September 2025

I’ve been really craving this French cafe restaurant salad the last few days. It’s a superb combination of tender roast chicken with finely sliced fennel, red onion, butter head and baby leaf salad leaves, rocket, pine nuts tomatoes and dressed in olive oil and a mild basil pesto. And balsamic vinegar oil to serve as […]

Normally if you were eating seasonally, you wouldn’t be able to make this at this point in July. However, due to the cold spell in April, the rhubarb in the garden is still good. If like me you have rhubarb that needs eating, this is an excellent way to serve it. This recipe is entirely […]

It’s dark and rainy here today, which is not surprising really bearing in mind that the North is known for being on the colder wetter side. It is reputed that the Rossendale Valley has seven times more snow than the rest of England and I deeply suspect that something like that goes for the rain count as […]

View all posts by Alison Allmand-Smith

I found these pictures today and they brought back some very happy memories of many years ago. This was our first AGA and we chose to have it in Racing Green.  We bought it reconditioned, although it looked absolutely brand new and never let us down.  The people who had lived in our house before […]

We went clay pigeon shooting and it was a lot of fun! More later!  View all posts by Alison Allmand-Smith

This is such a beautiful book! I bought it on Monday in Waterstones when the shops reopened; I couldn’t get in there quickly enough! Well done to Sarah Wyndham Lewis and James Weston Lewis who have written and illustrated it (respectively) superbly! 

I love World Book Day and frankly, every day is a book day for me as I’m a book obsessive through and through. With that in mind, I was delighted to be able to take part recently in the very first installment of the Institute of Leadership & Management’s Virtual Book Club. Leadership Development | […]

I can’t get enough of this salad. This is the second time I’ve tried to replicate my favourite French salad made with lettuce, fennel, red onion, chicken & fresh basil pesto. This was definitely a big improvement on my previous attempt. The first picture I’ve used is while I’m still preparing the salad and before […]

Hi everyone, I am so sorry not to have a blog post fro you today. I am having trouble with my computer, so it’s going in for a service. I do have some really fun things to tell you about though, so please come back and by next week I should be sorted (hopefully)! The […]