Christmas Pudding

I have just been reading the blog of an American currently living in France who has just sampled "Figgy" or Christmas Pudding for the first time and pronounced it to be a disaster. It would seem that Americans are not too familiar with the use of suet in the production of puddings, which for such an advanced nation is to be wondered at.

You really do have to be very careful though, about whom you allow to cook such a thing because there are some terrible pretenders around.

At its best it is a divine experience that will never be forgotten, for all the right reasons.
It is not absolutely necessary to use suet either, as butter and vegetable shortening are a better option, or you can use vegetable suet, which again is probably a more healthy version. Perhaps I'm fortunate in having a wife who is an expert in such things.
The mother-in-law of one of my daughters produced her version a year or two back which would probably come into the same category as the one sampled in France. She also confessed that it had been maturing for a year, but it was ok because she had cut off the mould. This confession after we had eaten it!
My grand mother use to make a version which relied heavily on stout or Guiness for its colour, and boiled it for 24 hours to within an inch of its life. Cannon balls spring to mind as a description. If you could move from the table after a couple of spoons-ful, then you did well.

I Have a picture here of an embryo Christmas Pudding. When it emerges from its chysalis in a few days time I will record the event.



Note that even traditional British fare can prepared in French cooking pots. We're not proud!

Books

I have recently finished reading a couple of books which really have nothing in common other than their African locations, but which sit well together as a reading experience. The first was "Dark Star Safari" by Paul Theroux and the other "The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency" by Alexander McCall Smith.
The first was the relating of an overland journey from Cairo to Cape Town by the author using only the local means of transport and having no pre-set itinerary. He travelled through Egypt, The Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and South Africa, many of which, whilst being some of the most beautiful places on earth, are also amongst the most dangerous; particularly for the independent traveller.
Paul Theroux had worked as a teacher some 40 years before in Malawi and as a lecturer in Uganda and was trying to rediscover some of the people and places he had known before. The resulting book is extremely well written and it soon becomes clear that the Africa of today is very different to the one he had left in the 60's. The impression given is that progress has passed them all by and been replaced by corruption, famine and disease, the latter two largely as a result of the first. However, it is not a depressing book, and it is obvious that he loves the countries that he passes through and the people that he meets. It is not a picture entirely of gloom, and despite all the difficulties he encounters, he does make it to the end and survive.
What is clear is that the areas that western travellers are taken to on commercial safaries have little in common with the Africa witnessed daily by the inhabitants, many of whom seem to want to get away. I would rate it as a very good read, not only for the armchair traveller.

Book Pics

The other book is one I was not sure if I would like, but was tempted by the sheer number of his books that were in the best selling lists. Most of the action takes place in Botswana, a place not on the agenda for Paul Theroux. The picture painted here, although not glossing over the fact that it is a very different place to western society and inhabited by a people who have very different priorities, you do get the overriding feeling that it is an altogether better place than you get by reading the other book.
After the first chapter or two I was still not sure that I was going to enjoy the book, but suddenly Mma Ramotswe gets under your skin and it was not a book I wanted to put down. There are shades of Miss Marple about it, but somehow more believable. Another good read, and I may well be tempted to try a few more in the series in a while. The author was born and educated in Zimbabwe and now lives in Scotland, but has worked in several African universities includind Botswana, and brings a quite refreshing view to lighten any lingering adverse impressions brought by the Theroux book. A good bedtime read, not too demanding.

More Christmas Cheer

We've just been to the supermarket again; this really is becoming a habit. It seems to be a habit for a great many other people as well. Where do they all do their shopping when it isn't Christmas? One of the great mysteries of life always used to be "where do all the flies go in winter", but I believe that this one about shoppers is even greater. Presumably they all have to eat, unless of course they are all slimming down after the annual winter bingefest that is Christmas, and all now back on their Atkins diet, or whatever is the latest fad.

I gave some thought, as I steered the trolley dutifully around the store, that maybe we should be doing something about supporting the local farmer's market. But are we really ready for such an experience. Having been brought up on supermarket fare for so long, would it be possible to stand in line at a market while those ahead in the queue all discussed the merits of various fruit and veg and working out how best to cook them. Supermarkets do tend to be a fairly quick way of shopping, assuming that the till roll doesn't run out, or that the person in front has not bought too many special offers that require the price label to be peeled off each of them.

