventurous really but again I was winging it and just chucking things in. So wheat-free pasta, spinach, red onion, garlic, celery, tomato, soya mince (with not enough soy sauce added to make it unbland!), veggie stock (with added cornflour and tomato puree) and the aubergine. It turned out alright, but would have been better without the soya mince!
Let’s see what next week brings!