Cornflower

Waterstones Book of the Year is ...

    ... POLPO: A Venetian Cookbook (Of Sorts) by Russell Norman, and it has beaten a very strong field to take the prize.

    We have been enjoying cooking from the book - not just pizza - and we used it for its recommendations of bàcari, backstreet bars which serve authentic Venetian food, on our recent visit to Venice.

    May I also commend the book's 'spineless' design which allows it to open flat and stay that way when in use in the kitchen!

    Here is a short video to give you a taste of the book and a look at its Venetian roots.

Scotland, stitch by stitch

    Last year I posted briefly about the ambitious embroidery project The Great Tapestry of Scotland - stitching the story of Scotland from pre-history to modern times. Lindsay and Dark Puss asked back then which events would be included in the work, and here is a list of the subjects to be depicted in the panels.

    

    The project statistics are worth noting, too: 50,000 sewing hours, 49,000 metres of yarn, over 150 separate panels, and the finished piece - it's due to be completed next summer - will be the biggest tapestry in the world (the Bayeux is as nothing in comparison!).

    Speaking of the Bayeux tapestry, it comes into a fascinating plot strand in Jane Rusbridge's excellent novel Rook, which I was talking about yesterday. The book's setting, the south coast village of Bosham, appears in the tapestry itself, and its history as recorded there affects the stories of Jane's present day characters. This leads me to wonder whether some novelist of the future will use The Great Tapestry of Scotland as material for the page, fashioning a drama, perhaps, from stitches of coloured wool.

Thanks a bunch!

    These little violas (I think they are 'Blue Blotch') have been flowering merrily since I planted them in April. The flowers may be small, but bunch a few together and that powerful colour brightens the day.

    Speaking of blue and purple flowers, in her book Flower Decoration in the House (1907), Gerturde Jekyll advised her readers not to use them on the dining table as the evening light drained their colour. I plucked that tip from Gardening Women: Their Stories from 1600 to the Present by Catherine Horwood.

A few more stanzas

Click to enlarge

    Some postcard images from Rosslyn Chapel, a few more stanzas of that 'poem of stone'.

Top left: 'Forte est vinu[m]. Fortior est rex. Fortiores sunt mulieres: sup[er] om[nia] vincit veritas' - 'Wine is strong. The King is stronger. Women are stronger still: but truth conquers all.'

Top right: one of the hundred or so Green Men in the chapel.

Bottom right: the Apprentice Pillar (click on no. 10 here). There is a cast of the pillar - 'cleaner' than the original as it was taken before damaging 1950s restoration work - in the V&A.

Bottom centre: the ceiling of flowers and stars.

Bottom left: William the Seemly (click on no. 2 here).

A poem of stone

Click to enlarge for a better view

    My thanks to Geranium Cat whose post last week gave me the gentle shove I needed to visit a place I had long wanted to see. This is Rosslyn Chapel, just outside Edinburgh, a late-Gothic building notable for the extraordinary richness of its decorative stone carvings. Frustratingly, photography is not permitted inside, but if you click here and go to 'explore the carvings' you'll get some idea of them - they cover every surface and include pagan symbols as well as religious narratives and references to Norse mythology, and a vast amount of plant imagery.

    The building was described in 1914 as "a poem of stone ...powdered with stars", and it is unlike any church of its period that I've visited. My first impression was of its atmosphere - very uplifting and almost joyous - and then of the artistry and industry apparent in the stonework. It is awe-inspiring, and the place has a reverence about it, but at the same time it felt surprisingly intimate and homely in a way.

    Although we arrived shortly before it opened for the day (and this was a very wet, cold Sunday), the car park was almost full and there was a queue of people waiting to go in, among them - it was obvious - a large number of fans of The Da Vinci Code; I am tempted to read that now to see just how Rosslyn features. Also in the chapel was a small black cat, asleep on a bench. Clearly a regular member of the congregation, this person was well catered for with a scallop shell full of cat treats on the floor beside its chair.

    If you'd like to see more of the chapel and learn of its history and recent restoration, watch this BBC film presented by the Countess of Rosslyn.

Books and cakes - 55

    A baking failure!

    I think this is the first time in 55 pairings of books with cakes (or rather 54, if you take into account the liquid refreshment for My Cousin Rachel), that the results have been disappointing.

