Know when to "twist"

Hannah was treated to a nice new school bag when she started at secondary school.  It was a present from her grandparents.

After about seven months the magnet clasps fell off the bag.  I got in touch with Cath Kidston, returned the bag and they sent a replacement and refunded my postage.

About six months later the replacement bag had also lost its magnetic clasps but the handle also came away from the bag rendering it an un-bag.

I got in touch and returned the bag to Cath Kidston following their advice.

They didn't reply so I followed up.  The deal was that they'd provide goods to the value of £30 which was the last price that this bag was sold for.

I questioned this as a very similar bag was available on the site for £41, reduced from £68.

I was told there were minor changes between the bag we'd returned and the one that was currently available.  The deal was £30 worth of goods or, if I produced proof of purchase for the original bag, then whatever was paid originally.

I checked and said we were happy to accept goods to the value of the similar bag currently for sale at £41.  We had used the bag for over a year and this seemed fair.

The answer came back.  Goods to the value of £30 or the value on the receipt.  No more.

I checked with Hannah's grandparents and they produced the receipt for £68.

The customer services team could have got away with a spend of £41 plus postage costs.  They're now committed to £68 plus postage costs.

Is this good customer service?  

Well all I wanted was the £41 value.  I've ended up with £68 and I should be a satisfied customer.

I know they were gambling on me accepting £30.  In the game of pontoon the decision to stick and not twist has meant they've gone bust.

Technology versus efficiency

I decided to clear leaves from the garden today.

I could wait a few more weeks until they've all fallen but today was sunny and there were plenty enough leaves on the ground already.

We have a garden vac/blower and I always imagine that this should make light work of leaf clearance.  In my head I imagine some ridiculous advert where a garden vac makes leaf clearing the sort of task one could complete before breakfast.  So, because that's how this garden tool should work, I decided to use it.  

It was slow going.  The leaves were wet and therefore heavy and rather like Greater Anglia I felt like crying "They're the wrong sort of leaves" before cancelling the service entirely.

I persisted, because that's what I do.  It was still taking forever.  A brief chat to a passing neighbour didn't aid my progress.

I gave up and resorted to good old fashioned manual labour when my muscles and patience ran out.

Leaf grabbers like these are a brilliant invention.  Many leaves moved quickly.

Progress slowed several times, three to be precise.  I met James from across the way and we had a good long chat.  Margaret and her daughter stopped for a chinwag as they passed and Barbara came by so we spent some time catching up, which comprised mainly of moaning about the builders and the  council.

I'm thinking of ditching the garden vacuum.  It promises so much and delivers so little.

Getting hands dirty and getting stuck in is far more satisfying.

Really?!

I read today that Paramount are hoping to build the World's third biggest theme park and indoor water park just south of Lakeside.

The article implied it would be built just south of the river and I assume that means Dartford.

Really?

I recall plans for something similar just inside the M25 on the north side of the Thames in Essex. That didn't happen presumably because a nature reserve was involved.

I'm just a bit sceptical about Paramount's designs for north Kent.

If it goes ahead I look forward to the inevitable traffic chaos and the end of shopping at Bluewater (for me). But I'll also probably, and very hypocritically, be in the market for a season ticket.

Gogglebox

Dave and I have decided that we'd be good TV if we were part of Gogglebox.

But we're not. So you'll just have to use your imaginations.

Homework detention

Ethan attended homework detention today.

Had he done his homework? 

Well he tells me the only requirement due today was that he should have read three times.

He reads all the time. So why the detention?

Because his loser parents didn't sign his homework diary attesting to his reading.

But before you crack open the violin case to play Hearts and Flowers, bear in mind that homework detention comprises of half an hour of doing the missing homework which, for Ethan, was reading, his favourite thing to do.

Don't ask your children

"Hannah, how much do you think Daddy should spend on my birthday present?"

"About the same as you'd spend on me or Ethan."

"Ah, but he's known me longer."

"But mum, when you and Dad spend money on me or Ethan that's money from the joint account.  Dad'll be spending money from his own account which won't have as much in it as the joint account so actually Dad should be spending less on you than you spend on Ethan and me."

"Ah, but what am I worth?"  

It is at this point I realise I'm clutching at straws.  I consider explaining that the joint account is actually a massive overdraft but decide against it and abandon the conversation and open a beer.

NHS cutbacks

I received a letter today advising that Ethan's height and weight will be measured by the school nurse soon.

It reminded me we were supposed to have an appointment with the school nurse in August.

I called the number on the letter, which was a mobile number.

The nurse who picked up said I needed to speak to someone else.  She gave me another name and mobile number.

When I got through I asked a few questions.

When were patients of the school nurse service going to be advised that the service provider had changed at the beginning of October.  I had been told all patients were to receive a letter.

I was told that the person I was speaking to had only been in role for a couple of weeks, the service was stretched and her priority had been children at risk and domestic violence cases.  She was aware that communication was overdue and would be "phoning parents as soon as she found some time".

I asked when we might expect the August appointment we had been promised.

I was taken through a consultation over the phone and offered an appointment.  I was told that the school nurse service no longer had a physical base.  Whereas previous appointments had been at a hospital this was no longer the case.  Would it be possible for the nurse to come to us?

This explained the mobile phone numbers rather than a desk phone.

I wonder whether it's efficient for a school nurse to be travelling to visit all patients or whether it's more efficient to have patients visiting the school nurse.  Is it better to have the NHS paying for travel time and associated expenses or better to use space in a hospital?  

I also wondered whether this is what happens when the NHS loses a contract.  Do NHS facilities become a chargeable item to non NHS providers?  Is this new provider avoiding using a hospital room because it costs too much.

I also wondered whether visiting a "child at risk" or victim of domestic abuse in their own home is always a good idea.  I can see that Social Services might need to see the home environment but wonder whether this is always the right thing for a school nurse.

The nurse then asked me for Ethan's details so she could find his record, and she found nothing.

Has the database been systematically wiped or is a nurse operating away from an office struggling to find a record because of a lack of infrastructure?

I'm not convinced this outsourcing is a good thing.  I'll see how we go when we have the appointment but so far it's not demonstrating an improvement over the prior caring and organised provider.

Establishment or not?

What to do? Imagine you're a Home Secretary. You're looking for someone to chair a committee into child sex abuse. You need to find someone who's eminently qualified to chair such an important inquiry but also someone who isn't part of the establishment. 

Now if you imagine for a minute what you think an establishment figure looks like. I'm guessing you're picturing a rather stuffy, overweight man. To avoid recruiting someone in this image, the simple solution seems to be to recruit a woman. 

You choose Lady Butler Sloss. Whoops. Her brother was the Attorney General who could have made decisions about cases that form part the inquiry. Survivors didn't believe she could remain objective. 

You try again, desperately trying to come up with a woman who wasn't part of the establishment. You pick Fiona Woolf. Whoops. Leon Brittan was her neighbour and they used to attend the same dinner parties.  He was Home Secretary and could have taken decisions that would be under the committee's magnifying glass. 

Who's left? Anyone?

