Brown Soup Days

We have reached the time of the year, I like to refer to as 'Brown Soup'. The weather has changed from deliciously, invigoratingly frosty to damp and sludgy with rain pouring down from skies that are hanging heavy and low over the landscape. A local saying around here suggests that when a particular hill is wearing its hat (i.e. cloud sitting on the top), the day will be wet. Well, dear reader, more than once recently, it hasn't been so much wearing a hat as burrowing itself under a cloud duvet. 

But these are the necessary rest days and the weather is doing nothing more than helping us slow down and take stock. They are the days where you can stay in the softest clothes you own, catching up on books, tv shows, music that you'd been meaning to all year, if only you had the time. Well, now you do. Say thank you to the weather. 

There are walks, but of the sort that make you scurry home faster than usual. There are gatherings but these have lost the frenetic energy that powers the pre-Christmas ones and we don't mind when someone inevitably dozes off in the corner. There is yoga of the sort that requires lying down rather than pushing through some kind of core workout. These are not the days to push through (unless you're in active labour), but to rest. 

These are also the days for clearing out. What no longer serves is being taken out of its habitual hiding place, shaken down and held up to the low winter light for inspection. We have donations for the charity shop, items listed on Freecycle and boxes of memories packed away for the attic: the postcards and birthday cards and ticket stubs and ephemera of life that will have no relevance to anyone but us, but still they remain and we can't quite bring ourselves to throw them out. 

Somehow, despite resolutely not buying anything of the kind, we find ourselves with boxes of mince pies, biscuits and chocolates. Not many, but more than we would normally buy in a year. Some have gone to the foodbank, but they appear to have reproduced in the way boxes of that sort do and are part and parcel of the feasting and gluttony we do to shore us up against the cold and bitter days to come. 

To counter all this sugar, I make brown soup from leftovers in the fridge. The rain is tapping gently at the window and I can see the thin branches of the acer whipping about in the wind. We haven't seen the fish since November as they've taken themselves down into the warmer depths of the pond. I have a large pan of stock coming to the boil on the stove top and Kirstie Young is talking about her desert island discs in the background. Above me, I can hear the bump-buzz-thunk of the hoover being pushed about the floor. 

On the chopping board, leftover roast potatoes, carrots, sprouts, swede and parsnips are neatly (ish - this is not a beauty competition, this is Brown Soup) cubed and waiting to be added to the stock. My phone pings with a message from an old, old friend saying they would be delighted to see us for japes and larks, or, more sensibly, scrabble. 

Cheered by the news, I reach back into the fridge for the leftover turkey, pigs in blankets and stuffing. Just a handful or 2, enough to add some protein and some of that gorgeous sagey flavour. The cat flap bangs and seconds later Mabel headbutts my leg vigorously, loudly demanding biscuits. Her fur is cold and damp, thick and fluffy in its winter condition. She's been patrolling her patch, defending the borders against the evil tabby, and her eyes are glowing green with triumph. I feed her. 

A quick step into the garden for some lemon thyme. Shake the rain from my hair and pull the leaves from the stems. 

Everything in the pot, I leave it all to simmer while I occupy myself watching the weather beat against the house. The black-eyed susans were finally forced into giving up flowering during the cold snap and now the stems that wound so vigorously around the jasmine during the autumn are hanging limply, like so many bored socialites, all limp and jaded greenness. Hanging from them are raindrops like glass beads and, in that delicious betwixt times kind of way, I let my thoughts drift while watching them drip. 

The smell of soup, and the silence of the hoover, brings me back to the now and I turn my attention to the tricky business of tipping the contents of the steaming pan into the blender: have I misjudged the amount of stock and it will all overflow? Have I misjudged the angle of the tilt-and-pour and am about to have a counter liberally covered? Luckily the answer is no. Blend, noisily, for 30 seconds. Tip the resulting liquid back into the saucepan and back onto the hob. 

Taste, season, add a glug of Worcestershire sauce - the proper stuff. My, this is a brown soup indeed. Thick and rib-sticking, it promises to cure all ills, to coat your bones in a comforting umami hug. It will win no beauty prizes, but it will see you right, cutting through the gluttony, the sugar highs and lows, the hangovers and the hang-unders. 

It brings both my boys to the table where we break bread and nourish together, facing the oncoming change of the year. 

A note on the image above: I can't find the name or reference for this, although I am getting a hint of Vanessa Bell, maybe? If you know, can you let me know so I can credit properly? 

Of the Before and the After

The Potting Shed by Lore Pemberton. 

On my Christmas wish list, Click on the image to get to her website.

I had planned to pop on here and say something cheerful about winter being nearly here, but it feels like we have crossed that invisible marker here in the Midlands. Winter is already here. The past week has been full of huge downpours, torrents of raindrops that hurled themselves at the windows and roof, drumming percussive music through the week. Whole days have been blackened by rain clouds, battered by winds. Taking the train to Gloucester, I could see the silver glint of flooded fields by Bredon Hill, the hill itself looking dark and already folded into hibernation. Occasionally, a wild sunbeam would break through the cloud, sending down a fierce bright light that made me blink. 

On Monday, my friend came over with her little boy. 10 months old and already staggering around like a wee drunk man, bow legged and hands raised up for the sheer joy of motion and speed and independence. He is a joyful whirlwind, a tiny tyke, a terror of all cats and bearer of childhood nursery germs that I had long lost all immunity to. 24 hours later, whilst hoovering up what I hoped was the last of the rice particles he had liberally blessed the carpet with, I felt an ominous itch in the back of my throat. 

This has been a proper, old fashioned cold, the like of which I haven't experienced since the Kid left primary school. Stuffy of head and nose, full of catarrh, throat like sandpaper, eyes like heavy hot marbles and sleep punctuated by a cough that would scatter the crows. Bravely I have soldiered on through it, meeting grant application deadlines, project end deadlines and meetings that could not, would not be shifted. But now I'm ready to lean into it, give in to it. Lie on the sofa with a cool flannel on my forehead, a soothing drink to hand and someone else to cook. To give credit where due, N has been dying to do this for days, it's only now that I have the capacity to lay down tools and let him. 

Own. Worst. Enemy. 

But I am ready for winter now. For fresh air walks in the morning that leave your cheeks pink and tingling from the nip of a frost. For gentle yoga meditation in a candlelit evening, emerging blissed out into a house that smells of rich stews and baking bread. To take up a craft again, pick up the knitting needles or crochet hook and not care if the end result is any good. For the time to make bread and stews and soups. For woodsmoke, and citrus, and spices. 

Not that I can smell anything right now, and I was about to write "stupid cold".  Which is reflective of how I treat most of my conditions. They are stupid because they get in the way, they stop me from doing the job I loved, they cause me pain. 

But it occurs to me that this is the wrong approach to these things. It lacks grace and understanding. It tries to set the bar to how things used to be when, truth is, it can never be that again. As a friend said last week "it's okay to be angry about them but don't let that anger become all you feel". So, it is time to reach an accommodation, an acceptance of where I am now. To develop an intuitive understanding of what my body is trying to tell me, instead of rushing over it because there are things to be done. To consider a new approach to my body instead of feeling like a failure because it doesn't work like it used to. 

