Date Evening - Terry’s Version

 4th February 

Those of you who were readers of my Charity Walk blog may remember that Pat and I made a joint New Years restitution to have a Date Evening once a month. This was the first of them. Our agreement was that I should cook a meal worthy of an upmarket restaurant and we dress as if we were going out to dine. I would also wash and wipe up and allow Pat to have a carefree evening of being waited on and relaxing. I think she deserves that and so does she. I can’t believe what a wonderful man I am, so thoughtful and caring. I’m sure you can’t wait to hear my blow for blow account of the evening, so here goes.

My attire for the evening consisted of black trousers, pink long sleeved shirt but no tie. PINK shirt!!!. Don’t snigger, I’m taking this opportunity to demonstrate my allegiance to the sisterhood by displaying my feminine side. We decided however not to ‘take the knee’. I also wore an apron while preparing and cooking the meal to protect my clothing which I forgot to take off and wore throughout the meal. Black mark!! If any of you get the chance to watch me while I’m working in the kitchen you will fully understand the need for this precaution.

Pat looked absolutely lovely wearing black trousers, a cream blouse decorated with a black and grey floral pattern, sparkly earrings.and some very nice perfume. She had had her hair done several days earlier which rounded off her appearance. Despite the passing of the years she is still as beautiful as she ever was simply because beauty goes much deeper than a few layers of skin. I’m a very lucky man. If I was to be a teensy weensy bit picky I would have to admit to a little twinge of disappointment that she did not wear one of her nice bracelets especially the one we bought last year which I didn’t know we were buying or had bought until after we had bought it. I’ll never learn. Pat doesn’t have too many opportunities to wear items like this so I felt an opportunity was missed. Never mind, no big deal and in all other respects she embraced the evening for what it was meant to be.

Cooking this meal is a bit of a juggling act but everything went according to plan and turned out just as it should. In other words, it was delicious. I will at this point give you the skeleton of what it consisted of and it would be best if I sub divided it into four parts.

The potatoes are sliced thinly and placed in layers into a ceramic baking dish, each layer sprinkled with garlic and covered with a white or cheese sauce mixture. The top layer is coated with parsley then placed into the oven for approx. 1hour 15 minutes.

The vegetables are a personal choice although on this occasion I used Green Beans, but in the past I have used Cauliflower and/or Broccoli and sometimes Asparagus.

I use thin cut Sirloin Steak which I fry in oil until it’s tender enough to be cut easily and when done I place in an oven just to keep it warm.

The sauce is the most important ingredient of this meal and a white or cheese sauce mixture is added to the oil residue in the frying pan along with mushrooms, onion and other various spices and condiments. It needs to be to be stirred on a regular basis to prevent it sticking to the frying pan until it thickens sufficiently to be able to be spooned onto the steak.

I will share the exact recipe and timing details on a later post.       

Pat had a pre dinner Brandy and lemonade but returned to her favourite red Shiraz wine during the meal and I stuck with my preferred £3.75  bottle of German white Liebfraumilch wine. I would describe this wine as unpretentious although I’m not sure exactly what that means but I’m guessing it means it’s a very basic cheap bottle of plonk. So be it. I like it.

The meal was partaken of to a muted background of romantic music by the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard amongst others and our conversation consisted only with murmurings of Pat’s love. For the food, not me, you fools.       

Note to Jamie Oliver: if you had served up food of this quality and in adult portions your restaurant chain would not have gone belly up.                      Note to all celebrity chefs and so called wine experts: stop all this food and wine snobbery. Producing food in bite sized proportions and more for photographic reasons than for eating, at grossly over-inflated prices, will come back to bite you in due course. Telling people what specific wine goes best with a particular meal is just one persons opinion. People’s, don’t let these these ‘experts’ indoctrinate you, drink what you enjoy.  

The main meal was over and I’m sure that Pat enjoyed it because she had second helpings, said she enjoyed it and even gave me a kiss as a thankyou.  It wasn’t a snog but more like having your lips brushed with a butterfly’s wings. Lovely.                                                         

My rating of the meal I cooked?  5 Michelin Tyres and a Hub Cap.

I left Pat to enjoy her wine and to relax while I set about the washing up etc. It’s strange but when I left the kitchen immediately after I had completed the cooking it didn’t look too bad but when I returned after the meal it looked like war-torn Kiev.

It was much later in the evening that I cooked Apple pie for Pat’s dessert which she covered with cream.

The main meal over, the washing up completed and the kitchen back into a presentable condition we repaired to the living room to be more comfortable. It only took a little prompt to get Pat to sit next to me on our two seat sofa where we sat and chatted for a while before deciding to watch some t.v. Her suggestion of watching Bargain Hunt was met with “over my dead body” so we opted for another episode of Hope St.

As we sat there side by side I stealthily eased my arm around her  shoulders and to my amazement she acquiesced. With my arm around her and her head resting gently on my shoulder and chest I started to get that feeling. You know what I mean guys. Yes you’ve guessed it. My arm had gone to sleep.

Was our Date Evening a success? Yes, I really think so. Would I do it again? Most certainly. Did it bring us closer together as a couple? No. we are already as close as we can be. It was intended to maintain the status quo and to make sure complacency doesn’t set in. Would I recommend the experience to others? Yes, it takes a bit of effort but it’s cheaper than going out, doesn’t entail the cost of a cab or going out  in the cold. What would have cost, with everything taken into account, approx. £100 actually cost a fraction of that which is why I’m only charging Pat £20 for the experience.

Pat’s version of the Date Evening will be published within a few days.                   

                                              Bon Appetite