A Quiet Shopping Trip

I called in at a farm shop and then at a nearby Aldi. The differences were striking. The farm shop was meticulously protecting the workers and customers and the Aldi was largely indifferent apart from the screens around the cashiers. I much prefer the one way systems, even if I do spend at least 10% of my time, even in a familiar store, going the wrong way and having to turn around while muttering to myself. 

Now things are settled a little, I'm planning on getting more and more from farm shops. It's much friendlier and I feel it's important to support the farmers in any way I can. There are two shops nearby, both of which I've discovered since the start of the Covid-19 crisis, and both really friendly. One has plenty of good veggies and the other has good meat. 

Tonight I cooked Slumpie from Terry Pratchett's Nanny Ogg's Cookbook. I failed. It was okay, and the men enjoyed it, but I felt it lacked something. The recipe calls for around a pint of dark ale. Obviously, I can't have that, because dark ale has gluten in it and I can't have gluten. You can buy gluten free beer but I didn't want to pay that much for something just to cook with. I just added more stock and lots of worcestershire sauce (the gluten free version, as the usual Lee & Perrins has gluten). Then the cooker seemed to be a little temperatmental and I couldn't get any good heat going. It just didn't click I also added mustard powder instead of made mustard because I had forgotten to pick some up, so that may have affected the taste. It was okay, but I think I'll fiddle around with the recipe next time. We had it with mash and some gorgeous new carrots from the farm shop.

Thank you for all the kind wishes on the writing. I'm still dazzled by the trailer. There's likely to be lots of writing stuff going on in the next few months, and it's okay to skip over it. I'll try and keep it to the separate section or on my other blog. 

Hugs and good health to all.