Sunday 28 March 2010

Penguin and mushroom salad

I'm probably inviting all sorts of weird web search results with a title like that - what a world of difference a missing comma makes (as I said to my students this week in a seminar that rather worryingly had to turn into a grammar lesson on how to use an apostrophe). Needless to say, the penguin was only matched with the mushrooms in the course of writing this post, and neither was harmed in the process.


The mushroom salad was actually my entry to Lisa and Jacqueline's monthly No Croutons Required event, which was featuring chickpeas this month. Chickpeas are our favourite pulse (is that sad or with-the-moment?) so I really wanted to enter - but busy-ness got the better of me actually posting it before the deadline. I had paired my chickpeas with a marinated and grilled portobello mushroom, serving it with mixed leaves and sundried tomato, and with some home-made blackberry vinegar drizzled over the top. I would have added avocado too if I'd had any - I think that would be a nice additional texture. You can't really see the vinegar in the photo but it gave a nice fruity acidity. I kept the marinade simple as I didn't want the vinegar to get drowned - just a bit of shaosing wine, some balsamic vinegar and some garlic powder.


Inquisitive penguin

The penguin was another matter entirely. I started him quite a while ago but then didn't have any orange wool, so he sat rather sinisterly beakless and featureless for several weeks. Then I got some more wool and made him his beak, but didn't get round to attaching his wings or giving him any eyes. So when I finally got him all together I was pleasantly surprised at how cute he was. He's another character from my book of knitted toys, and the reason I was pushed to finally finish him, is because he's one of several ambassadors from my sewing group, to an exhibition of toys in Cardiff. One of our remote members lives there, so she will be taking them in, and hopefully seeing them in situ. They come back to their owners eventually, which I'm pleased about - I felt rather sad squishing him into the postbox to go off on his important errand.


Scholarly penguin

The Easter break starts at the end of this week so hopefully I will get a few more posts up - including an award from the lovely Johanna :)


Thoughtful penguin

5 comments:

Johanna GGG said...

That penuin doesn't fool anyone when he starts reading books upside down :-) He is very cute though!

And aren't chickpeas everyone's favourites in that timeless way alongside all the other trendy beans that come and go - I always hava tin in the cupboard - never tried marinating and grilling mushrooms - sound like a fine partner for chickpeas

Kate said...

Aw he is adorable!! Also, hilarious photos - thoughtful penguin HA!

SmitoniusAndSonata said...

Mushrooms , chickpeas and penguins .... to paraphrase that duo from Masterchef , "posts don't get any better than this" .
Must eat that salad tomorrow . Might take a little longer ( Oh , all right . A lot longer ) to knit a penguin .

Caroline said...

I love thoughtful penguin - gave me giggles! He's adorlable, hon.

Also, chick peas are my favourite pulse too. I make a salad with cherry toms, spring onions and fresh coriander in simple olive oil and lemon juice dressing. It's delicious!

Ilana said...

mmmmmmmm, mushrooms and awwwwwwwwww, penguin :) xx