Chronic pain is the worst bedfellow, it sucks as a walking companion, and I've raged bitter war against it, but maybe, this Winter, I can take the time to recognise it for the signpost it is. The one that guides the way to a better, more sustainable life, overriding the itching temptation to eat all the chocolate oranges under the tree and carry on as before. 

'Before' is a closed box; 'After' is a wide, open landscape to explore. Let's see what I can find there. 

October at the Allotment

As you can imagine, there is something about a wedding that gets in the way of allotment time. Apart from flying visits during the day where I'd dash up there, water and chat to the sunflowers, I didn't really linger. Certainly, my habit of taking a coffee up with me and sitting down to watch the insects fell by the wayside. 

But now we're in October and there is no big event to plan and make metres and metres of bunting, or stamp seed packets, or sift wildflower seeds, or source vintage jugs, or panic-source tablecloths for, so now I can switch my attention back to the place that brings me most peace. 

I'm planting red and white onions that will ripen over the winter. Garlic and broad beans too. The kale is still going, so I'll leave that in situ, but mainly this month is about tidying down. 

The courgettes are done, so I dug those up at the weekend. The french beans too, but I'm letting those die back before lifting them as they're good for setting nitrogen in the soil. The potatoes are all out now too. Only the sunflowers really remain, defiant against the dropping temperatures. And I'm reluctant to cut the raspberry canes down just yet as the bees are still bimbling amongst them, finding nectar where I thought it was all gone for the year. 

We got to try our first ever home-grown red cabbage. Shredded thinly, served with beetroot and red onion (likewise) with feta and a standard vinaigrette dressing, it was delicious. Red cabbage salad is one of my favourites. Good job really - there are 5 more cabbages in varying stages of readiness up at the plot. 

I've wound the hose up for the last time and strimmed all the long grass down with my inadequate strimmer. It's battery only lasts about 5 minutes, so it takes a good 4 trips to get the whole plot done. A little frustrating but a good excuse for short breaks from the desk this week. I've cleaned the tools and managed not to scream at the spider that wanted to know what I was doing, lifting its comfy trowel out of the dark corner. 

The plan is to let everything die down and settle down until November when we'll start making plans for the raised beds. the 4th growing area will be going no dig for next year as I just don't have it in me to dig over another large area like that. I always end up damaged and with large physio bills when I do. Instead, we've been gathering cardboard like there's a world shortage and will soon order in the tonnes of topsoil we'll need. 

Then it's the simple task of building the beds, getting the topsoil to the plot, lifting it into the beds...I'll stop there. I already feel the need for a lie down. 

Luckily my brother-in-law is a gardener for hire, with a van and the quiet winter period looming, so we'll rope him in with promises of tea, sausage sandwiches and a day's pay. I think the latter may be a more convincing bribe. If we can get my sis and her kids involved, it'll be like an Amish barn raising. Without the barn. Or the beards. 

Then it'll be time to move our sights to the far end of the plot. By February, I'm hoping to have that cleared of knotweed, fallen tree branches and accumulated nonsense so the polytunnel can go down there. In short, there are plans afoot. 

N and I spent a good few hours in the garden on Saturday. It was looking raggedy around the edges with drooping tomato plants, pots piled everywhere and the corpses of plants that didn't make it through the drought standing like little signposts of guilt about the place. 3 hours later, everything dead or about to be cleared, pots washed and piled neatly, mini greenhouse cleaned and scrubbed, a big yup of stuff for the tip gathered, roses and honeysuckle pruned, we toasted our efforts with mugs of tea and a sit down. 

I once heard that Sophia Loren's advice for staying youthful was to avoid 'old people noises', those groans and whimpers and oohs and aahs people of a Certain Age make after physical exertion...or just standing up from the armchair. I'm sorry Sophia, but I made all the old person noises on Saturday. Worth it though. 

A Found Thing

I had a bit of a blogging break recently as I rushed to get some work finished up before we went away. There was work that I'd not managed to do because the heatwave knocked me for six and other work that was fast approaching a deadline and more work that had been put aside because I'd got carried away helping a client set up an exhibition. 

Actually, the latter made me realise that, whilst the freelance life suits me, I do miss the energy and buzz of being in a museum, working towards a common goal, rather than sat solo in my little office, tapping silently away. It's nice to have a taste of it every now and then. So now, once a week, I catch the train into Gloucester and work and chatter and plan and help out. It's a lot of fun and very good for my soul. 

Last week we made an escape up to Northumberland, that beautiful county full of moors, hills, woodlands and beaches. Ruined castles staring moodily out to sea. Viking lore. Big brooding skies that stretch over wide empty sands. Hills turning slowly purple as the heather flowers. Yeavering Bell. Lindisfarne. The Laidly Worm of Spindlestone Heugh. Grace Darling and the heaving North Sea. Corned beef pasties. Craster kippers. I'll blog more about it next time. 

The week has helped to reset my head and revive my energy. Grief is a strange, shifting thing that, this year, has made me mostly sad (as opposed to last year's incandescent anger) and feeling as though joy might have been locked up forever. I could find enjoyment in the moment of things, but that pure joy, with its giddy laughter and keen eye for nonsense, had gone. 

Or rather, not gone but hiding. Time away, some spent with good friends, and the absolute determination that I would not go through life joyless, found it for me again. I'm very grateful. 

And also grateful for the shift from August to September that occurred while we were away. There has been much-welcome rain. Dew on the ground. Stripy spiders creating complex and beautiful webs right across the very path you need to walk down. Socks are required once more and I had to, brace yourselves, Put A Cardigan On last night. When Mabel comes in at night, she is no longer dusty from lying under bushes, but speckled with water from damp grasses. The smell of the air is different and I can feel my lungs opening up to it. 

The Kid looked after both house and cats extremely well. So well that neither cat bothered to get up when we got back. Actually, that's their standard behaviour. The house was clean (we had given him 4 hours warning of our return) - even the bins had been emptied - and I think he'd seen it as a bit of a holiday for himself too. It is hard: at 24 you don't want to go on holiday with your Mum and her partner necessarily, but you can't always afford to go by yourself. Have decided to put the offer in of a break regardless and see what he says. 

A stay away always makes me think back to my stint in hospitality, over 25 years ago now. How I took pleasure in making sure guests had everything they needed so that the first thing they could do was kick off their shoes, make a cup of tea and just sit for a while in a chair that held them like a hug. I wanted them to say "oh it is good to be here." 

What does not make people say that is making them track down the nearest supermarket for milk the minute they arrive, or expecting them wrestle with a coffee machine/kettle that needs a NASA degree to operate and then sit on a sofa that fair rattles the bones. Luckily, we were only there for a couple of nights before moving on to our Friends in the North.

I think self-catering providers should be made to stay in their own properties for a month before letting paying guests in. Trust me, once I rule the world, that will become law. 

