Zesting cheese and walnut whips. It's all getting out of hand.

Nothing's safe at the moment, from the zester

I've got a terrible addiction.  Actually that's not true. I've got several, but there we are.

Some I've already confessed to elsewhere on these pages.  Chocolate for example.  I'm a big girl when it comes to chocolate.  I could eat the stuff everyday (but don't) - on a biscuit, wrapped around a chocolate bar filling or just a solid bar of it.  Don't care.  I worked with someone years ago who did clearly have an addiction to chocolate. She was eating it by the sack and had become a real issue for her, so whilst for me it's just a slobbering desire, we shouldn't forget that for some people, these things take over lives in a most unpleasant way. Eating a whole pack of Penguin biscuits plus a multi pack of Mars Bars nightly is at best, unusual I would have thought.

I was prompted because on the tele last night I saw a piece about a young woman who shifted, I think, because I was only half watching, six litres of cola a day.  She rarely ate anything but said nothing quenched her thirst properly other than cola.  There was some extraordinary statistics in there; eating the weight of a four year old child in sugar over a year or something bizarre. I wish I'd paid more attention. A team of doctors got her off the stuff in the end but she was biting the walls on the way there as she came off it. She now eats three meals a day and - as they say - has a balanced diet. I'm full of admiration for people that manage successfully that kind of struggle.

Sweet childhood memories

So this puts into perspective somewhat my 'desires' rather than addictions. I drink too much tea and coffee, but have never smoked, so in my head (incorrectly) one cancels out the other. Back to chocolate for a minute, I've rediscovered Crunchies; that honeycomb in a choccy coat is just fab.  Well, it is at the moment.  I've had fads.  I favoured Mars Bars but haven't eaten one now for years. Snickers, or Marathons or whatever they're called this week have lost the appeal.  And I do occasionally hanker after my youth.  Whatever happened to Spangles?  Not choc, I know, I'm just meandering. Aztec Bars.  Sherbet Fountains.  They were a yellow paper tube full of the kind of sherbet that once in your mouth turned your lips inside out and made your eyeballs lurch violently backwards inside their sockets.  Inside the tube and hanging out of the top was a stick of fairly acrid black liquorice.  Magnificent, they were. Can't remember the last time I saw one.

My memories are
whipped into shape

For years I questioned the absence of a half walnut in the bottom of a coffee walnut whip.  As a kid I hated the damned walnuts for being too bitter.  Now of course with a shift of palate, I like them. Anyway. I was convinced a semi walnut resided there at the very bottom of the Whip. Chomping one a few years back the Whip was sans walnut. Disappeared.  So anyway the conversation about the 'thin end of the cost-cutting wedge', 'how dare they abandon my childhood with such a dismissive attitude towards nuts', 'no respect for tradition, culture and heritage' rumbled on for months with me going increasingly round the bend.

All for half a damned walnut, I know.  I'd lost it.  The big questions of life were passing me by. Bear in mind this happened years ago, I'm since recovered, but as I said, the big issues of the day such as why was Robson and Jerome in the Top 40 and which vindictive halfwits were responsible for buying the damned records, were not reaching my radar.  It reached such a peak, I had to contact Nestle's/Rowntrees (I think) and demanded an explanation for their damned cheek.  Around a million walnuts are used by the company every week on Walnut Whips and they've been a crucial ingredient since 1910.  So in my eyes a walnut whip without a walnut is falling well short of expectations and fundamentally alters the description. In that scenario it's just a Whip. End of. Unsatisfactory.

Whipped into shape

'What the hell are you playing at woman...!'  I bellowed down the phone to some hapless and admirably polite PR lady on the other end.  You can see I was at the end of my tether, and I'm not proud, let me make that clear.

Turns out there was never a half walnut on the bottom of a coffee walnut whip.  It seems the original vanilla whip did enjoy a half nut on the chocolate base, inside the mallow, and not on the top. As a marketing ploy, a walnut was later added to the top and the nut inside was removed not long after.

My childhood memory had let me down badly and I retreated, embarrassed to lick my wounds and hang my head.

Anyway.  Back to addictions.  Or as I say,'desires' because I suspect the word addiction is a bit strong. I can't stop zesting.  I'm zesting everything.  I've mentioned this before and I thought it was a phase but clearly not.  It's sitting there smirking at me on page 17 of the new Pampered Chef catalogue.  The Microplane Zester.  Quote: one swipe removes the zest and leaves behind the bitter pith. I'll say it does.  No citrus fruit is safe in my house, or nearby supermarket for that matter.  It safely gathers all the fragrant zest effortlessly which just sits, patiently, at the top of the zester, waiting for instructions.  Try as you may, the revolting white pith is nowhere.

The medium round stone

Pampered Chef microplane zester multitasks

I've become adventurous.  Not content with fruits I've moved onto cheese - feta in particular.  At a recent cooking show, I was making a pizza on the round flat stone (medium round flat stone with handles to give its proper name) and I grated or zested some feta cheese on top.  The point being I hardly used any cheese - so healthier - and my little zesting friend was more than able to cope with a cheese as incredibly soft and crumbly as feta.  Small wisps of feta floated down like dessicated coconut.  It was a win.
The snag is of course it's done nothing to ease my appetite for seeing what else I can zest that was never intended for such treatment. And before you even suggest the heels of your feet, you can think again.

Now I've caught a whiff of childhood, I'm off to see if I can buy a pack of Munchies. Or Treets.  I don't hold out much hope though.

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You did what? Put mashed potato - in cakes?

'For mash get - cakes and tarts and stuff...'

Is it just me or is instant mash suddenly cool again?  Or at least OK?

I vividly remember eating it as a kid.  My mum was a keen advocate of new-fad labour-saving cunning-plans culinary-wise. We had both the instant mash dust and the granulated versions.  Facinating to watch the dust transform into a potato tribute act.  And with a blob of butter added as it gathered pace it was perfectly fine to eat, I seem to recall.  Not sure if I'd say the same now because I haven't eaten it for years.

Look, I've got a craving now.  It's always the same.  When I write about stuff like this, I want a slab/portion/slice/blob of right now.

Vesta instant meals: 'exotic chinese curry in minutes'. Fab. I'll have you know it was the height of sophistication. Seriously. This was in the days when a glass of fresh orange was a starter on a restaurant menu, when Leonard Rossiter and Joan Collins where banging on about Cinzano on TV ads and the lady still loved Milk Tray. Convenience foods were sexy and this was long before the fleet of takeaways we have now down our high streets.