And what if, when at the farmer's market, you were asked what sort of cut of meat you would like and what weight it should be. In supermarkets it all comes ready packed, and you get whatever they choose to put in it. Making those sorts of decision is not obligatory, unless you decide to go to the meat counter. On reflection, I think that we shall have to stick with the supermarket, and just wait for mysterious disappearing shopper trick to manifest itself again in the new year.

DDIY

Before I come to an explanation of the title of this piece, I would like to explain that I have just been reading a report that states that in this country, more than 50% of women do their own DIY. I personally find this rather worrying and wonder if that is because it is an indication of yet another female incursion into the world of men, or, because of the fact that I am undoubtedly a knight in shining white armour, I worry about the harm that they might do to themselves.

Hence DDIY; Don't do it yourself (if you are a woman). Now I know that this might raise a few eyebrows, especially among the fairer sex who may have been waiting years for their better half to attend to the leaky tap, squeaky floorboard or other miscellaneous annoyance, not to mention putting right previous failed attempts to attend to the aforementioned items.

I have just been relaying some carpet that I put down in our cloakroom some months ago, full well knowing at the time, that it really wasn't quite right. At the same time I have been correcting a job in the same room done by a so called professional. We had a new suite installed a while back, which looked fine, but didn't smell so good. I eventually traced it to an improperly sealed waste pipe which was allowing less than pleasant fumes back into the room. So much for the professional. Perhaps women, many of whom now survive alone without a man, are also reluctant to call in the professional. Perhaps they are better off without them.

Wherever I feel I can, I prefer to do jobs myself. At least I know they will be done properly. Eventually. There are, of course, limitations to the skills of a former accountant, and the clever bit is being able to recognise what those limits are. Unfortunately, there are some tasks that I feel I have the skills for (basically because they often don't require much skill), but with advancing years, I have to accept that some jobs are best left alone. My wife is often the arbiter in such matters; I do now respect my back more when it comes to hard physical effort. I would not wish to imply from the previous few sentences, that heavy labour is necessarily unskilled. The two may go hand in hand.

My philosophy in the past was always "why pay someone else to do what you are perfectly capable of doing for yourself", and this has admittedly got me in a few awkward situations, like when I dealt with a squeaky floorboard by attaching it to a water pipe stupidly sitting beneath it. The real lesson I learned from that was, never remove a nail from a water pipe until the plumber arrives; especially if you haven't turned the water off first.

So to come back to where I started, DDIY (if you are a woman), (and probably, if you are a man). Most jobs that can be done at enormous expense by qualified tradesmen, can be done by the amateur if they do them often enough to pick up the tricks of the trade, and if they are prepared to put their hand their pocket and buy the correct tools for the job. By which time you could probably have paid for the job to be done anyway. The satisfaction level wouldn't be so great though, and at the end of the day I love a challenge.

Dawn Chorus

I was rather under the impression that the dawn chorus was something that happened in the Spring or early Summer when the male birds were proclaiming their territory. There's a robin around here that doesn't seem to have heard about this and is going at full throttle at about 6:00a.m. every morning. Not, I suppose, that one robin truly comprises a chorus, but the effect upon ones sleep is much the same. I'm all for birds being around, but they really should learn their place.

We do rather encourage birds by use of feeders so I suppose that we shouldn't complain when they take up residence. Our ivy is in fact now home to several dozen sparrows who also create a terrific din when coming home to roost in the evening, but at least they keep it under wraps during the hours of darkness which is now between about 4:00p.m and 7:30a.m. I don't know what they all do in there for so many hours; must be a strange sort of existence especially during the winter months.

The squirrels continue to dig up various parts of the garden in pursuit of the many peanuts that they have buried there during the year. In fact, they often seem to dig them up just to check that they are still there and then bury them again, often somewhere else. They are a bit of a nuisance, but I don't begrudge them there existence as it sometimes provides us with much interest and lightens up an otherwise dull day.