Hallowe'en

Well, one culinary triumph follows another. The Bavarian chocolate cream used 6 egg yolks, and what's a girl to do with 6 leftover egg whites?

Make meringue ghosts for Hallowe'en. That's what. And here they are.



It felt all wrong, really, because in my childhood, meringues were Christmas fare. But I thoroughly enjoyed making them, accompanied by all the memories of helping my mother make trayfuls of the things, and then sandwiching them together in pairs, flat bottom to flat bottom, with whipped cream. My mother had meringue-making down to a fine art. I loved feeling the friendly ghosts of meringues past hovering around me, as I tried my own (and no, I've never done them before, since I hear you all asking, in surprised voices - listen, I'm only 45, when would I have had time to try making meringues before now?).

If I'd been writing the recipe for meringues, instead of St Delia, I'd have said something like this: "Heat the oven to 300 degrees, but the minute you put the meringues in, turn it down straightaway, immediately, right then and there, don't forget to do that, don't get on with clearing up, and have a good looky round your kitchen cupboards for black food gel icing for the eyes, because if you leave the oven at 300 for 15 minutes before you check back to the recipe and remember that it told you to lower the temperature, the meringues will still taste fine, but they will be slightly brown, instead of ghoulishly white". Which is why I don't write cookery books, because they would probably turn out rather long. On the other hand, slightly brown ghosts are good, in these politically correct days.

Here's one who didn't make it to school for 9-yo's party, because 9-yo was fond of it, and wanted to keep it at home, all for himself.



Here are some other treats I made for the party.



The website called them forked eyeballs. Forked eyeballs, peoples, forked eyeballs. I made some with red gel icing, and some with ordinary red icing.


Husband said that the ones with gel icing were more realistic, which really begs the question: how does he know what an eyeball on a fork looks like? He also said they looked more realistic than the picture on the website, which is why I married him. Well, it's not exactly why I married him. I don't remember eyeballs on forks feeding into that decision, 16 years ago. But Husband, if you're reading this, you'll be pleased to know that forked eyeballs or no forked eyeballs, I'm glad I did. Decide to marry you. Actually, I don't think websites were even invented then.

Where was I? The eyeballs weren't all as perfectly round as these ones. Dillons (who never replied to me about my query on aseptic drinks, by the way - bad customer service Dillons!) had run out of their own fresh baked doughnut holes, so I had to use the kind that have been sitting in a packet on a shelf since May, and they were so dry that when I forked them, they tended to split in half. Some I managed to catch before they were completely split, and glue together the crack with the melted white chocolate. But I ended up using some halves, to produce oddly shaped eyeballs with one flat side. But this is Hallowe'en, and oddly shaped is good too. Might even be politically correct. I mean, why should we discriminate against people with oddly shaped eyeballs?

Dillons also didn't have any black plastic forks, which would have looked much better than clear. I am falling out of love with Dillons.

Meanwhile, on the costume front, we have been decidedly lack-lustre in our efforts. 13-yo declares himself too old for dressing up. 9-yo is sporting the same alien commander costume I purchased last year from Target. It's a long black robe, with a scary mask which won't stay on very well, so in 9-yo's case, it's a long black robe. 6-yo is a fairy, in a fairy dress that is a little small for her, but looks fine over a long-sleeved stripey top and stripey tights. Originally she was going to be the tooth fairy, as she was last year, but then she thought perhaps she'd be the candy fairy. I suggested the stripey fairy, but that was met with a certain scorn - "the stripey fairy?" - and she concluded that she'd just be a plain fairy. Which suits me just fine, because I'm all out of creative juice after my exertions in the kitchen, and a plain fairy needs no accessories.

Oktoberfest

One of the things I love about blogging is that it gives you a community of people from whom to seek advice on almost any question or problem you may have. It's like having your own personal Wikipedia.

Thus it was that when I was invited to an Oktoberfest, and asked to bring along a German dessert, I knew exactly what to do. My go-to person on German affairs (though I've never actually had any call to consult her before) is Metropolitan Mum, who writes a blog in impeccable English. I didn't know she was German for ages. Anyway, I emailed Met Mum and asked her for an idea for a very simple German dessert (Husband away this last week, and I knew I'd have no time or energy for trying out some fancy concoction). She emailed back, and suggested I give Bayerische Creme a go (that's Bavarian Cream to you and me), and sent me a link to a recipe on a website. This one, if you're interested. It didn't look too hard, and Met Mum had also sent me a link to a recipe for raspberry sauce which looked achievable, so I thought I'd give it a whirl.