Why chop onions and carrots when you could boil a kettle and watch the veg reappear before your very eyes? Something in the back of my mind is telling me that the noodles in a Vesta Chow Mein had to be fried to crisp up?  Apparently, you can still get the meals. Anyway...I digress.

Angel Delight.  I could murder a bowl of that now, washed down with a lime pop from the Soda Stream.  Now look what you've made me do.  I'll be wanting a Babycham next. Or a Dubonnet. (Too young..?  Ok.  It was a sweet wine-based thing, ridiculously popular in the 60s and 70s among the smart set; bitter because it had a good dose of quinine in it.  It was first sold in 1846 and the story goes the French Foreign Legion were encouraged to give it a good swallow because of the quinine and its protective qualities against malaria)

Instant mash 

 

I was watching the Food Network the other day, which I do when no-one else is around because they're fed up with me watching all the food tele shows. Some bloke in the States was making restaurant quantities of a meatloaf, burger kind of concoction - I wasn't paying much attention.  But I did when I heard him say 'instant potato' which he chucked into the vast metal bowl as a binding agent.

I have a feeling there will be several people now shouting, 'yeah...and...?'  but it honestly hadn't occurred to me.  Breadcrumbs, yes, egg, yes.  But not instant spuds.  Maybe because instant potato - in fact instant food in general - has such a poor reputation in some quarters of my generation.

Gluten free lemon drizzle - with spuds.

But it is two thirds starch by dry weight, it would thicken and grab hold of what's around it so it does sort of make sense, I suppose.

Slice of gluten free lemon and potato cake? 

 

I think I'm suddenly aware of potatoes taking on a more unusual role because my wife cooked a lemon drizzle cake this week, made with potato. Carrot cake, we're used to.  I quite like it.  But potato?

You see, my brother and sister in law paid a visit and she has to steer well away from gluten.  Basically, 250g of cold mash takes the place of the flour and do you know what?  You'd never know. It was fantastic. I had more than one slice which is the norm.  We've never had to search for this kind of thing because this is a recent diagnosis  and again, I wouldn't be surprised if this isn't all really obvious to those who have battled through lists of ingredients before.  It must be exhausting to keep needing to check and check again.  The rest of us have no idea how lucky we are.

Instant mash in a Pampered Chef style

 

Deluxe min muffin pan

Now this is coincidence, honestly, but I picked up an old copy of the Pampered Chef recipe book, Season's Best, and there, on page 8, a recipe for potato bites.  Instant mash mixed with cheese butter and egg becomes a golden brown case in the deluxe mini muffin pan as would pastry.  I've never tried that and now I want to.  Whether that's the power of TV, recipe books, a yearning for nostalgia or just my curiosity taking over, I don't know. There is a continued recipe for the case filling but really, I guess that could be just about anything you fancy, chopped up small enough.  

I suppose the yearning to go shopping will take over now.  I'll probably have to wear dark glasses if I pick up some instant mash until I've come to terms with my silly behaviour, I don't want the neighbours waving net curtains, but I also want to see if there's any Fray Bentos pies handy.  Or Angel Delight. Gravy Browning. Bottle of  Emva Cream or Stones Ginger Wine..

I could certainly do something to a Pop Tart right now. And no I don't mean Cheryl Cole, I meant one of those things you put in a toaster, thank you. Really. Pffft.

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By the way...please feel free to comment, in fact I'd like it if you did, about the bloggy stuff in general or this bit, whatever takes your fancy.  I'd quite like to know where I am with your train of thought and if you've got suggetions. then get it off your chest. Your ideas are just as valid as mine. And why not join the page on the right hand side. That would be nice and appreciated at this end.  But if you'd prefer to keep it quiet then contact me at mikegetscooking@gmail.com, also that mikegetscooking thing on facebook and twitter.  You have a nice day now.

 

KEEP CALM. It's only a school holiday.

Easier said than done. Keep Calm, it's only a school holiday, who's he think he's kidding..?

 

Drawing to a close; the dying embers. Now, my offspring sprung from school some time ago so it's not an issue for me.  But it most certainly has been with the three of them.

We tried to go to the seaside a fair bit as we live not far from the east coast.  Each boy was equipped with exactly the same swimming trunks in the brightest colour we could find, pretty much in keeping with the mikegetscooking philosophy - electric lime greens, vivid bright orange and so on.  It made it much easier to keep track of them just in case one small boy decided to leg it down the beach just as my back was turned as I tried to explain to another why a recently caught crab the size of a 50pence piece with two remaining legs, now in a bucket, was almost certainly dead and unlikely to take part in any beach races. And that particularly stiff star fish that they hid in the car last time stunk to high heaven after a couple of weeks.  And no, I didn't appreciate your mother blaming me for the smell with unfounded accusations of wanton farting, so I really would prefer it if this new exceedingly dead star fish was laid to rest where you found it.

The car for weeks was almost a permanent, mobile sandpit. No matter how much vigorous shaking of shoes, clothes and boys we did, sand dunes would slowly appear in the boot.  But the boys were more than happy to spend hour after hour, digging a hole and filling it in again.  Then digging another one. Repeat until time to go home, with a small break for a sand sandwich and a melted ice cream and the periodic argument at the application of sun creams.

"Dad can't do it, he's useless...you got sunburn last time because he missed a bit. Or most of you.  He doesn't rub it in..."

Have a brew and Keep Calm...it's nearly over.

So mid afternoon it was down to the icecream booth when their mother would tell them they could have anything from the bottom lines on the ice lolly posters - mini milks etc, not the Soleros.  They still talk about that now, particularly as it was a policy enthusiastically taken up and supported by all the other mummies in the 'group'.

We did, every now and again, go to a very well known holiday resort not far away and swim in the pool there and use the rest of the facilities.  I don't want to sound ungrateful hence my reluctance to say out loud which park it was, but the pool changing rooms were always something of an experiment in whether it was possible to leave without catching something that would probably make you itch for a while. The floors of said facilities bore an uncanny resemblance to those glass plate jobs you see under microscopes. Always a potentially awkward GP-type chat.

"And where did you take the children again, you did what with them..?"

Again, the (not-so now) boys recount that when the subject is raised.

Anyway...to cooking matters.  I saw on the Facebook malarkey only recently that a mum/PChef chum was organising a Pampered Chef cooking show with her offspring.  I'm liking this.  Cook with the children, demonstrate some of the kit and how easy it is to use (childsplay etc...).

One lump, or two..?

