hoppy easter*

* favourite ale at margate beer festival last friday

after having cooked, then squaffed a (may i say so myself) really really good lunch, our friends having gone home to nap ("nap"?!), we are now outside in the garden for the first time this year, fire raging, humph all tucked up in a fleece blanket, listening to odd music (neal's player - mine ran out of battery). there's wine left over from lunch (oh happy days) and contentment runs high.

this easter weekend has been cold, rainy and windy. not at all what we had envisioned but probably what we should have expected, y'know, living in england and all. it was, however, perfectly conducive to staying in, napping, and getting all comfort food-y. risottos and carbonaras, curies and natchos. yum.

and today, i finally made a successful caramel (on the 2nd try). this was almost a disaster as i only had enough double cream for one batch of caramel and one batch of ganache (dark chocolate tart with salty-peanut caramel base - and yes, it was as good as it sounds). and, yes, i burned the first batch of caramel beyond belief. and then i STILL poured the cream in, thinking, (not believing) maybe it's SUPPOSED to be that way. there really is such a thing as being too open-minded.

so, no cream, no problem, this being 2010 and all, we'll just nip to the shops and pick up some more. except that due to some historic (hysteric) law, stores with more than a gnat's crotchet of floor space are not allowed to open on easter sunday in the uk, which knocked out the 2 main supermarkets. This left the small co-op ("smaller than a gnat's crotchet" - you heard it here first). we rushed (literally) to the shop, only to gaze upon an empty shelf bearing the sign "two for one double cream".

"maybe" we said to ourselves, "tesco won't really be closed and we can still buy double cream." neither of us believed this for one second but desperate times, desperate measures, and lo, our faith was rewarded . the tesco garage was open, and had two cartons of long-life double cream, which we snapped up with unseeming (and, undoubtedly to the cashier, inexplicable) haste. i will never understand the workings of uk supermarkets.

anyways 2nd time lucky, tart a triumph, and if anyone has further recipe suggestions for the pint of single cream (bought at the co-op just in case) or the pint of double cream (just in case i needed multiple caramel attempts) please let me know.

insurance cream. good grief.