SPRING?

I wrote a post last week about seeing the blossom on the trees and the start of Spring.

You'll have to trust me when I say it was a sweet little post because I wrote it but then didn't ever find the time to edit or post it.

What was I doing?

Watching American Idol, starting to pack books ready for the move, taking the train to Sussex for the weekend.

It's in Sussex that the pale pink blossom was pushed aside.

On Saturday we ate breakfast in the garden before jumping in the car to go to West Wittering beach. We bought ingredients for an impromptu picnic - rolls, cold meat, sliced goat's cheese, sausage rolls, a cold bottle of Copella apple juice. We got to the beach where the sun was shining but the cold wind kept us in our jackets even though some people were braving the sea. We ate our picnic and then walked along the beach taking photographs of beach huts, watching kites flying, laughing at the dog who didn't want to get its feet wet. We had goosebumps but I came away with a pink nose and the start of my 2009 freckles.



On Sunday we spent the whole day in the garden. We ate breakfast outside. We sat on the swing seat in summer clothes and sunglasses. When it was time to eat lunch we dragged two tables into the middle of the lawn and sat down to roast lamb with roast new potatoes and vegetables followed by more pudding than should really ever appear on one table.

Do I need to tell you that it was near impossible to drag ourselves away to get the evening train back to London? Do I need to tell you that when my Mum offered to drive me to the station in the morning to get the train to work instead I actually considered it even though I had to be at Euston for an 8am train which would have meant getting a 6am train from the local station?

The one consolation was that by the time we left the sun had gone in. It hasn't been anything other than blustery March weather since.

A HOMEMADE LIFE

When Chris spied the cavolo nero on Sunday I had a vague memory of a recipe involving cavolo nero with an egg perched on top. Eventually that vague memory became more solid, more identifiable, more Orangette shaped. I had remembered it as curly kale but no it was, handily enough, cavolo nero/Tuscan kale/black cabbage.

No one likes having to pick favourites (it is a bit too close to those uncomfortable days of being picked last or, on a good day second from last, for the team during double hockey on a Wednesday morning), but if you made me choose just one blog I wouldn't even have to think about it. It's not that I don't enjoy the rest, I do, but I would have to pick Orangette. It is the only one that has me checking for updates every Tuesday morning while I watch the news and eat breakfast. It is the only one that makes me a little bit sad when there is no update ready for me to read before I leave for work (a rare event), and the one that gets me most excited about cooking, writing, and bettering my attempts with a camera.

So, when I saw that UK Amazon had the book ready to ship a week before its publication date I was pressing 'express delivery' without a thought. We ate the chana masala last week and, thank you Brandon, it was delicious. I need to find a reason to make the cornbread for mopping up maple syrup, the berried pound cake, the chocolate cake so good it became a wedding cake, the pickled carrots, the oven roasted tomatoes, the French toast... I think you get the gist. I read the book too quickly (when will I learn), it was finished and it had made me cry twice, proper tears, on the bus. The wedding almost got me as well but I just about managed to hold it together, if I had been at home on my own it may have been a very different story, one involving swollen eyes and a very red nose.

I thought I would make one of the recipes from the book to post with this but actually, now I think about it, this kale recipe is the perfect choice. When I think of Orangette I think of baked goods that make you want to be invited round for a cup of tea and a chocolate chip cookie, or banana bread (she shares my obsession here), or that chocolate cake. I think of the story that comes with every recipe. And I think of vegetables that are usually dismissed as dull, cabbage, kohlrabi, brussel sprouts, but become utterly desirable when chopped and sauteed and photographed on that white table under the window with the soft Seattle light shining through.



Boiled kale with a fried egg and toast. It may not sound like the most earth shattering stuff but try it and see and for that I will hand you over to the girl in question...

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER

I've been a little preoccupied lately.

In January we found out that we have to move out of our flat at the start of April and so begun much tedious trawling of flat hunting sites. The housing market is quite exceptionally dull at the moment so the same rubbish overpriced flats kept appearing but with more and more agents as the owners became more and more desperate. The fear of the unknown was starting to fray my nerves, meaning bouts of 5 am wakefulness until, on Saturday, we put a holding deposit down on a flat about three minutes walk from where we live now. We move on the 4th of April. Favourite things so far - parquet flooring, windows in all of the rooms, a balcony. Least favourite - fifth floor, no lift. Oh well.