The recipe involves making a creamy, eggy, sugary, milky mixture, adding gelatin to it, and then leaving it to cool. Before it sets, you fold in a comfortingly large amount of whipped cream (anything with whipped cream is going to be a success, right?) The recipe says something like "remove the milk/egg mixture from the heat and allow to cool until it begins to thicken". It doesn't say (and it surely should) "don't go off at this point and do something else like checking your emails, or putting away the laundry, or reading the newspaper, because you will probably forget the mixture for too long, and when you open the fridge, you will find it completely set and it will be TOO LATE to do anything about it". What kind of recipe leaves out a detail like that? I tried combining the stuff with the whipped cream (I use the word 'combining' because we were way past the possibility of 'folding in gently' as the recipe wanted), but the result was a clumpy lumpy mound of something that looked really very horrid (though still tasted quite nice - if you ignored the texture, and maybe there are people out there who like small gelatinous lumps in their smooth food).

So, Met Mum, Vorsprung Durch Technik and all that, I thought I'd better improvise. I spooned the lumpy mound into my blender, added a good amount of chocolate milk, and whisked the living daylights out of the stuff. It became light, fluffy, delicate, fragrant... so I quickly poured it into some white ramekins, because we all know that anything in a white ramekin looks good (I sometimes sit in one myself, just to feel better about life), and popped the re-christened Bavarian Chocolate Cream back into the fridge. Even having been whisked beyond death with the chocolate milk, it set nicely.


I'd rather lost heart by this stage, so I didn't try the raspberry sauce, but you can see that I kept the berry theme by decorating each one with a delicate slice of strawberry. You have to realise that these were going to be transported to the other side of town on the laps of assorted children, and I didn't think a flourish of whipped cream, or a dusting of cocoa powder, or a curl of dark chocolate tucked inside a sprig of fresh mint would make it.

When I ran out of ramekins, I used sherry glasses. Sophisticated is my middle name.


So thanks for your help on this one, Met Mum. Not only for the recipe, but also for your suggestion that I should wear a dirndl skirt (sadly, I didn't have one) and impress my friends by learning and performing this song.

Which I totally would have done, except I didn't want to overwhelm them with my multifarious talents, what with the Bavarian Chocolate Cream being such an unmatchable demonstration of my creative prowess.

One thing leads to another, and this whole venture made me realise that taking photographs of culinary delights is really tricky. It's a whole art. I mean, you can probably tell that my pictures just don't do justice to the triumph that was the Bavarian Chocolate Cream. Luckily, should I ever want to improve in that area (can't quite see a future in which I'll be photographing a lot of my cooking, but you never know), I can think of the ideal go-to blogging friend on that too. The blogging community isn't just a personal Wikipedia, come to think of it. It's an opportunity for a masterclass on pretty much any subject you like.

(And by the way, Met Mum, I don't speak German, so I hope that song isn't full of rudeness and obscenities. This is a family-friendly blog.)

Does parental experience count for anything?

You'd think that 13 years of being a parent would count for something. It appears not. That is why, with Husband away this week, the following things happened.

1. I was pondering to myself how some things do get easier, and reminiscing silently how one of the children always used to be ill whenever Husband went away, and how once I even booked a doctor's appointment in advance - which I did then need (or perhaps I was just proving my point), but how they seemed to have grown out of being ill so much. This is known as TEMPTING FATE, and as a parent, you don't do it. We all know that. It's in Chapter 1 of all the baby books.
2. I have not had my antennae tuned recently. We all know that parents need fully-functioning antenna, which can pick up any hint of a "wouldn't you just know it" story before it becomes reality. For the week Husband is away, I am working on Monday and Tuesday, and the boys are off school on Thursday and Friday. This leaves Wednesday as the one day for me, me, me. So when 6-yo creeps into my bed at 5.00am on Wednesday morning, complaining of a tummy ache, why do I not see where this is going? Why do I operate my mind-over-matter strategy on her, saying "I'll get the bucket and we'll put it by the bed, but YOU'RE NOT GOING TO BE SICK"? And then in the morning, when she hasn't been sick and says she's feeling a bit better, but has a temperature of a little over 99, why do I optimistically say "oh, we'll take it again in an hour... it'll probably go down... people often have a slightly raised temperature first thing in the morning" and not remember that that's just when you're ovulating, which, at 6 years old, she probably isn't?
3. When we are driving home from taking the boys to school, and 6-yo announces "I'm going to be sick", I reply "but we're nearly home, very very nearly home, I can see the house, just hold on ONE minute". Yup. That's what I said. Even the most inept parent knows that when a child says "I'm going to be sick", the correct answer isn't any sentence including the words "just hold on". We all know that stopping the car is the only workable strategy at this point, and who cares about the neighbour's lawn?
4. I didn't have a receptacle of any description to hand in the car. Any decent parent has a plastic bag or two in the car, don't they? In the few seconds available to me, I looked at the box of tissues, and wondered if she could be sick tidily into the little window at the top of it. I even looked at her adored dry erase board, and wondered if she could hold it horizontal and keep it level, as a sort of vomit-receiving tray (though I knew this would be cruel beyond measure - she loves that dry erase board so much). So as I sped up the road, the best I could do was to say "open the window - if you're being sick, do it out of the window", forgetting that those stupid electric windows in the back of the car don't open all the way down.