Socially irresponsible

We're doing the tourist thing for a few days in the heart of England. 

Yesterday was torture at Alton Towers and today we're halfway through a day of industrial heritage. 

If I owned Alton Towers I'd want to maximise the social sharing being done by guests. It's a theme park where experience is what it's all about.  I'd want pictures of people pumped with adrenaline and videos of people trying to walk in a straight line after their inner ear balance control had become confused by a disorienting ride. I'd want Twitter and Facebook to be stuffed with images of people winning things, eating candy floss and conquering terrifying rides. 

People obviously need access to the internet to make this possible. We found that the 3G signal was very poor, perhaps due to the sheer volume of people. Alton Towers think they've overcome this by providing WiFi via The Cloud. What they don't realise is how shockingly bad this WiFi provision is. I'm an oversharer and I spent most of my day frustrated with lack of internet connection. I'd be flipping between a failure to connect via 3G and a failure to connect to the WiFi. 

I struggle to understand why the Alton Towers team haven't fixed this connection issue because social sharing is fantastic low cost advertising. 

The picture service they offer delivers your purchased image to a website. There is promotional material everywhere for this feature. It's just a shame they didn't think to invest in the infrastructure to support this functionality.

Today, by contrast, we've been in a museum which has zero 3G signal but free, good WiFi with no sign in required.

BYCTWD14

Today was Bring Your Child To Work Day.

I imagine that there are some companies where that could be quite a dull affair.  This is where working for an automotive giant has it's advantages.

Now if Hannah had shadowed Dave or me I'm pretty sure she would have found it rather boring but fortunately the Educational Outreach team organised a brilliant day.

Hannah's day included clay modelling vehicles in the Design showroom; a tour of the anechoic chamber (I'll let you look that up); checking out the NVH (noise, vibration and harshness) labs; the hot and cold testing rooms (including consumption of an ice lolly); something to do with one of the largest 3D printers in the world (who knew); a plastic moulding thingamabob; a canteen lunch including spotted dick and custard; a hot chocolate in Costa (my treat); checking out cobbles on the test track in a Transit; and what Hannah assures me was the best bit - zooming around the track in a Focus RS.

Hannah has now seen more of Ford Motor Company than I have.  I'm officially jealous.

Tesco troubles

Tonight I was doing an online shop to arrive for later in the week.

The Tesco website kept crashing and throwing error pages at me left, right and centre.

I always, foolishly, assume that problems like that are my fault.  I mean how can a major operator like Tesco who rely so heavily on the online shopper possibly have website issues?

I was blaming the Wifi, Apple, user error, in fact anything except Tesco.  It took so much longer to do the shop than normal and was incredibly frustrating.

A conversation later with hubby meant I needed to change the time of the delivery.

Back onto the hideous website and I must have tried 50 times before quitting.  The page I needed just would not load.

I cracked and called Tesco who took far longer than normal to answer the phone.  I explained what I needed help with and they coughed to "systems problems" which were so bad that they couldn't help me and they suggested I try fixing things later.  The IT team were "on it" and a resolution in an hour was likely.

I suggested that to avoid frustrating customers it might be a nice touch to for their IT team to pop a message on the website letting people know there are issues and recommending people come back later.

I got told that it wasn't the IT team that "put stuff on the website".  So I told my obstreperous Tesco employee that I understood how web authoring worked and perhaps it would be an idea to get someone from the authoring team on the case.

I then said my goodbyes and noticed that the Grocer had awarded Tesco "Onine Supermarket of the Year".  I took to Twitter and tweeted the Grocer's editor, Julia Glotz, and The Grocer's main account suggesting the award be rescinded.

Cutting the cost of motoring

So the Government wanted to cut the cost of motoring for the young.  It's a noble aim and one that I should be behind 100% because it helps to keep me in a job.
There are many ways that this could have been tackled:

• Scrap VAT on cars
• Remove VAT from fuel.
• Reduce fuel duty.
• Waive the VAT for driving lessons.

All of these would have a significant impact but none of these were the chosen policy.  The Tories have chosen to reduce the cost of a provisional licence from £50 to £34, a whole £16 back in the pockets of young people who are learning to drive.
This saving is less than the cost of a driving lesson, estimated by the www.moneysupermarket.com in 2013 to be £24.
It's less than the cost of a tank of fuel.
I'm not convinced the Government was that serious about helping young people with the cost of motoring.  If they were, they'd have tried a bit harder.

Christmas present idea

I have a suggestion if you are stuck for a present idea for your little, or even your big, darling.

The Sphero is a unique toy that children and adults will enjoy.  It costs about £80 and you'll probably want to buy a "nubby" to protect it costing (an over-priced) £16 ish.

The recipient will need access to an iPod, smartphone or tablet to be able to operate it.
I'll leave you to Google it and find out more (try goshero.com).  Purchases can be made in many places, but Amazon and Firebox probably deserve a mention.
You'd get more of a sales pitch if I was on commission.

Always read the small print

Apparently the EU wants quite a bit of money from us, and they wan't it quite soon.
It's our fault.  It was in the terms and conditions, we just didn't realise.  Well we did have a clue and never questioned the situation when it was advantageous for us, but now it's less advantageous we're having second thoughts.
Many of us get ourselves into financial arrangements and we all know it's important to check the terms and conditions.
I struggle a little with the fact that this situation has come as a big surprise to David Cameron. But it's OK because he got angry and said he wasn't going to pay by the December 1st deadline.
So, given that the Prime Minister can see fit to renege on an agreement and pretend he didn't understand the terms and conditions he was signing up to, does that mean we can all do that?
Can I turn around to my mortgage company and say "Naff off"?
No, I can't.
Cameron should set a good example.  I'm appalled by his childish strop.

Early onset stupidity

So the Government have set aside £5million to spend on rewarding doctors for diagnosing dementia patients.  For the next six months doctors will receive £55 for every dementia patient they diagnose.
Why?
Well the Government believe this incentive will increase the number of dementia patients who get a diagnosis.
Really?  Does that mean that doctors aren't very good at their jobs?
That's a good question.  I think it means the Government don't think doctors do a good job which isn't exactly the same thing as saying that doctors aren't very good at their jobs.
So, does the Government think that doctors don't know how to diagnose dementia?
Well if the Government thought that then one imagines the £5million budget reserved for this would be spent on training.
Good point.  So does the Government think that doctors are just lazy and can't be bothered to diagnose dementia?
Difficult to say really what the Government thinks because this policy make no sense at all unless one assumes that doctors are so lazy that they need a £55 incentive to do their job.
OK, do we think doctors will fiddle the books and diagnose dementia amongst patients who don't have dementia?
Well I have a better opinion of doctors than that and I think they will just continue to do their jobs in the same way as the were in the last six months but with more money in their pay packets.
So you think this is just a waste of money?
Yes.

Daily Fail

This appeared in the Daily Mail in 1969 (credit to The Media Blog on Twitter).

Some things don't seem to change.

Anarchy in the UK

I was listening to the radio, I think it was the Museum of Curiosities or something equally middle class and from the  Radio 4 stable. 