After all the excitement we were relieved and tired, in that order, but woke up early on Sunday morning and, as we were both uncharacteristically wide awake and the sun was shining, Chris suggested heading over to Marylebone Farmer's Market. We have been saying it and saying it and saying it but somehow Sunday mornings came and went and still we stayed in bed and lazed around drinking coffee and left the house at 2pm while wondering why weekends keep disappearing so quickly. So, with this uncharacteristically early start, we were at the market by 11. After a few circuits we snacked on a spinach and cheese borek, bought some bread to have with dinner and decided to pick up a few pieces of veg to eat during the week.

A few pieces of veg became celeriac, carrots, parsnips, leeks (which have all (bar one leek) been made into a vat of soup, the last leek is destined for pasta), jerusalem artichokes, purple sprouting broccoli (more on those shortly), beetroot (to mix with chickpeas and feta for packed lunches), an onion, and some cavolo nero (I'm not sure what to do with this yet and have never cooked it before so any ideas very welcome). An impressive haul and, at just £9.90, a bargain to boot.

So back to the jerusalem artichokes. I chose to ignore their well reported trump inducing properties and flicked through a few books before settling on Nigel Slater (I know, I know, so predictable but isn't a new ingredient exactly when you most need Nigel's reassurance?) and his suggestion for roasted jerusalem artichokes.

ROASTED JERUSALEM ARTICHOKES
Serves two

500g of jerusalem artichokes
One lemon
Three bay leaves
A few bushy sprigs of thyme
Butter and olive oil
Salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 190˚C. Scrub and peel your artichokes and slice them in half lengthways. Put them into a roasting dish and squirt over the juice of the lemon, dot with a little butter, add enough oil to lightly coat the bottom of the dish, tuck in three bay leaves and add some thyme leaves, salt and pepper. Roast for about 45 minutes stirring occasionally until soft and slightly sticky.

We ate this with lightly cooked purple sprouting broccoli and some thick sausages but toyed with the idea of melting cheese over the top instead or just eating the artichokes with a big green salad.

Oh and the trumping properties? They have not been overstated but, as Nigel says, who doesn't secretly enjoy a good fart?

I KNEW IT

I knew there was a good reason for having a freezer full of bananas. The numbers are not reducing as quickly as I would like but we found a new use for them last night...

If your baby is teething (and starting on solids) then just let them knaw on a peeled frozen banana. We tried it with a friend's six month old baby last night and it seemed to work (or maybe he just really likes banana).

A word of caution though, just remember to peel the bananas before freezing. I had to saw one in half with a bread knife before using the vegetable peeler to scrape away the skin. Not ideal.

CHOCOLATE, CHOCOLATE, CHOCOLATE, CHOCOLATE

If you like baking then at some point you are bound to find yourself volunteering.

Charity cake sales roll around and I find myself balancing cupcakes and loaf cakes on the bus trying my hardest to avoid icing sticking to the tin.

Birthdays come and the night before I find myself elbow deep in flour.

Working in Edinburgh there were five of us who could be relied on to produce cakes for any occasion, and sometimes (often) for no occasion at all. Sometimes the sheer quantity of birthday cake tipped into ridiculous but we ate it and we enjoyed it. Of course we did. Four out of five did the Moonwalk in 2007 and raised money by baking cakes to sell every other week. Banana bread, lamingtons, sponge with whipped cream and fresh passionfruit, brownies, cookies. Everyone was a little bit sad when the Moonwalk was over and the excessive baking stopped.

Then last March I moved to London and to my new job and someone's birthday rolled around and out came the boxes from M&S. Apparently I no longer worked with bakers so if I wanted cake to be homemade (which I did and do) then I would have to provide it.

So on Thursday evening I broke out the chocolate to make the quadruple chocolate loaf cake from Feast.



In a last minute fit of laziness I abandoned the syrup (even though I know it is delicious), it was pretty crumbly without and I think it's probably better to include it. It was good, although, to be honest, being the lone baker can be an embarrassing experience. I can only take so many people saying 'wow, Gemma, did you make this?' before the part of my character that hates anyone examining anything I do too carefully starts saying that maybe M&S cake isn't so bad after all. Maybe after a few more birthdays they will get used to it.

WALKING THE WALK

It was always going to take a lot to top snow day.

That sounded like the start to an amazing post didn't it?

Now I'm supposed to tell you how I have been searching for the recipe to end all recipes for the last two weeks, how I have not left the kitchen except to shop for exclusive ingredients with which to wow you.

