Happy Mistakes

I'm currently on my holidays and so, it seems, are my brain cells. There is always a natural wind-down in the first week of a holiday, when you realise how tired you are, so you sleep alot, eat and drink nice things then come alive a bit in Week 2. Worryingly, I've done the opposite. I was positively buzzing at the start of Week 1 and managed to read three books in two days. Since then, I've been slogging through the fourth book, even though it's actually a very easy read - not too taxing, good characters and a plot that races along nicely (the perfect holiday book). More worrying still, I can't seem to get any of the answers in our daily beach crossword (it's all happening here folks) and - worst of all - I'm making really silly grammatical mistakes. I've been saying things like 'it was wrote', 'warm it is' and 'she rided the bike', and just generally stumbling my way through sentences like a foreigner speaking English for the first time.  

Now you may have gathered from previous posts that I love language and all its intricacies - I read books on word origins, meanings and linguistics just for fun - so for me to start spouting sentences with glaringly poor grammar is akin to walking along a crowded path in Dublin while wind-milling my arms and shouting at passers-by. It is both horrifying (what on earth is happening to me?) and embarrassing (I wince when anyone else uses bad grammar and this is infinitely worse, as I know better). My youngest sister, who is on hols with me, is greatly amused by my grammatical slip-ups - she reckons I never get anything wrong (absolutely not true) and sees this as a breath of fresh air. Perhaps this is a form of Tourette's Syndrome, only instead of cursing or twitching, I use the wrong past-participle? Hopefully, it's simply the result of extreme tiredness and will pass before I head home. If it continues to worsen, this may well be the last comprehensible blog post that I write (if indeed you can understand my ramblings at all). 

In the meantime, I shall leave you with a wonderful recipe for muffins - originally by Hugh Fearnsley-Whittingstall and improved through happy circumstance. The use of lemon zest, lemon curd and ground almonds in these muffins seems fitting, given that I am, at present, ensconced in sunny southern Spain. Both lemons and almonds abound here and are used in both savoury and sweet dishes alike. I first made these little treasures a couple of months ago and haven't yet gotten round to sharing them with you. They are about half the size of the typical shop / cafe muffin, which means that they are a guilt-free pleasure or indeed that you could happily eat two of them (baker's choice). The use of ground almonds helps them to stay lovely and moist - a bonus with muffins as generally they're best eaten on the day you make them (home-made muffins contain less fat proportionally than other cakes and so stale more quickly). 

The original recipe called for the lemon curd to be swirled through the batter in the bowl, but being lazy that day I just dropped a blob into each filled muffin case and popped the tray in the oven. This led to an unforeseen volcano-effect, with the lemon curd bubbling up and spilling over slightly onto the tray (oh dear, I thought, when I saw what had happened). But the butter and sugar in the lemon curd caramelised and formed a crust on top of each muffin, which was such a fantastic bonus that it more than made up for the sticky mess on the tray (nothing a sink full of hot sudsy water couldn't tackle anyhow). The lemon curd beneath the sticky crust remains like the liquid gold it is; a melting, creamy, zingy contrast to the sweetness of the light almond sponge. These are an altogether wonderful addition to my catalogue of muffin recipes and in the event that I continue my slow but steady decline into Jelly Brain, with grammatical errors at every turn, I can console myself with the fact that not all mistakes are unfortunate; some are very happy indeed.

The Great Birthday Festival, Part 20

It has been a festival of many parts and while I do exaggerate slightly in the title (not quite Part 20 yet, though I'm getting there), the celebrations have indeed been many and varied. There were lunches out and lunches in, glasses of bubbly, birthday cakes (yes, plural - who has just one birthday cake?), a birthday dinner, birthday bouquet and lots of fabulous presents. As is ever the case, some of the best gifts are handmade and I was lucky enough to receive some really thoughtful ones: a beautiful, soft grey woollen blanket, hand-knitted by No.1 Sister; a framed photo collage featuring yours truly over the years, which was put together by my Mam (it includes this photo of one-year old me, very much delighted with myself in a rather wonderful lace-trimmed hat); and a playlist of my favourite songs from the last four decades or so, painstakingly selected and burned onto CDs by No.3 Sister (in deference to my car stereo, which is stuck in the pre-digital age).

The Birthday Bouquet

As it was my birthday, I was banned from baking and was instead given the opportunity to select whatever cake I liked for my birthday (which No.1 Sister would make for me). It proved a difficult decision (so many cakes, so little time!) and made me realise how much more I like baking cakes than eating them. Or more accurately, how much I enjoy the combination of creating the cake and then sharing in the eating of it. With the prospect of baking and decorating a cake removed from the equation, however, I had to think long and hard about what it is I would like to enjoy with a cup of coffee on my birthday weekend. 

Birthday Cake No. 1

I had made a chocolate fudge cake for No.1 Sister the previous weekend for her birthday down in Kerry, so it wouldn't be that. A summer staple in our house is the simple but delicious Victoria Sponge filled with cream, jam and strawberries, but much as I love it, my Mam had already surprised me with a yummy swiss roll with cream and strawberries on my actual birthday. The meringue and lemon curd variation of the Victoria Sponge, lovely and all as it is, wasn't calling me either (one of the layers is a fabulous combination of sponge and meringue - a neat trick that looks much more impressive than it actually is, but that's a topic for another day's post). Coffee and walnut cake was a real contender and plans advanced enough that there were discussions of trying a cream cheese instead of plain butter coffee icing. Although it didn't win pride of place as my official birthday cake, it is a variant I am determined to try soon. But ultimately, the only way I could choose was to figuratively remove my baker's apron and hat and pretend I was sitting in a cafe, a cup of steaming coffee in front of me. What would I like to see on the plate in front of me? 

