Bonus post: Christmassy Pigeon

You will be glad to hear that a member of my family tied a piece of Christmas ribbon round the Pigeon's neck. She looks so pretty in it that I am considering getting her a ribbon for each day of the week. 

I hope you all had a lovely day. 

HAPPY CHRISTMAS

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

Happy, happy Christmas to all the dear, Dear Readers.  You are all absolutely bloody marvellous and I hope you are having the finest day.

All good Christmas wishes from The Pigeon, The Pig, and me.

Pictures taken this very morning, on our bright Christmas walk:







And now off I go, bearing my bread sauce.

Christmas Eve

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

What a day of contrasts. There was black cloud; there was bright sun. Like the weather, I was sad, I was happy; I was grumpy, I was blithe; I was exhausted, I was exhilarated.

I can’t quite work out if this is to do with the year I have had, or just the extremes of the Christmas season, or the very essence of life itself. Possibly all three.

Despite starting off stumping about quite crossly in my gumboots, I did, in the end, manage to do all my tasks. The Co-op was not the zoo I imagined, but quite calm. I got all the ingredients for the bread sauce, and the carrot and neep pureé. Then I went up to the village shop for Madeira for the gravy. In a last minute panic, I got a bottle of Marsala as well. Then I thought: oh, so now there will be a Madeira Marsala stand-off over which goes in the special Christmas gravy. As a good liberal, I solved the problem by using both. Third Way, Schmird Way. It's like breathing in and out for me.

I made the bread sauce the hard way, steeping onion, cloves, bay leaves and peppercorns for six hours. That sauce will have flavour if it is the last thing I do. I made a chicken stock. I did the gravy. I pureed the hell out of those damn carrots. (All these things are, I insist, better on the second day. Also, it means that tomorrow I may have a quiet morning.)

I cooked the ham. Three hours simmering in stock, and then half an hour in the oven with a ginger conserve and mustard glaze. I should say I am not usually this domestic. But oh, oh, oh the goodness. I sometimes forget how sad shop ham is. When you cook your own, it is an entirely different animal. It is not just the flavour, but the texture. Regular readers will know that I am a bit of a texture queen.

But still, there was the wrapping to do. I started to get a bit grumpy at this stage. For some reason, this year, I have chosen amazingly unwieldy objects for my family. Why, I thought, as I surveyed the present table, could I not have chosen small, neat, square objects? The lovely Stepfather’s present was so impossible that I gave up completely and put it in a nice bag with some tissue paper. I do hope he does not mind.

I did the wrapping, as is my tradition, whilst listening to the carol service from King’s. The moment the high pure voice of the lone chorister started singing Once in Royal David’s City, I burst into tears. I don’t know what it was. I thought of my dad taking me to midnight mass at the church in Lambourn when I was six. I don’t know why I remember that night so well, but I do.

So that was it, for the rest of the hour and a half. I wrapped, and listened, and thought about my father, and cried. I sang along to the carols, at the top of my voice. Then I cried a bit more. Once I got used to the idea that it was going to be a weeping hour, I just went with it, and it turned out very cathartic. Tears, I thought, are not always a bad, sad thing. Sometimes they are quite the correct reaction, and a relief for the good body. (Better out than it, as strict ladies used to say in my childhood.)

Then I marched the Pigeon through the gloaming, where we stopped to gaze at the evening star, hanging in a sky the colour of forget-me-nots. I sang a few more hymns, to the hills. I suddenly thought that if anyone saw me, they would think I looked like one of those tremendous lady evangelists, from the 1920s. I was Mrs Melrose Ape, from Vile Bodies. All I needed were a couple of angels called Humility and Divine Discontent. I never sing hymns. But it was the time for Oh Come all Ye Faithful, and that’s all there is to it.

I was due to go up and take the great-nieces and nephew their Christmas books. It was important they got them on Christmas Eve, because one was called The Night Before Christmas. I was so tired I almost chucked, but in the end I took some iron tonic and got in the car.

That was one of the best decisions I ever took. The Smalls were sitting up in their beds, ecstatic with the thought of Father Christmas coming. They loved their books. It is rather amazing to me that modern children are still excited by books. Oh, the hugs I got. I said, as I had two little girls on either side, their arms about my neck: ‘You two are the very spirit of Christmas.’

Then I went downstairs and drank a strong vodka cocktail with their parents, The Landlord and The World Traveller, which was also the very spirit of Christmas. We talked of politics, friendship, state funerals, and family, and had a lovely time. We parted on a note of perfect fondness. I thought, as I drove the mile back home, how very lucky I am in my extended family.