    Simon Mawer's The Glass Room - which we're talking about here - involves the consumption of the famous Sacher-Torte, a cake I've made many times, but it also mentions bábovka cake, something I hadn't come across before. Searching for a recipe I discovered many variations, some for a yeasted dough, others with a poppy seed filling. The simplest version was a sponge made with oil instead of butter, flavoured with cinnamon, and divided into two parts so that cocoa powder could be added to half and the light and dark mixtures marbled together in the tin before baking.

    Not having the appropriate tin I decided to make individual cakes, one of which you see here. For starters they all broke as I removed them from their moulds so in shape they are far from perfect, but the texture isn't good either being rather on the claggy side. However, it's the taste which is the biggest let-down as they are far from sweet enough and neither the cinnamon nor the cocoa comes through sufficiently to make their presence felt.

    It's near the end of the book, when the Landauers (or Landors as they are known by then) are in America, that the bábovka cake appears when Veselý is served it by Ottilie's son. I hope it was a bit more appetising than my effort.

Time-and-effort-saving tip

    We had domestic appliances the other day (and many thanks again for all the advice), and today it's the turn of scourers: this Scotch-Brite thing makes very light work of cleaning the bath. I'm not sure of the correct name for them as I no longer have the packaging, but I got mine at Waitrose and I should think they are widely available, and any tip that could make that particular back-breaking task easier is worth passing on.

A Victorian walled garden in Las Vegas

    "We found ourselves in a waiting room of a sports physiotherapist, muscle spray, shea butter, massage oil and warming up cream, next to a disinfected tiled floor and a newly opened First Aid Box. To taste, we moved into the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas with belly dancers and an oriental market - hot like a desert and intense like Turkish delight with rose water - intriguing depth. With water the nose led us into a Victorian walled garden, damp bricks, herbal notes and the smell of a variety of roses. The taste is now like toasted cinnamon bread with butter, an apple crumble with cream and the enticing sweetness of a ripe mango."

    Those are the tasting notes for a malt whisky, and if that one isn't to your taste, how about another,  A Magical Moment in Time, say? -

    "A lady, clothed in lambswool and floral perfume, is seated by a pine forest; she opens her handbag – scents of leather, menthol cigarettes and citric sweets – a waiter brings coffee and Turkish Delights – she smiles beautifully. Her man friend arrives - smelling faintly of sage and tobacco – he orders tea. This was the kind of picture conjured by the nose. The palate moved us on – she orders a luxurious, dark chocolate-covered mint ice-cream – a splash of cognac in the sugary espresso dregs. Sun shines on the wax-polished table – he lights a cigarette and kisses her on the neck – tenderly, lingeringly..."

    No single malt for me - I'm drinking peppermint tea and eating a Bendicks Bittermint as I write this - but Mr. C. happened to be at The Scotch Malt Whisky Society for a meeting today (and he kindly brought me back his notepad and pencil), and when I was looking up the details of their restaurant later, I stopped to read a bit about the whisky. I'd love to test my palate against the descriptions - or perceptions - of the Society's tasters; how about a little French patisserie in a bluebell wood, "ideal after gardening or a walk in the countryside."

Good service

 

    I've said it before, but full marks to the ladies at the Bobbi Brown counter in the Edinburgh branch of John Lewis for their excellent service.

    I was there again today with a daughter in tow, and their very friendly, expert advice was most useful. They know how to keep their customers coming back for more! Particular thanks to Beverley for all the help she gave to Harriet who was looking for special occasion makeup which would be versatile enough for every day. We're quick to complain about bad service, so it's great to have some of the good kind to praise.

Book of the day no. 1

    I've been browsing publishers' catalogues today looking at forthcoming releases, and I've spotted a couple of books I'd like to mention based simply on their short descriptions.

    The first is Play It Again: An Amateur Against The Impossible by Alan Rusbridger, out in January:

"The Guardian editor's account of a remarkable musical challenge during an extraordinary year for news.

As editor of The Guardian, Alan Rusbridger's life is dictated by the demands of the 24-hour news cycle. It is not the kind of job that leaves one time for hobbies.