I was never a cook by any stretch but I started venturing into the kitchen because I wanted my boys to see me cooking.  I didn't want them growing up believing cooking was exclusively 'womans work.'  We bought them a toy kitchen, I remember, and a tea set. Now not all our friends got the idea.  In fact I remember one dad being majorly dead against the concept.  But the outcome is all three do indeed now cook for themselves to varying degrees and the eldest  is probably a damn sight better than me.

Anyway I was half watching the Food Network on the tele today with Guy Fieri, and his five year old son wandered onto the set.  Accidental or a production decision, it didn't make much difference.  It gave Guy the chance to point out the importance of kids connecting with food, enjoying helping to cook and taking - as he put it - ownership of not just the food but the experience.  I'm all for that. Well...as you've heard me say on an audio post elsewhere on here, regardless of previous prejudice, the boys are coming forward in droves for food technology classes; it's the girls that are now lagging behind.

Anyway.  My aim is still to get more men involved in opportunities such as Pampered Chef.  It's ludicrous that more men are cooking than ever before and still we have yet to engage this market. I'm working on it behind the scenes with others and hopefully tangible progress will be seen soon. 

These are seriously suggested as girls school shoes on a website

That's quite enough of that for now. The point is, the school hols are almost over, a new start and the chance to keep calm and carry on with a few of the things we did with the kids over these past weeks - including cooking.

Still to finish - the collosal rows over school shoes...

'God mum, they're like well lame, you're embarrassing. I can't wear them, like a freak, I want them' cos they're dench...'

(Don't ask me, I'm just writing it down, but I suspect it's striking a chord here and there.)

That hideous experience, plus the rows over uniform is long gone for me.  Time passes. I could no longer get away with Mini Milks with my lot but at least, on the bright side, I no longer have to buy my twenty-somethings lime green swimming trunks. Or bury flippin' starfish.

BOOOOMMMM!!!! That'll be a raspberry pip and a decorator bottle, then.

 Time for the pips

 

You just can't take raspberry pips for granted.  In the wrong hands they can cause devastation.

At the very least they can kick-start a need to redecorate.  This is a cautionary tale involving the Pampered Chef  Decorator Bottle Set and a pip.  Rubus idaeus, is the red fruit we are familar with here in the UK and much of Europe.  It's the native species of Rubus to Europe and northern Asia. I didn't realise until recently that black raspberries are grown in parts of America.  Now whether this is all getting confused with what we know as blackberries, I don't know and I'll leave that bit to those that do.

I'm not a fan, to be honest.  In fact, I've never been a fan of raspberries.  Don't know why really, just don't like the taste.  I've already mentioned before that meringue is a mystery to me so raspberry pavlova is about as far off my taste-bud radar as is possible. Perhaps because the perfume taste of the raspberry is a bit lame for me.  I like munching raw gooseberries that are so tart you can actually feel your face turning inside out; the sort that push your lips back inside you mouth towards your tonsils as your eyeballs balance yet wobble on the outer edge of the sockets.  Hardcore sour. I like that.

Anyway, back to pips.  They can wedge in dental lapses and provide an unwelcome crunchy thing.  Not the exact same example, but on holiday abroad recently I was reminded how used to seedless everything we have become.  I was offered some uber-plump raisins to graze on, and duly did.  Now, I got the shock of my life when the plump fruit went crunch in my mouth.  I have to say I panicked slightly as I pondered the effects of eating a loose filling only to be relieved when I realised it was a seed.  A raisin with a seed. Well...yeah...why not?  It's just that we have become used to seedless stuff.

So maybe our concentration in these matters is not what it should be.  We've blanked pips from our memory.  We take no account of what havoc a single pip can unleash.

Will Torrent

Put this to one side for a moment as we focus on decorator bottles.  Now, I haven't got any of these and suppose it's because I generally don't decorate my food.  I might blob something or other here and there but all that fancy waving a sauce around isn't my gig.  Again, as with meringues, I've jabbered on here about jus and other sideshows.  Gravy I get and adore, but a teaspoon of blobby on my plate hardly seems worth the effort.

To get me into all this, I should perhaps give these bottles a go.  There's certainly no faffing about with bags and random nozzels.

Quote: 'Three easy-squeeze bottles and writing, basket weave and rosette tips let you decorate with different designs and colours at one time. Perfect for icing, whipped cream and soft cheese...' 

Sounds painless. Now at this time of year the PCheffers all get to hear about the new products for this season and in parallel there have been demos on how to create no-bake tarts by PChef's new guest chef, Will Torrent, using the new tart tins, decorated with the bottles.

So there's been a flurry of activity of late demonstrating how easy it is to do all this.  My chum Carolyn told me about one such cooking show.  Tart made, there was some raspberry sauce action to get sorted. So, in the bottle goes the sauce, the onlookers looking on, suitably enraptured. Squeeze. Nothing much happens, certainly not the carefully formed red trickle and at this point, of course, the penny drops.  The pip. A damned pip. The bottle has fallen foul to the stroppy pip blocking the only available exit.

Now, I've had a kidney stone.  In fact I enjoyed the mind-altering pain so much I've decided to have another.  It's been sat there for a long time now.  You don't know you've got one until it gets bored and decides to stretch its legs. When it does and you have to pass a stone larger than the exit facility, something has to give.  Likewise the damn pip. 

Someone suggested having a cheeky squeeze over a bowl to free the intrusion. Mistake. Seriously.  As I said, something has to give...

Fruit Casualty

BOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!

The whole lot exploded.  It must have looked like a scene from 'Casualty'.  Screams, hysterical activity. Red splatters everywhere.  One team member was caked in it, the wallpaper splattered, all the products on the table dripping - only the ceiling escaped the explosion of seasonal fruits.

Naturally those out of the blast zone roared with laughter, but we could all do with learning from this tale.  We've become careless, lazy even.  As long as I keep myself reasonably hydrated me and the kidney stone can call a truce.  But if I let my guard down it will  head south. The thought has just made me shudder as I recall a Boxing Day never to be forgotton as the last stone blinked in the daylight.

Watch your pips, gang.   The little buggers have a mean streak when they fancy it.  

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By the way...please feel free to comment, in fact I'd like it if you did, about the bloggy stuff in general or this bit, whatever takes your fancy.  I'd quite like to know where I am with your train of thought and if you've got suggetions. then get it off your chest. Your ideas are just as valid as mine. And why not join the page on the right hand side. That would be nice and appreciated at this end.  But if you'd prefer to keep it quiet then contact me at mikegetscooking@gmail.com, also that mikegetscooking thing on facebook and twitter.  You have a nice day now.

Sweaty? I'm throwing in the towel, Juan.

