Mmmm Jane that sounds yum. My standby savoury is to buy a selection of colourful veg, cut into small slices and arrange round a pot of bought dip. Carrots, celery, peppers, cherry toms (whole), french beans, mange tout, mini bread sticks etc… looks pretty, is dead easy and ticks the healthy eating box!
PS Did not do the secret hand check!
Great minds! I was going to suggest a bag of frozen sausage rolls! Or you could buy cocktail sausages - you could put those on sticks if you felt adventurous - but it’s still very simple! - and maybe intersperse with cherry tomotoes, or tomberries (teeny weeny tomatoes, available in supermarkets) and/or cheese and pineapple on sticks. Very seventies, but they always get snaffled up at school buffets. Dead simple to do and they look pretty and taste delicious.
Of if it needs to be veggy: perhaps a bought quiche or pizza? You can buy them ready to eat or just whack it in the oven, to eat hot or cold.
Cheesy puffs -
roll out some bought puff pastry so it’s thin, cut in half, cover one half with grated cheese of choice, slap on the second piece, gently roll to stick it all together, then cut into triangles or fingers. Beaten egg glaze is posh, then shove in a hot oven until all puffed up and golden. Voila!! I use the pizza wheel to cut it up cos the pastry doesn’t stick.
Will definately try the choc banana pud - what is it about choc AND banana???
Tomorrow is clinic day re: nip and tuck…on the Feeling Excited Bench.
Thank you all for writing BISCUITS in the sky for Barley, bless her.
Millie had a Big Walk today, with a share of my hot pie and chorley cake at the bakery - yum.
grumpy
Good Luck tomorrow Grumpy. Glad you are feeling excited about it and not anxious!
Choc and banana definitely go well together!
I just made an AMAZing pud! I still had some of those pears left over and OH was trying to scoff the choccy pear cakes I made for school (after all that’s where the free pears came from!) So I made little puddings, lining the individual basins with sliced pears then filling with choc sponge mix. But in the sponge mix was 1/4 jar of home-made mincemeat, left over from last year, that I wanted out of the way. (This year’s is marinating in a big bowl ready to be put in jars tomorrow evening!) It had matured wonderfully - the brandy in it had kept it from going mouldy, but it seems to have got quite a lot more alcoholic. Hic!!
No doubt I’ll pay for it later, as alcohol seems to make the flushes soooo much worse, but even though I say it myself: OMG! it was delicious!
Aww Grumpy I’m sorry to read about Barley xx
Had a weekend in Wales, looking round Aberystwyth uni with my son. He fancies computer sciences, the student giving us a tour was excitedly telling us about some research that’s going on there to do with mammograms and interpreting the info. Student blithely said “apparently they can be quite painful”… Um, yup!
Is this turning into a cookery thread? I can’t compete. I’ll just sit on the “can’t cook,won’t cook bench” and wish that I did like cooking, I don’t…in fact I hate it as every time I try anything new it’s a total failure. I can turn out a decent roast dinner when I have to, but baking is totally beyond me. I failed my ‘O’ level cookery exam back in 1970 and it’s all gone downhill since then!
My husband could throw random ingredients together and get fantastic results, me, it’s always a disaster!
I will try the chocolate banana recipe as it sounds delicious and doesn’t involve cooking.
Grumpy good luck for tomorrow, all fingers and toes are crossed.
Thank you sooooooooo much for all the brilliant ideas, I should have had it sorted today soooo annoyed with myself!! So quick run (haha) to supermarket in morning, oh dear! I know I’m still going to be standing with glazed, dazed look thinking now I have been given ideas what should I pick???
Off to the “getting on my own nerves” bench, it’s pretty near the “why have I turned into someone who is so indecisive???” bench. Oh no, now I can feel the “guilty” bench calling…
All the very best for tomorrow, grumpy. xx
Thinking of you tomorrow Grumpy - hope all goes well for you.
I will be cooking Nicarguan recipes for our post-harvest fun-night (the overseas appeal we are supporting is there) so have to bake tart des tres leches!!! A cake with cream ,evap and condensed milk… and heaps of sugar.
Hugs for anyone who needs them… not around much this week, busy couple of days then off further north for a conference.
Katy, if you don’t know which to pick, “ip, dip, sky blue” should help!
Off to an interview tomorrow lunchtime. A second interview, so I’m hopeful, but I won’t uncross my fingers until they’ve offered me the job and I’ve started. Here’s hoping.
CM - fingers crossed for you as well. Hope the interview goes well and …yes … here’s hoping. Good luck.
CM hope all goes really well… “knock 'em dead” as the saying goes. Will look out for your mean machine racing round Benchland afterwards!
good luck tomorrow CM - keep us posted… and hope all goes as you want it to Grumpy, nipping and tucking… tucking in to all that yummy food perhaps… no? oh… oK
just roasted carrots & leeks in 100ml dry white wine with 1 tbps honey & fresh thyme… it was fab… (sorry FF!)
night all, sleep well… wonder if any sleep fairies are popping over from The Woods? need one…
Jane xx
Just popped over from the woods with a large net full of sleep fairies to let loose in Benchland. Buggeritt helped to round them up.
There…off they go, fluttering around the benches looking for somewhere to rest for the evening. If they don’t stay then don’t blame me! They do prefer to rest inside tents. So if any of you woosie benchlanders want a proper nights sleep I would suggest you come to the woods and either use one of the spare tents or climb up the ancient yew trees and try out one of the vacant nests. Sleep awaits you in the woods…
Come on Buggeritt …HEAL!!
Burst out laughing CM, (probably will be doing that), best of luck for today xx
Sleep fairies beat it back to the Woods - was watching Strictly result programe at 2.30am!!!
have a good week - how does ip dip finish again?
love Jane x
First zapping session today, suppose I’d better get up…?
Ali, unfortunately the Microwave Crew are very good at kicking us off the CBA bench. Give yourself plenty of time to get there and parked, to reduce the stress of it all.
Good luck today Grumpy and CM. I hope it all goes well for both of you. Good luck for you too Ali. Although the long term ses of zapping were worse than I expected (stiffness, shoulder pain–may be because of my general lack of youthfull suppleness!) the actuall zapping wasn’t all that bad, so don’t be too worried.
I am being slowly worn down by this cold/flu and feeling VERY sorry for myself–just rescheduled tomorrow’s herceptin for next week and am getting ready to climb back into bed for a couple of hours : (Every time a sleep fairy nestled up to me, I let out a giant cough and scared her away. Back to the woods with me, I think.
Let us know what you’re cooking Katy!
‘microwave crew’ - like it!!
Quail, lots of drinks, relaxing music on, snuggle back down and have a duvet day… Fluey colds are awful at the best of times xx
Sleep fairies target me mid afternoon and about half an hour before the alarm’s due to go off! But, after our weekend in Wales with LOTS of walking I slept really well last night! So, I obviously need to spend every weekend in Aberdovey 
Hope it went well CM, at your interview. Hope your tit and nup - no sorry. nit and cup - get it right in a minute - NIP and TUCK appointment went to your satisfaction, Grumpy, and that you managed to settle on something for the buffet, Katy. I hope it didn’t end up as mashed bananas, cheese and sausage rolls on sticks coated in yogurt and cream??
I am soooo tired today. Got sent home at 3pm instead of staying for staff meeting, so I must have looked nearly as sh*t as I feel. I’m on the ‘getting really p***ed off with this’ bench because towards the end of last week I felt I had loads of energy - even more than BBC (before BC) at this stage of a long term - but yesterday. WHAM! Tiredness hit me like a brick again and I feel like a limp lettuce. I hope it doesn’t last into next week. I postponed the Highlands holiday from May, 'cos I’d have just finished Rads and I’d be too tired! 