The Incident of the Sugar Coated Son

It was only a matter of time until it happened.  A stealth trip into Alfie's room in the depths of the night, I close the baby gate behind me on my way out only for me (in my not really awake state) to fail to realise the baby gate has not closed correctly.

Usually I would have placed money on Alfie having made straight for our room when he woke.  But this is Alfie, and he rarely does as expected.  And so this morning Tash and I awoke to hear the faint 'chink chink' of glass bottles downstairs.  As Tash dozily wondered "can he get to any bottles in his room?" I was already off down the stairs to see what he was up to.

And what was I greeted with?  Two (already) empty vokda bottles on the kitchen floor, Alfie sat on look-out with Harry under the stairs, and a kilo bag of caster sugar sat just outside their 'den'.

And it was then that I learnt;

  

PLUS

EQUALS

Its not often he starts his days with a shower, but today was one such day.  And all before 7am.

The Mad Hatters Macarons

It was many months ago that I spoke to Dawn and she said she'd really love for me to do the cake for Dale and her wedding ... but they didn't want cake, in keeping with the Mad Hatters Tea Party theme they wanted an array of biscuits and cookies.

So time passed, I had fleeting thoughts about what to do but kept coming back to the conclusion that macarons would be perfect for the occasion.

We were really busy in the build-up, and it wasn't until a few weeks before the wedding that I got to think about the finer details, and then the week before that we managed to do a few trial runs.

Oh yeah, and I'd never made macarons before!  My first two attempts were complete failures ... not in the end result but in the fact Esme always needed attention and the macarons ended up being made by Tash!  Although we were taking steps, we knew our piping nozzle was too small and the end results weren't quite as I was after.

And so it came to the week of the wedding.  After discussions with Dawn we'd planned some choc chip shortbread and then a range of macarons.  The plan was to design a range of macarons that tasted complely different to how they looked.  And so as the wedding week kicked off we were facing making 200 macarons consisting of choc orange (dark choc shell and green ganache), rose (blue shell with white ganache), spiced (green shell and dark choc ganache) and finally a 'peanut butter and jelly' (white shell with pink decoration and peanut butter and jam filling).

With making 200 I quickly learnt how things should look and what I was searching for ... and I knew I wasn't happy.  Everything on the net made them seem like some mystical baking challenge that can take years to perfect, and I even bought a wee book to help me!

I tried many things but I always felt my mixture was too thick and I ended up with too many 'nipples' on my shells.  Plus the difficulty of learning what setting the oven needed to be at and precisely how long to bake for to ensure the perfect shell.  There were just too many variable at this point!

Come Thursday night I did a load of reading on the net.  I still wasn't happy and I felt my sugar content was too low and mixture too wet.  I looked at loads of recipes and found a gem of information.  It was recommended to use egg whites that were 24 hours old, or give them a quick blast in the microwave to slightly reduce the moisture in the egg whites.  And so with a new technique and a new recipe I was confident all my problems would be solved.  I was up at sparrows fart to hit the supermarket - and 40 eggs and endless amounts of ground almonds later I was ready to get going.

I'm pleased to say it worked an absolute treat and Tash and I spent the whole of Friday (the day before the wedding!) pretty much making all new macarons.  There were some from previous days which were OK, but in general I was making them over again.  With each batch they got better and better and I think the final peanut butter and jelly ones looked fantastic!

One thing I've learnt is that everyone has a different recipe and a different oven.  You need to find a recipe that works for you and a setting/timing that works for your oven.

So here's how I do 'em;

3 egg whites
50g caster sugar
200g icing sugar
110g ground almonds

Step 1 - Stick your icing sugar and ground almonds into an electric mini grinder and give them a quick whazz.
Step 2 - get your egg whites in a suitable dish and nuke for 10sec at 50%
Step 3 - Get your electric whisk in action and go crazy on your egg whites until you call hold the bowl above your head and you don't end up wearing it.  Or stiff peaks, stiff peaks is fine.
Step 4 - Add the caster sugar a third at a time until you have a really sweet glossy mixture.
Step 5 - this is where you add and any flavourings or colourings to your mixture
Step 6 - with a 10mm nozzle pipe your macarons onto a baking sheet loaded with some baking pacrchment.  Shells want to be about 40mm in diameter
Step 7 - leave to form a slight 'crust'.  Likely to be 30-60 mins.  Basically you should be able to lightly touch the top and have no mixture picked up by your digit.
Step 8 - Get em into the oven - 11 minutes in your 150 degree preheated baking machine.
Step 9 - Take em out, let them cool a little, remove from baking sheet.

