Tag Archives: biscuits

Disjointed Notes

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I had a rejection yesterday afternoon. I’m currently at 5 and 3 with two more to go. The worst it can now be is 5 and 5, and 50% isn’t too bad. I’ve written enough on that subject recently so I will pass on to other subjects.

How about a Flying Saucer? We ate there several times when going to see Julia’s family as it used to be at the point where we turned off the A1. I was sure it was there for longer than the time frame reported in the article, but my mind plays tricks these days. I found an article about it while browsing the internet but this link is better.

I then went on to read a list of amusing rude names for British towns and villages. However, I’m trying to portray the image of a clean-living, serious-minded poet here, so I won’t provide the link as it’s not for the fainthearted and I wouldn’t want to upset anyone.

This one, on the other hand, is quite interesting. The trophy, which is even more interesting, cost £125 when it was made, which was a lot of money at the time.

We had steak for tea. Julia received two boxes of gifts for Mothering Sunday via Amazon, so I thought the least I could do was produce a decent meal. I did oven chips, as they always seem better than wedges, and I found, as usual, that onion rings at home are never as good as onion rings when eating out. We also had peas with garlic and mushrooms, so I kept the veg level reasonable. My vision didn’t extend as far as a fancy pudding so we had fresh fruit.

You need very finely chopped garlic when making the peas (a new recipe for me, if you can call it that), every time I peel  garlic clove I remember an incident with a teacher. I was demonstrating on the farm and had trouble peeling one. He told me, in front of the whole class, it wasn’t even worth trying to peel cloves as it wasn’t possible.  Several teachers did that sort of thing o me. I doubt they would have appreciated me walking into class and correcting them in front of their pupils.

I needed three more and prepared each of them in seconds. It’s normally that easy, and he looked like an idiot.

Whenever I peel a clove of garlic these days I think of him and regret the incident. I shouldn’t have continued to peel the cloves, but I needed them and couldn’t think of a tactful way to do it and let him save face. Having said that, much as I regret it, he brought it on himself. A true dilemma, and not really my fault, even though I do feel bad about it.

I’ll post some pizza photos from my great days as a baking instructor, such as they were.

 

 

What I Did Today.

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After writing the post yesterday I beans on toast with scrambled eggs. Protein, fibre and tastes good. I resisted the lure of bacon.

I checked my comments and email a couple of times more and spent time on a piece about Cromwell’s Head. I then made a light lunch and Julia went out. I stayed in and cooked Pasta Bake, Cheese, Onion and garlic Soda Bread and Rock Buns.

The bread took more liquid than usual and needed longer to cook. I think it was the new flour – needed more liquid. It was close to being undercooked, but just squeaked in as acceptable.

The rock buns were far too soft and  far too flat and smooth. They weren’t rock buns, but they were very nice biscuits. Somewhere there will already be a recipe on the net for them with a traditional name. They start with this recipe and I substitute 100g of vegetable oil for the 125g of butter. I also had to cut up about 60g of apricots to use as dried fruit as I was short of that too.

All in all, not very productive. Tomorrow I will prioritise the writing I have been avoiding. That’s the trouble with a list – you can still avoid things and tell yourself all is going OK.

It’s like the talk I’m preparing. I felt good at getting a complete outline down on paper, but I have not done anything much since, I really need to work at it a little each day. However, i cooked and baked today, which is good. It keeps me moving and adds to my repertoire.

No photos of the rock bun biscuits I’m afraid, they were just too good. Maybe next time.

Pickled Eggs and Gingerbread

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Biscuits

I started off by writing a post called “Things I Wish I’d Done”. By the time I’d done 150 words I’d depressed myself and, if I’d published it, would probably have spread this depression round. It is currently dispersing itself in cyber space, a selection of pixels slowly growing smaller a bits flake off. The only thing that survives is the title and a memory, but the way my brain is going, the memory will be gone fairly soon.

That’s the beauty and the tragedy of memory. Long term memory survives (which is why my Dad could still beat me at dominoes when he was over 90 and suffering with dementia). The tragedy is that you can remember all your mistakes with painful clarity. But you can’t do anything about it.

Anyway, enough about memories. I bet you’re wondering how far I got with my planning for next year. Having said that, anyone who has read this blog before isn’t going to be expecting too much. In fact, my dedication to procrastination is so pronounced that I’ve just been tidying my desk rather than getting down to any actual work.

Peppermint creams in preparation

The facts of this morning are that I got up, started work just before 8.00, wrote a post I deleted, looked at a few comments, checked emails, had breakfast, decided to have some toast, made coffee, washed up, watched birds and squirrels, sat at the desk, tidied desk, paid some bills and finally wrote something. As you are probably already thinking – it wasn’t worth the build-up.

