Growing up, mum always had a dessert, or pudding, on the table at meal times. These were usually seasonal fruit based delights, even in Winter, with a myriad of apple puds to chose from. Mum made the best pastry, by the way. Gooseberry fool, apple crumble, golden syrup dumplings, the Christmas puddings, trifles, pies, baked stone fruit, sago based puddings, both hot and cold, custards, rice puddings...oh, I could go on and on.
Back then, with all the unlimited energy of youth on our side, none of us were overweight, so eating pud at almost every meal was quite the norm...we certainly ate less "party food" those days. A lot more veggies, less meat, (a large roasted chicken, for example, served all seven of us very adequately), no processed foods in our daily diet, so I guess that helped...along with less sugar, cream and ice cream, for example.
I had to think hard what I could use as an image, I am a bit spoiled for choice on this topic, I have to say. I firstly decided on an image of a raspberry sponge I sometimes make for the odd occasion when I have lovely fresh raspberries on hand...It is a pretty simple recipe, really but always goes down well.
It even looks simple. A sponge covered with a vanilla glace icing and decorated with a few fresh raspberries looks a bit ho hum even, but when sliced and served, it reveals a luscious cream and berry filled interior.
The trick is how the top is cut out and the inside hollowed out, leaving a minimal sponge shell. This is filled with whipped cream and whole raspberries, the sponge top re applied and the glace icing applied, fairly thickly over the top and down the sides. This covers the cut line in the top and provides the only sweetness. Fresh raspberries are placed on the top, usually just over the cut line for further disguise. This makes a lovely and fairly portable dessert that can be cut into quite a few pieces. Makes a good birthday cake, too.
Another recipe I hesitated over choosing, both for it's simplicity and popularity, is strawberry sorbet...but I did not have a very good image of this frozen delight. You can check out the recipe here...you won't regret giving it a try next time you have lovely fresh strawberries on hand...
In the end, because I so love the flavour combination, I decided on this image of pear halves, simply flavoured with a little fresh ginger and baked to a translucently rich caramel goodness...food for the soul.
I find everything I do now has to be planned for shorter bursts of activity with more frequent resting time between...very frustrating! Still, things could be a lot worse, I do know that...and I get more crocheting done these days, during rest periods.
Last week Sarah returned a box of cards she had placed in her work office some time back. There were a few cards leftover, ones that had not appealed to her work colleagues. Most of these I popped into a box at the gallery as sale cards...they have almost all disappeared...every one loves a sale, it seems! The remainder, a few Christmas cards and a couple of pretty birthday cards I have repackaged to place in the gallery. I was on roster last Saturday morning, an several customers told me they were buying Christmas presents to send overseas, so I suppose a few Christmas cards might catch these early birds eyes...
We have had a few showers lately and the garden is looking much more lush as the Spring growth gets underway. The compost, additional fertiliser and regular Seasol applications Tim has been working at are certainly helping make things look more prosperous in this rather poor sandy soil.
Better trot, I am reviewing some documents and developing an assessment tool and must have these ready when needed...plus it well past lunch time...all this talk about desserts is making my stomach rumble...mind you, if the lads read this, I think they are going to be a tad disappointed this evening at supper time when they discover it has all been reminiscence and no actual pudding has been produced...;)
Bye now,
Di