Now all you need to do is work out your filling!

Mark Webber Bought Me A Fishing Rod

Here's where I tell a tale of how I bumped into the Red Bull F1 driver Mark Webber in my local tackle shop and after tipping him how to catch monster bass he thanked me by buying me the Daiwa Kenzaki fishing rod I'd been after for over a year!  But that would be fabrication, lies, tall stories and white elephants.

I did however get my rod, and Mark Webber did indeed play a large part in the process.  The story is a very short, simple and sweet one though.  I like to have a bet on the F1 and saw the bookies offering me 25/1 on Mark Webber to win the Monaco Grand Prix last weekend.  With the Red Bull looking fast, Webber typically driving better than Vettel this season, and him having won previously these seemed ridiculously long odds.  So I stuck £3 on him.  And he went and stuck his Red Bull on Pole Position!  With Monaco being notoriously hard to overtake I was over the moon and although the last ten laps had me right on the edge of my seat as the wet weather closed in he drove an awesome race and netted me £78.

And yesterday my new toy arrived!  I spent ages researching rods and looking for something that was not only up to everything I might throw at it, but also nice and compact.  The Kenzaki is available as a 2 piece, but I chose the 3 piece as it means I'll have a rod that fits in a suitcase!  Cannot wait to get out on the boat now, the rod is simply gorgeous and feels so nice in the hand ... just need to feel it with a fish on the end now!

If The Mad Hatter Threw A Wedding

A few weeks back (May 12) Dawn and Dale brought about an occasion which very rarely happens - my good self wearing a suit!  They had chosen a gorgeous summer spring day at Marygreen Manor in Brentwood to finally tie the knot and open up their relationships to all the benefits(?) the current government choose to bestow upon married people.  Everything from the invites to the dinner table had a Alice in Wonderland theme to it and it made for a unique, beautiful and relaxed day.

The buildup had been frantic.  And that was just for us at FTC.  I was honored to have been asked to provide the 'cake' in the form of choc chip shortbread biscuits and various flavoured macarons.  There will be a blog about this in the very near future, but lets just say come the start of the week I was still yet to learn how to bake a macaron!  I figured that if the Mad Hatter did macarons then nothing would taste as they would look and so that is the path I went down.  I just wish I'd had Heston's mobile number!

We did a day trip down to Brentwood and were very pleased to see that upon our arrival most of the biscuits had arrived in a condition very close to that they left Arlesey.  All that was left for us to do was unpack, change (cos you can't trust Alfie or I to travel in 'smart' clothes!), sink a G&T, and get ready for proceedings to begin.

Dawn looked stunning, Dale was terribly dapper, and with Alfie and young Imogen (Dale's niece) leading them I can't think of anything more perfect to get people in the gushy wedding spirit.

They had a lovely service, albeit slightly interrupted by a young boy who was unsure if he wanted to share his limelight ... he had a captive audience after all!

With fingers now wearing new bands it was time for photos.  Tash set up an amazing spread for the 'tea party' whilst the snappers were at it and I think it looked better than either of us ever imagined it would do!

We were in a lovely little room which had a real intimate and welcoming feel to it.  Before each course it was time for a speech with Dale, Dad and Simon (Dale's best man) all taking their turn.  My Dad's speech was really good, and I'm sure Dawn was very relieved.  There was loads he could have brought up but somehow slipped through the net ... Bec & Pen anyone!?!?  It was sometime during the speeches (or more than likely the pass the parcel interlude!) that Alfie acquired a whistle ... that whistles a quack.  Need I say anymore?  He still has it in the Benz and creases with laughter each time he hears 'quaaaaaaaaaack' resonate off my windscreen.  These stoppages between courses gave people the opportunity to enjoy a bit of croquet, sadly minus flamingos, and generally chat and drink in the sunshine outside - a sure sign of a wedding going well!

After food came drinks and biscuits aka the Mad Hatters Tea Party that Tash has so wonderfully laid out.  Thankfully I am led to believe went down well although oddly enough I didn't really fancy one!

And finally the day was rounded off with a lovely reception all kicked off with a first dance.  I was dead impressed with their choice of song, I know it off the film Juno which I suspect is where Dawn first heard it.  My dearest wife excelled herself here and managed to get it all captured on the Powershot!

It wasn't long before the events of the day had caught up with Alfie and we chose to hit the road.  It was a beautiful day and here's some of my other shots.  All 100+ of my photos can be seen here.

