We tend to use Pataks Balti or Tikka Masala paste which are not hot. You can use whatever you want to your taste. You could even use a dry mix of spices if you want but that may be harder to mix in evenly.
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Good way to get kids to eat veg I suppose 
sounds like you could include whatever you have eg cauliflower, broccoli, parsnip
Talking of eating things, tonight’s dinner was basa (fresh water catfish) fillets sprinkled with a little salt, then coated in desiccated coconut which was pressed into the flesh. Shallow fried a few min each side to brown the coconut, served with sweet potato chips.
It’s just nice, and not so stodgy as traditional F&C. I’d forgotten about this until my wife asked for it again last week, but it’s really quick and easy (15min) to do.
Yes, whatever you like, although root vegetables are best as they are easy to grate and you have to get as much of the water out of the veg as possible.
We started out doing bahjis from a recipe which added all sorts of dry spices and was quite complex. We found using a paste and simplifying the recipe made better bahjis.
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A few weeks ago Standard Life ignored my clear instructions and paid me a substantial amount in error - in the wrong tax year. I formally complained (something I’ve very rarely ever done), and instructed them that I wished to return the amount paid in error. To their credit they took the complaint very seriously, investigated it thoroughly, and today upheld my complaint. Although I didn’t seek any compensation, they’ve told me they’ll pay me £300 as a goodwill payment, which is very much appreciated, as is the seriousness which they took the complaint. I’m a long term fan of SL and was surprised at this lapse in their usual good service, so all’s well that ends well. I know financial services companies often get a (justified) bad press. For me, the acid test of a company is how and whether they try to resolve matters when things go wrong. SL have certainly passed that test in this instance.
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DTKWÝÀ though, George1 ?
Today I saw my first Brimstone butterfly and yesterday I saw a Common Blue butterfly. Robin has been singing to us all morning whilst Stuart has been finishing pruning/cutting the hedges and lots of our shrubs - peony, astrantia, astilbe - are shooting. Our chocolate vines (the dark one and the white one) are almost in full flower and the wisteria will be flowering within the next week or two. It’s the second day of sunshine with more to come tomorrow so the ground and the drive are beginning to dry out.
What a lovely spring day !
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Decided to go to LeClerc this morning as they have things I can’t get in our local Super U like birthday cards and Baby Ray Sauce. Honestly you would have thought WW3 was under way, there was nothing on what is usually a very busy main road heading towards the airport and then very few shoppers inside the large store especially as its still school holidays. I decided I am going to invest in one of those three or four wheel shopping trolleys so I can do more heavy shopping stuff locally like water and tinned items, students use them all the time instead of breaking arms with heavy carrier bags as it is a good 20 mins walk each way for me but flat all the way and I won’t need to waste precious expensive petrol.
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Sounds like a very sensible idea to me, @shiba . Simple, effective and great for the pocket (and environment) 
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Appearances can deceive (when will I ever learn?). On the Paris Metro this past week, a fairly dishevelled, wild looking chap shuffled towards me, waving to get my attention. I ignored him, assuming he was begging. He started saying ‘do you understand me’, and I continued to ignore him. I’m good at that! He eventually gave up and left the carriage. It was only after he’d gone that I noticed that one of the arms of my glasses (which I was wearing) had become detached from the frame, and was lying on my shoulder. The chap had spotted this, and was obviously trying to warn me, so I didn’t lose the arm. Real kindness in a crowded city and I felt very grateful - and very guilty.
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I can really sympathise with you there! It’s hard not to make assumptions based on appearance 
Mary Stewart’s “The Ivy Tree” (one of my favourites of hers) is on Amazon Kindle for £0.99p. Guessing that price will be there about a week.
Also at £0.99p each are a number of the Gabriel Wolfe easy thriller series by Andy Maslen - they are good reads with an appealing modern male hero.
Stove installed today, which is great as a miserable grey afternoon so can enjoy it.
What you don’t really see from before photo is that previous owners had put plastic’y laminate floor down. Over original oak parquet! So that is now waiting for someone who wants it - LBC is full of cheap/free laminate floors. So oak parquet was sanded and waxed and is just fine.
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Looks good.
It amazed us that people would put lino (Lino!) over tiles in our place.
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In ours, it was gloss-varnished, imitation tongue and grooving on all three storeys in order to cover up massive 600 year old chestnut beams.
OTOH, far better that they just cover things up, rather than do a ‘proper’ job.
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Do you think there was some sort of central decorative medallion above the mantlepiece, or is it in the stone?
No, it was a hole for a stove pipe. It’s the same on the other fireplaces, which are all huge. At some point in the past the fireplace itself was closed and a woodstove placed in front of it with the stove pipe venting into the chimney.
This is the one in the bedroom and you can see the drips of soot - which I rather liked as gives sort of ghoulish guillotine vibes. However our maçon had other ideas so looks rather different now.
After fourteen years here, I still never cease to be amazed by some of the local interior design solutions. There’s a mediaeval house in our village whose ceilings are made from cardboard cartons that probably conceal some fine old beams. That house also contains a slimy cavernous grotto with a pool full of frogs.
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Yesterday was an awful day, weatherwise. So to cheer us up, we ordered some more plants from Dutchgrown.eu and are looking forward to receiving them next month. Here is our order :
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Or more accurately, interior happenings 