Hi this is ME...on Aioli - Tuesday, 18th December, 2013.

On Saturday, as I waited for my hairdresser to get to me, and idly leafing thru' a summer food magazine - Delicious - I think it was - I spotted a recipe for Aioli, using anchovy fillets, oil, a medium egg and salt.

Also, a recipe for Gremolata, which is a mixture of fresh parsley, lemon zest and juice and a clove of garlic.  According to Elizabeth David's Italian Food book - Penguin  paperback - Pages 183-184 Gremolata is a mix of chopped parsley, one chopped garlic clove and the zest and juice of half a lemon; according to Elizabeth David - for the "Milanese - it is an essential part of the traditional ossi buchi Milanese." and they sprinkle it on top of the ossi buchi before serving.

The magazine photography looked so enticing, I wanted to rush straight home and make it, right away!  Also the Aioli!

The magazine also discussed spinach fritters, and they looked just like the rissoles I first read about, years ago when beginning to scan magazines and newspapers for new and stunning recipes to make. I found the rissole recipe in the Telegraph, probably the Sunday Telegraph but can't quite remember now, well, it was rather a long time ago!  The whole idea of the recipe was to encourage the use of left-over vegetables or meat, mixing them with a thick Béchamel sauce, chilling, and then rolling small amounts into small thick sausage shapes, before coating in layers of flour, beaten egg and breadcrumbs.  These coated rissoles, or croquettes as they are also so called, are then baked or deep fried, before serving with a good well-flavoured sauce.

Well, these spinach fritters looked amazingly like my rissoles of years ago, and I found the magazine article amusing and.....yes, sufficiently fascinating for me to be intrigued  by the process of creating something fresh and tasty out of left-overs.

Coming away from the salon, I dashed into Marks and Spencer for their Made Without Wheat bread and their Beef Bourguignon and Crispy Potato Wedges from their Dine for £10.00 for two weekend meal deal;  well, I can't always create and prepare supper at the same time now, can I?

Fast-forward to this morning and, because of other things, I did not get to whizz up these new recipe re-finds over the weekend, making my own carrot cake recipe and regular meals instead!  So, before dashing out this morning for a spot of babysitting, I got to grips with the Aioli, which is basically a "kind of Provencal mayonnaise" - this from my copy of the "Concise Larousse Gastronomique" Page 8., ISBN 0-600-60009-2

As I'm sure you know, mayo is made using egg yolks and oil, creating an emulsion, with various added flavourings.  Now this magazine recipe stipulated a whole egg plus anchovy fillets, one crushed garlic clove and salt; my interest was assured, so too my curiosity.  I've never been much good at mayo, making instead Hollandaise, which I've always found much easier and quicker + it can be kept hot for up to four hours, which is useful for certain service situations.  So I made the sauce, using just one egg yolk with the other ingredients and, unfortunately, it curdled.  This can and does happen, quite easily with sauce making and the received solution is to start again with one fresh egg yolk, into which you slowly drip-feed the curdled mixture and, hey presto, you have a good finished sauce.

However, I decided this time to use a whole egg, plus seasoning, beating for a minute or two in a food processor, before beginning the slow drip-feed process of adding the required amount of olive oil.  Well, I added my curdled mixture and unused oil, to the whole egg and, within a few minutes, I had myself a full jar of smooth, lightly thickened Aioli.  I had also added two crushed garlic cloves and, fresh ground black peppercorns,  which was not in the detailed recipe; I just knew the final mixture would be improved by this addition!

Aioli may be served with hard boiled eggs, poached white fish, salads and cold meats; to which I would add, freshly cooked pasta, shell-fish and swirled into a simple soup.

It had been my intention to lunch on hot pasta and Aioli today but, came home much too late for lunch, going straight instead for a take-away Chinese meal of various items, which we enjoyed within thirty minutes of getting home.

So tomorrow....! I shall lunch on hot pasta with Aioli and maybe chopped hard boiled egg and raw, sliced red onion and I'll let you know just how good it tastes.

I'm also away from home tomorrow morning so, before I go, I'm going to whizz up a batch of Gremolata and try freezing small amounts in my ice-trays, for easy storage, for future use with chicken fillets or a roast bird and whatever other food combination I might dream up!

I made several batches of basic white sauce over the weekend and I shall use some to make up a batch of rissole mixture which, with left-over Christmas roast meats coming up soon, with Christmas cooking and eating, you might be able to use my suggestions for utilising your Christmas left-overs?

No photography to show you, as my computer is still away being repaired, and in its absence, I'm using His computer, making it difficult to feature my food pictures.  But be assured, I'm still snapping away and will show you the results just as soon as I can, once my computer is up and running!

I adore cooking for Christmas but, sadly, am doing very little myself this year, as I'm away from home,  What's keeping me interested is my current idea for things in pots and jars, for creating almost instant meals and lunch snacks, like my kale pesto, potted kale, creamed Cavolo Nero and sticky red onion marmalade.

Food-talk is so engrossing, hey???

Bye for now  - Daisy