Life begins… ten reasons why I’m exactly the same.
So by the time you read this, I shall be winging my way to gay Paree to spend a fabulous, star-studded (what? Mickey’s a star), glamorous 40th birthday weekend courtesy of the lovely folks at Disney (yes yes, there’ll be the customary ‘this is what I had for dinner’ photos, don’t worry) checking out Disneyland Paris’ New Generation Festival.
This was supposed to be a ‘now I’m 40 I feel different because…‘ kind of post, but I wrote it and re-wrote it, and frankly, I couldn’t find anything different about being 40 than being 39 (I’ve only had a few hours to get used to it, to be fair). Okay, looking back on my 30 year old self or… god forbid… my 20 year old self – would I swap places? No. I’m probably happier in my – admittedly slightly less firm – own skin than I’ve ever been, but there’s nothing momentous I can tell you young whippersnappers about being 40, I’m afraid. Nope, nothing to see here, move along…
So here goes, then, with reasons why I’m probably likely to be exactly the same forever, whether I’m 40 or 70… In fact, I can feel a top ten coming on. Brace yourself:
1. I am still clumsy. I fall down a lot, set fire to things and drop things all the time. I’ve probably always been like it, but spectacular crashes aside (the walking down the stairs when the dog trod on the back of my slipper incident – henceforth known as slippergate – springs to mind), I don’t seem to hurt myself too badly. And boy, do I bruise like a peach.
2. I am still horribly unsociable. And yes, years ago I suppose I used to beat myself up about not wanting to go to parties, and my horror of being surrounded by drunken, sweaty people… But do you know what? I still feel exactly the same. The only difference is that now I don’t care. I embrace my inner solitary mad cat lady and go with the flow. I have lovely friends that I cherish, and who seem to love me for who I am, the nutters. So I shall continue to adore them back, and spend lots of time sitting on my sofa while other people go and do that sweaty, socialising stuff.
3. I am still a nerd. If I’m not cooking, then you’ll find me on Twitter, or I’ll be writing my blog and if I’m not doing that I’m gabbing to my mental bloggy mates on gmail and if I’m not doing that I’m probably on Facebook. I sit with my ‘fercuck’ glasses on and type faster than a greyhound with a hot bottom. I say things like STFU! and LOL! and do I care? Nooooo. I’m always saying to #1 that if anyone calls you a nerd, embrace it. Do you think Bill Gates gives a shit if people call him a nerd? Doubtful.
4. I still can’t take my drink. On Saturday night, we started with a cocktail, then went on to gin and tonic. I think I had two and was happy as larry. Cheap date? Yup. When we lived in Ireland I could always tell how much alcohol I had consumed by how unsteady my last walk around the garden with the dog was. We’re not talking 2 or 3 bottles here, we’re talking glasses. I’m a total lightweight.
5. I’m still completely in love with my children. In fact, I think I’m probably a better parent now they’re able to have a good, snorty, laugh-til-you cry silly conversation (at which I excel). I was actually a crap Mum when they were little – no patience for reading the same book ten times in one evening, and hopeless at painting and stuff. Still, they got to make loads of cakes. My happiest time is 3.30pm, when the door bangs open and there’s a rush of testosterone-fuelled, slightly muddy-smelling energy in my direction. Okay, so they ruffle my hair and go ‘alright, knob?’, but it’s with affection. No, really.
6. I still have the stupidest baby hair in the world. It’s like toddler hair – so soft that you can’t even put it up in a pony tail without the bloody thing falling out, slipping down the back of your t-shirt and ending up in your pants. I’ve stopped trying to control it now and go through life looking like a blonde Russell Brand.
7. Talking of toddler-ness, I still can’t help myself but go ‘oooh’ when faced with anything pink, sparkly or gorgeous smelling. It doesn’t matter if it’s lovely shimmery nail varnish, the edible glitter you put on cupcakes or one of those vaguely scary ladies in Debenhams offering to squirt you with perfume. I love it. Well, I love the perfume, not the scary ladies. In fact, I always get an urge to lick my finger and wipe it down their orange faces to see if it will leave a white mark. So far, I’ve resisted…
8. I still love baking. I love the mixing and the stirring and the lovely smells and the alchemy and the sheer pride of giving something delicious that you’ve lovingly created to someone that you adore. In fact, I love it so much, I’m going to teach an evening course at the local college this summer. A three week ‘Introduction to Cupcakes’ course. There’ll be sparkles too. It’s just how I roll.