I recall hating the radio that my parents chose and yet I have fallen into half of their listening, the Radio 4 half. I console myself with the thought that at least I don't listen to Radio 3. 

As I listened to the programme I thought I heard the name of a history professor: Anna Key. I thought that was the perfect name for a history professor in the UK. If my surname was Key and I needed a name for a daughter then Anna would be that name. No middle name required.

Scientific madness

Looking around schools to choose the perfect school for one's child leads one to conjure tricky questions for the poor teachers having to be salespeople for the day/evening.

I don't think it's a stretch to ask teachers to sell.  I think that's effectively their job; they need to sell children an education and more than a passing interest in the subject they are being taught. 

But on open days I've taken to asking questions about science, and what I've learned is frankly shocking. Excuse me while I launch into "In my day...", but, when I was a lass if you had an aptitude for science then you chose which of the science subjects that appealed and those were the exams you took. 

I was a geek and choose Physics, Chemistry and Biology.  If I had been interested in just Biology then I could take just Biology. If I was more of a humanities or languages specialist then I could choose to study General Science which was one subject studied at a low level but providing a taste of Science. 

By the time children are choosing their subjects they will have tasted the sciences as separate subjects and they will know what they like and what they're good at. Most schools today offer compulsory Double Science. This is rather like the old-fashioned General Science subject but to a higher level and is counted as two GCSEs. Some schools may make an option for a less involved exam that is slightly less involved, just core Science, and counts as one exam. If a child shows an aptitude for science then most schools will force then into choosing Triple Science comprising Physics, Chemistry and Biology. Whist this is studied as one exam choice it actually provides three grades in the individual sciences. The bizarre thing is though that it seems that the sub-subjects are joined and cannot be split. 

Triple Science is the subjects bundled together. At many schools it seems impossible to choose just Physics or just Biology and Chemistry. This seems to me to be madness. 

I have a daughter who loves Physics, likes Chemistry but hates Biology. Most schools would force her to take Triple Science but she would want to study Physics and Chemistry.

Why are we forcing our more able students to be generalists? Why are we forcing children to take subjects they don't want to study? If someone has an aptitude for Geography and History we don't force them to study Religious Studies. It's madness.

Free e-magazines

It's taken me a while to figure this out, which is why I'm sharing with you.

If you are a member of Essex libraries (and probably other library services) you can get free access to tons of magazines.

The first thing to do is go to the library website.  For Essex it's here: http://www.essex.gov.uk/Libraries-Archives/Libraries/Pages/Essex-Libraries.aspx

Click on the magazines link, browse and log in - this is the bit where you need a library account.  If your forgotten your password it's usually set as your six digit birthdate.

You then need a Zinio account which you create by clicking the Create Account button.

To read your magazines you'll need the Zinio app or you can read in the browser.  Getting the app is easy on iPad and Android tablet but takes a bit more effort on a Kindle.  You can view in browser on a laptop or desktop but a tablet is more magaziney.

On the Kindle you need to visit this url: http://imgs.zinio.com/faq/kindlefire.html#installation

Click to download and then you'll need to install it.  To find the file you've downloaded you need to open a browser.  On the left at the top of the screen there will be three horizontal bars.  If you click on this you'll have the option to view downloads.  Choose the zinio download and click it and choose install.  Once installed you'll see it in the choices from your apps menu.

Once you have the app installed you can log in and access hundreds of magazines.

It's brilliant and it's free. 

Sloe gin

Made a bit of sloe gin today. Here's how.

You'll need sloes. This is what they look like. Rather like blueberries but on trees. They do not taste like blueberries!

Wash, dry and use or wash, dry and freeze to use later. Before using the sloes they need defrosting. It's important the skin of the sloes is broken. Freezing and defrosting can help this but you can also use a needle to puncture the skin.

My defrosting sloes:

You'll need gin, any gin is fine.

You'll need sterilized jars or bottles. I used gin bottles and Kilner type jars. I discovered that putting Kilner jars in the oven can cause them to crack so I recommended the dishwasher sterilisation method. Top shelf without any detergent should sterilise jars and seals. 

I use jars or bottles with a 1.5 liter capacity. In these jars put:

1 litre of gin

450g sloes

350g sugar

Put the lid on and turn it a few times.

Put in a dark place and turn every day for the first week. For each following week just turn once a week.

After eight weeks strain the gin through a muslin into sterilized bottles. Screw top or flip top bottles are fine.

Then leave it. The longer you leave it the better.

I'm at the jar in dark cupboard stage.

Cracking school day

Hannah had something called an enrichment day today at school.  This, for the uninitiated, seems to be a jolly good excuse for larking around doing something other than a regular school day.
Today was all about cryptography and required Pringles tubes.  Pringles tubes we can do.  Cryptography content was provided by the educational outreach chap from Bletchley Park, Tom, and an "old girl" in more than one sense.  Mary used to go to Hannah's school but was also one of the amazing Bletchley Park team during the war.
My school days were never this exciting.  Hannah says that not all of her school friends were as enthusiastic as she was but Hannah had a great time.
Hannah started by cracking codes but she also made an Enigma machine using paper and a Pringles tube, and she got to use a real Enigma machine.
Perhaps the most interesting part of the day though was listening to Mary talking about her recruitment from Oxford and the way she signed up to take part without having a clue what she was agreeing to.  She even signed the Official Secrets Act before the nature of the work was disclosed to her.
I'd have liked school to be like this every day.  It certainly beats cross country running across  footpaths of Devon clay and History lessons with the bearded teacher with rancid body odour.

Privacy policy

I have a Flickr account.  I use it as a backup in case the Mac, external drive and NAS drive fail, basically in case the house burns down.  I've uploaded historical family photos and more recent holiday photos - over 7,000 images.
I've previously set the privacy settings on these photos to be public.  There's nothing I've uploaded that I'm not happy with anyone seeing.
Dave has recently started scanning photos from our pre-digital albums and I've been storing these on Flickr too.
There was some pictures of us at the beach from 20 years ago so I just checked with Dave that he was happy with the public privacy setting.  He wasn't.  In fact he wasn't happy with any photos I'd uploaded being publicly available.
I checked this statement.  Even landscapes and pictures of buildings?  Yes, even those.
These are our photos, they aren't mine or his.  So I've felt that I've had to change the access to these photos; all of them.
I'm not happy.  I think it's an overreaction. But I can't think of a way around it that keeps us both happy.

Sometimes

Sometimes everything works and I appear beautifully organised.

Today at 4:00pm Sainsbury called asking if they could deliver earlier than the booked 7-8pm slot.

My answer was that that was fine but I wouldn't be getting in until 5:15pm.  Just as my caller was explaining that was OK, I stopped him to explain I'd be going out again at 5:45pm.  He said he'd be outside at 5:15pm.

I got home at 5:00pm.  Jacket potatoes were perfectly cooked having been put in the oven in the morning with the oven timer set to turn the oven off at 5:00pm.  I heated up a filling, served it up on plates just as Hannah and Ethan walked in through the door at about 5:08pm.

