There’d been another long gap since the last evening, as were all so busy, and sadly Janet wasn’t well enough to join us. But Mary came up trumps for us again with a very successful evening of delicious food.

Starters

Justine – Celeriac soup with pancetta and croutons

Justine made the sourdough (brava!), then cut them into soldiers with oil and Parmesan. The soup had celeriac, potato and onion. Really easy, really delicious. The croutons were a triumph. This was from Mary Berry Everyday.

Sue – Smoked Salmon and asparagus roulade

Mary did this on her TV programme last year, which Sue had copied then from memory. This time she found the recipe. It used cooked salmon as well as smoked, and was easy to do, but involved a few hours of chilling beforehand. Later, when we were remembering that we’d done Mary Berry at Karen’s a couple of years ago, we discovered that Sue had done a very similar starter. We loved the fact that our memories are now so poor that nobody had remembered it. We could just all keep cooking the same thing every session and we’d be none the wiser….

https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/salmon_and_asparagus_69637

Mains

Julie – Tuscan chicken

This came from Mary Berry’s website. It was a luscious mixture of onion, peppers and chicken thighs which had melted into the stew. Then cream and spinach was added at the end. Yum.

https://www.maryberry.co.uk/recipes/main-courses/tuscan-chicken

Debrah – Tiger prawn and courgette spaghetti

Another one from MB’s website. It involved courgettes that were spirulized with Jus’s mum’s old spirulizer. And Debrah had individually deveined each prawn. The coconut milk made it rich and delicious.

https://thehappyfoodie.co.uk/recipes/mary-berrys-tiger-prawn-and-coriander-courgetti/

Sides

Jane – Green veg with mint caper butter

This was easy, but so fresh and tasty with the fresh mint. And the leftovers worked very well the next day too!https://git.macropus.org/bbc-food/www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/green_vegetables_with_71110.html

Puddings

Karen – Lemon cheesecake with mascarpone and lemon curd

Karen added raspberries to the top and left the ginger from the recipe out of the base. It was more a cheesecake inspired by the recipe than what was written, but very much not the worse for that!

Tracey – Apricot frangipane tart

Tracey made the pastry for this, no bought pastry for her! Surprisingly, given Mary is the queen of the not soggy bottom, the recipe, from Everyday, doesn’t suggest baking blind. It was easy to make, using tinned apricots that had to be thoroughly dried beforehand.