9. I’m still married. Something of a miracle this one. Fifteen years and counting. He tolerates my unending, ‘shiny, happy’ optimism and I occasionally tell him off when he’s really grumpy. Apart from that, we rub along pretty well. The fact that pasta makes him gag, he doesn’t do creamy sauces, and can’t stand pork OR buttercream is another matter altogether.
10. I am still stupidly enthusiastic about stuff. I suppose this is in part due to my infernal, eternal optimism, but oh how I love having something to look forward to. Holiday, birthdays, Christmas… all come in for some serious list-making, planning, wishing, hoping and longing. Oh, and I still hunt in cupboards for my birthday presents. I can’t help it.
Anyhoo, I’ll see you on Sunday… à bientôt! xx
English Grandma’s special spiced rum and raisin brownies
So English Grandma was visiting last week. It was her birthday and as usual here at English Towers, this meant that the birthday person had the honour of choosing their own cake. Except of course English Grandma didn’t really want a cake, in fact, didn’t really want to be reminded that she was 70 at all. It’s a great age, though, I reckon. It’s the same age as Raquel Welch (about whom the term ‘looks good for her age’ equates to calling the north pole ‘a bit nippy’) and Ralph Lauren, for goodness sake, who’s classier than Ralph?
Plus, there are so many bonuses to being 70: you can be as outspoken as you like, wear odd socks, shave your dog’s hair into weird patterns, use beer towels for curtains (Hubby actually had an aunt that did that) or walk around with your hair sticking up like Fr Jack out of Father Ted, because, let’s face it, who’s going to say anything to you about it? And even if they do, you can club them with your handbag and get away with it. Bonus.
Anyhoo, digressing. So I had to think of a nice dessert which would please the chisellers, who insist on cake at birthdays (what child doesn’t) and be unbirthdaycakey enough to please the mother. I know she likes rum and raisin and I toyed with the idea of rum and raisin ice cream, but then the cake-ish issue reared its ugly head again. ‘I know!’, said #2,’ birthday brownies!’. Fabulous. And for an added twist, I thought I’d get the rum and raisins in there too. Here goes, then:
3 tbsp rum (I used Morgan’s Spiced Rum)
Couple of handfuls (about 50g) raisins or sultanas
200g dark chocolate (this one was from Lidl and had a very pleasing ‘snap’ to it)
170g butter (salted is best with chocolate, or add a pinch of salt)
3 eggs
225g caster sugar
110g plain flour
1/2 tsp ground mixed spice
So first preheat the oven to 180/gas4 and plop the raisins into the rum to soak. Melt the butter and the chocolate in a bain-marie (yes, I know you know, but some people don’t, so I still have to point out that we’re talking about a heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water, not touching the bottom of the bowl):
When the butter and chocolate start to melt, turn the heat off and let it melt gently using the residual heat. When it’s all melted together, put it to one side to cool slightly.
Meanwhile, take out your Very Special Anniversary KitchenAid (or a whisk and a bowl, if you’re not as lucky as me). Crack in the eggs (if you don’t have a small red chicken with an attitude problem who lays eggs that are approximately half her body weight, don’t worry, they sell eggs in Tesco too)…
…and whizz them together with the sugar until they’re nice and fluffy:
I’d just like to point out that this is a complete excuse to use the KitchenAid as I’ve actually just mixed the eggs and sugar with a fork before now, and it comes out exactly the same. Still…
Fold the flour and mixed spice in to the eggy sugary mixture - nice and gently because (altogether now): working the gluten in the flour too much will make the end result tough:
…and finally, stir in the melted chocolate and butter and the rum and raisins:
Put some bake-o-glide or greaseproof paper in the bottom of a lasagne tin, pour the mixture in:
… and bake for about 35 minutes until the top is all cracky and shiny, but the inside is still retaining a hint of gooeyness.
Leave to cool slightly.
Fight off children, reminding them that this recipe contains alcohol and is therefore for the over 18s only, and serve with a flourish, or some vanilla ice cream, to 70 (shhh) year old birthday girl.
Oh, and absolutely no singing of ‘happy birthday’, okay? She might hit you with her handbag.
Happy (belated) birthday, Mum!