The Definitive Carrot Cake 

The winner, ladies and gentlemen, was the humble carrot cake. It can be found in different forms in cafes and tea-shops across the land; some of them too dry, others too dense and many too sweet and lacking in any discernible flavour. But when it's made properly and decorated as a luscious gateau, it is one of the best cakes you could ever wish to have alongside your cup of coffee (or tea, if that's your tipple). The use of oil instead of butter and the chopped nuts and grated carrots in the sponge ensure that it gets better with age (much like me, ahem). 

Birthday Cake No. 2

The cake remains beautifully moist, so you can safely make it a day or two ahead of time (ever a baking bonus). The addition of lemon and orange zest really perk up the flavours of the cinnamon, ginger and mixed spice, while lemon juice in the cream cheese frosting is the perfect counterpoint to the sweetness. At my request, No. 1 Sister used pecans instead of walnuts - for some reason, walnuts baked into a cake make me nauseous (weird but true), but by all means stick with walnuts if it makes you happy. And if I've learned nothing in my forty years thus far, it's that cake is all about what makes you happy. This is the definitive carrot cake, made to a recipe adapted by No. 1 Sister especially for me, from the 'Best Ever Carrot Cake' featured in the Good Food magazine (see her variation below).

So 10 days on from the birthday and the festivities continue a-pace, but I've taken a moment to reflect (a much needed moment - these extended festivals require some stamina!). With age comes a certain amount of wisdom, but as the saying goes, you learn something new every day. My first discovery of this decade is a modest one (no Nobel prizes here) and possibly already a well-known fact, but I thought I would share it nonetheless: a slice of delicious carrot cake goes equally well with a glass of prosecco (complete with drunken strawberry) as it does with a cup of coffee. Just so you know.

The Great Birthday Festival, Part 1

The Wild Atlantic Way

Today is my birthday and, as anyone who knows me will be aware, that makes me very, very happy indeed. The fact that this is a Big Birthday (as we call them in our house, when referring to the mile-marker ages - 13, 18, 21, 30, 40 etc), means that I can extend the birthday celebrations beyond the usual weekend or week and keep the festivities going for at least a month or two. So although I only turned 40 today, party-time commenced last weekend on a mini-break in Kenmare, when I shamelessly muscled in on No.1 Sister's birthday (though to be fair, we've been sharing the birthday-party spirit ever since I arrived just five days after her first birthday).

G&T by Cocoa Bean Chocolate Co.

As mini-breaks go, this one deserves its very own Carlsberg ad. We had mostly fabulous weather, despite dire predictions by Met Eireann, with the only rain falling on Friday while we were safely ensconced in what is probably the world's best spa (Samas in the Kenmare Park Hotel if you're interested). By Sunday, the sun was shining once more, the sky was blue and the views were outstanding as we drove along a stretch of the Wild Atlantic Way towards Valentia Island. We reached the Skellig chocolate factory just before lunch time and decided to pop in for a look, thinking we might have a browse and maybe (!!) buy some chocolates. Much to my surprise and continued delight, there was a tasting area where you were welcomed by a cheerful chocolate-loving assistant, who made it their business to introduce you to as many wonderful chocolates as possible. 

Now by 'introduce' I mean 'encourage you to eat', which we did. Presentations were made in twos: there was the battle of the pralines (dark chocolate vanilla versus milk chocolate hazelnut); an alcoholic skirmish (Irish whiskey truffle in dark chocolate weighing in against a milk choc strawberry champagne truffle); and a duel of chocolate brittles (dark chocolate mint versus milk chocolate orange). I know there were others - one stand-out winner was the lime zest and black pepper dark chocolate bar - but sadly I can no longer recall the details thanks to partial amnesia as a result of the ensuing chocolate coma. 

Edible G&T 

However, I was determined not to be defeated by the tasting and shuffled along the counter with the rest of the chocolate zombies to the bagged and packaged chocolate treats available for purchase (canny Skellig chocolatiers!). Despite grabbing up more bags of chocolates than I could safely hold, I managed to exercise a little restraint and settled for a bag of milk chocolate salted caramels (amazing) and a bar of Gin & Tonic dark chocolate (yes, really!). The latter is produced by the Cocoa Bean Chocolate Company (also responsible for the fabulous lime zest and black pepper bar). They recently joined forces with Skellig Chocolates (makers of the incredibly yummy salted caramel chocolates) and may I say, I wish them a long and happy marriage and hope to hear the pitter-patter of tiny chocolate feet for many a year to come.

The G&T chocolate bar is, I've decided, the perfect treat to settle down with and enjoy as I launch myself into my forties. I adore nothing more than a cold G&T (made with Bombay Sapphire or Tanqueray gin) with ice and a slice of lime, ideally imbibed on a lazy, sunny afternoon. Unfortunately, alcohol is not always my friend, especially when I'm unwell, which has put paid to many a lovely G&T moment over the last few years. Happily, chocolate is a loyal and constant ally and now here it is, in the guise of my favourite tipple. The fresh lime zest and crushed juniper berries in the dark chocolate somehow fool the brain into thinking you've just had a sip of a G&T, instantly transporting you to your happy place (Margaritaville here I come!). Sophisticated flavours, very pretty packaging and delicious chocolate - who could ask for anything more? The perfect mini-break in Kenmare, a G&T in a chocolate bar and with more treats and celebrations yet to come, this is probably the best birthday festival in the world.