And now, I am back. I have checked on all the gravies, stocks, sauces, and other animals. Everything looks happy. The Pigeon is dozing at my side. Frank Sinatra is singing Merry Christmas as only he can.
I think: it will all be quite all right.

Pictures of the day.

Present wrapping station. Before:











The Banned List, by the tremendous John Rentoul, which I am giving to everyone this year:



He is not my friend, or anything. It's just that when anyone writes a book against jargon and cliché, I want to plug it with all my might.

And present table after:





Yet another fold of eucalyptus, because this year I cannot get enough eucalyptus:



General Christmassy room:





The Pigeon was looking so majestic today that she gets three whole photographs to herself:







And the dear old hill:



Obviously, I shall wish The Dear Readers an official Happy Christmas tomorrow, very much in the manner of our own Dear Queen, but I still say a very,very Happy Christmas now. That goes especially to the readers in Australia and New Zealand, who shall already be up and tearing open their stockings.
May your Christmas be merry and bright.

Two good words

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

I am afraid I am going to admit something shockingly sappy. My favourite thing about this time of year is that you get to say Happy Christmas to people. It’s such a simple salutation, but it is oddly pleasing. How often, after all, may you say Happy anything to near strangers?

Last night, a rather amazing thing happened. I have a televisual device called BT vision. It has its limitations, but it suits me. One of the most important things is that you can record stuff on it. My device had broken, and I was getting in a panic that I would not be able to record Kauto Star attempting to win his fifth King George on Boxing Day, which is the highlight of my year.

Of course, I had left it absurdly late to ring. I was convinced that the poor person on the other end of the telephone would be defeated, and there would be muttering about an engineer being able to call some time towards the end of January. I was braced for disaster.

BT has a bad reputation for its telephone helpline. There are many horror stories on the internet. Also, they have their call centres in India, and often the line is rather bad, and I end up yelling at some poor Indian person, simply to be heard over the crackle, and worry that they will think I am one of those awful unreconstructed Britons who believe in shouting at Johnny Foreigner.

Anyway, at about six, I finally got around to ringing. I got a very determined young fellow. ‘I reassure you that I shall get my tools and do my utmost best to solve this problem,’ he said, sternly. I loved him at once.

I explained that I had gone to the help page on the website and followed the instructions to reset the system, to no avail. The gentleman was amazed. ‘No one does that,’ he said. ‘They normally just ring us up. I must say that I am very impressed, and thank you for going to the help page first.’

I blushed. ‘Well, you know,’ I mumbled. ‘One doesn’t like to bother people for nothing.’

We ran through a number of things. I kept having to put the telephone down and go into the next room, whilst the polite fellow waited patiently on the end of the telephone. I was still convinced that he would be able to do nothing. Then, suddenly, the thing worked. My Kauto dream could come true.

‘I don’t believe it,’ I said. ‘You are a genius. Thank you so much for your determination and patience.’ (It had taken forty minutes.)

‘I am delighted to be of assistance,’ said the gentleman.

I asked, because I am always interested, where exactly he was. New Delhi, it turned out.

‘And may I ask your name?’ I said.

‘Shiv,’ he said.

‘Well, thank you very much, Shiv,’ I said. I thought Shiv was a delightful name, very chic and elegant. It’s exactly the sort of name I would like to give to a character in a novel.

Then, and this is the point of this rather rambly story, I wanted to say Happy Christmas. I was filled with festive spirit. But I thought that Shiv might be a Hindu; possibly even named after Lord Shiva. Would it be a terrible cultural faux pas? Would I be like a woman in a Bateman cartoon?

Then the gentleman saved me. ‘Happy Christmas,’ he said.

‘Oh,’ I said in relief. ‘And Happy Christmas to you too.’

The irony, I think now, is that quite possibly that was an exchange between a Hindu and an atheist (although I should not make too many assumptions; in New Delhi you may find Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, Buddhists, Zoroastrians, Jains and Jews). But that is the thing I love about Christmas. It is such a welcoming festival. It does not matter if you do not believe in the literal truth of the virgin birth. You may celebrate the spirit of the season, a spirit of joy and new life and family and love and kindness. You can embrace the lovely, ecumenical ideal of peace on earth, and goodwill to all men, and women too.

It’s the thing I like about the Church of England too, as they welcome people into church who only come once a year, and may not follow strict religious practices, and the vicars smile to themselves as everyone loudly sings We Three Kings of Orient Are.

This morning, I went to the village to do more errands. The sun was shining, and the air was balmy and cool. Everyone was smiling. I took the special fridge cake to the lovely newsagent, who was wearing her excellent festive cowboy hat, trimmed with fur. ‘Happy Christmas,’ I said.