N starts uni on Monday and is keeping a very careful lid on how nerve-wracking he's finding the notion of returning to education. Rationally, we both know he'll be absolutely fine. Irrationally, I'm fighting the urge to make him a packed lunch and iron him a clean handkerchief. 

Later today, I shall take myself off to the allotment to see what it's been up to during my absence. Hopefully there will be more damsons on the wild trees for me to scrump on the way back. I'm going to make a hearty risotto full of mushrooms and garlic. I'm going to put on fresh bedding that carries the smell of autumn with it. I'm going to soak for a long time in the bath and remove the summer peach polish from my toenails. I'm going to book tickets for See How They Run. 

But first, I'm going to savour being back in my little office, tapping solo at my laptop, In Our Time teaching me new things at a low volume, gently closing the window against the sound of the aggressive needless lawn-cutting going on outside. It's good to be back.  

Leftovers Cake

I don’t often bake these days. Whilst being an enthusiastic supporter and consumer of baked goods, there just isn’t the call for it in our house. N will sometimes make sounds of appreciation over a sticky toffee pudding or a crumble, then put his portion in the fridge and forget about it for 2 months, which is no way to live quite frankly, and should, in all right-minded households, result in some sort of jail sentence. 

The Kid decided some time ago that he’s reached an age where my attempts at birthday cakes are superfluous to his enjoyment of the day. These days he likes his birthdays with a side of beer rather than a cake that resembles the leaning tower of Pisa, if the tower at Pisa had been constructed of sponge, cream and strawberries, or that has a strange blobby space monster blobbing it’s green tentacles all over a wonky moon. And the least said about the doughnut cake the better. 

My Nan used to make wedding cakes of 3, 4 tiers. Fruit cake heavy enough to knock out a burglar, stacked on silver paper covered stands, covered with thick marzipan and icing rigid enough to break a tooth. They would be decorated with flowers she had painstakingly made herself from the same icing, rolling it to a fragile thinness, cutting the circles and strips that would then be rolled, crimped, frilled and pressed into flower shapes to adorn the tops. Further icing swags, curls and dots would decorate the sides and the lack of a steady hand could be hidden with a quick design change or swipe of a damp sponge. 

I still have the blurred photographs she took to remember each creation; the flash is too harsh, the background too dark. I can recall the smell of the cake, the sweet grittiness of the icing. I was mmmph years old before I realised marzipan needn’t taste synthetic. 

She was a bakers daughter, my Nan, and I still have the recipe book she wrote when she joined the bakery at 13. I say “joined”. It was more in the way of the family National Service - the only person who escaped conscription was her brother, the great hope of the family, eventually brought down by gambling and ego.

In this hard backed, faded red exercise book, she wrote down the recipes for Eccles cakes, the coconut macaroons that would eventually become my dad’s favourite. Malt loaf made by painstakingly soaking the fruit in cold tea. Bread off every kind, cottage loaves a speciality. Her unsure, looping hand records how the ingredients are scaled up and up for batch baking, the demand in this Lancashire town never quite satiated. 

So when I bake, I’m small again. My own kitchen recedes and I’m stood on a stool to reach the counter, a riot of 70’s daisies spread over the apron that’s been tied around and around my waist. There is the smell of cold tea, coconut and sugar. I can feel the warmth of her oven and heat her telling me to “sift the flour, really lift it.” 

This recipe isn’t hers but it has her fingerprints all over it. 

Leftovers Cake: 

Ingredients - 1 pot of yogurt about to go off, 1 banana that’s too squishy for eating, zest of one lemon, 1 egg, self-raising flour, vanilla, any berries that need using up, caster sugar. 

1. Blend 1 cup of yogurt with the banana, half a cup of the sugar and the vanilla. Chop and add the berries. 

2. Stir in enough flour (to sift or not to sift, you decide according to time) to make it look like a proper cake batter - I think it took about 2 cups but I was ad libbing, talking to the cats and listening to the radio at the same time, so I can’t quite remember. 

3. Remember the lemon zest, grate it over the bowl, Drop the lemon into the batter, curse, wipe it off, continue grating till done. Stir in. 

4. Line the cake tin of your choice - I used a flapjack tin, about 15 cms wide because I appear to have lost all my roundy tins - with baking paper and tip the mix in. Sprinkle with Demerara sugar. 

5. Bakes for 20 mins in a 180 heat oven that you’ve remembered to preheat. If you haven’t remembered to preheat, do it now and make a cup of tea while you wait. Possibly talk to your partner/child/handy pet at the same time. 

5. Test readiness of cake with a skewer or, in my case, a wooden chop stick. If it comes out clean, cake is done. Allow to cool a little before lifting it out of the tin. Allow to cool completely before removing the paper. 

6. Slice according to portion preference. Eat. 

July at the Allotment

Gracious, it has been a week since those dog days of oppressive heat and unforgiving sun, where N and I took to hanging damp towels in front of open windows and, at the worst points, putting even damper towels over our heads. We may have looked all kinds of ridiculous but, as we never left the house past 10am, no one was any the wiser. 

Do you know what has been absolutely loving this heat? The sunflowers. Yes, they have finally taken off from the thin spindly, slug bitten things that they were and are shooting skywards (you can see a video of their progress on my Instagram feed (pretty much the only social media I engage with now. Does Blogging count as social media? It feels too measured for that. Anyway, back to the point...). All they needed, it seemed, was a solid dose of Mediterranean temperatures to set them on the right course. It's quite reassuring to see, although I have been researching emergency florists just in case. 

The courgettes have recovered from a similar case of slug attack too. They were nice and healthy when they went out; a day later they were stripped of all but one leaf. It's incredibly frustrating but other plot holders tell me I'm not alone - slug levels have been off the slimy record and we're all grasping at coffee grounds (the one I have had most success with), copper tape and wool pellets. There are slow worms on the site but it seems there aren't enough of them. I really must get my pond dug and frogspawn transplanted when the time is right. 

I'm reluctant to bring in hedgehogs as there are badgers here, and badgers eat hedgehogs (true and disgusting) and I don't think I could bear to be responsible for that kind of massacre. 

BUT, there are signs of balance. I've seen more ladybirds on the plot this year, keeping aphids under control with no intervention from me. Chives have seen off the white and black fly from the beans. I keep a shallow dish filled with water to encourage birds down. Crickets scatter as I walk, so I know they're around picking off pests. 

As usual, my low boredom threshold for weeding means that there are "wild flowers" galore, so the bees and butterflies are out in number, which is just fun to sit and watch. It also means that the ever present bindweed is really flourishing in parts, but I like to let that get to a decent length and then pull it out of the ground like spaghetti from a carbonara. 

The potatoes are nearly ready, I think. I'll be lifting a few at the weekend to check. The beetroot are slow but that's my fault for the late sowing which has meant the ground has been too dry to plant them out. The raspberries are mainly autumn fruiting but a few are already ripe, albeit small through lack of rain. These I pick as I go, handy snacks rather than a crop I make plans for. 

