Day 15 A plague of wasps

After a very wet day, the kitchen and downstairs loo were invaded by hundreds of wasps. Luckily the village website came up with the name of the man who could deal with them. And deal with them he did, first thing this morning. There was a nest in the gutter. No more!

Today’s Book

Cold Granite by Stuart MacBride

Aberdeen, the granite city, sparkly in the sunshine, grey and dour at all other times, is the setting for a series of detective stories by Stuart MacBride, featuring DS Logan McRae.

In the first book in the series, called, as it happens, Cold Granite, it is December and it is all very dark, dank and wet. The crimes at the centre of the book are horrible - the abduction and murder of small children - and it is a mark of MacBride's expertise that he can make his book not only engrossing but enjoyable and at times funny, without diminishing the terrible seriousness of the crimes.

How does he do this? I think it is because he shows them as being part of the working life of the police force he is writing about. These things occur and have to be dealt and cleared up by somebody and those that do the clearing up either have to be able to develop a certain level of detachment or go under. It's a fine line. Having said that, MacBride does not spare us from the gruesomeness of the crimes or the grief of the bereaved. Nor does he spare us from the anger and prejudice of those members of the public who allow themselves to be wound up by the press into a violence against anyone they feel is to blame - including the police.

The plotting is excellent - not neat or contrived, but satisfactorily real. However, the real strength of this book is the characterisation. Logan and his colleagues feel like the genuine article. You might say that the portrayal of the villains is somewhat superficial and stereotypical, but that is how they appear to Logan and co and when you get a shaft of insight into the criminal's behaviour, it is more shocking as a result.

I really enjoyed this book. I liked Logan and I am now on book ten of the twelve so far published. What I like about these books is that the plots don’t repeat themselves and Logan progresses and develops. Too many series wear themselves out and instead of getting better the standards drop with each successive book. No so here!

Music

Sorry, I couldn’t resist . . .

The Wasps, Vaughan Williams

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FzSt1oulfA

LPO Vernon Handley

Food

It’s another grey day, damp but not raining – just generally bluh. So I think a curry might just brighten things up.

Spicing a curry

Curries don’t have to be hot, you just have to choose your spices carefully.

Spices for heat

Chilli, pepper, cayenne, paprika, ginger, mustard seed, garlic

Spices for flavour

Cumin, coriander, cardamom, turmeric, cinnamon, allspice, fennel seed, clove, nutmeg, fenugreek

A very basic curry powder (mild)

1 tbsp coriander

¼ tbsp turmeric

2 tbsp cumin

¼ tbsp chilli

This is a recipe for a very basic vegetable curry. It is mild but full of flavour. The basic framework for the recipe works for all curries, just vary your ingredients.

Putting a vegetable curry together

Components

· Vegetables

· Ginger and garlic paste

· Spice Mix

Vegetables

1. Decide what vegetables you want to use. A good mixture would be onions, aubergine, carrot, green beans, peas, tomatoes and potato.

2. Cooking the vegetables: Place the aubergine, carrot, green beans and potato in a medium-sized pan. Add 250ml/8fl oz water.

3. Bring to the boil, add the peas, then cover, turn the heat to medium and cook for four minutes or until the vegetables are just tender.

4. Chop the onions.

Ginger and garlic paste

(Increase the amounts if you like your curry with a bit of a kick to it. These quantities are for a mild curry)

1. Peel and roughly chop 1 ½ cms of root ginger and put in a mini blender.

2. Peel and roughly chop 2 cloves of garlic and add to blender with 2 tbsp water.

3. Blend to a paste

Spice Mix

Choose what spices you want to use. Start with the basic mix, then experiment. Where possible buy whole spices. They stay fresh longer. Grind them in a spice mill or coffee grinder.

Keep about ½ tsp cumin whole.

When the vegetables are just cooked, add the chilli paste. Stir and simmer gently for five minutes.

Making the curry

1. Put 4tbsp of oil (sunflower, rapeseed or mild olive oil) in a large frying pan.

2. When hot add the whole cumin

3. About 10 seconds later add the onions and cook on a slow to medium heat until soft and translucent.

4. Add the spice mix and stir thoroughly for about 20 seconds.

5. Add the ginger/garlic paste and stir for about 1 minute.

6. Strain the vegetables, reserving the water.

7. Add the cooked vegetables, stirring so that they can absorb all the spices.

8. Add the tomatoes and enough of the reserved water to make a good sauce (you don’t want it too watery)

9. Stir, bring to boil and then turn the heat down to simmering until the vegetables are cooked.

Serve with rice and garnish with fresh coriander garnish with the fresh coriander.