 

‘I’m sweating like a fat lass in a club…’

Now, I’m not sure where I heard that, I think it might be a Peter Kay line, but I’ll stand corrected. We do like to make jokes to cover up emissions of a personal nature be they from armpits or twixt buttocks.  It’s the former that is taxing me at the moment.

 I’ve been quiet on here for a while mainly because I’m several thousand miles away in Northern Cyprus – the Turkish side.  I also had to miss the PChef annual conference which happens every year in Birmingham for various reasons, so I have no insider gossip on that front to reveal.

This isn’t to say that I am in a non PChef zone right now, because I’m not, as I shall jabber about in a minute.

The temperature here bounces around 40 degrees, give or take. We are staying at a friend’s house equipped with all the usuals – fridge, freezer, blah etc. And this is kit that really has to put its back into it to keep anything from rotting within hours of purchase.  And you want to buy.  As with some many other countries the markets are amazing.  I’ve shifted more fruit and veg in the last few days than within six months at home – water melons the size of unfurnished flats; and water, gallons of the stuff.  But we’ve been coming here for a few years now so we knew – or at least I knew – that bodily functions would be put to the test.

I’ve been cooking. Apparently that’s my job on holiday.  In 40 degree heat.  So here’s one example.  I’m (loosely) cooking a PChef recipe of chicken, chick peas, chorizo (Turkish sausage) pepper, chicken stock , tomatoes etc, all bunged into one pot and served with rice.

Dear Lord.  There are cooler blast furnaces.  The sweat after five mins or so of chopping reached crisis levels and I’d not cooked a damn thing yet. That snake-hipped lad and his kitchen towels – Juan Sheet – or whatever he’s called would  need a pack of rolls never mind one flaming sheet.  In fact I wish he’d been here because I wouldn’t mind slapping his smug little face.  Anyone who can wear trousers like that needs to be treated with caution. As the pathetic kitchen towels available to me dissolved on impact with my forehead I had to engage some serious support.

With the start of cooking in progress, fighting for oxygen and with a T shirt that now looked as though it had been taken out before a fast spin, I went to the bathroom and got a hand towel which I plonked on my head and wrapped around me ala Lawrence of Arabia. To cut a long story short, I managed the meal but needed two such towels to cope with the onslaught of moisty bits. 

Pampered Chef note:  I have been using a selection of knives, pink and green versions, stoneware etc all resident in the island.

‘A bit hot…?’ says my wife after a gruelling shower plus sit down for half an hour with a white wine and soda, as her meal is presented.

I think I mentioned something about never feeling dry at any stage and knowing now what a slug feels like.

‘You need to wipe your face,’ said wife or friend Bridget, I can’t remember, I was hallucinating I think; I’d got locked in the Lawrence zone by this stage  and I think I saw camels in the garden. Either way I plonked down in a chair looking I’d just finished the 100 meters backstroke.

‘I have been wiping my face…I’ve been using the hand towels…done it before’

‘You did WHAT!’

‘I used the hand towels to…’

‘I’VE BEEN DRYING MY HAIR ON THOSE..!’

I won’t go on, you can guess the rest.

Tensions were a little raised before because we’d not long finished a chat on Skype via this very laptop with the middle son who was about to head off to Italy for a couple of days of work.

My wife is very big on sun.  Loves the stuff.  A tan – whilst not an obsession - is a summer must-have in her book.

‘Do I look brown then Tom…?’ she asked eager for confirmation.

‘Yeah, you look like Lennox Lewis’

Now, whether it was son suggesting that his mother closely resembled a boxer or my comment about Fatima Whitbread, or my snort of laughter, I don’t know, but it set a tone for the evening that climaxed in the towel incident.

There are other tales to tell from here, but while I’m on this theme, we went to a market which sold just about anything you’d like from clothes and accessories to dodgy rip-offs.  Tucked away was a small booth-come stall that housed two young girls plus an older woman who was turning out what at first glance appeared to be pancakes or crepes – except they can’t have been. That’s because I watched the older lady roll out a ball of - I have no idea what – with what looked like an inch thick piece of dowel rod.  These now ‘pancake’ sized discs were lightly filled with potato or cheese or meat or aubergine or any combo.  They were folded and lightly rolled again with the filling inside, placed on a hot plate which the girls cooked.  Naturally these, whatever they were, were blisteringly hot and tasted fantastic.

However…on the board behind the girls, written in white chalk, that listed the options of meat, cheese etc., there was a ‘Sweat’ version.  Even in this heat it didn’t take much working out that the poor girls meant ‘Sweet’ and not the more unconventional ‘Sweat’.  Look, I’ll try most things – I like faggots and gravy and I’ve eaten snails, but sweat flavoured ‘pancakes’ are a whole new departure for me and not one I’m keen to explore.

Bridget pointed this out and had to visually explain the error by pointing at her armpits.  An urgent search for chalk and the ‘A’ became’ an ’E’.

Anyway…must dash, more later.  There are some towels to wash, apparently.  Some people are so picky. 

I need to have a go at whipping something.

 

I don't really do cream so I'm somewhat unfamiliar with stiff peaks.

 

The runny stuff, the single cream is OK up to a point, but double whisked, fluffed-up cream isn't my number one choice. This is perhaps the reason why I have few whisks at my disposal at home.  Apart from a flick around a gravy, I generally have no need for the things.

Meringue is another mystery to me.  Pavlova is a big hit in our usually male dominated house, so I can't even say it's a girly thing.  I have tried it, but it's a deeply disappointing experience.  You bite into it only to find there's nothing actually in your mouth except a blast of something that was probably very sweet.  It just seems a bit pointless. 

In fact, if I'm honest, puds don't really cut it for me at all.  I'd have a cheese board or just an ice cream if an ice cream should be available. Any flavour. Oh and fruit salad.  I make an excuse for chocolate though.  My passion for chocolate is well-documented in these pages.

Pavlova? I don't really get it.

Yet some people visibly melt at the very mention of meringue.  I've noticed it prompts the occaisional "Oooh...ooooh" with a curious accompanying satisfied or expectant facial expression from those of a female persuasion which suggests I am totally out of my depth when it comes to egg white-based confections.  

I might be wrong here but they so often appear to be the same ladies that go all peculiar when it comes to Baileys, which is another off my radar item. It tastes, to me, like the catch-all medicine that I used get rammed down me as kid that was a cure-all for whatever was ailing me at the time from chicken pox to runny nose.


But of course, it contains cream.  So maybe that's it. Or maybe it's the emulsifier containing refined vegetable-oil which stops the cream and whiskey splitting that doesn't work for me, taste-wise. Whiskey or whisky, on the other hand are big hits with me. We've had an affair for many years.