The Japanese wineberries are also looking ready to burst from their strange, sticky cases. They made a superb jam last year, but I'm not sure I'll have time to make jam again. Too much to do in the run up to September. Maybe a flavoured gin that can quietly steep while I'm busy and then be handed out to everyone who helped with the wedding? 

I like that idea. I also think gin will needed. 

In August, I'm going to order in a heck-tonne (an official measurement) of topsoil and compost so I can finish off the last 3 beds in the no-dig fashion. N has, reasonably, pointed out that digging through the accumulated nonsense - accumulated by previous plot tenant - absolutely breaks me, takes months and actually depletes the soil in the long term. He is not wrong, which is annoying. And I find that, in my 4th year of plot ownership, my enthusiasm for digging up that nonsense has decreased considerably. The arthritis makes progress slow and dispiriting, so better to try another method than involves no more than cardboard and a hefty topping of topsoil. Which I asked for for my birthday. 

Hey, some girls like diamonds, some like earth. 

The brassicas are HUGE now, having recovered from their dodgy start. N built me a new cage for them from bits of the fallen fruit cage, scaffolding netting and drainage tubing. They now have even more room to shoot up. Extra bonus: the netting is yellow and the pipes blue, so it’s a very colourful cage. 

I managed to put my back out slightly, lugging a half-full water butt into a new position. Annoying as it meant my planned 2 hours at the plot were curtailed by 40 mins so I could go home and lie down till the agony passed (it did) but also, hurrah for another water butt! 

This year is the driest I’ve seen the allotment. We haven’t had a decent rainfall for months. The canal level is low and a hosepipe ban is lurking just around the corner. Of lot of plants, under stress through lack of water, are throwing seed out early. The clay soil is crazed with deep cracks where it’s shrinking back on itself. 

There have been a few half-hearted attempts from the sky to throw some rain in our direction, but mostly it evaporates in the sky, or gets lost somewhere around Wales. Trying to weed or plant anything is like chipping away at plaster, so I have a number of plants in pots, waiting for the right time to go in. So we just have to hope August is a little kinder. 

At home, the garden is just about coping. We've lost more plants to the local fox family coming in and scent marking their way around (goodbye thyme, dwarf acer, ferns) than we have to weather conditions. Although the honeysuckle has never really enjoyed life here. The lettuces did lay down and die but the tomatoes are loving this, even though we are using grey water to keep them refreshed. 

Let's just hope they don't taste unusually fragrant when we come to harvest them. 

Bear or Gecko?

I am sitting here at my desk, in my apricot coloured office, with Radio 4 burbling gently behind me and the rain drumming its own beat outside. Oh rain, I'm so pleased to see you! For a spiritual bear like me (some people are spiritual geckos, some are spiritual bears), yesterdays 30+ degree heat was just...like some awful 3rd rate sci-fi hellscape. With chirpy neighbours who are more gecko than bear. 

"I just love this heat, don't you mate?"
"Oh yes mate. A real treat. I'm going to mow the lawn and chainsaw a tree. See ya mate."
"Good luck mate, I'll be here pointlessly hammering nails into bits of wood."
"Good on ya mate."*

There is a strict routine to days like that: in the morning, the blinds and windows at the back of the house are flown open to allow as much (relatively) fresh and cool air in as possible. By midday, those are resolutely closed and the ones at the front of the house have been opened instead. 

The cats find new hiding places to escape the heat. The Great Boo is under the trailing spider plant, enjoying the cool green shade of the beast. Tiny Wee Mabel seeks out shrubs to sleep away her day underneath, coming in at night to lie on the beds, shedding dried earth and dead insects from her fur. 

I look in the fridge like a helpless infant turning to its mother for food. Why have the contents not converted themselves into nutritious salads and refreshing iced teas while the door has been closed? Does this mean I have to do it? N is no help on these days as he will happily eat cereal twice a day when it's hot, like an overgrown student. Which I suppose he is now.

Any allotment visiting takes place strictly before 8am where a short burst of watering, fretting over mysterious holes in the sunflower leaves, weeding and harvesting of an onion or two, plus a quick pick of sweet peas may take place. I can hear the rattle of the heavy chain and lock that keeps the gates closed, repeatedly clanging as people race against the temperature clock. 

"Don't lock it!"
"Sorry! Think we're all up here, aren't we?"
"Can't stop, I've got 5 minutes to water everything while the kids eat breakfast!"
"Don't shut the gate!"

"Wait for me!"

The only other time it's this busy is on a Sunday morning where we can linger over Thermos's of coffee and commiserate over bindweed. There is not the time at 7.30 on a Friday: we rush in, sending dog walkers - on the same early morning mission - scattering in surprise. It's like the rush for an IKEA sale, without the tea lights and meatballs. 

At some point, I manage 10 minutes of yoga and realise that, along with all the usual places, my eyebrows are sweating. Eyebrows! I didn't even know they could do that! So I ditch out of the 4th downward dog in favour for practising shavasana - corpse pose. Apologies to the plucky tiny Texan teaching us all via YouTube but my inner bear wants shavasana, preferably on the cool tiles of the kitchen floor, a la the Great Boo. 

Another mournful gaze into the fridge fails to automatically muster up a peach, mint, bulgar wheat and feta salad with pomegranate molasses dressing, or even the ingredients for one, so I eat cheese on crackerbread and then retire for a nap on the sofa, the coolest spot in the house, waking an hour later with only the vaguest of notions where I am. 

Coolest apart from the hallway but I've not yet been forced to camp in there. Give me time. 

I've recklessly promised a friend I will go along to her preview show, so I pack sandwiches (the last time I went to any kind of exhibition preview, the promised 'dry snacks'** turned out to be packets of Walkers crisps. I am not falling for that trick again), bottles of water and wet flannels into a bag packed with ice blocks. I pack the friend foolish enough to say she'd come along. And we head out for a 50 minute journey down the M5 with broken air conditioning. 

***

As the mini Magnums are wilting on their slushy bed of ice, people are eschewing sticky backed hugs in favour of air kisses that land wide of their marks. Carefully designed 'Become a Patron' flyers are crumpled with use as fans and sticky from use as cocktail coasters. Faces are flushed and shirts are damp but the preview is a success, which is all that matters. 

I stay up talking with N, who'd been to the Gardeners World show for the day (the day! I'd have lasted an hour and probably tried to push Monty Don into a pond in my heat-induced fury), till 1am, neither of us able to sleep in heat that lies like a blanket. We drink cold white wine, eat Pringles, from our seats on the floor, the coolest part of the house. Tiny Wee Mabel comes in and announces, loudly, that she is going upstairs to sleep and scatter debris on a duvet after her long day of sleeping. Great Boo sits silently by his bowl, hoping that mute appeal will win him a second helping of supper biscuits. 