But in the summer of 2010, he managed to make his annual escape to a 'piano camp'. Here, inspired by another amateur's rendition, he set himself an almost impossible task: to learn, in the space of a year, Chopin's Ballade No.1, one of the most challenging one-movement pieces ever composed, with passages that demand outstanding feats of dexterity, control, memory and power – a piece that inspires dread in many professional pianists.

His timing could have been better.

The next twelve months were to witness the Arab Spring, the Japanese tsunami and the English riots, and were bookended by The Guardian breaking two remarkable news stories: WikiLeaks and the News of the World hacking scandal. It was a defining year in the life of The Guardian and its editor, and one of the most memorable in the history of British journalism.

Such was the background against which he tried to carve out twenty minutes' practice a day, find the right teacher, the right piano, the right fingering – even if that meant practising in a Libyan hotel in the middle of a revolution. Fortunately, he was able to gain insights and advice from an array of legendary pianists, from theorists, historians and neuroscientists, from a network of brilliant amateurs unearthed online, even occasionally from secretaries of state.

But was he able to play the piece in time?"

    Click here to see Jorge Bolet playing the Ballade, and still on matters pianistic, Lang Lang's extraordinary life is profiled in this recent documentary, part of the Imagine arts series (and look out for the delightfully serious little boy Lang Lang is teaching at about the 20.40 mark).

                                                      ~~~~~

    Books of the day nos. 2 and 3 are here.

Domestic appliance tips

    I've been having minor problems with my 'white goods' lately, but a bit of internet digging has given me one solution which I pass on today in the hope that someone else finds it useful, and if you can help with the other issue, that would be great.

    Firstly, the fridge: water - quantities of it - was collecting in the very bottom, and condensation was building up on the underside of the lid of the vegetable drawer and dripping down, with obvious results. I cleaned the drainage hole but also moved all the fridge contents to the middle and front of the shelves as someone had been making a point of sticking things as far to the back as possible to keep them colder when in fact all that was doing was increasing condensation and causing a flood. Problem solved.

    Now to the washing machine: fabric softener has been remaining in its compartment, no matter which programme is used and despite my having cleaned out the dispenser drawer regularly. Today I removed the drawer again and with a torch, some cocktail sticks and a long-handled brush set to to clean the little holes in the ceiling of that area through which the water enters as, according to various sources, this is likely to be where the problem lies. But no luck - everything is as clean as I can make it and still my softener sits undispersed. Any ideas?

Has-beans

    Beans: black eyed, black turtle, butter, haricot, lima, pinto, red kidney, rose cocoa, alubia and mung. Celadon green and mussel shell blue, nail varnish red and pearl grey - it seems a shame to cook them and lose those lovely colours, but stirred into a roasted tomato sauce with some chilli added, their taste was as good as their looks.

Taking stock - 1

    I've been re-organising (some of) my TBR piles today which has meant moving knitting works-in-progress and having a small stock-take.
   
    A question: where do you keep the projects you are working on? Have you devised some clever scheme so that they are all to hand without cluttering up the place, or are they stored away - in which case, how do you prevent their being 'out of sight, out of mind'? Mine have all been in bags beside my desk so that I can pick them up in an odd moment, but those odd moments don't crop up often enough and now I need the space for books. So where to put them? A basket by every chair ....?

On my Christmas list ...

    ...the Labrador tea towel from the Black Toast collection at Emma Bridgewater! I already have this mug - that's for breakfast coffee every day (and part of its sale proceeds goes to a worthy cause, Help for Heroes), but the tea towel would match it and the two real canine residents of our kitchen.

    We got to talking the other day about the differences between cats and dogs, and although I've never had a cat and haven't much experience of them so may not appreciate their finer points, it struck me that one of the things I love about dogs - and which seems not to apply to cats - is their boundless enthusiasm. They show great excitement and keenness for the smallest, most everyday things: "Dog food? Again? Yippee!", and of course they are tremendously affectionate and good company, and you can tell when they are happy and smiling (Pippin really does smile - that has to be seen). But that natural exuberance is such an attractive and endearing quality (and not just in dogs, but in humans, too), so here's to Labs - and all other dogs - who are faithful, greedy, fun, frisky, adorable and quite lazy, as Matthew Rice has it above.

Word for Wednesday

    Wrythen.