A lovely day at home

I have had a lovely day at home today.  The boys were all out and Sunny had a very long sleep.  Instead of doing any of the billion things I could have done  I made myself a little picnic of cheese and gherkin vita weats, a cup of tea (twining's chai) and the last piece of chocolate caramel slice, sat on the couch outside in the sun and read my book.  I started Arabella by Georgette Heyer last night.  It is a historical romance and is great light escapist literature ( the intelligent woman's Mills and boons as Libby calls it).  After awhile the midges started to bite, the wind came up and it started to rain.....so I retired upstairs to the loft to continue reading in bed.  Still Sunny slept on.....what a rare treat!!

All good things must come to an end and feeling refreshed I went out into the garden and picked some Zucchinis and coriander for dinner.  I made a delicious, simple and quick Indian recipe from Madhur Jaffrey's Indian Cookery called.....

Prawns with courgettes

350g zucchini
1 1/4 tsp salt
350 g peeled frozen prawns (defrosted and patted dry)  - I'm sure you could use fresh ones???
5 tbsp veg oil ( I used a bit less)
6 cloves garlic peeled and finely chopped ( I used 2 massive Russian garlic cloves)
75g finely chopped fresh coriander
1 fresh hot green chilli, finely chopped ( I used 1/2 a hot yellow one)
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper ( I left this out)
1 can of tomatoes
1 tsp peeled, finely grated ginger
1 tbs lemon juice ( our lemons are not yet ripe so I used lime)

1. Cut the zucchinis into 4 slices lengthwise.  Cut each slice into 4 long strips. Cut the strips into thirds crosswise. (sort of like matchsticks) Put the zucchini in a bowl and sprinkle with 1/4 tsp of salt.  Toss to mix, set aside for 30 mins. Drain and pat dry.   ( I didn't really do this bit)

2. Put oil in frypan set over med high heat.  When hot put in chopped garlic. Stir and fry till light brown. Put in zucchinis and all the other ingredients except the prawns.  Stir to mix and bring to a simmer.  Add prawns and stir them in.  Bring back to simmer, cover, turn heat to low and simmer for 3 mins. ( I think i did cook it a bit longer).

3.  Uncover, turn heat to medium and boil away the liquid, if there is any so that you are left with a thickish sauce.

Serve with rice and I also made a cucumber raita.  YUM

This is a great cookbook.  If you like Indian food I would highly recommend it!

After cooking dinner I had to pick up the kids, take them into town for swimming lessons, go to the shop to get some cardboard boxes so that Nelson could make his hat for the Easter Hat parade.  He decided to make a robot bunny.

Now everyone is in bed and I'm going to go and finish that book.  Goodnight.