What I cooked last night.

' ... the Present evaporates continually. It's the Past, distilled, bottled, ... which is eau de vie, the cognac of existence.' - Hal Porter, The Extra . University of Queensland Press, 1975. * It was too dark to read the menu, so I didn't. I gazed out at Market Lane, the narrow thoroughfare our window table-for-two looked out on. In the late-summer light of Sunday evening a cast of accidental actors were taking part in a pantomime; hi-vizzed Indian cyclists, playing oriental kings, bearing gift-meals for hungry baby-Jesus adults reclining in their strawless sky-byres; fast boys spidering into their carelessly parked crackle-exhaust sports cars, having not held the opposite door open for their vacantly-botoxed passengers; skeletal homeless pilgrims moving drug-shakily, like marionettes, towards some dead-end mattressed Mecca. Harlequins, columbines, pierrots, clowns. I took in all this cinéma vérité with a ten-second glance, and then a waitress materialised beside our t...

On occasion over the years I've marked St Patrick's Day with a half-hearted attempt at an Irish stew; nothing much more than throwing a few chops into a pot with sliced potatoes and sometimes carrots and onions. Well, essentially that's what it is: on a sleety cold day in the Emerald Isle even that would raise the appetite. This year, more of the same, albeit with a few extra ingredients. Irish Stew with Leek and Parsnip. (Yes, parsnip, one of my all-time favourites .) Brown about one kilogram, or whatever that is in pounds, of lamb in oil - I used diced lamb steaks because they were on special.  Remove lamb and add a tablespoonful of butter to the same pan and saute a chopped onion, a finely sliced leek and a grated potato.  When the onion and leek soften add three carrots, three potatoes, and two parsnips, all chopped evenly. Over the vegetables, as you turn them, sift about a quarter cup of flour. This will help thicken the stew. Add a bay leaf and about a litre (ditto) ...