But I'm not going to.

The snow was just too good. Nothing has beaten it yet, I don't think anything will until the first day of Spring.

Valentines Day was nice. The brunch at Albion was delicious (even if I suspect that the queues will only get worse). But it was no snow day.

The two big bowls of pho last weekend were yummy and left us sated with fragrant cleansing broth. But it was no snow day.

The packed lunch project has been going well with an average of two lunches a week coming from home (this is a big improvement on the previous average of zero) but not even the joy of enough roast beetroot and butternut squash mixed with feta and chickpeas to last not just me, but me and Chris, not just one, but two whole lunches was enough to outshine the snow day.

So with no more snow days on the horizon and too long to wait for a holiday and Spring still feeling almost unbearably far away the only thing I have to report is that I have signed up for the Edinburgh moonwalk. I did it two years ago and at around 21 miles I was asking myself why, why, why couldn't I just hand them the money and be done with it, why did I put myself through this, why were there people saying (cheerfully) 'only five miles to go' (every time they said it I wanted to throttle those otherwise lovely volunteers in their bright yellow tops). But true despair only really kicked in when I thought, for one irrationally joyous moment, that we were almost finished until realising that there were still 1.2 miles to go. I could have cried. So why, why, why, why, why? Sadism perhaps? Or maybe some sick twisted part of me actually enjoyed the torture, the lack of sleep? Maybe...

I'm trying to raise at least £500 which will go to breast cancer charities and, as I am doing this all alone, your pennies will really help me to stay motivated (I hope). If you want to see how I'm progressing just check out my justgiving page.

SNOW DAY

I had planned to write about a few different things by now.

I had planned to tell you about walking to Fortnum and Mason to drink a cappucino complete with miniature ice-cream cone...



and about the pistachio ice-cream that not only tasted delicious but matched the tables in the 1950's style ice-cream parlour perfectly.



I was going to show you the Chinese New Year lanterns in Chinatown.



And I meant to let you know that on Sunday the sun came out just long enough for a trip on the London Eye...



and later, when we were well and truly chilled to the bone, we sat in Pain Quotidien sipping from huge bowls of thick hot chocolate and eating bread and jam.



I had planned to tell you how we bought baklava from one of our local supermarkets and about the way they dripped honey and tasted of orange blossom.

I had planned to tell you all of this but then it snowed.



I woke up on Monday to a thick blanket of snow and no buses on the streets of London. Happily I am reliant on buses so had no choice but to take a snow day. We stayed inside and watched the weather and travel updates. We walked to the park and threw snowballs, we looked at deer with snow on their antlers and a snowman complete with moustache, and when the snow started to fall again we headed home.



It felt like a holiday, it felt like everyone had been given the freedom to play for a day. I think we need a snow day every year if this is what it does to people.

When we got home we ate scrambled eggs with chorizo and bacon and drank tea and I decided it was a muffin day. To be more precise I decided it was a maple syrup muffin day...



Maple syrup muffins
Makes 12
From 'Muffins fast and fantastic, 2nd edition' by Susan Reimer

1 large egg
240 ml (8 fl oz) milk
90 ml (3 fl oz) maple syrup
60g (2 oz) rolled oats
85g (3 oz) butter, soft
85g (3 oz) caster sugar
225g (8 oz) plain flour
3 teaspoons (15 ml) baking powder
1/2 teaspoon (2.5 ml) salt
60g (2 oz) chopped pecans or walnuts

Glaze
1 rounded tablespoon soft butter
60g (2 oz) icing sugar
1 tablespoon (15 ml) maple syrup (plus 1/2 teaspoon milk if needed)

Prepare the muffin tins and preheat oven to 190-200˚C (375-400˚F). In a medium-sized bowl, beat the egg with a fork. Add the milk, maple syrup and rolled oats. Set aside to soak while you prepare the rest of the ingredients. In a large bowl, blend together the soft butter and sugar with a spoon. Sift together (or stir well with a fork) the flour, baking powder and salt. Add to the butter mixture and cut in with a pastry blender (or rub lightly with fingers) until it resembles fine crumbs. Pour all of wet mixture into dry. Stir just until combined, adding nuts during the final strokes. Do not over-stir. Spoon into the tins. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until the tops are lightly browned and feel quite firm. Stir the glaze ingredients together until smoth. Spread on hot muffin tops immediately after baking.