So serves me right, eh? Forty-five minutes wiping vomit off the inside of the window, the inside of the door, the seat belt, the car seat, the car seat cover, the floor, and out of the retracting cup-holder and all its niftily designed little hinges for which no doubt some studious Japanese designer received great credit from his superiors, because none of them thought "this flips shut very neatly, but I wonder how easy it would be to clean vomit out of all the small crevices".

But there's one thing I HAVE learnt as a parent, and it is this. There is NO SHAME in putting the tv on when you have a poorly child, in order to buy you time to write a blog post. So I guess 13 years do count for something.

[Stephen Hawking, by the way. The bad taste joke in the last post...]

Tales from the...

... shh, you know I'm not writing this blog. But if I was, I'd tell you about...

... the person I met today whose little boy is called Soya.

... how I posted a transaction for over $22 million by mistake. Something for my boss to sort out when she balances the books.

... the woman who bought a toy for a child whose name she couldn't remember (not her own child - at least, that's what she said).

... how at home I feel with a boss and coworkers who get my English sense of humour. They are truly like an oasis in a desert. It's such a relief to be able to make jokes in horribly bad taste, and know that people will laugh uproariously rather than be offended. Jokes, like saying that the electronic talking-singing toys might have been inspired by... by... no, too much bad taste for a blog, sorry.

... how I wish Playmobil and Lego used different coloured boxes. They are both an identical blue, and it makes life very complicated. Is it a stand-off between the Germans and Danes?

"Ve choze ze blue first. Ve vill not change to anuzzer colour."

"We may be a smaller country than you, but we have a statue of a mermaid in the harbour of our capital city, and we, too, will not change to another colour." (Sorry, can't attempt a rendition of English spoken in a Danish accent.)

... how you should never ever assume that you are alone in the shop, because otherwise, you might be boogie-ing along to a kid's song, snapping your fingers and wiggling your bottom, and find out that, oops, a customer is watching you.

PS It was actually Sawyer (as in Tom Sawyer). I had to ask, because I just couldn't get my mind round Soya, and I didn't want to refer to the child as 'your son' in every future conversation.

I am sad

I am sad. I am sad and weary. I am sad and weary and I have a question.

Those of you who have followed this blog for a while will know that Husband and I have been trying to return to the UK for, oh, two years or so, this move being dependent on Husband finding employment. One of the bad things about being a stay at home mum is that you find yourself in a position to contribute little to the mix, and entirely dependent on the whims and vagaries of the field of work of your spouse (in Husband's case, a very narrow field). The job search coincided with the credit crunch and its aftermath, and though Husband's area of employment isn't exactly at the sharp end of the business world, and perhaps a little cushioned from other people's harsher realities, no doubt the timing hasn't exactly helped.

I am sad, because we have just had disappointing news of the latest application, and weary, because this feels like boringly familiar territory. Husband has been doing all the right things. His cv ticks all the boxes. He knows how to present it. He has spent time networking with people in the field. He keeps in touch. We do not wallow in what Americans call 'a pity party' each time he is unsuccessful, but get right back up, and look for the next opportunity. He is not picky.

Here is my question, though. Is recruitment in other people's fields quite as bruising an experience as it has been for us - or have we been particularly unlucky? I can't help thinking that in most businesses, the process goes something like this: the job is advertised, a shortlist is drawn up, candidates are interviewed, one is appointed, and the others told they've been unsuccessful. In Husband's two areas of potential employment (universities, and the church - or church-related organisations), the process seems more like entering a maze. It is very common for no candidate to be appointed, and the post re-advertised in a slightly different format a few weeks or months later. It is very common for the process to take months. It is very common for the process to take months, and then to be abandoned. It is very common for them not to bother to tell candidates what has happened. It is very common for the whole thing to be a cover for the appointment of an internal candidate. With crashing irony, the time when Husband was in that situation, and all his department had to do was appoint him to carry on with his research, for which they had received money from the government ear-marked for that purpose and for him specifically by name, they managed to appoint someone else instead, who had no relevant experience at all. The words 'piss-up' and 'brewery' come to mind. It's how we ended up in America.

