Easter Hymnal to Easter Simnel!

Happy Easter! I have enjoyed a family gathering including an exciting Egg Hunt, an Easter Afternoon Tea with friends and, less enjoyably, a 10k run through local woods. The carrot on the end of the stick became a Chocolate Easter Egg both in my imagination and, thankfully, in reality.

I have baked Easter egg-shaped biscuits, rocky road nests and, for the first time, Simnel Cake.

Simnel cake has been eaten since Medieval Days when people would make a pilgrimage to the mother church of their parishes on Mothering Sunday (4th Sunday in Lent). It was later made by young girls in service for Mothering Sunday and taken home to their mothers as a gift. Nowadays it is synonymous with Easter.

The cake originally contained ingredients which could not be eaten during Lent. It is basically a fruit cake with a layer of marzipan in the middle which is baked and oozes almond flavour throughout. The cake is then topped with a layer of marzipan and decorated with marzipan balls to depict the disciples. I have done mine with 11 apostles, leaving out Judas, 'though some cakes include him (making 12) and some include Jesus (making 13). The marzipan topping is then (bizarrely) lightly toasted. 

Take a Walk on the Wild Side!

Today is the first day of Spring and with it comes a new food season. Think Jersey potatoes, salad rocket, watercress, Spring greens, asparagus, kale, spinach, salad onions, purple sprouting broccoli ...

Yum - so much to look forward to.

Some of our seasonal greens can be foraged from our woods and hedgerows at this time of year. Nettles make a wonderful soup (once you have cooked the sting out of their tale!) Another versatile food bursting with goodness is the common Wild Garlic. It is a member of the allium family and the pretty white flowers and broad pointy leaves can both be used in endless ways. Like spinach, the leaves can be wilted and popped in to risotto, soup, omelettes or served as a side vegetable. The flowers can be sprinkled in to salads to give a gentle hint of flavour in much the same way chive flowers do in summer. 

A lovely way of using wild garlic is in hummus by whizzing together a handful of chopped leaves with the usual ingredients of chickpeas, tahini, olive oil, lemon juice, cumin and salt.

Another idea is to make wild garlic pesto by whizzing together with pine nuts and olive oil (taste and add regular garlic if too mild in flavour).

It is thought that by eating the leaves and flowers, rather than the bulb, that this won't cause bad breath. I'll leave you to come to your own conclusions! 

Try these freebie treats - it's sure to put a spring in your step!

Service with a Smile!

Sitting happily in the passenger seat on a motorway journey this week, the windscreen wipers doing their best to obliterate the oncoming torrent, I gazed out of the window at the scenery, lampposts and signs rushing by. I was struck by the signage for motorway services which now inform drivers of extras,  ie the addition of Costa, Starbucks, M&S, Waitrose etc. Unless drivers are jiggling in their seats or passengers are crossing their legs, one has the luxury of driving the extra mile to reach the destination of choice.

My favourite service station has to be Tebay services near Penrith with its pond-side restaurant and home cooked, locally sourced food. It is the only family run service station and now has a sister site near Gloucester. NB Tebay is a real word. I am from Yorkshire and there are lots of Peter Kay jokes about t-internet. This isn't one about t'ebay!

My childhood motoring memories were of Granada Service Stations which ran from the 1960s until 2001. In the 1960s Service Stations had silver service restaurants (without alcohol) to meet the demand of more people being on the road and the introduction of the Good Food Guide. A far cry from today's fast food offerings.

Granada did, of course, diversify, providing the ITV for the North West, renting TV equipment and working with small hotel chains. 

When I was ten or so, my father bought his first brand-new car; a Ford Granada. At school that year we were learning about pie-charts and the boys carried out a survey on cars. When assessing their information and slicing up their pie, the percentage of Granada owners was deemed too small. The teacher asked us to put up our hand if we were the Granada owner. My hand went up, along with that of my friend Jane. "Ah, two owners?" the teacher quizzed, "I think we'll just put them in with the other Fords". Jane was mortified. Theirs wasn't a Ford but it was a Granada ... A Granada Rental Van!

Travelling around the country and filling up at stations was a joy as a child. There were football coins, Olympic stickers and Green Shield Stamps to be collected. My father had so many Green Shield Stamps that as he delivered his speech on my sister' wedding day, he gave her away ... With Green Shield Stamps!

Fair and square!

Martin Luther King Jr famously said "Before you finish eating breakfast in the morning, you've depended on more than half of the world." 

Fairtrade tell us, shockingly, that there are times of the year when many people who grow the food we eat for breakfast can't feed their own families.

We are currently in the middle of Fairtrade Fortnight and the message this year is to support farmers worldwide with their "Sit down for breakfast, stand up for farmers" strapline. This could be as easy as buying and using Fairtrade coffee, tea, cocoa and bananas, surely something we could all do. Personally I'm going to take part this year and, hopefully, not just for a fortnight. I regularly buy Fairtrade bananas but haven't taken much notice of whether other products carry the logo or not. I do recall that last year even the banana sales were down in some supermarkets.

The Fairtrade Foundation is a movement for change, ensuring that farmers and workers in developing countries get fairer trading conditions and producers have opportunities to invest in businesses and communities for a sustainable future. It is a registered charity and has been active for over 20 years. 

I have just had a quick rummage through my cupboards looking for the Fairtrade logo on my produce. Sadly it wasn't on many of my products 'though I did find it on this ...

... My Cadburys Dairy Milk ... Fair AND Square!