I’m off to boil some eggs and make cauliflower soup now. I’m doing a dozen pickled eggs for Christmas – six ordinary, six with chilli. That should see us through to New Year and after that I intend trying to make a new recipe a week and try to bake every week. That, as you may have noticed, has no bearing on my poetry plans for 2026. I did however, write about baking in a poem I had published in Contemporary Haibun Online.

I had the title for years, because I’d used it for a blog. It looks like I had the title for nine years, in fact. It took me starting to bake again before I found a poem to go with it. It’s not even original, I pinched it from The General of the Dead Army by Ismail Kadare.

Look at that, an effortless slide from biscuits to Albanian novelists. Makes you wonder what this blog is coming to, doesn’t it? There was a time it was all compost, alternative toilets and sausages. Those were the glory days when I was trying to make the world a better place. Now I’m just happy if the world is still there when I wake up in the morning.

Poppies and corn wreath

 

An Addiction to Words

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Wilford Notts

You can tell I’m addicted to writing. Today, trying to have a rest and gain some perspective I started by ordering groceries online and ended up writing reviews for groceries. I didn’t make a decision about it, I just found myself doing it.

For breakfast we had cereal and raspberries. Somehow, which were starting to go over just days after purchase. I wrote for a while then made lunch (potato cakes using last night’s mash, leftover sausage and tomatoes, all baked in the oven). Normally I fry the potato cakes. They are, I can conform, nicer fried, but less fattening done in the oven. They also, despite a good layer of oil, managed to bake themselves onto the tray.

Tonight we will be having chickpea and sweet pepper veggie burgers with cashew nuts and spring onions. It’s an amalgam of several recipes taken from the internet. I looked at several so I think the method is right and am pretty sure the ingredients will be OK when mixed. Also got garlic, Henderson’s relish, cumin, cumin seed, oatmeal and egg in it. And no chemicals.

Speckled Wood

It will, I forecast, be tasty, but will fall apart and be vaguely disappointing. Very much like my life. Last week I tried my hand at cooking for the first time in ages. I tried olive oil biscuits with vanilla essence, lemon zest and honey. There was nothing vague about the disappointment. They were soft, lacked flavour, and had an unpleasant texture. I struggled with them, Julia refused to eat them and the birds loved them. We put one lot out, crumbled up, and the birds cleared them in minutes. Next day – same result.

If anyone has a recipe that uses oil, so I don’t have to do much kneading and crumbling of butter and flour, I’d love to know about it. I will also make sure I have all the right ingredients. It may be that my several changes to the recipe are to blame for the end result.

Also did quiche last week. can’t find the photos. They came out well, though I did have help in the shape of ready-made pastry cases. They are much better than the cheap ones I buy from the supermarket, and much more expensive too. I will be making more this week, though I am tweaking the recipe.  When extra expense brings better quality I am quite happy with it, though I will be looking at the costings again this week. Reducing the ingredients by an egg doesn’t save much money, but it does save calories.

Fresh Figs

I lost the photographs, so you will be treated to a selection of almost appropriate photos of yesteryear.

What Happened Today?

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Let’s see . . .

I have a complaint about work, but I won’t make it here. It’s a good job I have little choice or I would have walked out a couple of years ago. Working for other people, particularly other people who won’t invest in decent equipment, has a short shelf life and if I were younger and fitter I would have gone ages ago. Slow, second-hand computer, rudimentary camera, toxic work atmosphere. I would, I confess, have walked out two years ago if I could. I still, as plans stand, have just over a year to go. It’s going to be hard.

Wheatsheaf Loaf

I spoke to my rheumatologist today as part of a routine telephone appointment, asking about getting a blue badge, which would make my life easier. I am now booked in for an X-Ray and consultation with a knee specialist. All I want is a blue badge. Give me a disabled parking bay and I will be happy. With that I can start going places again. Next year, after I retire, I can start the X-Rays and stuff. This year I just want to be able to park next to my destination, not quarter of a  mile away. Is it too much to ask?

Cooling the biscuits

Got home to find that Royal Mail had tried to, deliver a parcel again. They tried yesterday and I used the website to rebook the delivery – tomorrow. So today I rang. Couldn’t get past the robot gatekeeper until I made several deliberate errors and they said they would get help for me. Estimated wait time to talk to a human being (with no guarantee of intelligence, even then,) was 50 minutes. That’s right, even after selecting the phone option you are still one robot and almost an hour away from being able to speak to someone. At that point they thanked me in advance for my kindness and consideration towards their staff who are doing their best. That was just about guaranteed to make me sarcastic and, not wanting to spend an hour hanging on the phone, I left. This, of course, is exactly what their system wants you to do.

Saltdough poppies

I have registered a complaint and have to wait 72 hours for contact. This may or may not include Saturday and Sunday. They probably don’t count them in the 72 hours.