The Sainsbury delivery driver rang the doorbell at 5:10pm.  He said he was impressed at my organisation.  He'd seen the children arrive two minutes earlier and now he could see them eating their dinner.

I put the shopping away, said goodbye to the delivery driver, got changed and walked Ethan to football practice which starts at 6:00pm.

I then walked home, cooked dinner, ate with Dave who arrived just before I served up.

I then left the house again to collect Ethan from football and brought him home so that he could shower and do his homework, due in tomorrow.

Next Wednesday though is a different story.

Unlikely bedfellows

I like the Channel 4 series Obsessive Compulsive Cleaners.  It teams people who tend towards Obsessive Compulsive Disorder behaviours with hoarders and people who either don't know how to, or can't be bothered to, clean their home.

These people are polar opposites and the premise for the show is that these two different people can enjoy a brief symbiotic relationship; the obsessive learns that letting go a little isn't disastrous and the hoarder learns that it is possible to de-clutter and clean house.

The pairings aren't always successful but often they are with both participants gaining from the experience.

It made me wonder whether there are other unusual bedfellows that might benefit from exposure to an opposite.  The only one I could conjure was the mixture of an agoraphobic and claustrophobic.  I wonder if there are others.

Genius plan

Vic and I came up with a plan today. 

To be fair it was Vic's idea but I ran with it and semi-claimed it. If there was any money in it I'd already have taken a solo trip to the patent office. 

The idea is a Lego lending library. 

The pleasure of Lego, for some, is the build. The more complicated the better. The problem with this is that complicated Lego sets aren't cheap and they take up space. 

A lending library with perhaps a borrowing fee overcomes the need to purchase and store but still provides the borrower with the build pleasure. 

Being the sort of person who likes to strike while the iron is hot I got onto the interweb and found a nice chap called Steve doing "chat" on the Essex library website. No, not that sort of chat. 

Steve was a bit rubbish. He told me some libraries already do this and shared a link to prove it. The link he shared was about American libraries. I wasted no time pointing out this faux pas. 

Anyway, Steve reckoned I needed to discuss my "genius" idea with Sarah. (I coined the "genius" tag.) So Sarah, Head of Children's Services, has my idea in her inbox awaiting deliberation.

Wine aficionado

Stuart recommended an app to help when choosing wine.  I tested it over the weekend and am a fan. 

The app is Vivano. It allows you to scan a wine bottle label and if it has details of the wine in its database then it'll tell you more than the label will. 

You'll find out what should expect to pay for a bottle, whether it's deemed to be a good wine for that vineyard, region, country our indeed globally. You can add your own notes so that you remember where you bought the wine and you can see reviews by other people. 

On Friday I scanned loads of bottles and came away with one white and one red bottle that were rated well at all levels. We've had the opportunity to try both bottles and, whilst I'm no expert, they were both excellent. So I recommend trying the app.

For your little darlings

Hannah's school recommends a website quizlet.com and I'm sure other schools recommend it too. I'd never heard of it before but it sounded interesting.

If your little darling has vocabulary that needs memorising or spellings that need learning then you can pre-load the website with the information and it will create tests. Hannah's teachers use it to create tests for the class and Hannah uses it to create her own learning tools.

If only this had been available when I was at school I wouldn't have flunked German.

Posh bread and butter pudding

This month saw my first ever bread and butter pudding. I chose Nigella's posh version. 

Ingredients

• A loaf of brioche (400g) 
• 3 eggs 
• 3 tbsp caster sugar 
• 1 cup milk (I used skimmed) 
• 1 cup cream (I've used double and whipping but I'm sure single is fine too) 
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract 
• Large handful of raisins (or sultanas) 
• Marsala wine (or sherry or port or whisky or brandy) 

Method 

• Preheat oven to 180ºC fan oven. 
• Soak raisins in your chosen booze. 
• Slice and butter the brioche (you don't need to use butter, olive or sunflower spread is fine)
• Grease a large baking dish using butter or margarine or spread suitable for baking 
• Pop the buttered brioche into the baking dish starting at one end overlapping the pieces so that the tops of the slices stand a little proud. 
• In a bowl mix eggs, cream, milk, sugar and vanilla. 
• Scatter the raisins over the brioche slices and any excess booze can be tipped over the top too. 
• Pour the egg and cream mixture over your brioche. 
• Bake for 30 mins. 

Best served with custard.

Imperfections

I'm the first to admit I'm not perfect but why don't you tell me? 

I made another savoury cake this evening using the recipe I blogged about a while ago. As I was reading the method for the recipe I noticed a typo. Instead of the word whisked a spellchecker had assumed I meant whacked. 

I didn't mean whacked. Whacking an egg mixture makes no sense at all. I've been in and edited it but I know some of you read it and just glossed over the error. Please don't. 

I type my blog either on a Mac using Mars Edit software, on a Kindle using a notes app which then allows me to send the post by email to the blog as a draft, or using the Blogger app on my iPhone. Sometimes I'll use Blogger natively in a browser but rarely. 

Often I'm blogging when tired and I don't do any proof reading or checking. Sometimes my eye will catch a mistake but it'll be by luck, not judgement. I don't like typos though. I would much rather present something that doesn't contain mistakes. 

I live with the formatting inconsistency because I don't know how to fix that over the many platforms I use. I only live with the typos because I don't know about them, which is where I'd like your help. 

If you spot a mistake then please leave a comment, or text me, or email me, or phone me, or tap me on the shoulder and talk to me. 

Thank you.

Appearances count

We are doing the rounds of school open evenings and went to one recently that didn't make the best impression, unfortunately.

We arrived early and nipped into the IT department to kill time before the head teacher's speech.

There was no teacher around and when I started to look at a particular screen I was told by a pupil that it was the work of someone in Year 9.

The pupil left us to browse and Ethan and I started to critique the website that was on display.  

Capital letters were not used where they should have been.  Spelling was poor.  Formatting was inconsistent.  Grammar was incorrect.  The overall look of the site was passable though.  Although we were looking at the site together, I said what I was thinking, and I said it made me wonder about the school if they were presenting work of this standard.

Ethan has rejected this school based on this tiny insight into the school ethos.  If they can't be bothered to correct these things on work that is being showcased during an open evening then can they really be bothered by anything?

It's a shame.  We had a great experience in some of the other classrooms and there was some "newness" in the head teacher's speech that was interesting and innovative.

I have explained to Ethan that that particular piece of work being on display could be indicative of an inclusive environment, where everyone's contributions are valued and it isn't just the top percentage of students who get to see their work on display.

But appearances count.

Bakewell tart that isn't

This can't possibly be a tart because it has no pastry, but for me this is its appeal. 

Pastry just adds time and complicates a recipe and there are some diners who detest the stuff, happily cutting it off and leaving it at the side of the plate. 

I can understand this behaviour in the gluten intolerant crowd but there are those who see pastry as an unnecessary barrier to dessert. If I've bothered to make that pastry then I find this behaviour a little rude. 

I'm not sure about the baking time for this recipe. It requires  45 minutes but kept failing the skewer test so had closer to an hour in the oven. I think that 45 minutes may have resulted in a more marzipan-like texture in the middle. More experimentation may be required. 