Double cream, double the fun? Pampered Chef double balloon whisk time.

Anyway.  I'm getting off the point. I would like to get into the whole whisking thing because I think there could be something quite satisfying about it and it's prompted by a couple of events. 

One squirt or two..?

One: I read some - no, quite a lot of  - sniggering from women clearly up to speed with the whole 50 Shades of Grey thing and there were whisk references going on.  It's a not a bedside reading item for me so I can only wonder what caused such sniggers or whether I had totally confused the messages. Maybe it was cream, rather than whisk thing...anyway.

And two: the Pampered Chef double balloon whisk I saw demonstrated a bit back.  It's a strange looking creature, if I'm honest.  It looks like somone started making what a whisk should look like and got a bit confused having too many whisk-type metal bits, mid way. 

Anyway the end result is maximum aeration. Loads of air after a moderate beating. It certainly made short work of the cream I looked at. After giving it a bit of a seeing-to, the female demonstrator had peaks all over the place.  And in record time.

I want to join in the fun.

Taken us a while to get there; we've had a passion for sweetened creamy stuff since the sixteenth century. Maybe my not liking frothy cream thing was also driven by the 'squirty' cream that was a pudding staple in my childhood. Press too hard, one squirt and it was all over the damned place. And it tasted of what, exactly?

I could give a batter a batter. It's a possibility. But maybe I need to get over this whole whipped aversion, get a double balloon whisk, give it a go and see if I can peak.

I might even like it.

• If you have any thoughts and theories, please feel free to comment. And repost on facebook and twitter as you so please. You can contact me on mikegetscooking on facebook or at mikegetscooking@gmail.com.

Curry please, make sure it's slim line.

 

This is a tricky one and I'm not sure what I think.  This is what set me off...

'You've used the wrong milk again...how many more times.  It's not my milk!'

My wife is now giving me that look that suggests I will pay a heavy price for this latest lapse in concentration at a time and date to suit her. If you lived in my house, you'd hear that quite a bit.  Sometimes I forget, sometimes - I have to admit - I can't be faffed with swapping endless different sorts of milk about.


I was making two mugs of hot chocolate and 'accidently' used semi skimmed milk in both, instead of one with skimmed milk.  Skimmed is the fluid of choice for my wife. I should make the effort particularly as I am getting seriously fed up with others foisting their food and drink notions on me.

We both used to drink full fat.  I can't remember when we shifted sideways, likewise I can't remember when we both dropped sugar.  To go off track slightly, I used to work for a major organisation that sent a 'nurse' around occasionally for workplace healthcare. Now a colleague of mine, true to his agricultural roots, ate vast quantities of fatty bits washed down with Jersey milk.  I haven't seen Jersey milk for years; not sure if you can still buy it.  It's so fatty it almost stands up by itself.

Anyway, the nurse did all the relevant checks during one of her workplace visits and the test results seemed to suggest my colleague had been dead for several years, it's just that no-one had bothered to tell him. He was off the scale; such was the effect of the milk and all round meaty consumption.  Except of course he was very much alive, in pretty sound health generally and was a little surprised to find out he was dead.

Suffice to say, he didn't change his diet, and is still on his toes.

Fish and chips anyone?

Now, I do try to watch what I consume.  I'm not a great fast-food fan, except fish and chips.  The whole burger thing leaves me apathetic. I do need to lose weight though, but that's more to do with not getting off my backside enough.  I don't drink much alcohol really and I don't smoke: never have done, never tried it in fact, so I've no idea what that's like.  It's my choice.  I like choice.  I choose to like choice.

So I'm starting to get just a tad frustrated by the increasing levels of 'skinny' and 'lite' in the choice put before me. No, not just before me, almost thrust upon me. Before we go further, when did skinny become a gastronomic option? I can't remember.  Skinny. Odd.  If I called someone skinny they'd probably be less than pleased.  Slim, yes, not skinny.  And yet if I want a coffee that isn't skinny I'm looked upon like a social misfit.  Yes I know I'm getting paranoid and a bit silly, but I almost feel like I need to apologise in advance when I place an order.

"Can I have the chicken please...and I'd like the skin left on"
"Left on..?
"And a coffee.."
" Skinny..?"
"Just semi-skimmed, please..."
"So...you'd like skin, but not skinny?"

And off she goes to tell her workmates to treat the bloke on table seven with extreme caution as he's clearly unstable.

It's a tricky one.  We should eat responsibly.  We eat too much fat.  I eat too much fat.  I know I do.  I like cake and chocolate and biscuits.  I like to be able to choose a fatty or a non fatty version: example, I prefer low-fat yoghurt.  I like the choice, I just don't like the feeling that I'm wrong to like a battered sausage once every six months.  But maybe I should?  Maybe I'm the one that's wrong. Maybe choice should not be a choice after all.  Food education is a serious matter not to be trivialised as so many people gain dangerous weight levels.  What we do that will make a major impact, I have no idea. I'm not sure guilt is a great option though as it prompts me to eat another biscuit to take the guilty feelings away.  I do think we haven't seriously tackled the issues of high fat foods sold cheaply or marketing to children.  It all feels a bit token.

Fried?..not fried?

I saw this recipe on the facebook thingy for 'lite' fried chicken.  (I can't tell you how much I loathe the non-word 'lite'...anyway.)  The reason why the 'lite' fried chicken was 'lite' was because it wasn't fried.  So what exactly is the point of calling the damn thing fried?  It was oven baked.  But because we all secretly like fatty fried chicken, we have to call a non-fried chicken fried so we can say we haven't actually eaten fried, fried chicken.   If I want oven baked chicken, let me choose that or let me choose a fried version:  why call something what it isn't? We can't seem to make our minds up with messages mixed all over.

I was in a well-known national pub chain pub last night for a meal after a very long day left me too tired to cook.  Browsing through the range of menus before me I glanced at the drinks and saw - skinny singles.  What?  Example: Vodka and a low carb Monster.  I think after grazing through steak, chips, a fried egg and onion rings, a low carb Monster isn't really going to scratch the surface. However, at least I have the option, and we would criticise them if they didn't make an effort.

This reminds me: a while back we went for an Indian meal in a restaurant after which my wife asked for a gin and tonic, but make sure it's a slim line.  That's after a months supply of curry calories in one sitting. I did raise the issue but...

I suppose there are two main threads to all this. Firstly, I am a grown up, I am incredibly fortunate to live in a country at a time in history when I can choose what I want to eat within reason, so please let me choose.  And please continue giving me that sensible option. Just don't make me feel guilty, it will backfire.  And why do we now pretend to eat what we are not eating? I don't understand and I'm not sure the pretend part is helping with food education.  There is a third thread which is about what manufacturers put in our food to make it low or non fat and yet taste 'fatty' and 'creamy'.  But that's for another day.

