Fruit salad

I have, as my parents will doubtlessly testify, always been a bit of a magpie. This is particularly true for food. And now that it is moving towards summer and the fruit section of my local supermarket is full of beautiful, fresh, local produce, the only logical thing to do seems to be to make fruit salad - and lots of it.

Kiwi, strawberries, mango and apple - all, apart from the mango, from France. It's the perfect thing to have in your fridge in the summer, and is gorgeous either as it is or with a dollop of Greek yoghurt on top as breakfast or even as a virtuous pudding. This was also my first attempt at preparing - or, as my friend's family calls it, "hedgehog-ing"- a mango. I had a quick look online to see what was the best and easiest method of getting the fruit out, and it turned out that hedgehog-ing it was the most popular and simplest way. Delia told me to slice down around the stone, then to score into the flesh, being careful not to cut through the skin, then push it and cut the cubes of mango off the skin and into a bowl, making sure you have something to hand to catch all the juice. 

It seemed simple.

It isn't. 

When Delia said "stone", what I didn't realise she meant was "massive flat thing that's as big as the mango itself and impossible to locate when you're cutting down through the fruit". After butchering the poor mango trying to find where the stone finished so I could have as much fruit for my fruit as possible, I then failed to avoid cutting through the skin, forgot to put a bowl underneath to catch the juice, and generally made a bit of a hash of it.

Word to the wise - mango juice stings if it gets into cuts. I found this out the hard way.

Despite my apparent inability to do something that should've been pretty simple, I did eventually succeed in getting the mango from the fruit into a bowl and then added my strawberries, kiwi and apple - all of which were much easier to prepare, poured in some orange juice, and gave it a stir.

Et voilà! Pudding/breakfast/part-of-your-five-a-day all in one very pink bowl. It is officially summer.

Breakfast of champions

For all I may complain about living here sometimes, I am definitely going to miss being able to nip out for pain au chocolat and coffee for breakfast from the canteen in the grounds of my halls every so often.

I try not to make a habit of it because I really would be the size of a house when I came back if I did this too often (amazingly there is a 'too often' when it comes to buttery croissants... Who knew?). But for mornings when you really, really need something to pick you up, there is something indescribably wonderful about being able to hop out of bed, get dressed and then go and get a warm croissant and some hot coffee. Today was definitely one of those days. Especially as I had no milk (therefore no coffee, the horror) and nothing for breakfast. Unwilling to go into an exam without having eaten something, what other option did I have?

I had an exam at noon which I was definitely in the midst of a panic about, so last night I decided that the thing to do was to get up early(ish), get about an hours' worth of revision done, then buy said breakfast, come back to halls and continue some last-minute note consolidating. And may I say, there is nothing in this world that makes revision of "Origines et diversité des langues" more bearable than a cup of coffee and a still-warm pain au chocolat. Particularly when it's dunked into the coffee. Yum.

The exam? It was okay. Not fab, not terrible, just okay. But you know, I could spend days revising for these exams; or I could just do my best, be prepared to resit them in February, and actually enjoy my year abroad. It's unlikely that I'll get an opportunity to live somewhere where fresh bread and pastries are just outside my door, and I intend to make the most of it whilst I'm here ;)

Easy like a Sunday morning

I think that there is no better way to start my Sunday than by a long lie-in, preferably with people bringing me cups of coffee, gloriously buttery toast and allowing me free reign of the remote control. However, I am living the student life, so the coffee and toast has to be made by me - quelle dommage!

But, I had the next best thing this morning - half a carton of eggs left to me by my housemate and the offer, nay, the instruction, to use them up before she comes back from visiting her father. As you can imagine, it was a real struggle to think of something to cook, and after I puzzled for about thirty seconds, I got the necessary accoutrements together to make a fluffy cheese omelette.

Like a lot of things I cook, I judge whether it is a success or a failure based on how much like my mother's the end product resembles, and omelettes are absolutely no exception. My favourite dinner when I'm home is when Mum can't think of what to cook, none of us have anything in mind, and there's plenty of eggs in the fridge. Cheese, ham, bacon, occassionally potatoes and onions to make a traditional Spanish tortilla - omelettes would certainly be a contender for my last meal on earth.

The key with making a perfect (read: my mother's) omelette is to make it really, really fluffy, keep the pan well-oiled but the heat not too high, and to wait for the open top to cook before you fold it, and flip it. Getting a good non-stick pan that's not too wide across is also important, as if you get one that's too wide, you really need an obscene quantity of egg to be able to cover it from side to side but also have a bit of depth. Luckily, my housemate has provided us with a pan that is absolutely perfect for this.

So, with your pan on the hob and a glug of olive oil in it, spread all across the pan so the majority of the pan is covered, you need to beat your eggs, seasoned with a little pepper (2-3 for one person), and preferably prepare any fillings so it's nice and quick to throw the fillings in once it's ready. Once the eggs are beaten, pour them into the pan and as soon as it starts to cook around the edges, take your fork and drag some of the edge into the centre, then tilt the pan so that the raw egg covers the space. Keep doing this, working all the way around the pan until there's a pile of fluffy egg in the centre. This is why it is crucial to keep the pan on a medium heat - if it's too high, the egg will cook too quickly and you won't be able to make it gorgeously fluffy. Once the top's cooked and there is no more runny egg, add the filling, then get a fish slice under the omelette, and fold it in two. Press down so that any remaining raw egg seeps out and can be cooked, then once you're happy everything's cooked, carefully flip the omelette to cook the other side. This is where experience pays off! Once that's cooked, slide it onto a plate and enjoy - preferably while watching "Saturday Kitchen" on the iPlayer ;]