For God Sakes Jim, I'm a Frying Pan...

Not a space-ship man!

We dined out for lunch today at the Office on our Christmas belt buster & it was a real festive treat. We counted down the hours till 12 midday & when it finally arrived, we flew down to Cafe Rouge & embarked upon our jinglesome journey.

We had crackers to start off with, which although minimal in content were fun nonetheless. The drinks were poured & I myself had eine kleine beer, well it is Christmas after all! Starters were wolfed, mains were scoffed & deserts unsurprisingly were grazed at, but we all did well. As we sat in our, rather on the small side, colourful paper hats, we also opened out secret Santa prezzies to one another. There was some very thoughtful & clever goodies exchanged & it made our gathering quite special indeed. I received a Vintage Fullers Ale of some 8.5% (I must be getting old-er as I received booze for both my Birthday & Christmas this year!). Might see what more I can get out of it & leave it bottled up for a little while longer, and then it really will zonk me out! The certain someone who I bought Dunster fudge for at the weekend was very pleased with their gift too!

The rain set in after lunch & took us all the way to dinner - my famous Sausage Mustard Pasta, pictured here. My inspiration for this meal came from watching one of my fave cooks, Nigel Slater, rustling up something similar. It's a creamy, sweet, warming dish & one of Jen's fave's! I like this shot as it reminds of the starship Enterprise from Star Trek because of its shape, random I know! And if ever fancied it, I reckon I'm getting closer to creating & shooting my very own cookbook with sharp, close-up angular snaps of food like this one.

Beyond din-dins saw the climax of the day at Elland Road, Leeds, arrive. Leeds United played Chelsea in the Capital One Cup & in the drenching rain Leeds took a first half 1-0 lead. It was at this point that I switched from minutely updates via the web, to watching it live on the box. This may have proved to be quite decisive, & as soon as the second half was underway, so were Chelsea, easing their way through the Leeds defence, 1-1. And the trend continued until the game finished 1-5 to Chelsea.

A few you win, most you lose. Well, if you're a Leeds fan anyway.