So, things I have been cooking:

It turns out you can do a decent dish with crayfish tails: saute some potatoes, add some tomatoes and cook down, add onion & basil and the crayfish tails and serve with a wedge of lemon.

Also, pork chops with grapes & olives seems to work OK. Needs a bit of improvement, but I was impressed that the grapes didn't oxidise and become sour. Top tip: when pan-frying pork chops, you can sear the fat with a blowtorch for extra flavour - I need to practice a bit more and see if I can manage crackling.

Amazingly, http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/teasmokedduckwithbab_79161 works; leaves a mess in the pan, which is why they say put tinfoil in your pan first. I chose to crisp the skin first in the pan. My duck came out a bit overdone, but deliciously moist (name another context where you can get away with that phrase ..).  Next up: I wonder what else I can smoke duck with - the trick of putting some soft brown sugar in to give a burned effect seems to work quite well ..

And I've had another go at Gordon Ramsay's duck with blackberry sauce; I think it is starting to make sense and I would've got crispy skin and properly done duck had I not been a bit of an idiot,  baked the duck the wrong way up and then left it in for too long. I also oversweetened the sauce rather, which everyone else will hate, but I like.

In other news, rosemary and tarragon roast potatoes turn out to be quite nice and I may explode soon ..