Cornflower

Hole in one

    I was in Valvona & Crolla a couple of days ago and I noticed these biscuits on the shelf  - their shape alone had me picking up a packet. They are Miller's Stones made by Artisan Biscuits in Derbyshire, and they are essentially digestives which come in oat and wheat (pictured) or just wheat versions.

   Full marks to them for their striking design and clever marketing (the blurb on the box is entertaining) but also for their taste - I have sampled both kinds, with and without cheese, with tea (they would go very well with some of the Rare Tea Co.'s teas) and with coffee, and I shall be back to buy more as soon as the shops re-open after the New Year holiday.

   My next mission is to try their Elegant and English range, "Classic, stylish and as English as Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn"(!), and perhaps some Miller's Damsels ... purely in the name of consumer research, you understand.

You rang, m'lady?

   I've been watching the new Upstairs, Downstairs and I do hope they will make a full series next year. Meanwhile, I keep pressing the bell in the hope that Mr. Pritchard the butler might appear, bearing a drinks tray or some of Mrs. Thackeray's canapés (I'd appreciate her crimped edges which she felt were wasted on von Ribbentrop), but answer comes there none.

Will you join us?

   I'm just putting my head round the door to say that the Cornflower Book Group's January title (our 37th. book, amazingly!) is posted here. I hope you'll consider reading the novel with us and joining in our friendly discussion any time from Saturday, 23rd. January onwards.

Happy Christmas!

   It's a typically busy Christmas Eve here, so I'll leave you with our eccentrically decorated cake* with its array of icing figures - this year in addition to the snowman and the walrus there is Pippin the puppy, but for some reason poor old Michael Palin has been excluded and Hugh Laurie, with his House MD walking stick and stubble, appears in his stead.

    Happy Christmas!

 

*The cake was baked by the multi-talented and indefatigable Mr. C. who does all the Christmas food, from a raised game pie to tonight's ham, tomorrow's beef and all the trimmings.

Now with added icicles!

Variations on a theme

Before.

During.

After (in the gathering dusk).

A variation on a familiar theme, but with the severe weather, the garden has less to offer this year than in the past (2006, 2007, 2008, 2009). Perhaps next year I'll do something different.

Fast festive food

   Last night I made a batch of Mincemeat Bites (click on the link for a picture as ours were scoffed before I had the chance to photograph them). They are a very quick and good alternative to the traditional mince pie, but I think next time I'll cut them into pieces before baking - not after, as the recipe suggests - thus playing off 'escaped filling' against 'squished pastry'... we shall see which works better. 

What larks, Pip!

     Yet more snow here in Edinburgh, and an extreme weather warning for the area today; not so bad for those of us tucked up at home, miserable for everyone who is stranded or delayed. I hope you're all warm and where you want to be.

Books and cakes - 36

     "The table would be set with watermelon pickles and canned meats, apples and jelly doughnuts and shoestring potatoes, a block of pre-sliced cheese, a bottle of milk, a bottle of catsup, and raisin bread in a stack. Sylvie liked cold food, sardines aswim in oil, little fruit pies in paper envelopes. She ate with her fingers and talked to us softly about people she had known, her friends, while we swung our legs and ate buttered bread."

    Elsewhere in Marilynne Robinson's Housekeeping - and our thoughts on the novel are here - there's an impromptu picnic featuring a bag of marshmallows and "a single yellow chicken wing like an elegant, small gesture of defeat", but I thought I'd use the earlier scene quoted above and make rasin bread to go with  the book.

   My recipe is from Bread by Eric Treuille and Ursula Ferrigno, but there are plenty of similar ones available online. The cinnamon is incorporated in the flour/yeast mixture with the raisins alone being scattered on the rolled out dough - other versions have you sprinkling sugar and spice along with the fruit before rolling tightly to get that finished spiral effect.

    We are eating this toasted and spread with butter - just the thing for the first day of the holidays.

Butter wouldn't melt

Books for Christmas - part 3

      I've got one or two more suggestions for Christmas gifts today - as before, they are things I'm enjoying very much, though the first is not a book as such but 100 Book Covers in One Box:  Rebecca's post reminded me to mention again the super collection of Postcards from Puffin (which I wrote about a few weeks ago both here and here) - too lovely to give away, you may have to buy a set just to keep for yourself.

      If you're looking for a treat for the eye and a stimulating dose of visual inspiration, Jane Brocket's beautiful The Gentle Art of Quilt-Making is just the thing, (and if you're a knitter rather than a quilter, then like me you may already have Jane's next book in your sights).

    Now for some I haven't got but covet:

Angie Lewin: Plants and Places - Frances gives a glimpse of it here.

The book of the wonderful radio series, Neil MacGregor's A History of the World in 100 Objects (a very chunky 736 pages!).

Lastly today, Lucinda Lambton's new book The Queen's Dolls' House - I have a lovely book on Queen Mary's Dolls' House (some pictures from it here) and the house won't have changed in the twenty or so years since that was written, but I like Lucinda Lambton's style and enthusiasm, so this one is on my wishlist.

Chocolate gingers

     Chocolate and ginger crisps - biscuits flavoured with ginger syrup and lemon zest, studded with slivers of stem ginger, chunks of dark chocolate and pieces of pecan.

Recipe by Sarah Raven who suggests serving them with coffee or as an accompaniment to a simple pudding such as poached pears or ice cream, or wrapping them in cellophane to give away.

Diversion

    This is what I've been up to today!

Doe not vaiken sleiping dogs

   "Let sleeping dogs lie" has not quite the charm of the Scots version above - the motto of the Forbes family, to be seen on a seventeenth century coat of arms at Craigievar Castle.

    (Mollie is being remarkably tolerant).

Books for Christmas - part 2

    Simple, homely food and special, celebratory food; you'll find both and a fair range in between in the three books pictured here.

    With Fiona Cairns' Bake and Decorate we've produced memorable birthday cakes (amongst them white chocolate and cardamom rosewater sponge), great treats (sticky toffee cupcakes with salted caramel buttercream) and equally delicious 'everyday' cakes (family chocolate cake, for example). From the basic to the beautiful, this is a lovely book.

    I described Monty and Sarah Don's The Home Cookbook as containing "honest, familiar, mostly British dishes, uncomplicated and good", and I reached for it again just the other day, making a Lemon Drizzle Cake which turned out very well indeed. A comfortable and comforting book, this one, I do like its unfussy style.

    Lastly today, Nigella. We've been using her new book, Kitchen: Recipes from the Heart of the Home a lot and some of her dishes are featuring here almost weekly (I've also passed on a few recipes to Will to try out in his student flat). Often quick, mostly very straightforward, always tasty (and fun to read!).