… I know to some it may seem that recently i’ve been revisiting previous themes for random recipes but you see this challenge was never particularly about the theme, it’s more about the idea as a whole… the concept of encouraging us to use our recipe books more whilst also being more adventurous with our cooking… to shake up the ‘everyday’ chef and bring out a few little ideas we may have never tried before… and yes sometimes it will be a complete fail but other times you may just find a new classic to add to your repertoire…
… this month i’m going back to a firm favourite… those cuttings and clipping and old hand-written recipes we all have tucked away in folders or between the leaves of other books… i’m down in London and visiting mum again this week and well, you just have to see her clippings collection… it has a life of it’s own…
…mums collection lives in the cupboard above her oven and is organised into 7 A5 sized bundles and is made up of hand-written notes, newspaper clipping, magazine clippings, old recipe books that have fallen apart and little sheets taken from one of the rolla-deck thingy’s… each bundle is roughly labelled as meat, chicken, fish, lamb, soup, vegetables and desserts… and each bundle is wrapped in a larger A4 sized recipe and tied with an elastic hair band… very organised… just like my mum… and seeing that I was in her home I asked her to do the honours of selecting the recipe. With mum turned around so she couldn’t see, I pulled all seven bundles out of the cupboard and laid them on the kitchen table. I then asked mum to close her eyes and turn back around and reach out for a bundle… she landed on the one marked ‘vegetables’… I then asked her to close her eyes again and reach into the bundle and pull out a recipe… and with a swiftness suited to a woman half her age this is exactly what she did…
… it’s a recipe for Stuffed Mushrooms with leeks, Blue Cheese and Walnuts and it comes from a magazine clipping with no notes or clues as to the actual magazine other than it being under the heading of Comfort Cooking… it looks delicious and I can’t wait to make it…
and so of course, now it’s your turn, so here are the rules:
I missed the last challenge – sorry, things like house guests, car accidents, work, sickness, childminding etc. got in the way, not the cooking, but the part where it makes it from kitchen to computer.
Now this month will be different I promise, I have a selection of handwritten recipes but I don't think it would challenge your mother's collection!
That looks like a yummy recipe. I have clippings – so I will aim to join in!
Yes! So pleased with this theme. My great wad of magazine clippings is becoming increasingly neglected. Time to rediscover them, methinks.
Great idea.
I hope I turn up something as tasty as your stuffed mushrooms……who was it that said “life is too short to stuff a mushroom”?…they were obviously mad.
I'm going to do it this time. We have hundreds of miscellaneous recipes, many of them organized in binders, but a great wad of them loose.
Oh Dom – you don't know what you've done! I think I may need a bigger table to lay all mine out!! 🙂
I have all my clippings glued or taped onto A4 bits of paper and organized in a three-ring binder with dividers saying Poultry, Vegetables and Sweet Things, etc. It took me a quite a while to accomplish but I was so pleased with myself when I was done. It's easy to add to and now I can actually find them to use them. Which is all my way of saying that I LOVE this challenge! And I am adding the deadline to my Google calendar so I can't forget. 🙂
Your mother's collection is extremely impressive!
GREAT theme and I have as many as your mum, probably! Thanks Dom! Karen xx
Greta idea. Can't wait to figure out which one to try.. this could totally be teamed with Jacqui's Bookmarked Recipes, too. 🙂
Intriguing! I know those clippings are out there. Not organized, but for sure there are some. I only need to do something …
I'm with Ruth on this one – if the weather was better I might need to the whole of the back garden to spread mine out on. Oh dear lord this could be weird . . . I have clippings going back too many years to think about!
That recipe sounds great! I love this idea. I get really ruthless occasionally and throw out one or two clippings, but the rest seem to breed. Choosing one is going to be fun!
Brilliant! I spent a week one summer holiday sticking all my cuttings etc. in a spiral A4 book, then someone bought me one of those purpose made natty recipe book/folder for the rest of them. Looking forward to randomly selecting one of those.
That recipe sounds like a cracker, lots of my favourite things. OK, I'm in again this month. Just chosen a recipe and I've managed to pick one that will make me seem much more sophisticated than I actually am. Marvellous!
I'm in if I can find my recipes in one of my boxes – I keep putting off unpacking but I really should stop procrastinating!
Now that is a recipe I'd be very happy to make Dom, you did well there. I've been meaning to dive into my clippings for an age and keep getting distracted by all these blogs! So glad of the excuse to be encouraged into my very untidy and not desperately organised clippings pile, although I do, err, have a separate pile for chocolate clippings – clearly more organised than I realised.
I kept thinking about sticking my recipes into a scrapbook but some of them are double-sided so that wouldn't work and I have just never got around to any sort of system. They are now starting to fall out of the cupboard & into the sink so something must be done! I love your mum's fab filing system of food type per hairband, so I'm going to go with that! Vohn