Reduced To Pot Noodles

So far , 2014 hasn't exactly had the Wow! factor .  Even the little , wild-haired chap I see whenever I go to the supermarket , who springs  to attention waving a handful of plastic keyrings , "Hello Madame ... Buy One , Pay For Two ! " , seems deflated . His marketing ploy seems to have lost it's sparkle and his cackle's not so loud . Only Liz , whose photos of her Antarctic advenure are keeping us all enthralled , seems to be having fun .

Bored to a frazzle , Winter Olympics notwithstanding ,  I've been rummaging through my cookery books to find something to perk us up . Ignoring oddities like Mexican Risotto ... bananas , eggs , bacon and almonds  added to the rice  ....  from Lady Maclean's Cook Book (  Lots of worthy staples such as Chicken Liver Patè  , "makes enough for thirty" ... or Lady Sykes Pheasant patè , "will serve eight over a weekend" , as well as the 1960s abberations ) , I hovered over a recipe for Hooihaantjes from the morning paper . Cockerel cooked with hay , apples and beer . Though where , in a first-floor flat in the middle of town , one was supposed to get hold of a small quantity of hay , clean and appetising enough to soak in beer and stuff a chicken with , I didn't know . A pet shop ?  Anyway , we ended up having Pot Noodles for supper .

Well , not the real thing ... I don't even know whether they still exist . But I used  an Indonesian ready-mix for chicken soup

 

 

and , instead of the recommended additions of rice and potatoes  ... bleugh! ... , added a leek , egg noodles and baby spinach to the chicken . Looked hideous but cheered us up enormously !