Guess what I had to eat today?  A chicken dinner and chocolate fudge cake to follow.  Oh dear. I'll be eating deep fried Mars Bars next and that'll really give me something to feel guilty about.

I'm going to quite open here; I'm not sure what I really think or perhaps more accurately, should think. Maybe we are all so disconnected from food and its production that we need protecting from ourselves. Skinny or not so skinny.  That is the question.

• If you have any thoughts and theories, please feel free to comment. And repost on facebook and twitter as you so please. You can contact me on mikegetscooking on facebook or at mikegetscooking@gmail.com.

More male pampered chef surprises. Oh Hilary!

Just click on the pic to hear the latest revelation.

Guacamole? No thanks, I've just had a nuclear fallout.

The infamous MFP

Here's a question: will there be any demand for handmade guacamole after the nuclear apocolypse?

Interesting question.  I hadn't thought about it. I think it's safe to say I never would have given this the attention it deserves until I read some jabbering on Her Majesty's Facebook of late. It set me off, to be honest.  What would you fancy after the wholesale slaughter of the human race? The chippie would be closed, so that's out.

I really ought to say upfront that all this is not my thinking. My chum Carolyn was recounting a Pampered Chef cooking show she was at with a new recruit.  PChef makes this non-electrical gadget which PCheffers insist on calling the 'MFP'.  A 'manual food processor' if you like.  Now as you can see from the above pic, it looks like what a food processor looks like.  But no mains electricity is required.  You 'pump it' to quote from the blurb.  In fact  (quote) 'the more you pump, the finer the cuts.'

So if I've got this right, it could be a workout tool as well as a chopper.  Aren't you supposed to 'pump' when you workout?  I've no direct experience because I'm no friend of gyms and I've never seen this chopper - food processor - in the flesh.  I'm sure The Green Godess on Breakfast TV years ago would have found a use for it.  Anyway, to get to the point. A guest at this show suggested that the MFP would be better knowns as a Post Apocalyptic Food Processor, because it needs no power.  Then Linda, quite rightly joined the dots and suggested the demand for homemade guacamole would probably be a tad subdued, perhaps she was, by default questioning the demand for MFPs long term. Not sure if I agree completely. Guacamole is always a bit bland - no, subtle - to me in a nice way and I think I'd like that.  I mean, you wouldn't want anything spicy would you after going through a holocaust?  Enough excitement for one day.

The microplane zester

Apple, Orange and other devices

I could surround myself with other bits of non - power kit like garlic pressers, microplane zesters and so on, although what there would be left to zest is open to question.  And I couldn't ask anyone to find out because my mobile phone would have vaporised at worst or conked out at best, knackered by electrical storms.  Now that would irrate  all the hardcore mobile users wouldn't it?  I'm quite into techie bits  as a rule but the obsession with phones has left me behind.  Do you know, the fifth most popular thing to do with a mobile phone now, is make phone calls? The fifth!


In a bit of a tantrum I searched high and low until I found a phone that just makes calls.  Just calls.  That's it.  I'm happy.  I have no immediate taste for Apple, Orange, Blackberry, Chuck Berry or whatever they're called.

'Hey...can I show you the 5,000 photos from my last holiday I have on my Hokey Cokey 2000, or do you need to know the latest train times in Venezuela...?
'No, but I do strongly recommend you get a life..'

Actually this whole Apocalyptic thing is getting a little clearer to me now.  Those of us of a certain age may well remember the government's advice in the 80s when a Big Bang was a real threat.  They suggested we take all the doors off in the house, lean them against a wall, drape a curtain or two and hide inside. Or under the kitchen table.  Not sure if this was a foolproof plan.


A blast of thermal radiation to the tune of several megakelvins through your letter box would be more than a match for the deluxe kitchen wood effect suite from MFI. Safe to say the cat would be in for a hell of a shock too.

Pinot Grigio - weapon of choice

So all in all, as much as I like the idea of manual food processors and the like, I suspect I wouldn't have much of an appetite, guacamole or otherwise.

50 Shades of Threat

We don't spend much time these days worrying about nutters with warheads and fingers on buttons, well not in the way we used to, certainly.  Todays threats have a different twist. We'd booked flights to the States two days before the Twin Towers.  Friends suggested we should cancel.  Certainly not.  Out of the question.  Didn't fancy giving into that stuff really: we flew.  I certainly don't lose sleep because rightly or wrongly, I'm not scared right now of the Big Bang.

However...I do keep being asked if I'm going to the Pampered Chef Annual Conference.  A huge room packed with hundreds of excitable women armed to the teeth with well-thumbed copies of 50 Shades of Grey and unlimited cases of Pinot  Grigio.

That's a different story.  That's why I'm writing this under the kitchen table.  Move over Tiddles.


BTW  If you like what you read, feel free to repost on facebook, twitter, whatever takes your fancy.  In fact I'd like it if you did.  And PLEASE join the page - on the right hand side, it is a bit of a faff, but there we are.  You can always contact me at mikegetscooking on FB or twitter or at mikegetscooking@gmail.com.  Thanks.

Mangoes? You can't be serious?

The Pampered Chef Mango Wedge.  Great when you can get mangos.

Mangos. Seen one recently?

 

Do you know what, I couldn't buy a mango last week.

I had change in my pocket earmarked for a couple of them.  But there wasn't one single mango in my town to buy. Not one. Well, actually that's not quite true.  There was one, in a traditional grocers, but it had clearly been a mango for quite a long time and had long since dispensed with the need for keeping up appearances.  It had let itself go rather.  Even the lady in the shop didn't bother to hide her dismay; she didn't even really try to sell it to me.


'Yes...it's a bit past it, isn't..?' she said in a faltering voice.  But she still put it back on the rack, mind you.

Now I appreciate for many reading this, the situation sounds highly unlikely.  You've already gone back and re-read the first bit.

'Did he say there were none - in his town..!?' 

Well, yes I did.  I checked the supermarkets and the two available grocers.  You see, I live in a small, rural market town.  Even a few miles down the road the mango choice would no doubt have been extensive.  I could have browsed on at a leisurely pace through a selection, tweaking as I went to check for flabby bits or round firm buttock-y type portions.


And this search was first thing, about 8am to avoid any rush on exotic items.  But it was interesting to note the reaction of those I asked.  I had to ask in the shops - something we don't normally do these days - because time was of the essence and I needed to get to the point.