The Mad Professor’s birthday (thank God it’s only once a year)
“Are you awake? It’s my birthday! What did you get me? Can I open my stuff now? Wicked! Money! Cool! Look what I got from Grandma! Can we have pancakes? I’m starving. And look! From Grandad! Savage! Do I still have to go to guitar? Can I have a beer now I’m 14? Alright Grandad? I’m loaded! I’m gonna have a beer. Get off, stupid dog. When are you making my cake? Can I have it when I get back from guitar? Can we go shopping? Have you made my cake yet? Your dog’s gay. I’m ringing Grandma. Can we go shopping yet? Can I have a beer? I love these trousers! Thanks, I love you. Can we go yet? What? It’s itchy. When’s the Grand Prix over? Did you think any more about the beer? Is my cake done? Are we having steak? Where’s my hat? I’ve lost my hat! Who took my bloody hat? I need my… oh hang on, here it is. Aw cute puppy! Ooh this phone looks nice. Or this one. This one has a touch screen. Ooh, 8 gig memory! I think I’ll have this one. No, this one. Or maybe this one! Let’s look around a bit more. Gamestop! Savage! Ooh look, another phone shop! I like this one. ’Scuse me, you got this in blue? I’m getting this definitely. Can I have a beer tonight then? Can we get chips? I’m starving. Deadly! Ooh, and curry sauce. Can we go in the sports shop? Wicked Liverpool top. I’m getting this. Oh hang on, this Arsenal one’s cool too. I’m having both. Can we go home now? Is that my cake? Can I lick the bowl? Look at this cool screensaver! Ooh, is that coconut? Awesome! And the lights on the sides flash when the music plays! Ew Bert licked my nose. The earphones are awesome. I’m starved. Can I have a beer tonight? What time’s dinner? This game’s awesome. This cake’s wicked! Can I have some more? Did you think about the beer then? I am 14 now… Corrr cider! Can I have some? Awesome! Oy, it’s my turn! Argh you killed me! I had a wicked day. Where’s my phone? Whose turn is it? Was that a text? Awesome day. Thanks Ma. “
The Friday birthday photo: the pinkest raspberry meringue pie
So I had a lovely birthday, thank you so much for all your good wishes. I got lots of donations to my KitchenAid fund, which is now looking quite healthy, plus lots of lovely bits and pieces for my garden (including a fantastic Eucalyptus tree from the boys), and 6 new sparkly Denby mugs from Hubby to add to my collection:
Sensible Uncle I and Lovely L bought me Ching He Huang’s new Chinese cookbook, and Mad Uncle A gave me a nice wodge of cash (although I’m pretty sure the empty card was provided by me Ma as he didn’t seem to know a lot about that bit). Jen sent me the wondrous flowers you saw yesterday and the Disreputable One stumped up an eye-wateringly generous cash donation, which arrived via an enormous white courier van (well you can never be too careful) and so did my Ma. And yes, I probably accept that at my age I shouldn’t still be getting cash in the birthday cards from my parents.
As you know, the tradition here at English Towers is that the birthday person gets free reign to choose whichever birthday cake they like. Unfortunately, being Chief Domestic Goddess, that means I get to make my own. Still, I had me Ma here. And plenty of sodding about and giggling later, we came up with this:
First for the easy peasy pastry:
115g butter, melted
100g caster sugar
200g plain flour
Pinch of salt
Preheat the oven to 180/gas 4. Pour the melted butter into the sugar and stir. Then add the flour and salt and mix it around until it becomes a thick paste. Press the mixture into a loose bottomed (steady) flan dish or baking tin (about 24cm should do it), then bake it blind (scrunch up a bit of greaseproof paper, then smooth it over the pastry and pour in the baking beans) for about 15 minutes. Then take it out of the oven, remove the baking beans and put it back in to cook the base for about another 5 minutes, then take it out and leave to cool. Turn the oven down to gas 2/150 degrees.
Meanwhile, make the raspberry curd. We couldn’t find fresh raspberries, so we used a decent tinned brand and just squished the contents through a sieve, but you can use the bought stuff or just purée some fresh ones:
100g butter
4 tbsp raspberry purée
1 lime, zested then juiced
150g caster sugar
2 eggs plus 1 extra yolk (keep the white for the meringue)
Take a saucepan and bung in the butter, raspberry purée, lime juice and zest and caster sugar. Melt it all together slowly until the sugar is all dissolved. In a bowl, whisk the eggs and yolk until well combined. Now, take your beautiful pink mixture and gently pour a little bit into the egg, whisking all the time, then a bit more, then a bit more, until you’ve combined about half of it with the eggs. Now pour that lot back into the saucepan and keep whisking and simmering until the mixture thickens – remember it’s going to be baked in the pie, so don’t worry about making it really spready consistency at this stage. Turn off the heat and leave to cool. Remember to just stir it occasionally to keep it from getting a skin on. When it’s about room temperature, pour it into the pastry case.