 

Esme's 6 Month Birthday/The Batsford Family Holiday 2012

With such a fantastic forecast for the week I had made comment that I wanted to go to the beach ... and that day ended up being today!  We only decided in the morning, and Tash had to be out at some mothering convention this morning so it was only going to be a flying visit ... but a chance to give Esme her first paddle in seawater - on her 6 month birthday(?) - was too good an opportunity to miss.

And so it was that by 1pm we were in McDonalds.  Yes, you did read that correctly.  But time was short and road snacks/lunch was essential!

The chosen destination was Walton-On-The-Naze, a place I always used to holiday when I was a child and even with me living about as far inland as you can get in this country its still one of the closest places by the sea to me!

With many childhood memories I was really looking forward to take our kids there, and I had long wanted us to have a day away that could end in fish and chips by the sea.  Although sure the beaches would still be lovely I was sure the place wouldn't be as I remembered it ... now some 20 years ago in the distant past!

Some things just never change though!  I'm not even convinced the poor old pier's had a lick 'o' paint in all those years!

We arrived around 3pm, and having had a good nap (oh yes, the boy actually took a nap!) it was clear Alfie and Esme were super excited!

And, with the tide high (something I was keen to note as I'd brought a rod with me) we took a walk along the front and gave Alfie a chance to go mad on his bike.   The tide was right up against the sea wall but as we rounded a corner a different part of the beach opened up presenting us an opportunity to get down on the sand.  With only a handful of people about we were down on our beach towel before a Germans key could even rattle in the hotel room door!

And so Esme had a paddle and Alfie had a play.  With so much space I'm not sure he quite knew what to do with himself!  Having got his toes wet he went wild in the sea, and as you can imagine soon had his clothes removed before the inevitable 'toddler lack of talent/balance' reared its beastly head.

 

Having enjoyed a few hours on the beach our tummies were begin to rumble, but instead of Gruffalo crumble our favourite food is Fish and Chips!  And so took a walk back to the car with a quick detour to have a look at the pier which was also much as it had been 20 years ago ... although not much opens until June.  As Tash spotted though, it has a very sweet script above its entrance.

We found a place close to the seafront and enjoyed dinner looking out across the waves.  To top it all it was probably the best Haddock and Chips I'd ever had!  Pictures of this part of our day are non existent, we were both too busy trying to make sure we got some food inside us before the kids devoured everything.  Esme might have only recently started weaning but she'd stolen scampi from Tash's polystyrene tray and soon as the wrapper was opened!

And so with full bellies we departed the sunny seaside town of Walton-on-the-Naze.  As Tash is still job hunting its hard to justify spending money, but the time we all have together is worth a fortune to us and today was simply magical ... a definite justifiable expense, which is a good job as this day trip will probably end up with the tag 'Family Holiday 2012'.

We took over 70 photo's during the day, if you wish to see the rest they are here.

Totally Addicted to Bass

I have loads of blog updates to work through as we have been mega busy recently - reorganising kids bedrooms, attempting to cage chickens, visiting friends, baking four thousand macarons and even a wedding has made everything a little crazy recently!

Because of this though, it was nice to chat to Bill last week and him casually drop into the conversation that the forecast for Saturday looked ideal for a fish (which basically means no wind) and did I fancy it?  After our recent crazy schedule, DID I EVER!

And so we made our way down to Maldon for the weekend and had a perfect time relaxing and catching up with friends with a fishing session in the middle.

Not only was the weather and wind predictions perfect for a fish, so was the tides!  We were up at 6am, had time to visit the tackle shop in Brightlingsea for some bait, and out on Reel Grumpy fishing before 10am ... and with high tide not until midday confidence was high.

The plan was to visit Bill's 'secret spot' for some bass action until slack water and then chug a bit deeper to try a few other spots and see what else we might find.  We had a bit of a wager going, with £3 on offer for the first fish of each species caught, £3 for the biggest of each species, and £5 for the most fish caught during the day.

Photos from the day are few and far between, but that's an indication of what a good days fishing we had.  The 'secret spot' produced well and it didn't take long for Bill to get into a dinner sized bass.  The action continued as high tide approached, just sadly for me most of it falling to Bill's rods.  That was until out of the corner of my eye I caught sight of my rod bounce and the sound of Bill squealing had me striking before I could enquire how serious a take it was.  Turned out it was a pretty fierce take, and feeling the fish dive as it got close to the boat gave me a good idea that this could be a nice sized fish.  A few seconds later the fish surfaced and I think we were both pretty shocked and excited to see the size of it roll on the water top.  With the fish safely netted and aboard it was time to break out the scales and the camera!  The scales tipped round to 3lb3oz - a personal best for me, and the biggest that Reel Grumpy has had aboard! 