Of course, if my suspicions are correct, this is all caused by Spink the auctioneer, who have sent my package to my billing address rather than my delivery address. They have done it something like four times in eight purchases. Once I was in when they did it. Other times I have had to pick it up from the letter office before going to work, or arrange a redelivery. It’s just another aspect of modern life – nobody offers good customer service these days.

Poppies on the windowsill

Today’s pictures are from simpler, yet more interesting times – wheatsheaf loaves, ginger biscuits and saltdough poppies for Remembrance Day.

My Life as an Inaction Hero

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I had a lazy day today, to rest after my hard day packing parcels yesterday. Did I really work six days a week at one time? Or even five? I feel like a friend of mine who,,years ago, detailed his activities shortly after retiring and said plaintively “It’s a good thing I’m retired, or I’d never be able to fit it all in.”

He had, of course, made two cardinal errors – said “yes” when asked to go on a committee and allowed his wife to get involved with planning his day.  Wives are wonderful things, but they are, unfortunately, not to be trusted with a man’s time. That’s why I intend having a shed or workshop when I retire. Ideally a shed with a moat and drawbridge. That way I will be able to call my time my own and find things even years after putting them down.

I’m actually thinking of making that my First Rule of Lethargy – an object which is at rest will stay at rest unless it is acted on by a wife, or the kettle is out of reach.

This is the first proper saturday I’ve had off for a while,a nd I was able to devote the middle portion of my day to watching Sharpe and the bits at either end to eating. Murder She Wrote served to fil lthat awkward afternoon gap. We are now about to eat vegetable stew and watch some quiz programmes.

I see on the news that Donald Trump is threatening to start a new social media platform and that the Queen and prince Philip have both had their Covid vaccinations. That’s nice to know, as we really need a new social media platform, and it brings my vaccination date nearer.

To be honest, neither really affects me as much as the fact that we are nearing the end of the Christmas biscuits and are likely to be reduced to eating Digestives by then end of the week. It’s just that I am sometimess eixzed by the need to write for posterity.

Gingerbread and Vitriol

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I could start with my normal Saturday opening – “After dropping Julia off at work…” but I’m feeling like doing something a little different today. Same goes for the photos of the Mencap garden yesterday morning. They are OK but I’m just feeling like something more is needed. (As the post developed, not quite in the direction I intended, it became a little negative. It developed naturally, as I wrote, and I decided to let it stand. Not quite sure if it’s too negative or too personal. Let me know if you have any views on the tone.)

And that is why I am showing you pictures of cookie cutters.

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Novelty Cookie Cutters

I’m torn here. I love alliteration and I am committed to resisting American English. In the case of cookie cutters I feel as if continents are colliding in my head. I really don’t want to say “Cookie Cutter” but some irresistibly force makes me do it. There is no natural alternative – Biscuit Bodgers just isn’t going to do it. I’ll try Biscuit Cutters and see if that works.

I found the cutters recently whilst decluttering. They had disappeared without being used during one of the chaotic times on the farm. We made a lot of gingerbread with the group and these cutters (with six different designs) seemed a good idea.

The problem was that after the introduction of the Farmer’s Sister into the mix everything went wrong. It started with her telling me “we’re all on the same team” which is a management shorthand way of indicating we weren’t all on the same team. Then it progressed to her shouting at me because she said I thought she was stupid because I had a degree and she didn’t.

All I had done was proof read something I’d been asked to proof read and send her the corrections. It seems that this was wrong – I should have sandwiched the suggested changes between telling her how good she was, how valued she was and how hard-working she was.

There’s a vulgar term for this, but rather than expose my gentle readers to it I’ll post a link to it for those of you who are interested.

The truth is, I don’t have a degree.

I also, at that time, didn’t think she was stupid. I just thought that she had made a mistake that needed correcting. She had used a word wrongly. I can’t recall what it was, but it was something like uninterested/disinterested. It’s no big deal. I have to think hard when using affect/effect. Getting something like that wrong doesn’t make you stupid. If someone had corrected me on it I’d have thanked them and looked it up to learn the lesson fully.

No, what made her stupid, for I did eventually have to admit she was stupid, was her refusal to learn or improve.

We were stupid too – we should have realised that it was time to move.

However, that all belongs to another story, and stupidity was probably the least vile of her personality traits.

After the team comment, and the shouting, she started a turf war, and kept moving out stuff. We had to start moving it back home every time we used it, and eventually, things got lost in the confusion. That’s how the cutters became lost.

Other things disappeared and turned up in bins or dismantled in the workshop. Like over-sized children the Farmer and his sister knew nothing of how they got there. She took down the group’s art work and binned it. She once needed a book for kitchen use, so she took the garden diary book off the shelf, tore our notes out and took the book away.

Sorry, but it just seemed the appropriate time for this to be mentioned, and once I started, I thought I would finish.

Anyway, back to biscuits. I found the cutters. I will make some biscuits.