Having received a few startled jumps from the early supermarket gang, unsettled by demands for information on the whereabouts of fruits native to the Indian subcontinet, I dashed instead to the grocers.  The first encounter is detailed above and the second and final was even more brief.  I didn't even really make it through the doors properly. A quick dash passed the Jersey Royals and a chap, still putting out the morning displays, came up to me with armfuls of strawberry punnets.

'Morning!'  Cheery so far, in a grocer kind of way. 'Looking for anything in particular Sir..?'
'Well...mangoes actually, I don't suppose you..?

He shot me a glance that hovered between disbelief and outrage.

Strawberry punnets

'Mangoes?! No, definitely not!' Then, short pause...'Sorry about that' after he'd regained his composure. The look on his face suggested he was far too busy with a potential early strawberry rush to spend time on whimsical requests, I was clearly getting ideas above my station and should really downsize my ambitions. Or maybe he knew that mango peel and sap contain urushiol, the chemical  in poison ivy and I was obviously planning some kind of civil disobedience.

Don't get me wrong, I love living in a small community, I'm not an urban creature. But there are times when it would be great to be somewhere where you could buy more than one sort of rice.  And don't get me started on  polenta.  That can never be an impulse buy, involving a 50 mile round trip; no I'm not joking.

So mango and chilli salsa is on hold until I venture onwards.  I would like to sample the PChef Mango Wedger with its dishwasher safe ergonomic handles and protective storage cover, but...geography will clearly play its part.

There are 35,000,000 tonnes grown worldwide, and the only mango I could get couldn't manage The Last Waltz, never mind a Salsa.
 

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Why have boys taken command of the kitchen?

TV is awash with blokes cooking.  We know that. 

It's possible to watch a man cooking most nights on terrestrial TV and certainly every night on satellite.  And it's likely that the outcome is the huge increase in the numbers of boys cooking at school and choosing food technology, over others, in options.

Equally is that also the reason why so many girls actively don't choose food technology now?  Or is there a more subtle answer to all this?   I've been speaking to food technology teacher, Anne Gamble...

(Press the orange arrow to hear the audio...)

.

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Sheeps bits, samosas and a helicopter

 

 

Haggis samosas?  Haggis?

 

I think I'd be happy to try that.  Just been watching the excellant Hairy Bikers and a Mum Knows Best repeat. I like haggis and I like samosas so it's a done deal. Not that I've enjoyed haggis for a while.  When one of my sons was into rugby, the club organised an annual fundraiser Burns Night.  Very few on our table actually enjoyed the haggis or the tot of whisky to pour onto it.  And yet they went year after year. Meanwhile as a significant fan of both those items, I would leave the Ball roughly the same shape/dimensions of a haggis, wobbling due to  having consumed vast amounts of sheeps bits and whisky.  Whether it was the alarming shift in my centre of gravity due to bloated stomach or the alcohol, I can't be certain.

Thinking back to why so many of my fellow diners shunned the menu, I suppose there's a clue in the ingredients: sheep's pluck (heart, liver and lungs to you and me) with more mainstream onion, oatmeal, suet, spices, and salt, all plopped into a sheeps stomach and boiled until it's given up the fight.  It's widely believed that it's of Scottish origin but there are records of a dish answering to a vague description in Lancashire in 1430. Let's not get involved, there's heritage at  stake here.

Pigs trotters with a hoof

 

As a kid,  I waded through more than my fair share of pigs trotters and tripe.  I couldn't tell you the last time I saw either to buy. Butchers where I live opt for safe cuts they know will sell to what appears to be a squeamish market that's lost contact with food and where it comes from.  And who can blame them?  They have to make a living selling what will sell.  It's our fault, not theirs.

So imagine my surprise when I visited Birmingham some months back at the vast array of meaty bits in the covered market.  It was hard to keep my jaw from dropping.  The star of the show for me was the stall selling piles of hooves. I'm going to presume from a cow.  This is way off my radar.  I have no idea how to cook or what you do with a hoof.  Now Birmingham is about as multicultural as you could find in the UK and that would account for my ignorance, I suspect, living as I do in a small rural market town. I mean, they were sold by a butcher so eating must be the end result...yes?

Apart from eating the unusual (well, unusual by today's standards) there is also the question of eating in unusual places.

Roast dinner followed by a roast dinner 

 

I have eaten on a gas rig in the North Sea.  That was quite some experience.  You have to get there by helicopter obviously which marks it down as unusual before you do anything else.  Inside the canteen, ignoring the fact that you are miles from anywhere and lashed by waves the size of houses, the sheer scale of the eating was legendary.  It may have changed in the years since, but it was roast followed by a roast, with roast to follow.  Seriously, vast helpings and damned tasty.

I also ate a somewhat nervy lunch with members of our armed forces in Northern Ireland during one of my previous careers. You don't forget grabbing what you can with a bunch of  anxious young men in a hurry.

But as I write this, something unusual has happened.  I look up from my laptop through the window and I see the dwindling remnants of sunshine.  We've not had much of that.  And that reminds me...

Some years ago I ran a short live radio project with a couple of colleagues and a shed load of 11 to 18s.  It was hot all week. Really hot. We had an idea.  Can you really fry an egg on a path?  Or a car bonnet? It would make a great feature.

The car thing fell on deaf ears.  The usual kind of response was; "Are you havin' a laugh?  I've just had the damned thing Turtle waxed and you want to practice your Full English?  Jog on Monkey Boy."

So we tried the path. Let me tell you, eggs don't fry on hot paths. They sort of set. Ish. And they take some scraping off later.  I guess they might somewhere, majorly hot, but not our kind of hot. Shell-shocked, I was.  Eggsactly. Oh dear.

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Horns, flags and in the pink. Just another Pampered Chef 'Conference.' See you there..?

Feather boa time 

 

I wonder how I'd look with a pink feather boa?
Interesting thought. I can say right here, right now that not one single feather of any colour or dimension resides in my wardrobe.  That's just in case you were wondering.

Now, I wouldn't blame you for thinking that this is a random train of thought.  You know, what's suddenly make him think of feathery adornments?

Conference. It's not even called 'The' Conference.  Just Conference.  The Pampered Cheffers know all about this and there's a certain tang, a certain zip in the PChef Facebook Action at the moment because they're getting their loins girded in readiness.  I'd like to give more details and a cheeky insight into what happens at an event so eargerly anticipated.  It must be a pretty confident gig if it can ditch the 'The' willy nilly. But I can't because I've never been there. I've heard tales, obviously, but I have no first hand knowledge.

