The Month of Sloth

This is my first post, so let me explain a few things.  I love anything to do with food, especially sourcing it, cooking it and eating it – fear not, it doesn’t get any more disturbing than that.

I’m in a fortunate position that from May 20 I’m off work for a month – I’ll be between jobs - and this period of time has been dubbed, The Month of Sloth (MoS).

I’ve never had such a long period off prior to this, so I’m intent on using the time to the full: I’ve just taken delivery of a sausage making machine to start making my own sausages; I’m going to Paris for the day to hunt down some foie gras; I’ve got a table booked at Anthony's in Leeds and a holiday booked in Puglia.  This is just the beginning.  I’m ready, now the countdown begins to May 20, two weeks today.  Bring it on.

Before we get too excited, there is one more thing I should make clear from the beginning:  I keep kosher, to an extent.  I'm not minded to go into too much detail of exactly what this means here but as the posts go on I will expand.  What I will say is that being kosher means many different things to many different people - I keep the level I'm comfortable with.  Some people might think I'm virtually a heathen, others may think I'm over the top, I think each to their own.  As a guide, my basic parameters are:

• I only eat meat supplied by a kosher butcher
• I only eat fish that is deemed to be kosher - not shellfish and only that which has scales and fins
• I don't eat milk and meat together and I wait 3 hours if I've eaten something meaty, before I eat something milky
• I do eat in restaurants that aren't kosher, but I only eat vegetarian or fish dishes that comply with rules above

There's so much more I could say, but I won't, for now.   For now, my focus is on maximising the Month of Sloth.