Simple Grub

We always favour a simple meal after a long day at work. I mean who really wants to be spending hour slaving over the hob after spending 12 (or often more) hours out of the house at work and commuting?

Well we certainly don't!

Yesterdays evening meal was a simple homemade chicken kiev, simplicity on a plate. A chicken breast scored down the top, stuffed with some homemade reduced fat garlic butter and coasted in homemade garlic and herb crouton crust. Bake for 25 minutes and there you have a simple easy meal.

I served this with stuffed sweet potatoes which I had baked the evening before so they simply needed scooping out, mixing with some cheese and then spooning back in again and baking with the chicken. The selection of vegetables speaks for itself really. A winter selection of sprouts, kale, broccoli and carrot.

Cold

It was a cold and frosty start to the day yesterday morning and for the first time this year we awoke to ice on the surface of the water, not only in the marina but also on the Fossdyke from the glimpses that we caught as we drove home.

It will be short lived though as temperatures are set to rise as of today and by the weekend will be positively mild for the time of year.

Switched Over

Yesterday we tackled the job of changing the dashboard switches for the new ones we had bought. It may only be a small job but it has already made such a difference to how the dashboard looks. 

Before:

And after:

We have brought the sun cover home for the chart plotter this morning and this will get painted in the week with some paint designed for plastics. So the dashboard should hopefully be looking as good as new by the beginning of next weekend.

One set of small jobs crossed off the list.

Manic

Lincoln was a tad busy yesterday. The atmosphere was buzzing but blimey it was heaving. Far too busy for our liking.

Get Your Jacket On

Cooking jacket potatoes without an oven is something of a challenge, so with just two gas rings and a grill we don't eat them on Naughty-Cal.

Until last night that is. I had a brain wave in the week and rustled up a turkey mince chilli to reheat last to serve with the spuds.

Cooking them was easy. I bought precooked frozen jacket potatoes, wrapped them in foil and put them in the slow cooker on high power for a few hours. The result was perfect jacket potatoes to go with the chilli.

Perfect for a cold Friday evening and with minimun effort.

Marketing

It is Lincoln market weekend and this year we have decided to give it another go. It has been several years since we last visited and the last time we did we vowed never again. It was just too busy.

However this year we have friends bringing their boat up from West Stockwith to visit Lincoln and the markets so we have kind of been roped into it.

They won't get here until early to mid afternoon so we will have plenty of chance to do a spot of food shopping in Lincoln Market and will probably have time on Saturday whilst waiting for them to fit our new dashboard switches which arrived yesterday. 

We also have a new USB charging socket to fit in the cabin after one of them suddenly died earlier this year. For whatever reason it has slipped my mind until now that we needed a new one. Funny as it is the socket that we probably used the most when it was working. 

Switched On

As we are having the cockpit upholstery retrimmed it is time to have a look at tidying up a few other bits and bobs in the cockpit area.

The next item on the list is the dashboard switches. Over the years the symbols on them have faded and some of them are now completely worn away.

So I have ordered a brand new full set of switches from Seabridge Marine which should be delivered today in time to fit them at the weekend. It is only a small job but should improved the appearance of the dashboard no end.

Liam also plans to bring home the sun cover for the chart plotter which seems to have suffered quite a bit of sun damage itself. We have no idea what has happened too it. It has always been in much worse condition then the Tridata sun cover since we bought the boat. Liam has some grey textured plastics paint at work which should improve the appearance of it. It probably won't be a perfect match to the other sun cover but it will look better then it's current faded state.