Stewing in his own jus

We are back from two short jaunts to Spain and hostilities have yet to break out. However, I suspect tomorrow will see the temporary truce stretched to breaking point.

The OH has invited an old school friend and his wife to dinner. That’s fine – but he has also decided to do all the cooking. In addition, he has announced that he is meeting another friend – one of his journalist pals – for lunch.

So far I have managed to keep calm, but I anticipate that at lunchtime at least one bottle of red – if nor two – will be consumed in keeping with the old ways of Fleet Street. And I fear that this may have consequences in the kitchen later.

For one thing, he has announced that his ‘dessert’ (I usually cook what I call puddings) is to be pear and ginger soufflé. He has never cooked a soufflé in his life and I am pretty sure that by the time he has greeted his guests with a drink, then dispensed wine in the manner of a generous host during course one and two (celeriac soup and beef pie – sorry carbonade de bouef en croute) his sense of timing may be a little impaired.

So far I have merely asked if he knows that the soufflé recipe he is planning to follow has to be cooked at the last minute. He said rather snappily that he did.

On top of this he has been to the Iranian shop to buy onions and such like and came back with the beef for the pie. Triumphantly he explained that it was topside and had cost a fraction of the price Waitrose or even Sainsbury’s would have charged for braising steak, and it was incredibly lean. He showed me the meat. It looked very pale. It may well be beef. Or not.

He is now cooking it in the oven and I am not sure about the smell.

Meanwhile the daughter-in-law is bringing the baby for me to play with tomorrow afternoon, so I am planning to let him stew in his own juice. Or – as he would say – jus.