‘Happy Christmas,’ I said to the people in my favourite shop in Deeside, The Black-faced Sheep, where you may find the finest coffee in Scotland.

‘Happy Christmas,’ I said to the kind lady in the chemist.

‘Happy Christmas,’ I said to the gentleman from the Rotary Club who was packing bags in the Co-op in return for a small donation to good causes.

‘Happy Christmas,’ I said to Lewis at the checkout, who looks as if he should be playing bass in Coldplay.

Friends came round to drop off presents, including one from my small nine-year-old friend B. ‘Happy Christmas, Happy Christmas,’ I said.

I have not been feeling awfully Christmassy this week. I have had moments of great missing: for my dear departed dad, for my beloved dead Duchess. I have been rather cross and disorganised. But today, suddenly I got the spirit of the season, and that felt like a bit of a present, in itself.

I listened to a funny programme on the wireless, Jon Holmes and Miranda Hart being very jolly and comical and Christmassy as all get out. Then The Younger Niece arrived, and we walked up to see Virginia the Pig. ‘Oh,’ said The Niece, as we fed her nuts, ‘what a very lovely pig she is.’

Now someone is singing Silent Night. It is giving me chills. I feel happy, and lucky.

I know that Christmas is not always easy, for a myriad of reasons. But I hope that wherever you are, and whatever you are facing, you may find joy.

 

And now, the pictures of the day.

Up the avenue The Niece and I went:

To see Virginia the Pig:

And back down the avenue we went:

 

To see the sheep:

Oh, said The Niece, look at the light:

Then I made The Pigeon pose in the afternoon sun:

Look at her shining amber eyes:

And the hill, gracious and slightly misty:

Oh, and I meant to say: today is the funeral of Vaclav Havel, so I am thinking of that Velvet Revolution again. I am rather pleased and impressed that the Prime Minister made the effort to go himself, rather than sending a representative. Politics is so complicated now, and conditions so fraught and often unknowable; it is very rare that a political operative may do something to which one can give unequivocal approval. So it is rather nice, in the spirit of Christmas, to be able to say: Yes, Prime Minister.

Christmas spirit and chocolate fridge cake

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

THE PARCELS ARE POSTED. THE PARCELS ARE POSTED.

This is not code. I am not doing espionage. These are not Moscow Rules. I am not sidling up to a sauve-looking gent in St James’s park and murmuring: ‘The geese are flying south for winter.’ I am not communicating with my handler. I actually went to the actual post office with actual packages and put actual stamps on them and sent them off.

The postmistress thought the whole thing very funny. I was right up to the deadline this year; only by next day delivery could I guarantee success. Never mind. Someone has to keep the Royal Mail going, and this year it is I. (The queue behind me did not think it quite so funny, as I produced package after package.)

I gave the postmistress some of the special fridge cake, which I had wrapped up in a silver bag and tied with a ribbon. I was afraid that this might count as bribing a public official, or that health and safety would forbid it, but she seemed delighted. And for a special bonus, she was speaking Doric as I came in. ‘Are ye biding at hame, or fit are ye doing?’ she was asking a venerable old gent. (Trans: Are you staying at home, or what are you doing?) I love biding at hame. I am the mistress of biding at hame.

More Christmassy miracles happened. A kind gentleman arrived with a vast load of beech logs, so there shall be crackling beechy fires this Christmas. I made some more of the fridge cake and took it over to The Landlord’s office, which is just across the road. There are about eight of them in there, still working hard, and I thought they needed festive chocolate. And then, dear Amazon in America informed me that if I ordered in the next two hours, and paid an extra seven pounds, I could make sure that the godson in Santa Monica would get his present tomorrow morning. (That does seem almost in the realm of the impossible, a real magical elf feat.) I threw in a present for his mother, my old friend The Expatriate, because I love her and miss her. So they shall have happy reading on Christmas morning.

And since I seem to have dragged myself out of my Scroogish mood, here is the fridge cake recipe for you. I invented it last year. I was starting to make my traditional Christmas truffles for The Brother-in-Law. He adores them, and I like to give him a batch each year, made with love. But there was no cream, and I could not be fagged to go to the shop. So I improvised with what I had, and I came up with this very special sort of fudgy, truffly, chocolaty thing.

Take five bars of best black chocolate. I used Chocolat Menier this year, because it was on special offer in the shop. Also, I love the beautiful green wrapping, and I remember it fondly from my childhood. Add one bar of milk chocolate. I used a Green and Black one with butterscotch chips for extra loveliness.

