Hairy Pie Number One

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We have had a very quiet week. Nicky has had a full week at work, and I have done some Mac work too which has been welcome.


The social highlight of the week was Wednesday evening. We had invited Jancis Barlow (friend from Loughborough who is in NZ again for a few months) and her cousin Pat, and Pat's husband John over for dinner. Pat brought a lovely apple, rhubarb and strawberry crumble with her, along with wonderfully think custard. The evening gave me the chance to try out one of my Christmas presents - the Hairy Biker Perfect Pie cook book which Katherine and Ben sent. We chose a steak and ale single crust pie. It took me most of the day to make, what with cooking the filling for two hours in the oven and resting the pastry for an hour or so, but the results were worth it. I have never made or tasted a pie quite like it. The flavour was deep and rich, and even though the puff pastry wasn't as puffy as I expected, it was still good.


Claire called in on Saturday and had coffee and Nicky accompanied her up to the shops and the library. Today we have been to see the current Sherlock Holmes film which we enjoyed though I thought the first one was better. On the way home we bought a Domino's pizza with a voucher off the back of a supermarket till receipt, and that was pretty good too.


The weather has still not been very summery, but has got drier and sunnier towards the end of the week. The best weather seems to have been in the south of the south island, but apparently they were due to get some snow this weekend!


Bye for now,

Rick

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