Bill Farmer

Butter Beans in Tomato Sauce

We have been offered this in many Greek tavernas, especially the ones with what’s on offer displayed in a glass counter. On a trip to Alonnisos we saw big tins of these, called Gigantes, at the back of a taverna/supermarket/cash & carry that seemed to stock everything.

Ingredients

• Tin of butter beans
• Tin of chopped tomatoes
• 2 cloves of garlic, chopped
• 2 onions, chopped
• Oregano
• Olive oil

Method

1. Fry the onions, garlic and oregano in olive oil in a medium sized skillet until soft
2. Add the tin of chopped tomatoes, stir, and allow to simmer gently.
3. Drain the tin of butter beans and add to the pan.
4. Simmer gently until heated through and serve in bowls

Thai Red Curry with Noodles

This is rather unconventional, but we like it as a change from fried rice. Lidl conveniently stock the red curry paste, coconut milk and Chinese noodles. Enough for four.

Ingredients

• 2 or 3 garlic cloves, chopped
• 2 or 3 large onions, chopped
• 2 or 3 carrots, grated
• 2 or 3 tomatoes, chopped
• Whatever green veg is to hand, green, red, or white cabbage, chopped
• Mushrooms, chopped, if available
• Chicken, pork, fish, or whatever is available, chopped
• 1/2 packet Chinese noodles
• 1/3 jar red curry paste
• 1 tin coconut milk
• 1 tbsp olive oil

Method

1. Place the onions, garlic, carrots, green veg and meat in a wok with the olive oil over a low heat.
2. Cover with a tray or similar, and allow to steam until the veg is soft and the meat is cooked through, if raw.
3. Add the curry paste and tin of coconut milk, and give it a good stir and allow to simmer until everything is cooked.
4. Meanwhile, place the noodles in a large pan and boil a kettle of water.
5. When the kettle has boiled, pour boiling water over the noodles, and put over a medium heat.
6. When the noodles start to simmer, turn the heat down and separate the noodles with a fork.
7. When the noodles are done, drain in a colander, place in bowls, and spoon over the curry and sauce.
8. Enjoy.

Carrot and Coriander Soup

Tasty soup that makes a nice lunch for two.

Ingredients

• 3 large carrots, grated
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• Small bunch of coriander, chopped
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• Black pepper
• Milk

Method

1. Place the onions, garlic, carrots and coriander in a small pan with some olive oil and grind over some black pepper
2. Heat gently over a low heat until the vegetables are soft
3. Nearly cover with milk
4. Allow to warm until the milk begins to froth
5. Take off the heat and partially process with a blender so there are plenty of chunks of veg
6. Serve with toast or crusty bread

Using Emacs in Android Development

I’ve got a folder full of country flags which I have renamed using scripts so the names correspond to currency symbols. I want an integer array with references to the flags as android resources. This can be automated using emacs.

I get a list of the file names into a buffer using find, which I then open with emacs.

  % find src/ -name flag* > data/sym-flags.lst

They are already sorted, but just to make sure I use M-x sort-lines.

Markdown OpenStreetMap Maps

There does not seem to be a convention for showing maps or co-ordinates in Markdown, but almost anything gets put in square brackets [<anything>].

I had a request from Marco the other day to put OpenStreetMap maps in my Diary app using

  [<lat>,<lng>]

syntax. So I did a bit of a search to see if there was a convention in Markdown for co-ordinates and couldn’t find anything. So we seem to have broken new ground here.