Still on the road to recovery I’m slowly beginning to ‘do stuff’. I got up this morning wanting to achieve something so I set about making some French Onion Soup. One of my favourites. I use a Saint Delia recipe from her Winter Collection and make a small modification, I substitute the beef stock in her version for vegetable stock. One thing every person in this land knows with absolute certainty is love her or hate her, you can’t go wrong with a Delia. It’s just not possible. Her recipes are completely infallible.

I’ve been so cheesed off with not being capable of doing anything that my normal good humour has descended into gloom and despondency. I recognise I need something to think about and to start to mop up some of my energy but it’s not a simple matter of rushing out into the garden with a spade, that’s just going to end me back up where I’ve been this week and that’s been no joke.

I’ve not been off our own little patch of land for five days and it’s starting to get me down. I’m noticing (again) all the jobs that need finishing in the kitchen and all the other work still needing to be done in this marathon renovation (ten years already and nowhere near finishing) of this beautiful but intensely stubborn house…if a house can be stubborn!

So, anxious to start rebuilding my culinary vigour after a week of cooking simple, straightforward dishes, I jump straight back in with a dish that isn’t complex, just time-consuming to make. It’s used up some of that excess energy and proven itself a good antidote to the rain and howling winds that are sweeping across southern England at the moment.

And delicious it was too…..

Post Script: I've been fretting about not achieving anything and without me needing to do anything at all, in the postbox was our letter telling us our new joint mortgage has finally gone through...so we really are now 'official'.