Meals other people have cooked

Jeepers. My entire weekend has been spent cleaning the house in anticipation of my parents’ arrival on Wednesday. Now, my house is not normally that unclean, considering we all work full time and we HAVE LIVES, but every time they visit they comment on how dirty it is. Obviously the house is clean enough to me, but not clean enough to them. Being Chinese, they have very high standards and nothing is ever good enough. Kidding! Kidding! That may be the stereotype, but fortunately my folks aren’t really like that. Just with cleanliness, apparently!

Since I haven’t had any time or energy for cooking this weekend, here’s a little showcase of meals other people have cooked! Y’all know by now that I love cooking, but it’s still nice when other people cook for me. 🙂

Derm's chicken curry

My Bro’s friend Derms visited at the beginning of this year. One night he made chicken curry for dinner (with some assistance from my Bro). I find curry terribly difficult to photograph, so I didn’t do the meal justice. We teamed the chicken curry with basmati rice, and it was fragrant, tangy and spicy. Visitors who cook are visitors worth having!

Bro's lasagne

And this is a lasagne that my Bro made one evening a while ago. He cooked up a rich meat sauce, and layered it with cheese sauce and lasagne sheets.

Bro's lasagne

It’s hard to go wrong with lasagne, and despite my Bro’s grumbles about the cheese sauce, there was nothing wrong with this lasagne. It was pretty ace, actually.

Roast lamb

When my mother in law, Annette, was here the previous week, she offered to cook dinner one evening. Alastair got to choose a meal, and he asked for a lamb roast. Poor lad, he only gets a few roasts a year from me! This is the roast lamb, perfectly cooked and tender.

Roast veges

Along with the lamb there were roast vegetables: pumpkin, kumara/sweet potato, parsnip and roast potatoes. The pumpkin and kumara had softened up and become sweet and slightly caramelised. A special mention must also be made of Annette’s roast potatoes, which were gorgeously crispy with a pillowy soft centre.

Gravy!

And she even made gravy! Proper gravy!

Roast dinner

Ahh, it was a good meal.

Blueberry & yoghurt

But that wasn’t all! There was also dessert – yoghurt sweetened with honey and orange juice and layered with blueberries.

Roast lamb salad

There was lots of lamb left over, so the following night we had the rest with some salad. The lamb was tender and garlicky, and the salad was thrown together from bits and pieces that has been hiding in the bottom of my fridge. Nom nom nom.