Is the business world more efficient? I suppose committees of philosophy and/or theology academics were never going to be the speediest and most efficient of decision-making bodies, were they? I picture them all in a room, trying to discuss the relative merits of the candidates, stuck in the mire of theoretical considerations, and going off on tangents from which they have no hope of ever returning.

As for the church, well, I can only despair. Husband has been on the receiving end of the kind of behaviour from senior church men and women, on both sides of the Atlantic, that would make the Pharisees blush. If there isn't a Parable of the Blushing Pharisee, there jolly well ought to be. The inefficiency, the waste of money and time, the in-fighting, the empty promises... Most of all, the sheer lack of consideration. Do these people not realise what kind of effort goes into a job application? And the time it takes? Blimey, if Husband was paid by the hour for job applications and their accompanying preparation, he wouldn't even be looking for a new position, we'd be so wealthy. Do they not realise the emotional energy that is expended? Over literally months? Do they not think what it is like to consider moving a family? Because with every clergy job (not just in our case), it's not only the job that's involved. It's the location, the house, the schools, the whole life? Don't they think about that at all?

It is with this in mind that I am SO tempted to drop in the name of the latest Bishop who has just changed his mind on a job. This job was advertised in April, and then again in September, after a failed first round. Flight tickets had been purchased for Husband's interview. He wasn't guaranteed the job - I get that. So I know that it was a risky business getting excited about the place, and researching what it might be like to live there. No, he hadn't been promised the job, but he HAD been promised an interview. At a week's notice of the flight, he received an email saying the Bishop had decided nor to go ahead with the post at the present time. At least they are refunding the flight ticket (they'd asked us to pay half). And now Husband has to go away and hide somewhere for a week, because of course he'd told people he was going away, and has arranged for classes to be taken in his absence. It wouldn't do for him to bump into students in Dillons.

I realise that this all sounds horribly petty, and of course I don't know the inside story. I don't know what pressures other people are operating under, and I don't know what frustrations and problems they face. But for heaven's sake, STOP promising more than you can deliver. Stop it. Just STOP IT.

Oh, and the reason I'm so very tempted to name that Bishop is this. I know he, or one of his communications staff, will have his name on google alert. I just know it. And I want him to realise that this is a big deal. That for him, what is just a little twist in some Diocesan politics, or an unfortunate mistake, or an embarrassing glitch, for us, is life-changing. I want him to know, because once people get to a certain level in an organisation, they forget what it's like to be nearer the bottom of the pile, and they have people around them who shield them from the memory. They don't even have the decency to write emails themselves (too busy, too important). But of course I won't name and shame, because we can't afford to be alienating people in such a small world. A small sucky world.

Back to my question. Is our experience typical? Is recruitment in every sector such a painful process? Or is Husband just in the wrong business?

I should really retitle this post. I am sad. I am sad and weary. Most of all, I am sad and weary and ANGRY.

Double trouble

We've just been to a music program (concert) in which 13-yo was performing. One of the songs that the eighth grade choir sang was from the witches in Macbeth.

"Double, double, toil and trouble
Fire burn, and cauldron bubble."

When we got home, 6-yo was asking me about it, wanting to know what the words were.

"Why were the witches singing about toilet trouble?" she wondered.

Talking of phrases which get you wondering, she and 9-yo often say "on accident" instead of "by accident". Husband and I have started correcting them. Up till now, it's been one of those family phrases that we fondly think is rather sweet, but the time comes when the need for correct parlance trumps parental doting. It's been a very hard habit to break. Husband and I assumed that they were saying "on accident" because of the parallel with "on purpose", or possibly because "it was an accident" could be construed as "it was on accident". Either way, it sounds odd to us, and we just thought it was wrong usage.

But... in the past couple of weeks, I've heard "on accident" three times - on one occasion it was a child, but on the next two, it was adults (albeit young things).

Is this becoming current usage? Is it an Americanism, or have you heard it over the other side of the Pond?

Indian Autumn

It's autumn. I love autumn, and I always feel more content in myself and with the world somehow. Perhaps it's become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Oh gosh, it's autumn, let me see... do I feel more content in myself and with the world somehow?... do I?... yes... yes... I believe I do!