At last, although sleeping downstairs on the floor comes in for serious consideration, I remember that TWM brought a mouse in last week, and I don't much want to wake up next to a rodent corpse, I haul my heat-heavy carcass off to bed. One day, I promise myself, one day I will crack this heat thing and I will learn to love the weighty days of summer. One day I will have the right clothes, the right body, the right attitude, the right eyebrows that don't sweat. 

But right now, there's an ice block chilling my bed and calling my name. 

*neither of these people are Australian, they just feel the need to express themselves like they are. Ah yeah no, mate.
**seriously. The preview invite said "one drink and dry snacks will be available". I have never felt more invited

*** the allotment (the nice bits) at 7.30 yesterday morning. I will allow that hot summer mornings are something special

Inhale Deeply

Hello! Well, it has been so long since I last blogged that, coming back to it this morning, I couldn’t remember what I’d last written and consequently lost myself for an hour this morning, rereading, following back, plunging into that memory pool, occasionally asking myself if I’d really meant to write that. 

Generally yes. What I mean to write, I write. 

April and the 1st week in May were…bonkers. So much so that I’ve reached 7th May and fallen at its feet, kissing the ground with gratitude. I think I will lie here for a little bit and recover. 

treated myself to some freesias because why not?

Truth is, I did something I’d promised myself not to do since going freelance, and I’d over committed. In order to fit it all in, I worked over the bank holidays and weekends, push-push-pushing words into those coherent sentences that funders like.  

So. Many. Damn. Zoom. Meetings. Daily, twice daily, thrice daily. Finally, at the suggestion “we catch up via a quick Zoom”, I snapped and demanded an old fashioned phone call instead, unable to face another disjointed conversation full of “oh you’re frozen again” or “hang on while I share my screen.”

And I physically zoomed too: one 7 day stretch saw me dash between Birmingham (again), London and Gloucester. I have seen more train interiors this month than I have in the past 2 years. I have driven to Ely. 

But. Now May is here and the deadlines have been met. I have felt the weight of them fall from my shoulders like a heavy overcoat. 

sweet peas planted out in April

N is cantering through his last month of work. In September he starts a Masters in landscape architecture. No one chooses to be made redundant but there is no denying the freedom, once the period of adjustment and mourning has been got through, to go in a completely different direction that it gives you. 

Speaking of which, never have I ever heard so many tone-deaf comments as I did when the news was first announced. Redundancy is up there in the list of the Big Life Stressors (bereavement, moving, illness, divorce, redundancy, etc) and yet his shoulder rang with the metaphorical thumps of people saying “think of all that free time!”, “wish I could be made redundant!” and “it happened to me and I was over the moon!” 

The problem with comments like that, as well meant as they may be, is they diminish how the person actually feels. That period of mourning and adjustment as you realise the future you thought was secure has just been snatched away, that the small work ‘family’ you’d been part of will soon all be moving on without you, is necessary. Trying to cheer someone out of it just makes them feel worse. 

And now he's through that - jubilant to be leaving a work environment that had steadily grown more toxic over the past 2 years, coming out of meetings with deep sighs, shakes of the head and a wondering "I don't have to worry about that any more". There are plans for the future, university in September and then the wedding at the end of the month. We’re in a good place. 

Shelves at the Coffin Works. One of the helter-skelter visits I did. 

My poor allotment. I managed 1 trip up there, nearly 2 weeks ago. To be fair, the ground was so dry, it needed a mattock to break it up (it's a clay soil so when it's dry, it's solid). It needed the recent drenching. Tomorrow, recently nadgered ankle withstanding*, I'm planning a few hours up there, taking my sandwiches and my time over the jobs to do. There are seedlings ready to go in, another brick path to be built and, no doubt, strimming to be done. I love No Mow May but if I went with that at my plot, I'd never recover the ground. 

I have alpines to plant on the tricky dry bed, cornus cuttings that have rooted and need a place to be, a couple of achillea that 'fell' into my basket and a honeyberry (lonicera caerulea) which I also failed to resist. 

May is full of green and so beautiful that, now I have the time, I'm standing to stare. Trips to garden centres that are bursting with lushness. Going to see friends one evening, the lanes were so soft with new growth, bluebells shyly scattering the grass, that I had to stop the car to stare properly. I'm going to do that more, not just now, but this year in general. 

Things I have read and seen:

• Earthed by Rebecca Schiller, Some Tame Gazelle by Barbara Pym, Unreliable Memoirs by Clive James and South Riding by Winifred Holtby, which stayed with me for days afterwards and I'm recommending all over the shop. 
• Dinosaurs: the Final Day with David Attenborough. Just mind-blowing. Astonishing finds and research pinpointing the moment of asteroid impact that did for the dinosaurs. And continuing the asteroid theme, Don't Look Up. Funny and poignant, Meryl Streep acting it up a storm. An allegory for our environmentally-stricken times that can also make you laugh. 

There are 3 more weeks of May left before we tilt into the birthday pell-mell of June and July (our families seem to cluster around here and November-December for birthdays) and I can allow myself the luxury of Days Off. Things I will do in May:

• Eat asparagus in a variety of ways. 
• Ditto new potatoes
• Make elderflower cordial
• Inhale deeply when I'm around flowers
• Admire the wisteria at the allotments
• Watch butterflies
• Quit Twitter because, ugh**
• Yoga
• Write

What does May hold for you?

*the arthritis means that when I've been too much on my feet, I get unsteady, leading to Undignified Trips and, in this case, Falls. I've been resting this thing since Wednesday. Lots of ice etc. 

** Done!

PS If I've missed any of your posts and/or comments, I'm sorry. Slowly getting myself back into order. 

Adventures in Muesli, and other food stories

As you can imagine, with N's Mum ill, we had some weeks of quietness, panic, worry and bad eating because he certainly wasn’t interested in food that required thought, preferring to opt for toast with things on, or takeaways. But you can't carry on that way forever, so I pulled my socks up and set to, aided by a trip to the farm shop. 

Farm shops are great for inspiration. Not so great on the old wallet, so I tend to limit my visits. They are a treat rather than how we usually shop, but what a treat they are. I even love the way they smell. In no order of preference, I came back with:

• a Romanesco cauliflower, all spiralling turrets and vibrant green. Plus many other vegetables that were mainly normal and everyday, for e.g. carrots. You don't need me to describe the carrots
• Mango chutney and caramelised onion chutney. Because, chutney goodness. I'll stop saying chutney now*
• proper honey from a local bee keeper
• a loaf of bread stating "takes 3 days to make". It was crustier than a crusty after a week protesting a bypass from a tree top
• late plums and early rhubarb 
• strawberries! So so early but not flown in from overseas, grown within 5 miles of the shop! They smell amazing
• purple sprouting broccoli. 
• A giant bag of red potatoes that roast beautifully
• a crumbly, buttery-feel blue cheese that just slightly puckers the taste buds
• Eggs with golden yolks from formerly free-range but still definitely organic hens
• a made-on-site coleslaw that creamy and delicious
• sausages made from pigs raised and butchered locally

I roasted the sausages in a trayful of the vegetables, including the cauliflower, stirred in some of the onion chutney, threw in some garlic and stems of thyme from the garden. 

