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Showing posts from July, 2014

Languishing Lavender?

 Baking is one of my favourite things. I like the process (usually) and I like the end product (more often than not). My mother didn't bake so I definitely didn't pick it up from her. I can remember the first time I tried to bake a cake. Was I nine? Ten? Did I need a recipe? No. Intrepidly I gathered ingredients and mixed them all together willy nilly: flour, sugar, margarine, dried fruit, glace cherries, milk. No weighing, no measuring, no recommended temperature setting. There must have been a baking tin in the house because I remember putting the mixture into a round tin. I probably kept opening the oven to check the progress. The cake was edible and I thought I'd try baking again. In those days certain shops gave out Green Shield stamps  with purchases, the quantity depending on how much you spent. My mother would distribute her stamps between my siblings and me, and when we had each had filled our first book, she brought us off to the nearest depot where we exchan

Time To Hang Up My Ladle?

Clafoutis: cherries ready Every now and then during the last couple of months my conscience has pricked me. I haven't made soup during that time nor have I formally said goodbye to any remaining loyal blog readers. Goodbyes are difficult. Decisions cause me stress ... or anxiety ... I can't make up my mind which word to use. I have been otherwise occupied. Soup-making was a diversion from my academic pursuits, but I abruptly called a halt to those pursuits earlier this year. While waiting for certain matters to resolve themselves so that I could finally decide about returning to university or not, I undertook a comedy improv course. I had previously done occasional workshops but this was the first time I was able to give some sort of commitment to a continuing course. The course was different to my previous improv experiences in that there were more men, I was now among the oldest students and a group dynamic was nurtured. Then in late spring this year I leaped into a le