Felafel v Felafel, with porridge on the side

First of all I want to say welcome to Zana, I should have done this yesterday but my psychedelic  porridge threw me off piste.

This is an early post as I am going to be outside all day and once I have come in, showered, eaten and drunk a gallon of tea I will not be fit to string 2 words together.

Remember my promise? well here it is.

It looks a bit blurry because it was steaming hot, and doubly delicious for being in my Winnie the Pooh bowl. Today I fine diced the apple and warmed it with the blackberries for 3 minutes as I forgot to take them out to defrost.

Last night I made up a pack of the Felafel mix from AF, I had company for dinner and when I looked at the amount of mix I had a moment of "Crikey, there's not enough to feed a mouse there!"

So I grabbed my "Jack" cook book and turned to her recipe.

I had all the ingredients, I still have coriander in the garden and the parsley is growing while I watch, so made a batch, it took no more than 4 minutes. I decided that as it was a last minute thing I would make 4 patties, time was running and the other ones were in the oven already.

I got 8 from the AF mix and 4 from the "Jack" recipe, if I had made regular sized Felafels it would have been 12 - 14.

The patties were well textured, moist not wet, firm not dense and very moreish. The tin of chick peas were  on offer ages ago, I used 1 average sized carrot and half a large red onion, the herbs were from the garden and the cumin from a large pack at an Indian shop in London, I left the oil out of the mix because I forgot about it in my haste and used some 1 cal olive oil spray to fry them off. 

The AF mix ones were very tasty but low on texture, they were firm and dense. I will make them again but will add onion and carrot to open the texture up and fresh herbs to brighten the flavour.

I served them with wraps, AF, salad and spicy Mango Chutney, AF, thinned down slightly with a splash of hot water. I was going for the traditional taste of yogurt with mint but my hand closed round the Mango Chutney first.

Which would I choose first out of the contestants?

It has to be Jack's recipe, for a few reasons.

1. It uses store cupboard ingredients.

2. It needs no tweaking.

3. I made it myself.

4. I LOVE it.

5 My guest felt the same.

As I said I will use the mixes with some tweaking as there was nothing fundamentally wrong with them, and because I will not waste them, I am thinking of making a version of Onion Bhajis with a packet tonight to have with Lamb Madras ( using an AF Madras Kit)

I will be cooking Pilau Rice and Naan Breads so if they are not successful it will not matter.

Reasons to be grateful.

1. Dinner was a success at a minimal cost.

2. My Purple Porridge is sooooo gooood.

3. I have a full day in the fresh air.

4. I have walked Ben and managed to run for part of the way.

5. There are moves afoot to bring forward my move date.

I will share my plans later this week if they pan out. I may be looking at the end of April/early May.

I must not count my chickens yet, I may have to scramble some eggs!

My tea is drunk, my Purple Porridge is history and Ben is sitting by the door looking at me with a "hurry up" expression on his face.

                         TTFN                                              Pam