The potatoes I turned into surprisingly successful gnocchi (the first batch I've ever made that didn't turn gluey and the water into wallpaper paste) and had those with the purple sprouting broccoli and some of the blue cheese when N was out on Wednesday (he does not like PSB). 

The plumbs and rhubarb became a compote for adventures with muesli. To cut the sharpness, I added the honey rather than reaching for the sugar. I mean, honey is sugar, but marginally less so and it meant the compote has a more satisfying flavour than if I'd just bunged caster sugar in. 

Did I mention I make my own muesli? Well I do *pauses to polish halo of smugness*. Oats, sultanas, dates, pumpkin and sesame seeds, ground hazelnuts and almonds. Spiced with ginger and cinnamon. Cheaper than standard muesli from the supermarket (but only because I buy in bulk). Trying to do that from a standard shop where every individual ingredient is tiny-ly portioned and wrapped in plastic for our "convenience"? Forget it. 

Tonight, when we come back from college, I'll make an omelette with spinach, mushrooms and the rest of that blue cheese. We'll have it with tiny roasties, made from those red potatoes, and the coleslaw. Just right for a day where the temperatures have dropped and we'll have been outside planting parsnip seeds. 

Which reminds me, I have a giant parsnip I need to turn into soup. Before I go, I need to tell you that comment moderation has been switched on after a veritable swathe of spam comments for casinos, dodgy Viagra and so on. Is it just me or does the internet just feel like a lot of work these days? Easier to make soup. 

*No I won't

January at the Allotment

Mostly this morning, I am extremely tired thanks to the winds that blew a hoolie round the house all night and made me fret for the safety of our newly-constructed mini-greenhouse (fret not, it was still standing when I dared open the curtains this morning). So I've given myself permission to spend the morning messing about with seeds before I crack back onto work this afternoon.  

Yesterday, I grabbed a lovely couple of hours at the allotment. There was more digging of the long bed to be done but I'm pleased to report I'm now on the last third of it. The resident robin bobbed about nearby, on the look out for any worms, so when I sadly chopped one in half (and I was genuinely sad about it), I threw him the pieces and he darted off with his takeaway lunch. 

Which reminds me, my Mum recently told my niece about the legend that robins are the spirit of departed loved ones, come back to check on you. Pause. "I don't think Grandad is a robin," niece said thoughtfully. "I think he's a pigeon." 

Which has made us all laugh for weeks, every time we see a pigeon. 

It was good to be up there, with only a scattering of other people around, tending their own plots. The "You want a weed killer on that" man was there, hands in pockets, shuffling about his plot and stopping everyone who walked past to say "Werrrllll, I haven't seen so-and-so for aaaages. He's prah'bly quit." You may imagine that he is a bundle of joy wrapped in a holey jumper with a bad, slightly Hitler-ish moustache to bristle at things. 

Also up there were the Descriptive Couple. They like to allotment loudly, telling each other what they're doing. "So, I'm putting in the broad beans while you weed around the onions, right?" "Yes! And then I'll prune the raspberries while you turn the compost." "This is all great fun, look I've found a millipede!" When they got their plot, they smeared mud on their cheeks and danced around, hugging each other. They are adorable but not peaceful. 

And there was me, digging, sitting with a coffee, pruning, sitting with a coffee, picking up the blown over fruit cage, sitting with a coffee. I'm probably known as She Who Sits, but my brain is always busy. 

It was certainly good to be up there and feeling more positive about the place than I had been back at the start of January. Then, it had all felt overwhelming and depressing. Now, I was reminded that I've done this before and I can do this again. That, although the squirrels have dug up my spring bulbs (*shakes fist in general direction of squirrels*), the rosemary is shyly flaunting it's perfect little blue flowers. 

The raspberry canes had buds on them and the rhubarb had new shoots and everything, despite the cold wind whipping at my ears, felt ready to get going again. 

Back at home, thawing out with a hot chocolate (a particularly nice one, worth breaking my no-sugar vow, from the Harth chocolate company), I watched with increasing amusement as N put up the greenhouse. I thought the moment where he appeared consumed by the plastic covering, flailing his arms from underneath, as though covered by fog, was funny enough, but he then manged to put it over the frame with himself inside and the door still zipped up. Nearly spat out my chocolate as he mimed being stuck and then picked up the whole thing, turning around in circles. 

Funny man. 

This year, I've made myself a planting calendar of all the (70+. Yikes. Now I know where my money went last year) seeds I have and when to plant them. Oh yes, shit just got real as I am determined - once more with italics, determined - to make more use of the plot this year. No longer will I wake in August and realise I am 4 months late getting pumpkin seeds started. No longer will our windowsills be crammed with leggy seedlings, desperate for repotting. No more will I glower resentfully at those plot holders who appear to have it all planted out and ready to go. 

Oh no, this is my real new years resolution. I shall be the allotment holder all others envy. My potatoes will be plentiful, my berries bountiful and my squash splendiferous. People will congratulate me on the progress and ask for advice. I shall smile quietly and gently steer their gaze from that giant yup of dead wood at the end of the plot. 

Fake it till you make it. 

All Aboard

I had to be in the lovely little town of Ledbury this morning for a work thing. As I'm trying to keep our car use minimal, I set out via train, which is no hardship. Sit back in the warm, no worrying about turns, road works or mad other drivers, just let someone else trundle you through the countryside. 

And what a countryside it is. That stretch along the rugged spine of the Malverns all the way to Ledbury never fails to please. It is a quietly dramatic journey, as the hills rise up beside the tracks, looking dark and inhospitable, with abandoned quarries, dark woods, hill forts and tree-less top. At the same time, you can see into the back gardens of houses nearby, catching the briefest glimpse of someone hanging washing out with more hope than expectation, or a person spooning breakfast into their mechanically working mouth, sleep still hanging over them like a fog. 

Is there anything more guaranteed to raise a smile and feeling of contentment than the side of a tree-lined stream, meandering through a meadow, completely undisturbed by housing or roads? No. And you can only see them from the train. It's like being let into a big lovely secret. 

There is also that exciting moment when the train whooshes under the hills and into a long tunnel. I never fail to be awed by the feat of engineering that this kind of endeavour is. It's not merely a case of blasting through the hill: the resulting space has to be chiselled smooth, propped up, tracks laid, the safety of the whole darned thing has to be guaranteed every single day. 

But I am going to stop there because I am not, and never will be, an engineering nerd. Nor do I collect train numbers. I am content to remain impressed as I whizz along. I do not need to know the minutiae of how it was achieved. 

Even on a dark gloomy day, like today, train journeys are incredibly soothing. I'd got coffee, crochet and a book to occupy me, but mostly I stared out of the window and let my thoughts drift by with the view. I should do this every week. 