 

The day continued well with Bill kicking my ass on the gambling front as he caught first and biggest Whiting and even a cheeky Eel!  I couldn't care less though, catching dinner absolutely made my day!

And so that night the beers were well and truly on me and it was my Bass on the barbie to feed everyone, just a good job it wasn't too much bigger or we'd need a bigger barbie!

April 2012 at FTC

I've actually been fairly on top of things this month, and there isn't the usual mass dump of photos and videos needed to catch up with things.

So here goes, just a few photos and videos to illustrate what we've been up to.  More a visual representation of the daily madness at FTC.

I haven't managed to get in loads of cycling this month.  Largely due to me losing my waterproof jacket at the Start of Summer Specials ride I did, and this April then being - as Michael McIntyre would say - the wettest since records began!

As a result the skies have, at best, looked like this!

But in the middle of the month we did all manage to get over to Chicksands.  I spent a few hours hitting the XC trails whilst Tash, Alfie and Esme went for a lovely walk.  Even though this was before the weather really turned, we still got caught in an enormous hail storm! 

Incidentally, you can see the quality of the photo isn't that great?  The Canon Powershot A1200 had got a little worse over recent weeks until last weekend I decided to return it to Currys.  I think it had bounced once too often!  They happily replaced it for me and so I'm pleased to say the point and click photos which now seem to make up the bulk of the images on this blog are back to a quality I'm happy with.

Other than that, Esme has continued to pile on the pounds and now with full head/hand control is loving her Bumbo!

Following on from this, Esme has even taken her first steps to eating real hooman food!

And she's now graduated from being sat on the table like a Christmas centre piece to having the joys of being seated next to Alfie in the Me Too.

And finally, April was the month Alfie really showed an interest in speech.  Amongst a few alternatives, he mostly likes discussing underpants and beer.

A Place Down Under

17 April

I need to write some words down now as life as Tash and I know it might hugely change over the next few days and I want to remember what goes on.  If the past few days are anything to go by they sure will be action packed!

With Tash being made redundant we decided to look at jobs overseas as well as within the UK.  One option to us was New Zealand, a destination we have long spoken about moving to and hugely appeals due to the lifestyle and work/life balance.

Tash seems to have a few very positive and helpful recruitment consultants on side, and numerous Skype chats have been had followed but CV's being presented ... but as yet getting nowhere.

Until Now.

Basically a Government Department in Wellington has failed to fulfil a position and having seen Tash's CV they are very positive about her.  So positive that they want to see her face to face.  Of course Tash has agreed to this, on the condition that they fly her over.  It then gets complicated because there are clients and recruitment consultants and all other parties involved ... but it has all boiled down to the recruitment consultant offering to book the flight and Tash going halves if she doesn't get the job and paying the full amount back to him (the business I presume) if she does get the job.

This currently leaves us in the position whereby we are rushing to get Esme a passport so she can fly out with Tash.  The next decision is to decide on the length of her stay as we don't yet know how many interviews Tash will have nor how quickly she will get an answer to this interview.  We suspect they will want her to start immediately if she does get offered the job which could even see her not board her return plane and actually stay in NZ.  Alternatively we might decide to give NZ a go anyhow, and Alfie and I will join her a few weeks later (so as to see my sister get married) and then see if Tash's redundancy payout will support us for long enough for her to find a job.

Craziness.  We are currently running around working out what to do in case she does go out and not return.  We need homes for chickens, the dog, the snake, the chinchilla and of course not forgetting destinations for cars and caravans!  Today is 17th March.  Her flight is potentially 27th March.  What a ten days this promises to be!


18 April

A quiet day on the NZ front today.  I guess it comes from recruitment consultants needing to go back to clients to get everything 100% confirmed before everyone commits. Tash has told Matt (the recruitment consultant) that she knows where she stands with regards Visas, and also plans are in place for Esme to join her with babysitting facilities already sorted.  Hopefully this will put people at ease who might have had doubts.

We ran up to see Larry in the afternoon to get him to countersign Esme's passport photo.  We have an appointment with the passport office tomorrow and we'll be getting a fast track 7 day turnaround passport for her.  This means Tash and Esme should be good to fly together anytime from 8 days time!

The next few days promise to be interesting!

19 April

Another crazy day today.

We awoke to the news that the interview has been confirmed, and the recruitment consultant saying "lets get this moving!".  He is due to call when he is in the office which could be anytime from now ... so I am typing fast!