Break them up and put in a big non-stick pan. Add 150g of unsalted butter, and two tablespoons of runny honey. Very, very gently, melt the whole lot. This will take about five minutes over a low heat. Give it a stir from time to time, but try not to disturb it too much. It’s a texture thing. Chocolate can go a bit funny if you fuss it.

Then take about 100g of hazelnuts and roughly chop them. You can do this by hand, or blitz them up in a processor. Ideally, you want quite big, rough chunks, not nut dust, so go gently.

Then take a pot of glacé cherries. Do not be alarmed. I know that glacé cherries are ghastly orphans of the 1970s. Also, if you are like me, you may have strong feelings about not mixing chocolate and fruit. However, the cherries in this do not taste at all. I think the chocolate mixture is so strong that it overpowers them. What they do is add a wonderful gooey, chewy texture to the whole. Roughly chop them too.

At this stage, you may want to add some bashed up biscuits. This is entirely up to you. I am currently favouring no biscuits.

Put the nuts and cherries into a shallow, rectangular dish. I use a nice white porcelain one that is meant for vegetables; it is about ten inches long, six wide, and two deep. Think about the size of a hardback book.

Pour the chocolate mixture over. Using a spatula, very gently mix it all up, so the nuts and cherries are evenly distributed. Put in the fridge, and chill for at least six hours, or until well set. Then cut it into small squares. It is very rich, so you don’t want huge pieces. The cutting is quite hard, since the thing is very dense; you need a good sharp knife. Then you will have to lever the stuff out with the point of the knife. The end result is not terribly neat, but it has the virtue of looking very homemade indeed.

This amount will make about thirty pieces. If I give these for presents, I put them in pretty silver paper freezer bags and tie them with blue and red striped ribbon. You could put a label on, if you were being creative. I can guarantee that anyone who gets them will love you very, very much, with a fierce cupboard love. I often do inventions which are rank disasters. There is a reason that recipes are recipes. Sometimes, when you go off-piste, you end up arse over tit in a snowdrift. (Did I extend that metaphor a bit too far?) But in this case I got lucky. This really is a lovely and indulgent thing, and absurdly easy to make. I hope you enjoy it.

This is what it looks like:

And, in other pictures:

It was sunny and mild today; the light was quite outrageous. As you may see:

Inside, it was getting quite Christmassy, and the tulips were still going strong:

Suddenly realised we have had an awful lot of Serious Pigeon lately. Here is a smiling one:

The happiness is because she has a really, really splendid stick:

And the blue hill:

Finally, for those of you in my hemisphere, there is GOOD NEWS. Yesterday was the winter solstice, which I quite missed, but which always makes me happy because it means that from now on, the afternoons shall get lighter, little by little, each day. I love the thought of that.

A tea party

Posted by Tania Kindersley.

The great-nieces and nephew come for tea. I am still battling to find my full Christmas spirit, and so it was an excellent tonic to put on a special festive feast. I was also having a very, very bad hair day. But here is the wonderful thing about small people. They really do not care about the hair. They roar into the house, laugh and hug and skip, open eyes like saucers at the various foods on the table, grin their heads off, and tell you their news.

These particular ones also used my Christmas decorations as earrings, admired my tulips, and sang some songs. Then the oldest showed me her highland dancing. They also have a perfect habit of suddenly hurling themselves into one’s arms for a surprise hug. They find this very funny. (There is some science to show that hugging lowers blood pressure, calms the heart, and may even be the secret to longevity; so having the children here is like actual medicine for me.) They also stroked the Pigeon’s velvety ears, and now the smallest of the Smalls can say her name. He was excessively proud of himself.

For the tea, I made: tomato sandwiches, a favourite from my own childhood. Also, cucumber and cream cheese sandwiches. I even cut the crusts off. I made my special chocolate fridge cake, something I invented last Christmas, with hazelnuts and glacé cherries. There was shortbread (bought, not made; I am not quite that domestic godessy) and cocktail sausages and some carrot sticks and egg mayonnaise. I did some little cheesy popover things, also an invention, which are like a sort of cross between a fritter and a potato cake. I was not sure if the children would like those, but the oldest great-niece had four. She kept holding up four fingers and smiling beatifically to show me. And, since I am in a bit of a retro mood, we had lemon barley water to drink. It was very, very sweet.

Now they are gone and the house is silent again. There is just the faint crack and pop from the fire next door, and the slow breathing of the Pigeon by my side. I am going to have an early night and then tomorrow there is the Big Push on the post office. Wish me luck.

 

Some very quick pictures, as I am shattered after my entertaining. (Really must get some more iron tonic, for Christmas stamina.)

The Pigeon, having an awful lot of fun with a very big stick:

And showing off the famous velvety ears:

And the hill, wreathed in atmospheric mist: