Coffee this morning was hand scooped from this jar of Moccona.  I pride myself on how I actually used a teaspoon as opposed to pouring straight from the jar.

I applied similarly high standards of kitchen utensil use to our poor loaf of banana bread.  It’s one of those great mysteries of the kitchen as to how I can use a bread knife on banana bread and still come up with a triangular shaped slice.  It didn’t just look strange and it didn’t toast evenly either.  Just as well I slathered it with cream cheese, which helped to even out the width a little.  My food styling this morning didn’t stop there.  I drizzled honey over the top of the cream cheese because it makes cream cheese taste like carrot cake frosting.  After breakfast, I had a little lie down while my pancreas recovered.

Staying at home cocooning is one of those double edged swords.  Staying at home per se costs nothing.  There’s all this extra time to do the house work and plan a home cooked dinner with whatever’s in the kitchen but on the other hand, there’s all that extra time in front of the computer at 9 am feeling virtuous that you haven’t spent any money all day.

Which brings me to the Gilt Group.  A random tweet got me curious about this Alex and Aexandra’s members only online ‘sample sale’ and before I knew it, I found myself browsing the ‘sale of the day’ that was made for me – Missoni Accessories.  I will report back when my order arrives in the next couple of weeks.

Nothing like a photo of a bottle of champagne to diffuse the impact of  a reference to those Trying Times of mine.

I didn’t break out the Costco Champagne just to celebrate the purchasing of cut price Missoni.  I’ve officially dodged the operation that was planned for next week.  My blood tests were fine this week and I am now officially a blood test free zone until become a citizen of Planet IVF.  I’m telling you, I’m a completely different person to who I was last week.  A weight has lifted off my shoulders and calmness has returned.  I have a sense of finally being able to move forward and leave the last 3 months of uncertainty behind me.  The way the world is at the moment. you take what you’re given in the miracles department and say a little thank you to God while you’re at it.

But back to the champagne.  It really does come from France, hence the ability of Costco to label it champagne.  It’s not cheap though, $30 a bottle compared to Chandon at $20 and Moet at $49 (both Costco prices).  Mr SSG really likes it.  He reckons it is a champagne with body and reasonable value for its price point.  From my point of view, all I can taste is chocolate and that can only be a good thing.

From champagne to quinoa.  I don’t really know how to link the two.  I bought both at Costco?  Anyway, I’m finally getting in on the super grains fad.  On its own, it has this nutty flavour and a very firm texture.  I’m having it as a side dish with a tofu stir fry tonight.

Boiling it is like watching tiny corn kernels sizzling away in oil, waiting to pop.  And that image is about the only vaguely unhealthy thing about quinoa.  The kitchen  smelled fantastic as it cooked.  Very wholesome and organic in an earthy kind of way.  Completely made me forget that I’d had a pre dinner glass of champagne (or two).

I took the advice of my clued up twitter friends and cooked 1 cup of quinoa in 2 cups of boiling stock for 12 minutes before letting it rest with the lid on for 15 minutes.

My vegetable and tofu stir fry was based on this Kylie Kwong recipe.

You really need a strongly flavoured dish to go with quinoa but what quinoa doesn’t have in taste on its own, it makes up for in texture.

That’s it from me tonight.  I’m reliving Christmas by watching a back log of taped Jamie and Nigella programmes.