Rubbishy Cookery

  A good friend recently had a dinner party and served a delicious true tagine which inspired this experiment with leftover ingredients in the fridge and pantry. Allons-y! Ingredients: This was made on the fly with ingredients added as I went, so I don’t have my usual class photo of ingredients, but instead, a list: - leftover canned chickpeas - leftover canned tomatoes  - a peeled and cubed sweet potato  - a peeled and chopped carrot  - 4-5 finely chopped garlic - a chopped onion  - chopped dried apricots  - chopped prunes - many spices: salt, ground cumin, ground coriander, ground cinnamon, turmeric, saffron, smoked paprika  - olive oil Directions: Heat up a few gluts of olive oil in a soup pot and start frying the chopped onion: Add the chopped garlic, stirring often, until golden, and maybe a little browned: Add the chopped sweet potato: And chopped carrot: Keep stirring so nothing sticks or burns! Add all those lovely spices: Stir a minute or two ...

  A long time  ago, in a relationship far far away, I was shlepped around on many a canoe trip. I was not then, nor have I ever been, a lover of being in nature. I should never have been taken on a canoe trip, let alone multiple canoe trips, and by the same canoe-trip-loving person, because I was definitely ruining the whole experience with my whining and complaining.  The best part about those canoe trips was the morning breakfast oatmeal. It was simple and easy to make on a camp stove with lake water, and the oats with added dried fruits filled us up with stick-to-your-ribs goodness to fuel us for the day’s paddling and portaging. And mosquito slapping. And sweating. And sun burning. And getting wet hiking boots. And so on. Needless to say, my canoe tripping days are over, but my enjoyment of this oatmeal recipe lives on. Ingredients: Directions: Bring 1 cup of water to a boil in a small saucepan with the dried apples and apricots cut into bite sized pieces: Get 1/3 cup...