Making a meat curry is not vastly different

1. Cut your meat into cubes (the larger the cubes, the longer it will take to cook)

2. Put 4tbsp of oil (sunflower, rapeseed or mild olive oil) in a large frying pan.

3. When hot, add the whole cumin

4. Brown the meat to seal in the juices. You may have to do this in batches if you are cooking a lot of meat.

5. Remove the meat with a slotted spoon and set aside.

6. Add the onions to the pan and cook on a slow to medium heat until soft and translucent.

7. Add the spice mix and stir thoroughly for about 20 seconds.

8. Add the ginger/garlic paste and stir for about 1 minute.

9. Add the meat, stir to coat with the spices

10. Add the tomatoes and enough of the reserved water to make a good sauce (you don’t want it too watery)

11. Stir, bring to boil and then turn the heat down to simmering until the meat is tender.

If you want a richer curry add cream, yoghourt or coconut milk at step 8. Add it a spoonful at a time, stirring until it is absorbed before adding the next spoonful.

How much?

Taste as you go along and when it tastes good – stop.

Lamb Madras

A Madras curry has come to mean a curry made with a hot spice mix. This is an original southern Indian curry. It is quite hot.

Serves 4–6

• 1 tablespoon coriander seeds

• 1 teaspoon black peppercorns

• 1 teaspoon fennel seeds

• 10 fenugreek seeds

• 4 cloves

• 4 dried hot red chillies (If you want to reduce the heat, use few chillies)

• 6 tablespoons olive or groundnut oil

• 2 onions, very finely chopped

• 1 teaspoon very finely grated fresh ginger

• 2 teaspoons crushed garlic

• 3–4 fresh hot green chillies, very finely chopped (If you want to reduce the heat choose mild green chillies and reduce the number)

• 900g (2lb) boneless lamb from the shoulder, cut into 2.5–4cm (1–1½in) cubes

• 2 large tomatoes, very finely chopped

• 1½ teaspoons salt

• 400ml (14fl oz) tin coconut milk, well stirred

• 1 tablespoon finely chopped coriander leaves, to garnish

Step one

Put the coriander seeds, peppercorns, fennel seeds, fenugreek seeds,cloves and chillies into a small frying pan and set it over medium heat. Stir the spices over the heat until they are a shade darker and give off a roasted aroma. This won’t take long – a couple of minutes at most. Transfer to a bowl and leave to cool, then grind in a clean spice grinder or coffee grinder.

Step two

1. Pour the oil into a wide, non-stick pan, and set it over medium–high heat.

2. When the oil is hot, add the onions and cook, stirring, until they turn brown at the edges.

3. Add the ginger, garlic and green chillies and stir-fry for 20 seconds.

4. Add the meat and cook, stirring, for 5 minutes.

5. Stir in the tomatoes, ground roasted spices, salt and coconut milk and bring to the boil.

Step three

1. Cover the pan, turn the heat to low and simmer gently for 1 hour or until the meat is tender.

2. Uncover the pan and boil away a lot of the liquid, until a thick sauce clings to the meat.

3. Add salt to taste.

4. Garnish with finely chopped coriander to serve.

If you want to use pork, buy shoulder meat and cook it exactly like lamb. If you prefer beef, use good-quality stewing beef. Don’t use too lean a cut, it will dry out. A cut well marbled with fat will have the best flavour. Add a little extra water and then cook it for 1½ hours or until tender.

If you have time – the longer and more slowly you cook it, the better the flavour. At Step 3, place the covered pan in a slow oven – Gas Mk 3, 165C, 145C (fan) and cook for 2 ½ hours, check every 30 minutes to see that it is not drying out, if it is add some water.

Today’s painting

A Wheatfield with Cypresses, Van Gogh, September 1889

I grew up with a print of this painting in my bedroom and I have always had it hanging somewhere in the house, wherever I lived. I love its savagery and the fact that you can almost see the wind. It is obviously one of those wild turbulent days you get in the south of France, frequently just before a thunderstorm.

I have always taken it for granted. I knew who painted it, when it was painted and, more or less, where it was painted – and it hangs in the National Gallery.

When I was looking for a copy to upload, I was confused because

a) the quality if the prints seemed to vary much more than usual

b) because there were references to the fact that it was hung in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in America.

In fact I know very little about this painting at all!

This is what I have since found out:

There are three paintings with the name Wheatfield with Cypresses. They were all painted in 1889 while Van Gogh was at the asylum in Saint-Remy near Arles. They were inspired by the view from his window. The first version was painted in late June or early July 1889, probably en plein air, during a period of frantic activity, shortly after he completed The Starry Night. Van Gogh regarded it as one of his best summer paintings. In a letter to his brother, Theo, written on 2 July 1889, Vincent described the painting:

"I have a canvas of cypresses with some ears of wheat, some poppies, a blue sky like a piece of Scotch plaid; the former painted with a thick impasto like the Monticelli's, and the wheat field in the sun, which represents the extreme heat, very thick too."

His mental health suffered during the summer of 1889 and he didn’t start painting again until September. He made another version of it with a reed pen, now held by the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, and then two more versions in oils painted in his studio, one approximately the same size, which is the one I know and hangs in the National Gallery and a smaller version which is in a private collection. The July plein air version was much more heavily worked, and may be considered a study for the more thoughtful September studio painting. He sent the smaller and less accomplished studio version to his mother and sister as a gift.