I've blogged about autumn here before, and posted lots of photographs of lovely trees (you can click on the label at the bottom if you're interested). It's just such a beautiful season, and here, the weather is still warm enough to enjoy being out and about. It's mostly in the 70s, but still a day here and there in the 80s. Perfect. Sorry for those of you in any part of the world (mentioning no names) where it's grey and cold and drizzly.

I don't know much about how Indians chose their names, beyond watching Dances with Wolves, but if I had to choose myself a name inspired by my character or by the natural world, it would be something to do with autumn. Either that or Heap Big Laundry Heap, which would also be fitting.

What would your Indian name be?

And on the subject of Indians, I really haven't fathomed what to call them yet. I know that there will be people wincing as they read this post, because it's just not pc to use the word 'Indian' in many circles. In my early blogging days, I caused hilarity on the East Coast, by describing my 'pool cover-up' as a 'squaw dress'. (Funny to think there was a time when I didn't know what a 'pool cover-up' was...) But anyway, back to Indians. People DO talk about Indians round here, and we have an Indian Center in town, which is unashamedly called The Indian Center. When we went to Colorado last year, we watched a display of traditional Indian dancing at an Indian museum, and the word 'Indian' was used throughout.

So two questions, then. What would your personal Indian name be? And what should I call Indians?

Bless you

Now here's something that is odd, and I don't even know if it's odd because I'm English in America, or because I'm old and times have moved on without me noticing.

When 6-yo went to school the other day, she took a hanky in her pocket. An old-fashioned hanky - you know, a square piece of white cotton fabric for blowing your nose on. I say "you know", but do you? Not one of the other children in the class knew what it was for. When she got it out of her pocket, someone said "what's that?", and nobody could identify the mystery object. Except the teacher (and even she wouldn't guess that the hanky is dried by being hung on a line in the back yard!)

Would your child know what a handkerchief was? Would they keep one in their pocket, or would they always prefer to use a tissue? Just how odd is my family? (Don't answer that last question.)

Post-script: I should add that we do actually know what tissues are, and have boxes of them around, in the Manhattan household. I prefer them, myself. It was 6-yo who, on that morning, wanted to take a hanky to school, and asked for one (which had a butterfly in the corner - always nice to wipe your nose on a butterfly).

More book recommendations

What a fabulous idea for a sequel to Monsieur Saguette and his Baguette from Not waving but ironing (whose blog title reminds me of my own former moniker). Mrs Ruffins and her Wholemeal Muffins. I love it. I can picture her now, a cheerful, homely, English lady, who has as many imaginative uses for her muffins as Monsieur Saguette does for his baguette. She will go on holiday to France, where she will meet and fall in love with the man and his impressive French stick, and marry him. They will live happily ever after, or whatever the French equivalent is. They’ll have children: Mademoiselle Ciabatta, and her brother, le petit Roland, known as Cinnamon Rol. They’ll have two dogs called Crumpet and Scone, and a cat called Sourdough Puss.

I didn’t warn you, by the way, when I was recommending Monsieur Saguette and his Baguette, not to get the book if you are the kind of parent who balks at explaining to their child what an armed robber is, or how it can be ok, in a work of fiction, to eat bread that has been utilised to effect an escape from the city sewers, via a manhole.

But while we’re on the subject of books, people often ask me “Iota, do you know of any books for small children which have positive role models for girls?” Actually, they don’t… but they should, because it just so happens I do. Such books are few and far between, when you think about the volume of printed media about princesses who waft around waiting for their prince to come, managing only to kiss a few frogs or kow-tow to a few evil relations in the meanwhile. Here are two, which I recommend heartily, if you’re the kind of mother who likes to swim against the pink and sparkly tide every now and again.

The book Princess Grace, by Mary Hoffman is great. It's a very thoughtful treatment of the whole issue. Grace is excited when she learns her class are to be in a parade, and she can dress up as a princess. With the teacher's help, the class starts researching princesses, and what it is that a princess actually does. There's a great line where Grace decides that sitting around in a pink floaty dress sounds very boring, and that she’d rather be the kind of princess who leads a bold and adventurous life. I always want to cheer at that point. I would recommend the book for age 4 and up.

The other book on this subject that I like is Princess Pigtoria and the Pea, by Pamela Duncan Edwards. The story starts in the traditional way, but [spoiler alert] in the morning, Pigtoria is so cross with the pig prince for putting a pea under her mattress, that she goes off with the pizza delivery pig instead. It’s funny, and the text is wittily full of words beginning with the letter ‘P’. “Panting, Pigtoria plunked onto her pillows”, for example. This is a book that a 2 year old could enjoy, but 6-yo still reads and likes it.

And if you want a film with a positive female lead, there’s always Shrek. Three cheers for Fiona, I say.