Food and assignments

For the most part, apart from work and running a household of five, my week has looked like this.

I enjoy marking uni assignments. It's nice to be asked, it pays well and I like telling people to support their arguments with reference to their reading and to make sure to proof read their work to avoid silly mistakes. Perhaps one day I'll become an academic. It does mean, however, that for a couple of weeks I don't read much or watch television in the evenings. I'll be watching Midsomer Murders and Brideshead Revisited (the movie) and finishing the three books I'm reading as soon as the assignments are all marked!

Today I can't just sit and mark because we are having people over for lunch after church tomorrow. I really enjoy having people over after church except for the fact that you can't spend all morning cooking, it must all be done ahead. So far this morning I have put Nigella's porchetta in its marinade.

I have made banana cinnamon cupcakes.

I have even made cherry & ricotta strudel from Not Quite Nigella. Thankfully, Lorraine worked out all the bugs from the original recipe. I'm not usually much of a fiddler but I have tinkered slightly with Lorraine's recipe because I am staying away from refined sugar at the moment (tragic and so unlike me, I know, but I'm trying not to be the dumpy matron of honour in January. It's so hard not to compare four women in the same outfit).

I substituted 70 grams of honey for the caster sugar, sprayed the filo with olive oil spray (that hurt) and used almond meal instead of breadcrumbs which was the one change that will, I think be a good one. I left out the lemon juice to compensate for the fact that honey, unlike caster sugar, is a liquid and just zested the whole lemon. I won't actually cook it until tomorrow. I bet I forget to take a photo.

Back to the marking.....