Here, to provide a happy ending, are some previous biscuits (and some peppermint creams.

Grantham Gingerbread
Peppermint creams in preparation
Peppermint Creams – the finished article
Cooling the biscuits
Grantham Gingerbread dough
Cutting out gingerbread men
Gingerbread Men
Biscuits

 

Partridges, Photographs and Pheasants

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After dropping Julia off at work (she works at one of the few centres in Nottingham that wasn’t closed today) I went to look for a sunrise. There was a small one, but as I chased it down it became duller, smaller and less impressive, so I didn’t bother.

I did manage to get a picture of a Red-legged Partridge in front of a backdrop of oilseed rape.

In some ways it’s a picture of all that’s wrong with modern farming – a non-native gamebird against a background of monoculture. As it’s the only decent photograph I’ve taken in the last seven days I’m not going to dwell on that thought. It’s a sign that I’m getting better and have now recovered enough brain power to spare some for photography.

I accidentally photographed a pheasant and missed a hare too.

I spent most of the rest of the day back in bed sleeping (I’m still convalescing, after all) and when I finally got up Number One Son made me an excellent beef and horseradish sandwich using meat left over from tea last night.

We aren’t popular: it seems Julia had earmarked that for tomorrow night’s tea.

If you think I’m unpopular now wait and see what happens when she examines the biscuit barrel.

Tree, rapeseed and a pheasant

Can you see the pheasant?

A Man Without a Smiling Face Must Never Write a Blog

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Or, as the Chinese proverb says: A Man Without a Smiling Face Must Never Open a Shop. I’m dubious about many of these so-called Chinese proverbs, but the content is accurate, even if the attribution is not.

I’ve been unloading the stress of the day by complaining about roadworks, emails and various other things when I thought I’d look up the ten worst days in history. Compared to them I’m doing well. I have not been killed, tortured or rendered extinct today. Nor am I hungry, thirsty or in fear of my life.

In fact I’ve had a more than adequate day. It would have been better for the absence of roadworks, emails and the variety of other things that happened, but we did make jam and  biscuits, we did start to get the Technicolour Dreamcoat song right and we did have a visit from a representative of the Woodland Trust, who thanked us for our efforts in tree recording, gave us gifts and delivered copies of the latest report. It’s nice to be appreciated by someone. Sound people, the Woodland Trust, and I’m not just saying that because I’ll be needing a job in a month’s time.

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Our Woodland Trust Reports

Quite apart from the work they do with the farm, they have supported Quercus in various ways over the years and always treated the group with respect. Working with them is one of the main things we are going to miss when we leave because it’s a proper project with the possibility of important results. It’s a bit more serious than looking after a few hens or making biscuits, though I do like chickens and biscuits. Mainly biscuits, if I’m honest.

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Biscuits

 

Anyway, back to smiling – it makes everything seem better. I could have made myself quite miserable by moaning about my day, but instead I’ve made myself happy. (Though that may be because of the biscuits).

 

 

 

Pride, a fall and more gingerbread

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I was very pleased with myself last week after the gingerbread baking session.

Obviously I should have known better, pride going before a fall, and all that. Or, Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall. (Proverbs 16:18) for those of you who prefer your quotes accurate.

To put it another way, whilst having a second go to make sure the recipe works, I had a bit of a problem and the biscuits were not as good this time. I won’t bore you with details, but I will have a bit of a rethink.

Then I tried making Grantham Gingerbread. They are a traditional biscuit, first produced by accident in 1740, and not really like a gingerbread at all, being light in colour and sweet in taste, with not much ginger flavour. That will be something that changes before the next batch.

Grantham Gingerbread
Grantham Gingerbread dough

Mine turned out looking suitably cracked, but rather flat, at which point I remembered that I should have used self-raising flour rather than using the plain flour I had just used in the gingerbread men.

Even so, some had risen and had honeycomb centres, so they weren’t too bad.

Based on a post in Pies and Prejudice (a fine food blog, though modesty prevents me mentioning who writes it) I had an unusual salad with my lunch today – nasturtium leaves and flowers, feral rocket and a cultivated sorrel leaf.

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Foraged nasturtium salad

Julia and the girls started to assemble the poppy project ready for November, using the poppies made by using the bases of plastic bottles.

Poppies made from plastic bottles
Poppies and corn wreath

We had enquiries about Men in Sheds, an educational visit for next spring, renting the room, apple pressing and a forthcoming visit (the teacher wants to know what we have planned – I’m not sure she is expecting the answer “nothing” so I’d better get thinking).

At the end of the day, we had unexpected visitors, which was pleasant, and gave me a chance to offload some biscuits.

That’s about it.

I’ll be going soon, just need to get down on my hands and knees to find out what is jamming the bottom drawer of the filing cabinet.

There’s always something…