You need a flan tin or cake tin of roughly 20cm diameter. This must be well greased. 

Ingredients 

• 150g unsalted butter 
• 150g granulated sugar (golden granulated our caster is also fine) 
• 2 large eggs 
• 1tsp vanilla extract (don't use that plastic essence stuff) 
• 150g self raising flour (am sure gluten free works here) 
• 150g ground almonds 
• 6 tsp raspberry jam (may be easier to use a conserve that is less set) 
• 150g fresh raspberries (I used frozen and think this was a mistake - see cooking time comment above) 
• 50g flaked almonds (or fewer if you have fussy children) 

Method 

• Preheat oven to 160ºC. 
• Cream butter and sugar. 
• Beat eggs and vanilla together then whisk into creamed mixture adding a bit of flour to prevent curdling. 
• Fold in rest of flour and ground almonds (using a metal spoon). The mixture is diabolical at this stage and you will think you've made a mistake. Have faith, stick with it and when it finally combines as a cake mass then stop. 
• Put just under half of the mixture in the cake/flan dish/tin. 
• Add the jam trying to distribute evenly ish. 
• Scatter a few raspberries. 
• Try and put the remaining mixture on top. This isn't very easy. Do little bits at a time. 
• Push the rest of the raspberries into the top and scatter with flaked almonds. 
• Bake for 45 mins or until golden.

Serve with whatever takes your fancy. I like custard.

Anti-nostalgia

In the office this week we were discussing mobile phone contracts and bemoaning the cost of calls. But calls are cheap. 

My dad worked for BT, and before that the GPO and before that the Post Office. 

I never had that childhood experience of getting in from school and then spending hours on the phone with the friends I'd been with all day. 

Phone use in our house was rare because dad knew the cost of calls. 

I distinctly remember that when we made a long distance call to my uncle we drove to dad's office in Torquay to make the call. 

It's one of those things where I can say I know how lucky I am.

Mountain

My sister-in-law, Shona, got in touch a couple of days ago asking for help with my neice Olivia's homework; could we supply some names of ancestors?

Fortunately we have a family tree on the Cardus side that goes back to 1676, so I could.

The required names were from a couple of generations ago but I emailed across the ridiculously large pdf anyway.

My brother looked at it and found an unusual name: John Mountain Cardus.

I know nothing about John Mountain Cardus but that middle name brings with it expectations of great things. Or perhaps it smacks of unduly ambitious parental expectation.

Either way, Ian Michael Cardus fancies a name change to become Ian Mountain Cardus. I think it might just suit him.

How to run the perfect school open day.

I've become a bit of an expert, so here goes. Headteachers - are you paying attention? 

Firstly, find advocates. Find school leavers, pupils, teachers, governors and parents who will speak well about the school.  Now these should not be the volunteers our the people that did it last year, they should be passionate about the school, eloquent and comfortable with public speaking. 

The school leavers should be polished individuals who are happily placed at university or in a good job, ideally both. The parents of children who won't go to university want to know the school can achieve academic results. The parents of the academically inclined child want to know that the school offers a rounded education. 

The pupils should be immaculately presented (we like uniform here in the UK) and should be articulate. They should talk about what the school has done for them and how they've grown as individuals. They should talk about enjoying lessons and about the breadth of extra curricular activities. 

Only the best and most inspiring teachers should be allowed to speak. They should be engaging, caring and funny. 

The governors should address the topic of school performance and facilities, briefly and in a positive light. 

Supportive parents should share the pastoral aspects of the school in a way that makes parents believe the school is like an extension of family. 

The head should be inspirational. He or she should talk about achievements with pride but also talk about lofty ambition for further great strides that are being planned. 

Ok, that's the speech done, now the tour when school isn't operating. 

Getting around the school needs to be easy. Ideally parents should be allocated a role model pupil as a flexible tour guide. This special pupil will know every inch of the school and have key highlights already in mind but will adapt the tour to the specific interests of the parents and children they're guiding. 

All classrooms will have interactive areas with staff and pupils who will behave as though they have been on a sales  training course. They'll actively engage parents and children in conversation. They'll have prepared a sales pitch which they will modify based on the questions and reactions of the parents and children touring the school. 

The approach required for tours when school is operating is somewhat different and may be covered at another time. 

(Typos are the result of attending to many open days.)

Clash

Tomorrow evening we were all set to go and look around a local secondary school.  I say we, but actually I mean Ethan and I were.

This evening I reminded Dave about this, which meant he too became all set to visit the same local school.

Then Hannah announces that the tutor evening she mentioned a while ago is actually happening tomorrow, in the evening, at the same time as the open evening at the secondary school.

Well not quite at the same time, but there's a significant overlap.

So we had two places to be, at the same time.

We started to try and choose which activity had the highest priority.  Then Dave decided that we both ought to look around the school.

The problem is that the school open evening started at 5:00 but Dave wouldn't get there until 5:45.  The tutor evening started at 7:00 but was half an hour's drive from the open evening.

The final solution is a game of tag.  I get to the open evening at 5:00 do the tour and then Dave and I will overlap for about 30 minutes and then I'll go to the tutor evening.

Stupid sales strategy

I wanted to buy something on Amazon and needed three of them.

At the checkout I needed to adjust my quantity down because I was being restricted to just one item.

I have an Amazon Prime account so bought one item anyway. I tried to go through the buying process immediately to buy another and the site stopped me.

The next day I went back to Amazon and purchased a second item without any problem. 

The day after that I tried to buy another but they were on to me. They wouldn't let me go through checkout. So I used another Amazon account.

This means that instead of paying for one delivery service, Amazon are paying for three deliveries. This makes no sense to me at all.

Mild Panic

Having dealt with solicitors and wills I know that getting my affairs in order would be a really useful thing to do for my children.

I read of Lynda Bellingham's news that she has terminal cancer and has chosen to die naturally by stopping chemotherapy.  

I experience mild panic when I hear things like that because if that were to happen to me then I haven't got things sorted.  My life isn't organised enough for me to die.

When I sort through things I'm keeping in the loft, for example, I try to have rules:

1. Will I need it again in my lifetime?
2. Is it sensible to store this or would I be better to buy another when I need it?
3. If my children were sorting through my affairs would they choose to keep it or ditch it?

I'm not very good at sticking to my own rules and I know that my children won't choose to keep the majority of my belongings.

I'd quite like to ask their advice so I can be more efficient at sorting things but what they say now won't be the same answer I'd get from beyond the grave.

One thing my husband is taking control of is large, bulky photo albums.  We are sorting our photographic life before the digital camera and after the digital camera.  We are getting books printed that contain our memories.  They take up less space and are pre-sorted.

At least we don't have a three piece suite in the loft anymore, although there is a bed there.

I'm not "the hoarder next door" but I would quite like someone else to go through the loft and ditch stuff for me.

I have a horrible feeling though my legacy will be a mess requiring several skips and trips to the tip.

Great Expectations

This is school choice time.  The time of year when pupils and parents visit schools to decide which is best for their little darlings.

