What I've been eating

OK, inspired by Veggiedyke I thought I'd  record my evening meals for a week.
Sunday:  Pasta with roasted vegetables.  Sweet potato & garlic, red pepper, red onion, chestnut mushrooms, courgette & aubergine.  Bit of olive oil, bit of basil.  Boil pasta, roast veggies, mix together & add a few cubes of cheese (used Parlick Fell)
Monday:  Rest of pasta with some Thai curried vegetables from freezer
Tuesday: Mushroom lasagne made on Saturday, & frozen.  Lots of mushrooms, onion, garlic, tin of tomatoes, tomato purée, italian dried herbs.  Simmered till formed thick sauce then layered with ricotta & lasagne sheets, grated cheddar on the top.  Yum.  Ricotta was well past its best before, but was fine.
Wednesday: Baked potato & a lentil concoction from freezer.  Over Easter I bought too many mushrooms, so had some mushroom-based dishes over last week or so.  The lentil concoction was made to go with some 'rustic' potato chips which were very dull & needed enlivening.  The idea had been to make a kind of mushroom chilli sauce, & then I add puy lentils for protein.  It was nice with the chips, and even nicer tonight with baked potato & some grated cheese.
tbc...

I'll round off the week now.
Thursday:  Had egg fried rice. Boiled some brown rice while I stir fried in sesame oil some onion, garlic, cashew nuts, courgette, mushrooms, aubergine, carrot. stirred in a couple of eggs when the veggies were done then mixed in the rice.  Served with soya sauce.
Friday:  Did some of the rustic oven chips with a bit extra oil & some cumin to spice them up.  Made a chilli tomato sauce, and fried some halloumi then served it with pita bread, stuffed vine leaves & houmous. 
 

Photographing wildlife

Been on a course today about photographing wildlife.  There is so much to learn.  Just going to make some notes to remind myself in future.  So...

• Plan the day beforehand.  Have an identified species to focus on
• Think about the light - all the time - which places are best morning or afternoon, which direction to walk around a reserve, where to stop when you see a subject - often better to keep walking slowly to get to where you want to take the photo from - if you stop then walk on likely to startle it
• Generally use ISO400 - doesn't need to vary too much
• Be ready, lens cap off, camera switched on
• Can use aperture priority on DSLR - you set aperture & camera adjusts the shutter speed
• Thirds rule doesn't necessarily apply.  If bird in tree, try to get all sky or all tree, not combination. If 3rd horizontally, have bird looking into photo
• Use depth of field - may want bird to be sharp against blurred background
• Treat it like sports photography, so fast shutter speed
• Don't need to worry about camera shake
• Practise on bigger birds.  And in the garden.  Set up sticks near feeder so birds will perch there

So now I'm going to practise, & practise & try to get the hang of the aperture vs shutter dynamic.  And will need a bigger lens.