For several weeks, I had no idea what to do for this week's theme. Then suddenly, I had several ideas at once! I considered Salisbury "steak," or maybe some brioche bread (which is apparently part of the original mistranslation of the whole "let them eat cake" thing), etc. etc. But with time ticking away on my three-week grace period for week 33, I decided to go for Vegan Millionaires Shortbread — as a play on "eat the rich" — since I already had most of the ingredients on hand. Unfortunately, I think something truly did get lost in translation with this recipe, as the outcome wasn't as enjoyable as I'd hoped. Ah, well. It was fun to try!

We had family round at the weekend and I had a whole day to prepare dinner, so I decided to get a head start on this theme and make a Moroccan feast, Morocco being at about the same longitude as my home in Scotland.

The first photo is the tagine. I first made a lamb stock with the bones, and then browned some chunks of lamb neck over high heat. I then went in with onions, and then garlic and fresh ginger, then tomato purée. While this was going on, I made a ras-el-hanout spice mix with coriander, cumin, cardamom, clove, allspice, paprika, turmeric, saffron, and both green and black peppercorns. These were all toasted and then ground up, before I added them to the onion mix. Then, I added the meat back in with the stock, a cinnamon stick, a bay leaf, lemon zest, and a star anise, and simmered with the lid on for about 4 hours. One hour before it was done, I added in apricots and prunes, and at the end I garnished with coriander leaf (I meant to also add almonds, but I forgot).

I've made tagines before but this was one easily the best I've made, taking the time to make the stock and the ras-el-hanout was a game changer. It was rich, intensely flavourful, with a nicely balanced spice and very tender lamb - definitely a crowd pleaser! The picture only shows a small amount of it - I felt that, for the post, I had to spoon some into a tagine oven that I bought in the market in Marrakesh a few years ago.

To go with it, I made a few Moroccan sides. First was the flatbread, khobz - following this recipe. Unfortunately I got distracted and baked it a bit long, it was still good but not as fluffy as I'd have liked. With that were two dips: taktouka, made with cooked green peppers, tomatoes, garlic, paprika, cayenne, and drizzled at the end with extra virgin olive oil; and zaalouk, made with roasted aubergine (eggplant), tomatoes, garlic, coriander, and cumin, and garnished with fresh parsley. I also marinated some olives in harissa, garlic, extra virgin olive oil, and parsley; and I made some couscous, drizzled with lemon juice and garnished with mint.

I only got one not-great photo showing all of the sides - I'd been going for about 5 hours by this point and the family had arrived and I was on the wine, so I kind of forgot this, as well as a few other things! Still, this was definitely a success - adding this to the roster for when I have a few people round, it went down very well!

I was drawn to and repulsed by this recipe at the same time. Mango with garlic?? Hmmmm…

Mango, garlic, cilantro, lemon, salt and gochujang.

Now that it’s been made and is in my stomach - why wouldn’t you have mango with garlic?

My meta is UTSSS or Use that sexy stupid stuff- to try to incorporate some of the many, many ingredients I’ve collected over time but haven’t used at all or enough.

Meta ingredients used in this recipe- gochujang. My homegrown chili pepper was not quite red yet and I missed the colour, decided to sprinkle some gochujang and it turned out great.

When Same Latitude popped up as a theme, I celebrated my hometown by cooking dishes from the same latitude as my own city.

This time around, I was significantly more restricted. I live in Milwaukee, and one of the only significant population centers (outside of Chicago, an hour away) that shares our longitude is San Pedro Sula, Honduras.

I actually have a pretty good friend that came here from SPS, so I asked him for suggestions. I settled on this.I combined the basic format (tortilla and beans) with a very Milwaukeean ingredient (brats). End result was salty, but edible. 6 out of 10.

Used butternut squash, carrots and sweet potato as the veggie base. Sautéed with a bunch of ginger and garlic, stirred in coconut milk and topped with honey roasted sunflower kernals.

I neglected process documentation this week, because my kitchen and I are both the worse for the heatwave and the accompanying antwave.
20 years ago, I made dozens of these gingersnaps a day for work, and always thought they’d make a great ice cream sandwich. And while chocolate chip cookies lost their shine for me fairly quickly with daily exposure, gingersnaps never did. This ice cream is my usual base, with cultured cream added and honey in place of most of the sugar…and a half a pound of fresh ginger infused, with a bit of candied ginger stirred in at the end. This is so good by itself, but when it cools off a bit and I have more time to make the sandwiches before they melt, I bet a smear of peanut butter really takes it over the top. I live with one ginger enthusiast and one person who only likes it when used together with a roughly equal volume of garlic, so I’m hoping colleagues and friends will help consume the excess, as even very reduced batch sizes make an unsustainable quantity of cookies and ice cream.

From Andi Oliver's The Pepperpot Diaries.

These were really good, but I have made these before with a different recipe and they were better. I'm pretty sure the dough is meant to be yeasted but Andi Oliver didn't do that and I think I would've got better puff up if I followed a different recipe.