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I'm Alison, that's my little boy Finn, and we are absolutely thrilled to have you at BrocanteHome!

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Saturday 31 January 2009

Scenes From My Kitchen

My two newest culinary fetishes: onion spelt crackers with the merest slither of the maturest cheddar I can get with orange juice for breakfast and a spoonful of black and peppercorn mustard to be served with almost everything else... The Kenwood (Delia Cheat) mini chopper currently transforming my kitchen life if only because I don't have to do battle with my oh so complicated food processor on a regular basis and I can whip up a terracotta bowl full of hummus in the blink of an eye with this little gem... And here lie's the terrible truth: where sensible people have kitchen gadgets and other relevant but pretty little frippery, I have school ties and plastic sports day medals. I clearly consider kids vitamins and little pots of yeast to be worthy of display, and this dresser represents only a fraction of my darling little dilapidated kitchen. And finally my Mums recipe, split pea soup, blended for all it's worth into golden yellow nectar. To my utter mystification now, when I was child my Mum and Dad used to get a little delirious about this salty soup, while I with all the snobbishness of a pampered suburban schoolgirl wouldn't touch it, truly believing that my parents fondness for it harked back to a yearning for the relative poverty of their youth, when a bag of peas, a scrag end of gammon, two carrots and an onion were considered something of a feast... And now I can't get enough of it. Yesterday, in wont of gammon, I substituted a couple of slices of smoked bacon and a few salty chunks of pancetta, and added half a bag of split yellow peas, the said carrots and onions, a couple of sticks of celery, salt, thyme, cloves and black pepper, and two hours later found myself with a cheery bowl of homely frugal bliss. Have a lovely weekend Housekeepers.
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9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Recipe, please!

texasaggiemom

Anonymous said...

Your dresser looks loved and *used* - which is the most important thing. Functional but charming therefore.
As for the split pea soup ...oh yum yum gonna get me some. :)

Vee said...

Oh dear...I've never learned to like pea soup, but yours looks so golden and not all green and, well let's leave it at that.

I like your kitchen dresser...you've got style and so what that the vitamins are on display. It's a working kitchen for goodness sake.

Where is everybody these days?

Gena said...

Vee,I make this soup too and you use yellow split peas not 'green'peas,it is a s Alison says delicious and very easy!although I dontblend mine because I prefer the veg chunky.
Alison,wonderful pics,like a picture from a Cath Kidston book! I always think the best kitchens look as though they are actually used and not like a showroom kitchen,I can see you in your pinny sleeves rolled up making something yummy!

Alison May said...

@ Vee... I don't know where everyone has gone! At first I thought everyone had fallen out with me en mass, then I looked at my rss subscribers and it seems that somewhere along the line feedburner has wiped out my subscriber base and from Wednesday those subscribed to the rss (as opposed to the atom feed)aren't aware that I've been blogging at all!

So I'm hoping that explains the eerie silence and it's not that I've offended someone or become deeply dull overnight... I've been having complete horrors!!

@ Gena, Mum and Dad have theirs unblended but I live in fear of stringy chunks of meat and have to have it blended... heck I'm soooo nesh aren't I??

@ Texasaggiemom, ooh the recipe... I've got to say I'm a kind of threw it in and hope for the best kinda woman, but for those of you who are more sensible, I used 1lb of split peas,(no need to soak), two slices of bacon, a handful of pancetta chunks, two carrots, one onion, two celery sticks, two pints of chicken stock and assorted sprinkles of herbs and spices to taste, put it all in a pan, let it boil furiously for ten minutes, then simmered for almost two hours and blended...

Hope that helps!

Anonymous said...

Oh great, now I've got a hankering for pea soup...:-)
And I love the way your dresser looks! I'd love to have something like that but, alas, with my two little rascals I have to keep everything behind closed doors.

Have a great week-end!

Anonymous said...

Hi, Alison!
This is my favorite kind of post--pictures of different areas of your home, with descriptions of your daily life. It truly inspires me! Thanks so much!
:)
Katherine

Dinahsoar said...

Lovely kitchen...and the soup looks wonderful..reminds me of channa dal, the Indian version. I believe I'll try yours, though...hubby is not as fond as I of Indian spices--I think he'd like this version.

Also, love your blog..don't comment often but I'm reading regularly.

Anonymous said...

Oh my you moved. I have been playing catch-up on all your lovely posts all weekend. The new blog (well it is still Brocante, but new home) is wonderful. Yum to the pea soup and yum to the new style. xxx Tonette

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