We're considering grammar schools for Ethan because he's bright.  That isn't just my opinion  and I am aware parents are prone to over-estimating their offspring's abilities.

Other people tell me Ethan is bright: teachers tell me (as well as telling me his handwriting and presentation is dire), parents tell me because their children sit in the same class as Ethan and that is their view of him, and relatives tell me because Ethan memorises books full of facts and can appear knowledgable through the reciting of these facts.  I am well aware that others at Ethan's school are brighter; they just might exhibit more modesty.

People know Ethan's doing the 11+ exam.  I know how competitive the 11+ is and I am most definitely not sure whether Ethan will do well enough in the exam to gain a place at his school of choice.

Everyone else seems absolutely sure Ethan will do well and will "pass".

The problem with everyone else's expectations is that it piles on the pressure.  The "Oh, he'll be fine!" just increases the stress.  

Nobody wants to fail.  If there are no expectations then there is no failure.  If there are great expectations then there is the opportunity for great failure.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Chocolate fondant pudding

Ethan had been drooling after an episode of The Great British Bake Off and was bemoaning his lack of culinary skill.

I told him to pick something he wanted to cook from my recipe book shelves and we'd give it a try.  If it was something I'd not made before then we'd both learn.  He chose Tana Ramsey's Hot Chocolate Puddings which are chocolate fondants in all but name.

I'd never made these before and I left Ethan to it.  Hannah joined in when she arrived in from school.  They were just the way they should be: cooked on the outside and gooey in the middle.

I needed small pudding moulds.  Posh Silverwood pudding basins are £3.29 each in Steamer Trading Company

Sainsbury, on the other hand, have four non stick pudding moulds for £4.50.

You need six pudding moulds for this recipe.

Ingredients

• 250g plain chocolate (if you'd like it a little sweeter I'm sure milk chic is fine)
• 125g unsalted butter
• 3 eggs
• 2 heaped tbsp caster sugar
• 1 tbsp plain flour (I'm sure gluten free would work)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract

I'm sure you can add orange zest and that would make them very tasty.

 

Method

• Grease your pudding moulds with butter.  I'm sure ramekins would work but turning them out might be trickier.
• Pop butter and choc in a bain marie (bowl over a pan of simmering water and don't let the bowl touch the water)
• In a mixer whisk the eggs, sugar and vanilla extract until frothy.  (You can do by hand if you're a sucker for punishment.)
• Sieve the flour onto egg mixture and fold in.
• When the bain marie has done its job and the butter and chocolate have melted, add it gradually to the egg mixture folding gently with a metal spoon.
• Pour the resultant mixture into the greased pots.
• Rest for a couple of hours.  The puddings, not the cook.  Now we put our puds in the fridge which I think means we could have increased the cooking time by 30 seconds.
• Preheat oven to 180°C (for fan oven) and cook for no more than ten minutes (unless you rested them in the fridge in which case ten minutes and 30 seconds should still be fine.

They are just as they should be with a gooey middle and, whilst we served with ice cream, I think clotted cream would be perfect.

Smart marketing

I'm on too many mailing lists.

I don't mind a lot of the stuff that comes through the letterbox but I do get irritated when it's clear that the company sending me stuff hasn't put any thought into the mailing.

The Great Little Trading Company is a case in point.

I have bought from them when my children were younger but my children are now of an age where the GLTC products aren't suitable. My family has outgrown that retailer.

Surely there is a profile that would indicate that I'm no longer worth the investment.  I probably haven't bought anything for over five years.

Why are they wasting their money on me? Why aren't they applying a data-based approach to their CRM strategy.

Just doing the same old thing just because you always have isn't a good enough reason.

Use analysis and data to drive your strategy. Mailing everyone on your list is lazy and wasteful.

Savoury cake recipe

Ian made this and brought it in to the office yesterday.  At my request he brought the recipe in today.  The recipe used cup measurements, Fahrenheit oven temperatures and imperial loaf tin size.  So I've taken all of this and made it look like a normal recipe.
The concept is a cake like texture in a loaf tin but with savoury elements providing the flavour instead of sugar.  It's a very healthy option, I think.

Ingredients

• 250g plain flour
• 1tbsp baking powder
• 4 eggs (I used large eggs)
• 60ml milk
• 60ml plain yoghurt - I didn't have this in the fridge so I made my own buttermilk with milk and a dash of lemon juice and used that instead
• 160ml olive oil
• salt and pepper to taste
• Savoury filling - I used 150g cooked chopped chorizo, half a cooked chopped pepper, half a cooked chopped onion and chopped double Gloucester to the same volume as chorizo.  The recipe calls for 140g French sausage or salami (finely chopped), a handful of pistachios  (roughly chopped) and a handful of prunes.  The idea is to use up leftover bits and bobs that happen to be in the fridge.  

Method

• Preheat the oven to 180°C (for fan oven) and line a 400g loaf tin (loaf tins are sold in two sizes - this is the smaller of the two sizes).
• Put the flour, baking powder and savoury bits into a bowl and mix.  This coats the filling in flour and helps individual bits to stay suspended in the mixture when baked.
• Put the eggs in a separate bowl and whisk until thick and pale in colour.  Gradually add the milk, yoghurt, oil and seasoning, whisking all the time.
• Fold in savoury flour mixture.  Scrape/pour/tip into loaf tin and bake for 40 mins or until an inserted skewer comes out without any cake mixture clinging to it.

I'll be slicing this and freezing it.  For packed lunches I'll be grabbing a slice from the freezer in the morning which will defrost by lunchtime.

Planning

Planning food isn't really my thing.  

I generally buy ingredients and then invent ways to combine them.  Recipes are for cakes, bread and pastries not for a pasta dish, risotto or jacket spud.  My home cooking really isn't very inspired.

But I found this, which I quite like.  Tesco Meal Planner.

I haven't used it, but I think I might.  I know Tesco has been in the news today because they don't seem to be very good at counting (massive profit overstatement) but they can get some things right.

Parental sexism

Hannah took the 11+ two years ago. Ethan took it this weekend.

I remember thinking there were a lot of girls in the same boat as Hannah when she went through the process but I was not prepared for the number of boys who took the exam at the same time as Ethan.

It might be just perception, but I'm fairly sure there were far more boys doing the exam this year than there were girls when Hannah sat the exam.

I wondered if this might have anything to do with birth rates, and it could.  There are probably a thousand other, plausible explanations, including my faulty memory, but I just wonder whether one of them is sexism.

Do we expect more of our boys? Do we care more about their education?

I discussed this with a friend who had sisters and one brother. The girls all went to the local school, the brother went to a private school.

I'm not asking whether you specifically give your son's education more thought than your daughter's, but do you?

Or is this something that we don't realise is happening because it's unconscious and is only obvious at a societal  level?

Or is this just the mad and crazy imagining of a mother who doesn't have a clue what she's talking about?

Supper darling? Darling supper.

I've been to a few supper clubs.  Thought you might be interested.

Katherine (@mustardseedcook on Twitter) runs occasional supper clubs from her home.

A supper club is an occasion in which one opens one's house up to people willing to pay for your cooking.

