Beef Bourginon and a potted orchid

Well the snow is thawing thank goodness.....let's hope we have no more as pretty as it may look, it brings chaos and as I well know last Friday made my 45 minute journey home from work into a 3 hour nightmare.

Tonight we have a warming beef bourginon which we will eat with some creamy mash whilst accompanied by a lovely orchid colleagues where I work brought me several weeks ago as a good luck gift as I went onto another department for a 6 month secondment.

Michael my husband had always wanted one of those crock pots which you can use to start casseroles etc on the hob and transfer to the oven.  My mum and dad got him one for christmas and he has been longing to use it so tonight is its first outing.

The recipe we used is the Beef Bourginon recipe by James Martin from his book "Masterclass" Make Your Home Cooking Easier.  I spoke with the said chef a couple of weeks ago I rang in and asked a question on Saturday Kitchen about what we should do with frozen blackberries, we had lots in the freezer.  Didn't do the crumble (as yet) but did adapt the panacotta he did on the show using blackberries it wasn't half bad and it set too.

 The Beef Bourguinon recipe I made tonight was from the book "Masterclass" which is available through

James Martin Website (would make an ideal gift).