Ledbury itself is as picturesque as it ever was. I used to come here a lot in a former life (and a former marriage) as we had friends living here. There are some cracking shops selling things that are placed Just So, where I walked carefully, holding my breath so I didn't know anything over, or pollute it with my me-ness. The restaurant where I first ate a crab linguine (unfortunately the same night I developed tonsillitis and was seriously ill the next day), is still there, as is the wonderful Maps and Books shop. Fewer maps than there used to be, but still a great book selection. That place has been there so long, it's practically an institution. 

There are some seriously quaint buildings too, all along the Homend (the main street) and into the winding, cobbled Church Street, including the place I was going to visit. Crooked frames, sloping roofs, big timbers and low wooden doorways you have to duck to get through. If someone was going to design a model village, this would be the kind of place they imagined. 

I absolutely and completely want to live in this house, behind the big trees. 

I shall creep out o' night my dearies, and scare pub stragglers by cackling 

from behind the wall. Hey, we all need a retirement plan. 

That said, it must be deathly dull here for teenagers. No amount of poetry festival (Elizabeth Barratt Browning lived nearby with her weird father) or fictional links (John Masefield likewise, although without the father issue) or tasteful deli is going to make up for the fact there is, as is often the problem with small towns, Nothing To Do. 

A fact borne in on me when I saw a pop up sign for an holistic spa where the picture of a smiling, relaxed, utterly middle-class person had had a speech bubble added by marker pen and the words "What A Dump" drawn on. 

Which made me laugh. I remember all too well that weighty, bone-deep boredom of being 15 in a place where there was nothing to do and you were welcome nowhere. I almost wanted to add "don't worry, you'll be out of here soon". 

But I didn't because I'd already graffitied a copy of the Metro on the train (see below). Instead, I broke my No-Shopping-January by venturing into a couple of charity shops and coming out again with 2 books and 3 tops. Charity shop shopping doesn't really count as shopping, does it? It's really more of a donation. My good deed for the day. 

Later today, I shall be going to look at ART at the evening preview of a new exhibition at the local art gallery. Yes, I am going to be that kind of fancy. I asked the friend I'm meeting how long we'd be there and was informed that it would be for "as long as you want to consume free wine for." As I'm in No-Booze-January, I fully expect to be back home after 5 minutes. 

Have a super weekend, whatever it finds you doing. I'm planning to write, visit friends for a scrabble night, allotment and eat delicious things what are good for me. With the occasional thing that is not because, you know, life. 

"Stay tuned for our article next week on how young mothers are 

irresponsible, morally suspect and only in it for a council house!"

I'm eye rolling so hard, I may have dislocated a retina. 

Of Waste Puritans and Freezer Gods

In this household, 'waste' is a dirty word. Neither of us approve of it and try to reduce wherever we can. Vegetables looking a bit ropey? Soup! Leftover pasta or rice? Bake! Remnants of a roast? Pies! Mysterious jars of things that have been open too long? 

Oh. Okay. Some things have to be thrown. Please do not use that 3-year-old open jar of chutney in anything. 

In general, I'm quite good at remembering to freeze things at the time of discovering there is too much. Partly because we are Waste Puritans, doomed to poke through fridges and hold things up in an accusatory way, intoning our chant "Did you mean this to be a complete waste of money?" We scourge ourselves with the last wrinkled spring onion from the vegetable drawer and you bet we get invited to all the parties. 

Also partly because I then have meals 'in the bank' for those days where I cannot face another session at the kitchen counter. Usually on a Monday and Thursday when I'm late back in from Pilates/college, and I'm cold with all my senses urging a bath, not an hour cooking. 

And so it was, last Friday, I found myself with a mass of veg, a mostly picked over chicken carcass and, lo!, a wodge of homemade pastry in the freezer. I duly defrosted this and set to.

Leeks, mushrooms, celery, garlic and courgette were chopped into tiny pieces and cooked gently for a long while in a ladleful of stock with thyme thrown in for good measure. I picked over the very last of the chicken and shredded the pieces, throwing them in to seethe and simmer with the veg. It smelled amazing. 

I rolled out the pastry and laid it carefully in the quiche dish, muttering under my breath and patching as I went because if there is one thing gluten-free pastry does not have, it's structural integrity. It will break and tear and you will be forced to patch it regardless of your best efforts at delicacy. 

Let the mix cool slightly while you blind bake the pastry case for however long at whatever temperature. In my case, that was for the duration of time it took me to win that day's Wordle and walk to the postbox, and at 150 fan oven. 

Carefully tip the mix into the pastry case, avoiding the bit where it's shrunk away from the dish. Smooth over and then bake for another 30 mins. Serve with salad or extra vegetables of choice and roast potatoes because the world is always better for roast potatoes. Eat. 

At the eating point, I became aware of something I am not particularly good at. Labelling items in the freezer. 

Yes, friends. That was sweet pastry I had lovingly defrosted and used, all the while patting myself on the back with the Parsimonious Parsnip of Smugness. Specifically the sweet pastry I had used to make mince pies last year but neglected to label as I put the leftover in the freezer. 

Reader, I ate it regardless. And didn't mention it to N, who also ate it regardless. It was not bad, just ODD and I certainly wouldn't do it again (unless the Freezer Gods dictate that I shall) but it was edible. Which was the main thing and allowed me to continue to wear the habit woven from stale breadcrusts handed out to all us Waste Puritans. 

I find the trick is to not tell anyone about the pastry until it's all been eaten. So I might tell N later today. After his lunch. 

Tales from the Pudding Front

How it should have been...

First of all, a word of advice. Do not attempt the making of this dessert whilst 3 baileys/beers/glasses of wine/[insert drink of choice] to the better on Christmas Eve. If you’re sober and ready, then we’ll begin. 

First, the meringue. Separate egg whites from yolks. You’ll need only 6 but will actually use 8 as at least 2 of them will scramble during the separating process. Add sugar and whisk until stiff peaks. Do not attempt to do this by hand. Use electric whisk or spend Christmas Day asking passers by to cut up your food because your wrists have given up. 

Split the mix into 2, creating a sort of indent on one of them which will form a space for the creams and whatnot, and bake at 100 (electric fan oven). You have successfully completed the easy bit. Go and lie down while it bakes. Have another drink. Well done you. 

Now, raise yourself from the sofa and sift the cocoa powder into the double cream. Watch it drift and settle over every surface. Congratulations! You now have a brown kitchen and a speckled Baileys. Add the sugar and whisk in. 

Stop! Not that much. Now you have curdled chocolate cream. Start again. 

This next step calls for ground hazelnuts except you couldn’t find ground hazelnuts and the man in the shop thought you were mad asking for it: “Ground hazelnuts? Do people want ground hazelnuts? Nah. Ground almonds though.”

Sigh and buy the chopped hazelnuts, figuring you can grind them yourself with a rolling pin. This you can now do. At some point your rolling pin will slip and partially ground hazelnuts will scatter across the counter and onto the floor. Make sure you’re working on a very clean work surface before you begin or the damned nuts will also contain cat biscuits and crisp crumbs. 