I've seen the pics from previous years and grass skirts seemed to feature heavily. I can sense you're getting a bit lost here, so I'll go back a bit.  Pampered Chef is a direct selling company - one of the most successful in fact; long established in the US, not so long here in the UK where I sit. And in common with such organisations, the selling part is essentially done by those that sign up across the country.  The vast majority are part time and fit it around existing lives, some are occasional, some are full time. And again in common with industry practice there are incentives - a fair steady stream of free products to those that sell - independent consultants - just for selling.


On top of that there are holidays and so on.  The gang are not long back from a few days in Dubai and rather good it was too, I'm told.  The next biggie is a cruise, free to those that sell enough, and that will be a a significant amount of people, let me tell you.  Tempting to think the free stuff tumbles to a select few: not so.

Anyway, now we're getting to the point, although I've something else to tell you about the Dubai trip in a bit. Very saucy. Again in line with everyone else there are conferences where the company plus consultants of various levels all get together, in this case Birmingham. It's in July. There are meetings, workshops on a range of activities including, this time social media, and so on.  Naturally, there's a knees up or two. The pics from last years knees-up suggests it was a Hawiian-inspired event that looked like one of those Elvis films from the 60s.

Getting in a Flapper

 

The main theme this year, if I remember right, is Flappers or Gangsters.  I don't know, however, if this is compulsory garb.  I do know that PChef HQ asked those attending Conference to wear something pink.  This is all in line with with Cancer charity work that PChef does which raises thousands every year.  And all credit to those involved. Next Sunday I will be there supporting my wife and her friends taking part in Run for Life which they have done for several years. We should never lose sight of how important such combined efforts are.

I can do pink. I own a few pink shirts so that's not a problem. My wife has bought me pink shirts previously. Pink is good.

However, I've already been offered (through snorts and chuckles by PC ladies) the loan of a grass skirts, coconut shells etc etc. as they recall previous years.  I've yet to be offered Flapper attire but feather boas have been mentioned. Now, I don't want to seem ungrateful, but...

Hundreds of women, the core of such direct selling, will descend on Birmingham from across Britain. Plus a few blokes. A few blokes. Is the thought of a boa, constricting the number of chaps coming forward, I wonder, not just to conference but the whole picture? I've been thinking of that of late.

Anyway. Will I be there? Don't know. I have several names on my dance card apparently, so that can't be bad.  It will be energising and just damned good fun for those there. As one PCheffer put it to me, 'I went with a hobby and came back with a business.'  And let's not lose sight of how significant that is in such times of reduced incomes.  The chance to add to, supplement, change to a more fulfilling role can't be ignored.

It's just that I'm not sure if  I'm Flapper material. Now, apart from pink, the PCheffers have also been asked to take flags to wave in an Olympics kind of groove and blast one of those vuvuzelas horn jobs that irratate the hell out of football organising committees.  It was car horns last year, apparently.  I've perked up now.  I wish I'd gone last year. A rare excuse to nip to the local scrapyard and rip the horn from an old Sierra. One of my sons has a colossal Cuban flag on his bedroom wall, but I'm guessing that wouldn't hit the right tone.

Oh yes. Before I forget. About the Dubai trip. Well...predominately women again.  And (can't reveal sources, I wasn't there, remember) but, on the plane, by the pool, shopping, one of the main topics of conversation, if not the main topic was...well it involved...how can I put it...ermm..I had no idea women talked about that stuff.

I'll stop now. I'm getting in a flap.

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A pampering fit for a Queen. And an inflatable crown.

Pic from Belinda.

Ma'amite on toast for my Jubilee breakfast?  Not for me thanks. 

Notice the witty twist on the Marmite there? The label, presumably for a short run is a union flag with the 'Ma'amite' wording.  I quite like that.  Bit of thought going on.  I like it significantly more than I like the sticky brown stuff in the jar.  Concentrated brewers yeast on toast, originally from the Bass Brewery, has never featured on my 'to-do' list.  And I would not have naturally thought of it as a likely Jubilee commemoration product.  But then I've just read about French champagne sold at Gatwick, I think it was, with a gigantic union flag all over the bottle.

Now steady on here; French champagne wrapped in our flag?  Thin end of the wedge. Jumping on a bandwagon I suspect. Stiffly worded email to the relevant embassy required.

I do wonder what Ma'am (pronounced 'mam' so I'm told) is making of all this stuff that's out there?  Mind you, when your face is all over the stamps I guess you get used to Royal merchandising.

I fancy some fancies, personally. The nations baker, Mr Kipling has a boxed set of eight 'Great British Fancies' in a suitably patriotic box.  They taste of nothing whatsoever, but I love them and I have no idea why.  What a Great British Fancy is exactly, I have no idea on that score either.

So if my Jubilee tea is to be extended beyond cake, then as an Englishman, I have to have a sandwich.  And there are actually recipes out there for classic British/English sandwiches.  Now, I didn't realise I needed instructions.  Something out the fridge between a couple of slices usually covers it.  Anyway, I nicked this from Fortnum and Masons website:

Proper sandwiches for tea should be tiny and crustless, and cut into triangles, squares or fingers.
Cucumber: Very thin-cut brown bread spread with well-peppered cream cheese, very thinly sliced cucumber and crusts removed.
Anchovy Relish: Unsalted butter and Fortnum’s Anchovy Relish sprinkled with chopped chives.
Marmite and watercress sandwiches: Use thin-cut brown bread and roll up like a miniature Turkish carpet.
Colnbrook: Shredded boiled beef, mace, butter and shredded pickled cabbage (sauerkraut).

Mace?  Mace...? In a sandwich?
And that damn Marmite again, and how exactly do you roll a sandwich  to look like a miniture Turkish carpet? What does a miniture Turkish carpet look like?  There's no call for them where I am.

Anyway, the P Cheffers have been busy across the land making gigantic trifles in vast bowls and truly spectacular cakes all decorated with 'The Flag'.  Sales of blueberries must be at near record levels. Meanwhile I've been dragged around the shops again trying to source 'novelties' for the weekend.  We have the required bunting and flagged-up cup cake paper cases.

There was one awkward moment when my wife spotted red white and blue hair extentions in Primark.
"Do you think these will look daft...?"

Naturally, I shot her a quick look for signs of irony, but there were none. Realising there was an outside chance she might be serious, I pretended to get a text and moved off.

Aside from fancies, the weekend winner for me is the £5 inflatable pink crown in a shop I can't remember. At last, a jubilee momento that makes sense.  What's not to like about an inflatable crown? And pink at that.

Got to be better than that damned marmite, ma'am.