The most recent one I've attended at Katherine's house had a Mexican theme.  I booked, in advance, with friends.  Other people also booked and we all turned up hungry with BYO bottles in our hand on Friday evening.

Katherine starts with a theme which evolves into a menu.  The price is fixed in advance, a deposit taken with payment finished after the meal.

Katherine turns one of the rooms in her house into a dining area for up to 24 people.

It's a relaxed environment where you can be with friends, or meet new people, or both.

 

Mixed emotions

Just after I'd got to work, plugged the laptop into the docking station, sat down with a cuppa and opened my email there was a call on my phone.

The owner of the company building the flats next door to us was on the line.

He opened with "Are you in a good mood?" to which my rejoinder was "Why? What have you done?"

It transpires the builders have knocked our wall over.

This will be the long, single skin, six foot high wall that separates us from the building site.

Nobody was hurt.

My initial reaction was boiling rage but I suppressed that and asked how bad the damage was. John (the contractor) didn't know so I asked for someone to send me pictures.

He apologised and we talked about possible solutions; either a patch fix or a new wall.

Apparently the wall wasn't pointed on the side of construction so they had wanted to build a new wall anyway.

We had been told by other contractors working on our property that single skin walls shouldn't be six foot high.  I had been worried it would be knocked either by construction traffic or by residents' vehicles once construction was complete.

So the good news is that the children weren't hurt and this might result in a new, more substantial wall.

I don't know what other damage I might encounter but I can't undo what's happened.

The initial anger lasted a while and resulted in a fair amount of venting once the phone call finished.

The anger was replaced by nervousness because the extent of the damage was still unknown.

I'm sure I'm working through a cycle of emotions and, at some point, I'll get to acceptance. I'm not quite there yet.

Dentists

I visited the dentist the other day.

I hate visiting the dentist.  I hate the intrusion; someone I barely know sticking their fingers, mirrors and sharp, pointy, metal instruments into my mouth.

And does anyone else experience jaw ache after a dentist visit?  It hurts to eat and open my mouth and it's over a day since my ordeal.

I had a couple of x-rays while I was there.  No reason for them other than it had been a while since I had some.  That was horribly uncomfortable; being asked to bite down on some hard, sharp plastic to keep the film in place.

And then there's the scrape and polish which just sounds disgusting.  The "something and something" as a medical procedure.  I don't know why but it makes me think of D&C which is a very unpleasant connotation.

So scraping and polishing means using what my dentist calls the "Instrument of torture" combined with a metal scraping tool to clean the teeth.  When that ultrasonic thing hits the gum and not the tooth my nails dig into my palm to divert my attention away from my discomfort.

And the dentist said it would feel good afterwards.  It didn't.  My teeth felt scratchy and sharp and not good sharp.  

And because I don't know any better I have to trust that what the dentist is telling me is true.  In this case there was no work required but if had said "Five root canals needed to day Mrs Cardus" then I wouldn't have known whether he was right or not.  I'd have said "Er, OK" and gone along with it because that's what you do.

I posted that I felt "a little violated" after a dentist visit.  I seemed to be alone as nobody else felt the same way.  Just me?  Really?

Bounty bar

Julia recommended using coconut oil on hair about 20 mins before washing it and then washing it but not using conditioner.

I bought some coconut oil for the first time. Weird stuff. It's a solid until at body temperature when it turns to liquid.

I did as Julia recommended and it works quite well (but I found it easier to use conditioner too.)

I also did as the packaging recommended and used it as a moisturiser. It does this job very well but does leave you smelling of desiccated coconut.

The children don't like the smell of coconut and ran away when I went near them.  To overcome this I use the coconut oil followed by cocoa butter moisturiser. This means I smell like a Bounty chocolate bar.

This makes me hungry.

Boys books

If you're stuck to choose a book for a ten year old boy who do you ask for advice. Well you could visit a bookshop and ask in there or you could ask in a library. Or you could steal into someone's house and take a peek at what's on the bookshelves of a ten year old boy.

Ethan is ten and has a good reading age. These are the books on his bookshelves.

There are more books downstairs and on the landing but these will do for starters.

Based on this selection what would you recommend he read next?

Bruno, our housekeeper

A few weeks ago I was looking at the mess we make as a family, particularly anywhere where food and children come together, but also where food preparation and I collide.

I needed a solution.  Yes, I could haul the vacuum cleaner out from under the stairs.  Alternatively I could grab the pathetic handheld vacuum cleaner from another cupboard.

Both of these require regular effort and I am inherently lazy.

So I bought a Roomba and so far, so good.

We've called him Bruno because to give him a female name would be to assign a traditional female stereotypical role and that would be wrong (I live in a feminist household - what did you expect?).

Additionally Roomba sounds a bit like Rumba which is a latin dance.  Out of the Strictly Come Dancing judges, Bruno is the most latin so...

Bruno gets turned on every day, usually while I'm out, and he tours the ground floor of the house in a somewhat random and haphazard manner sweeping, brushing and sucking as he goes.

He's not terribly handsome but he is quite effective.

He needs attention daily because he's quite small and needs emptying daily.  His brushes also need regular maintenance because his brushes end up tangled with hair from Hannah and me.  But it beats the heck out of regular hand vac'ing.

Stay calm and draft an email

We are living next to a building site.

I understand that building sites are noisy, dirty places but that doesn't mean I have to like it. 

When work started on the over-priced, under-sized flats next door I checked to find out when I could expect activity over the wall. I discovered that there is a "Considerate Contractor" document on the Council website that outlines the hours that a considerate contractor will work. These are 08:00 until 18:00 on weekdays and 08:00 until 13:00 on Saturday. 

Today, a Saturday, builders arrived on site at 07:20 and were making a racket within ten minutes. Today's jobs required heavy machinery and industrial power tools. At 17:00 the power tools were still giving us 90db as measured in our garden. This stopped us from enjoying the garden and Ethan spent quite a bit of time being angry in the garden whilst wearing ear defenders. 

The builders, however, don't appear to regard their hearing with the same respect. Nobody over the wall today was wearing ear protection. But they don't seem to have much regard for Health and Safety generally. They don't wear hi-vis jackets, hard hats, eye protection or harnesses either. 

Today they were managing RSJs including cutting them with a circular saw with sparks and tiny metal shards flying around. The operator was wearing shorts and a t-shirt without goggles and ear defenders. 

While one crane operator lifted a lump of steel up the storeys, the chap up at top receiving it was wearing neither hi-vis jacket or hard hat. 

Their health and safety is their concern but their complete disregard for my right to enjoy my outdoor space does bother me. I try hard to ignore it. I try hard to be completely OK about it, but I can't. I started the day annoyed when they turned up forty minutes early. My anger escalated as the hours beyond one o'clock passed and as the noise from over the wall continued. 

My frustration and anger achieves nothing. Writing too the contractor will achieve nothing. Writing to the Council will v achieve nothing but I'll draft an email anyway.

Scorned

I have an iPhone and it's a dog. 

Apple are clearly very annoyed with me because it's been a while since I upgraded. I have gone through the £55 battery replacement but that's the only money Apple have had from me for a while. 