Fold these, the vanilla (extract because, again, you couldn’t find ground vanilla ANY WHERE) and suspect the recipe makers are fucking with you. Ditto ground cardamom (leave that one out, no one will know)). Add the liquor of choice: one for the pudding, one for you etc. 

Spread the chocolate cream over the meringues and sandwich together, covering the top one with more choc cream. Do not press too hard or you will have invented Tabletop Eton Mess and have to start again. 

Realise at this point that you forgot the first steps which was to make a super-chocolatey cream involving double cream and bitter chocolate melting together. Raise your hands to the sky and ask the Kitchen Gods why they are making this so hard. At this point significant others in the room will find reasons to leave..."pub's about to shut and I really need...peanuts...YES! Peanuts!"

Decide to improvise by making vanilla cream (again, no one will know). Make vanilla cream without bothering the wash the fucking bowls for the fourth fucking time that day. You now have mildly chocolatey vanilla cream. It will taste fine, don’t worry about it. Wrestle this into plastic tub, getting the spatula stuck between the tines of the whisk. Abandon both in washing up bowl. 

Now to deseed the pomegranate. It is a good idea to warn loved ones that you are doing it so that when they walk into the kitchen they do not fall to their knees screaming "but it was only a pudding, there was no need for murder!" This is because pomegranates are EVIL and will splatter bright red juice over you, all surfaces, walls, cupboard doors, appliances, floors, livestock and all stationary objects within a 100 metre radius. Congratulations! You now look like a crime scene. 

Decide that you will take all constituent parts (meringues, creams, seeds and other decorative items) and assemble in situ on Christmas Day with small children because that will be FUN. You will assume this because Christmas has made you lose your mind. Go and lie down in darkened room, leaving clearing up to those lucky bastards that escaped to the pub. They will be shifting sticky sugar and cocoa mixes for hours. Probably a good idea to have a bath. 

On the day, carefully transport the pudding components, along with a billion bags of presents, unsent cards that will now be hand delivered to relatives (so much nicer!), the entire beer supply of your local shop and several overnight bags of anxiety, stress and familial angst. 

After present carnage and gluttony at the table, gather small children unto you and attempt to guide them. 

"No, we squeeze the piping bag from the top."

"Please don't hit each other with the spatula."

"Yes, the gold dust is pretty but you shouldn't squirt it in each other's eyes."

"I really think that's enough cream in that spot."

"Maybe if we try spreading it..."

"Yes, that did make a rude noise when you squeezed it."

"No, I don't think we should just throw the pomegranate seeds in the bin."

"Could you not see if you can get gold sprinkles in your brother's ear?"

You are now covered in sticky substances and gold dust. Serve and eat. Silently cast curses in the direction of those refusing it: "I really couldn't, I'm so full" (may all their sandwiches be dry turkey ones). Bask in delighted noises from those that do eat it: "this is soooo delicious!", "bloody hell, how much Baileys is in here?"

The meringue is perfectly chewy yet crisp on the outside. The creams are boozily delicious. There is enough sugar to take them all down with diabetes. It is a triumph. Get another drink and make those who were TOO FULL to try it, do the clearing up. 

Note: unused pomegranate seeds (i.e. all of the damn things) are good in gin. 

The actual messy reality which WAS totally delicious and 

any lapses in good taste, structural integrity or artistic arrangements 

should not now or ever be placed at the feet of the original recipe 

designers, but are entirely down to REALITY getting in the way. 

Seasons Eatings

Every family has them. Those odd side dishes or food rituals that only appear on 25th December and incomers (sons and daughters in law mainly), look on with undisguised horror and incomprehension. But to your family, they are non-negotiable. If these foods do not appear, it isn't Christmas and boy, will you make sure everyone knows about it. 

There are the things you buy in - Quality Street, Cadbury's selection boxes, Cadbury's chocolate fingers, Terry's chocolate orange (you see where I'm going here, right?) - and things you make, bringing them to the table with a sense of propriety and pride, smiling like a beneficent god as the rest of the family choke down something they don't really like but wouldn't dream of hurting your feelings by saying so. 

For years, until Mum mastered the art of pastry, it was mince pies. My sister and I aren't sure, all these years later, what happened as this usually exceptional cook took the raw ingredients of flour, fat and liquid and turned them into something you could build a house with. Her pastry throughout the rest of the year was spectacular: light, fluffy, crisp, flaky...whatever it needed to be, it was. There was just something about the time of year that changed the way the pastry fell together. Now, years after those days, I suspect an egg was missing from the mix. 

These days, her mince pies are delicious, but somehow, I still hanker occasionally after one from my childhood years. Whenever I’m short of a weapon. Or some grouting. 

Dad didn't cook, wouldn't have wanted to cook, but would earn unending brownie points with us kids simply by deigning to share a Smartie or two from his Christmas stash.  If we were very lucky and very good, maybe even a square or - heaven! - a line of 4 squares of Fruit and Nut chocolate. Despite this being the total sum of his culinary contribution, his tastes shaped our Christmas lunches. 

I remember describing it to a friend once and she looked at me with horror; "Mushy peas? Mushy peas have No Place on a Christmas table!" They did in our house. He was not a fan of most green veg, my Pa, but put a bowl of mushy peas in front of him and he was as happy as a pig in a pea field. 

Likewise, he was not a fan of the claggy fruit-laden Christmas pudding. Yes, he'd set it on fire for us to ooh and ahh at, but that was it. Once it was safely blown out, he'd help himself to a wodge of syrup sponge pudding, adding extra syrup from that green Tate and Lyle tin that brings back such a sugar-rush of memories now, and then complain if the custard wasn't thick enough to stand a spoon up in. 

If there was not enough left for a second helping the following day, he'd sulk and refuse to share any more Smarties. 

Pity my poor Mum, influenced by Delia and Keith, desperate to bring a bit of class to our table with spiced red cabbage, goose fat roasted potatoes, a delicate cream for the puddings, only to be thwarted by his distinctly down to earth tastes. "Fancy tack!" he'd say and carve himself another slice of custard. 

This year, I tentatively suggested that we opt for rib of beef or goose (I like both more than turkey) when Mum voiced concerns about a possible avian-flu-related turkey shortage, only to be shouted down with "we always have turkey!". Like I said, some things are non-negotiable.

There will still be mushy peas this year but there won’t be a syrup sponge pudding. I’m not sure any of us could eat it without crying, and god knows, this year has rendered us soggy enough as it is. 

Instead, I’ve offered to make a festive pavlova. 2 layers of chocolate meringue, sandwiched together with a chocolate liqueur spiked cream, some pomegranate seeds and more sugary stuff that I need to buy in as I’ve sworn off it till then so we’ve nothing sweet in the house. I WILL make us a pudding to ooh and ahh at and fight over the second helpings or, so help me, take us all down with diabetes in the attempt. 

Of course, it has to survive the 40 minute car journey from here to there, so we may well be eating an Eton Mess by the time it reaches table. 

***Image above from Food Stories - click on photo for link to recipe - rest easy, mine is NOT going to look like that***