Mike was at work again today and he called at 8am to be picked up. He goes in to cut the grass and collect the golf balls from the range so he's not needed for very long. I went to get him and once I was back at home Sophie and I started preparing dinner for this evening.
Our recipe today was from the Hairy Bikers Mums Know Best cookbook and we'd chosen the barbecue ribs with Boston baked beans. Sophie assembled the marinade for the ribs while I cut them up, which was a mammoth task! We'd bought a rack of ribs which doesn't sound a lot, but once cut up I realised there was a lot of meat on them! I then had to place them in boiling water for about five minutes but there was no way they were going to fit into our saucepan so I placed the boiling hot water into one of our shallow china dishes and put it over a low heat. This is our biggest dish and I even had trouble getting them into that!
After they'd been simmered in the hot water we put them into another casserole dish, coated them with the marinade and left them to cool. Unfortunately, I forgot about the other dish being hot and burned my fingers! And then, to cap it all, the whole thing broke apart when I was washing it up! Not the best of starts!
With that bit of preparation completed, we went to see Mum and Dad and called into the Co-op as we needed tomato ketchup (for the baked beans) and I bought some lovely cookies to have with our coffee at Mum's. They were both looking well and we enjoyed a chat before Keith helped them mend their parasol which had been broken by some strong winds. They were really grateful as now they can sit out in the garden in the shade.
Back home Sophie and Keith had crumpets for a late breakfast while I had toast and tuna pate, which was left over from last night's dinner. The children were not keen at all, but I thought it was delicious! We pottered about for a while and simmered the pinto beans in water for almost two hours until they were tender. Keith, meanwhile, cut back the bushes in the garden which is looking very dry and arid again. We haven't had any rain since last Sunday and it's due to get hot again over the next few days. He also gave the garden a good water and Sophie and I sat out for a while in the hot sun. I could feel my legs burning! It was a good job we'd bought the little plastic flexible buckets so we could pour cold water into them...ahhh!
It all got a bit too much so we retreated indoors and I had a lukewarm bath and a pamper. When I got out I said to Sophie that we should put the ribs on to cook as, although the recipe called for just an hour's cooking, I didn't think it was enough and I liked the meat to be falling off the bones.
We went and retrieved them from the casserole dish in the fridge and arranged them on two baking trays. After covering them with foil we popped them into a moderate oven and hoped that we'd given them enough time to cook!
We then prepared the baked beans by pouring a sauce over them that we'd made earlier and which consisted of black treacle (we couldn't find Molasses), tomato ketchup, sugar, Worcestershire sauce and American mustard. We cut up some smoked streaky bacon, mixed some in with the beans and laid some more over the top. This then went into the oven for two hours. We also cut up some potatoes to saute them later. There was a lot of food!
The dinner turned out to be delicious and the pork ribs were very tender and, as I wanted, fell off the bones! There were a lot of beans, though, so I think we'll be having them on toast tomorrow!
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