I believe that Apple have somehow degraded the performance of my phone. I've read that there's evidence of Apple iPhone performance degradation when a newer model is launched. Apparently Samsung products don't experience the same issue. 

My phone is slow with battery life that means that one charge doesn't last a day of light use. I've seen the gumpf on the new iPhones and there's nothing that floats my boat. The phone I have does everything I need, it just does it too damn slowly. The phone freezes all the time which drives me mad. 

I'm just annoyed with Apple for spoiling the phone that I was very happy with. I don't want a new phone but my current phone is becoming unusable. 

I understand that this created obsolescence pushes normal customers to buy a new iPhone but I'm not a normal customer; I'm a woman scorned.

Sticky ginger cake with lemon icing

We had a birthday in the house today and the need for a cake.  The birthday boy isn't really a fan of cakes with buttercream and lots of decoration.  Whilst he's a Londoner by birth he harks back to maternal Yorkshire roots where cake preference is concerned. 

I searched and found the perfect recipe.

Here's what you need to do to make the same.

Ingredients

• 225g self-raising flour
• 1 tsp bicarb of soda
• 1 tbsp ground ginger (I read this wrong and used just 1 tsp)
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp ground mixed spice
• 115g unsalted butter
• 115g dark muscovado sugar
• 115g black treacle
• 115g golden syrup
• 250ml milk (any kind of milk)
• 85g drained stem ginger (grated) - grating this isn't easy and if you don't have a rotary grater then I recommend chopping finely
• 1 egg

Icing

• 50g icing sugar
• 1 tsp finely grated lemon zest
• Syrup from stem ginger jar

Method

• Preheat oven to 160°C if a fan oven.
• Butter and line an 18cm (7inch) deep cake tin.
• Put flour, bicarb and spices into a mixing bowl.
• Cube the butter and add to the flour mix.
• Rub butter into flour until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs and put to one side.
• Put the sugar, treacle, syrup and milk into a saucepan and heat whilst stirring gently until the sugar has dissolved.
• Once the sugar is dissolved, take the mixture to just below the boiling point.
• Add the stem ginger to the flour mixture and then add the treacle mixture, stirring all the time. I added the treacle mixture while the beater was whirring on the mixer.
• Add the egg to the mixture and beat until the mixture is combined and it resembles a thick pancake batter.  My mixture wasn't a terribly thick mixture.
• Pour into the tin and bake for about an hour or until it passes the skewer test.
• Leave to cool in the tin.
• The cake can be frozen at this point if desired.
• Mix the icing sugar with the lemon zest and the stem ginger syrup until you have a gloomy icing mix.  I put this icing in an icing bag and I made more than the recipe said to allow for waste.  If you didn't use an icing bag you could drizzle the icing from a spoon.
• The cake can be stored for up to two weeks and improves with age.

 

For canine commitment-phobes

Like the idea of a dog but think it's too much of a commitment?

Want a dog but you'd quite like to borrow one for a while to see if it'd work out?

Like the idea of getting exercise by taking a dog for a walk but don't actually want to live with a dog full time?

Would you be interested if I said all if the above was possible?

There are many centres around the country that re-home retired greyhounds and the nearest one to me is the Brentwood Retired Greyhounds Trust at Ashwells .

Ashwells Retired Greyhounds is home to 50 greyhounds who are all looking for their forever homes.  

All of the dogs need to be walked daily.  If you can spare an hour or so on any day of the week then the greyhounds would be delighted to see you (as would the kennel staff).  There aren't enough kennel staff to walk all of the dogs so the trust is reliant on volunteers to provide some exercise for the dogs.

The kennel opening hours are 09:30-12:30 every day and you can just turn up.  

The address is Suffolk House in Ashwells Road, Pilgrims Hatch, Brentwood CM15 9SG. The telephone number is 01277 373799 and the website is http://brentwood.retiredgreyhounds.co.uk  

You never know, you might fall in love.

 

Comfort Food - curry

Jamie Oliver reckons you'll want to cook up a proper posh chicken tikka masala.

Well you might.  Or you might get a takeaway.  Or you might buy a ready meal.  Or you might make a curry at home, either throwing ingredients together (my method) or by following a recipe.

What you're unlikely to do, is dig a pit in your garden for an impromptu fire.

You're also unlikely to have a few frying pans lying around that you don't mind using on an open fire in the middle of your garden.  I'm not sure what you do when you've finished with the fire.  Do you fill it in and try and sow grass to put it back the way it was or do you leave a gaping hole in your lawn ready to trip up the unsuspecting?

I'm not quite sure how far ahead one needs to plan to cook this meal or how long one is expected to live with the changes it required.  If there are special frying pans kept for cooking on the fire do they need to be stored in the kitchen or would they be stored in the shed?  I'm not clear.

The other thing I'm very clear you'll want to do is buy the 26 ingredients.  Yes, 26.  I'm not even sure my weekly grocery shop has more than 26 different food items.  I am being a little harsh here because many of the ingredients are store cupboard staples but who likes cooking something with so many different ingredients?  Especially for a Friday night curry with the lads (which is the way this particular dish was presented.)

Let's address the Friday night curry idea.

You've had a full day at work and you rush home via the shops to buy what's on the extensive ingredients list. Then it's beers in a fridge and get changed into gardening clothes.  Dig a fire pit and nip to a local garage or wood to collect firewood.  Make the fire, because for Jamie's fire you need a fire that's been burning for a while.  Put beers in the fridge (trust me, after going through the prep for this meal you will need beer.) Make a marinade and then bung the chicken in the marinade (the minimum marinade time is two hours). At this point you'll probably need a shower and a change of clothes.

Once you're refreshed you'll be opening the door to your mates because they're probably hungry.

You can't relax though because you need to make the sauce.  Once the sauce is made you need to cook the chicken.  At some point you'll also be making your own parathas.  Whilst you're doing all of this you'll be making your guests comfortable, tending to the fire and ensuring everyone has a beer in their hand.

Am I the only one whose thinking a take out is probably easier, (cheaper) and less stressful?

Comfort food

I caught a bit of Jamie Oliver's Comfort Food this evening (in between helping Hannah with History homework and Ethan with English homework). The two snippets I saw covered the cheese toaster and chicken tikka masala. 

I understand the premise for the show; the idea is to take the nation's favourites and make them a little more special. 

Let's look at these two, cheese toastie first. Jamie's cheese toastie was a cheddar and red leicester sandwich (white bread) which was fried, both sides and then enhanced with a cheese crown and bottom.

 I don't know about you but a cheese toastie is my "I've got in late and I've been drinking to much" snack. I toast bread (whatever is in the bread bin) then add butter or spread, bung cheese on top (whatever is in the fridge - probably mature cheddar) and grill until oozy. 

I don't think drunk people should be encouraged to operate a frying pan and manipulate melted cheese. 

I don't know what Jamie's thinking. He also suggests it is a suitable dish for breakfast. He's wrong. It's drunk food. 

I'll cover chicken tikka masala tomorrow but I think you can guess where I'm coming from.