Then for the meringue:
4 egg whites
225g caster sugar
Whisk the eggs in a very clean bowl until they form stiff peaks, then keep whisking while you add the sugar, spoon by spoon, until it’s all incorporated and the meringue is thick and glossy. If it’s your birthday and you’re rather prone to things pink and gorgeous, you can add a couple of drops of raspberry juice or cochineal here to give a delicate pinkness to your billowy meringue. It’s best not to do this after several glasses of wine because it all gets a bit silly and giggly. What? Oh, no, of course I don’t mean me. Pile it all on top of the raspberry curd and fluff it up a bit. Bake in the very low oven (gas 2/150 degrees) for about 40 to 50 minutes, depending on how squelchy you like your meringue.
Garnish with pink edible glitter (okay so you don’t really have to do that bit) and serve with a nice bottle of chilled rosé Prosecco and the company of your wonderful family. Cheers!
And no, I have no idea what the jar of Hellmann’s is doing in the background completely spoiling my shot. I blame the alcohol.
Get a grip, An Post.
So I’m going to have a little moan. Being of the ‘shiny, happy’ variety, I don’t do it often but blimey, the postal system in this country sucks and blows. As you know, my children both had their birthdays in April. Our families, the lubly beavers that they are, all send cards and presents and stuff for the boys. Well. I think of all the cards that were sent to #2 for his birthday, only 2 arrived on the day. And this is not because they weren’t posted early enough. Oh no, all the postmarks were a good few days, even a week before, and with adequate postage attached. And they’re still coming now. #1′s birthday, a couple of weeks later, was hardly better. The last of his came, I think, on Thursday. And I received a Christmas card in March too. I wonder if that’s a record?
But this isn’t the half of it. I’d say every card bar two had been opened and then resealed with a ‘oops, this card has been opened but obviously it’s nothing at all to do with us’ type sticker on it. Oh, okay then – so whose fault would it be exactly?
And then, after you receive a birthday card which has been ‘opened in transit’, what do you do exactly? How much bad form is it to ring the sender and have to say ‘erm…you know the birthday card you sent? Was there money in it?’. We had to do this when the card that Hubby’s Mum sent me for my birthday arrived opened. It turned out there wasn’t anything in it, but how awful is it to have to ask?
My sister in law has the right idea. She always sends birthday cards inside a plain brown envelope. And do you know what? They never get opened. So if someone from An Post is reading this – get a bloody grip. Oh, and you owe my children about fifty quid in birthday money too. Cough up, then.
Disgustingly Fattening Chocolate Fudge Brownie Cake
225g good quality dark chocolate
6 oz butter
3 eggs
8 oz caster sugar
4oz plain flour
For the ganache:
Small tub double cream
Small bar dark or white chocolate
Melt your butter and chocolate in a bain-marie (bowl over saucepan of simmering water) or in the microwave if you’re brave enough, but I always burn it. As always with this type of method, take it off the heat as soon as it’s well on the way as you need it just warm – you should be able to put your finger in it – any hotter and you’ll have lumps of scrambled egg in your mixture. Not attractive. In a different bowl, then, stir the eggs and the sugar until well combined, then add in the cooled butter/chocolate mixture and the flour. If you want to go completely bonkers you can add in some chopped white chocolate now which makes it look very pretty. Combine well then divide between two 8′? diameter cake tins (use spring form tins, or butter and line them as they’re a sod to get out). Bake at 180 degrees for between 25 and 30 minutes until all trace of wobble in the middle is gone and they look all cracked on the top. They’ll still be nice and fudgy in the middle.
Leave them to cool on a wire rack while you make the ganache. Again, melt the chocolate (I used dark again, but you can make white chocolate ganache which looks very pretty in this), making sure it’s not too hot, then slowly whisk in a splosh of cream. If it looks too thick add a bit more and continue until it’s a nice spreading consistency. Don’t panic if you make it too runny as it’ll thicken up in the fridge.
Whisk the rest of the cream, then place your first layer of brownie cake onto your serving dish or cake stand. Spread first with a layer of ganache, then with a layer of the whipped cream and add your second cake layer. Spread more ganache on the top. Add candles, sing happy birthday, serve, then sit back and revel in all that calorie-induced glory.
