Daphne and Homemade Baked Beans

My daughter is rarely ill.   In fact she hardly feels the cold so when she says she is sick I tend to immediately believe her without endless prodding and thermometering. 

This week we had such a day.   Given I was at home working anyway, it seemed opportune to cook up something comforting for her.    

For her, that is tomato on toast, or avocado on toast, or spaghetti bolognese, or perhaps baked beans.  Usually Heinz baked beans.  I do succumb to tinned food occasionally, doesn't everyone?  But I think what is really startling is the difference, in texture and colour particularly, between the tinned product and what you can make at home.    And it is probably worth mentioning that these are great for a hangover.  

I know that you can make baked beans with dried beans, and cook them slowly for hours and hours.  And of course, my dish is not exactly perfect itself, cooked as it is with tinned food.  But it has a really lovely reddish colour, and does not have that gelatinous slimy gluggy texture of tinned baked beans.    

This is my quick method.

Ingredients

1 400g tin of cannellini beans, drained and rinsed gently

1 400 g tin of tomatoes

A couple of pieces of bacon or prosciutto, chopped into little squares

A small brown onion, chopped finely

One garlic clove, chopped finely

Method

Gently saute the bacon, onion and garlic in a little olive oil until the bacon is slightly browned and the onion translucent.

Add the drained beans, stir gently to coat with contents of pot, then add tomatoes.  Stir again and simmer for about 20 minutes or until thickened and not too runny.  

Season and eat.  

And this was her lunch. This plate is one of the two I bought when I bought my Devil Night Light last weekend.  

Our daphne has been happily flowering this winter, just like last winter.  I don't know why, we actually do nothing to help it along.   

I have started reusing my candle jars once they are burned out. If you soak them in hot water the left over wax tends to fall away. This is a tiny little frosted Manuel Canovas and is about the only thing I have found for daphne display.

This makes me feel considerably less bad about the original cost of the candle.  Am I the only one who thinks that cost does not necessarily equal high quality smelliness?   I actually like Voluspa the most, they scent a room really well and do not cost the earth.    I still can't bring myself to burn them constantly however.  Must be my Scottish ancestry.  

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