This left us just a passport to sort for Esme, and we had the appointment booked for 4pm.  As Tash and I were checking we had all the documentation together and that the forms were filled correctly her phone rings.  Turns out its ANOTHER recruitment consultant, this time wanting to put her forward for a 12 month role in Hong Kong!  So now there are two potential foreign destinations for us!

We then realise Larrys signature was a few mm outside 'the box' and a quick call to the powers that be confirmed that this would make their machine explode and we would need to complete another form!  This left us running around to grab a form, grab another signature, and then fly up the A1 to Peterborough to go through the formalities.  This 7 day service we signed up for though now appears to potentially take 8 days as we were told Esme's passport would be with us by next Friday ... the very day Tash is potentially flying to NZ!!  It could become squeaky bum time next week!

20 April

Things are moving apace now.  The conversation with Matt (the recruitment consultant) went well, and Tash confirmed everything for him.  There are offers of car seats and various other things to make life easier for Tash whilst she's gonna be out there which is nice.  It was agreed she will fly out on the Sunday 29th April, the interview will be on the Thursday, and then her return flight will be booked for the following Sunday (6 May).  Following the call Tash sent details across to Matt for him to book the flights.  Its now just a case of waiting for confirmation ....

21 April

A quiet day today.  It's Saturday so we weren't expecting much to develop.  That said, Esme's passport arrived today - just 3 days after filling out the application that was supposed to take a week!  That's one concern well and truly taken off our mind!

23 April
With yesterday being Sunday we hadn't really expected any development, but I certainly hoped to awake this morning (Monday) to the news that Tasha's flights had been booked.  This would leave us in a position to arrange her accomodation and also babysitting for Esme.  Sadly this has not been the case.  I hope Matt has just been busy, but he hasn't replied to any of the the messages that Tash has sent him.  His Tuesday will start around 9/10pm UK time tonight so I'm hoping we might get an update before bedtime.


25 April
No news for two days has had me starting to think that this opportunity was going to fall down before it got going.  But after 48 hours of silence Tash had an email from Matt last night saying that the hold up was due to Fronde (the company) trying to negotiate Tasha's rate with the Government Department (the client).  I presume this rate is the rate that they can bill at as opposed to the rate Tash will be paid.  Either way, for the moment all we can do is sit tight and plan accordingly.

This is still a massively crucial week for us in terms of employment though, even if this NZ opportunity does stall.  Tash had an interview with KPMG on Monday, has an interview with Centrica on Friday, applied for another NZ job on Monday and is waiting to hear back about an opening with Cathay Pacific in Hong Kong.


26 April
We're now into Thursday, and over in NZ their working Thursday has finished.  Again, no updates have been received so it looks less and less likely that Tash will fly this Sunday.  If she does, she sure isn't going to get much notice.


The only other development we've had is that her interview on Friday has been cancelled.  The job has already been given to someone and so the position no longer exists.


27 April
Well this week certainly hasn't gone the way we expected!  The latest update Tash has had is that all jobs have been out on hold and they have suspended interviewing people.  Who knows the level of truth behind the tale, but it certainly means Tash won't be boarding any planes this weekend!  What with that, the cancelled interview and no news from the Cathay Pacific/Hong Kong opportunity the week has kinda withered away into something of a damp let down, a bit like the current weather.  Still, on the flip side she had the KPMG interview on Monday which we're still waiting to hear back on and also found another three NZ jobs which we applied for yesterday.


29 April
So today is the day Tash was supposed to be boarding a plane but as we already knew this isn't happening.  I have pondered about what to do with these recent entries - whether to junk them as they aren't particularly interesting or to post them as the do still document our first real flirtation with emigrating.  Seeing as you are reading this you can assume I opted to click the 'publish' button - a decision I took because although this opportunity hasn't flowered it certainly won't be the last time we look to get a move to NZ happening. 

Puddles + Wellies = ...(Big Bang 2012)

I guess that any blog entry about Big Bang should be about stunning bugs and slammed buses ... but not for us this year!

It was Rob's birthday today and so with our diary becoming clear we decided to head up to Santa Pod to wish Rob a happy day.  Any excuse for a beer!

The forecast was poor and the weather outside looked pretty miserable but we set off in the hope the Pod would once more have its own contrary weather system in action.  We arrived and it was dry.  We made our way down to the Fuellers Bar and it started raining.  And it didn't stop. 

And so while Tash and Esme took cover

Alfie made the most of the opportunity to test exactly how waterproof wellies really are.

He must have run around jumping (and occasionally falling over) in puddles for over an hour, but he had a grin on his face from ear to ear.  Much like this ...

And when it all gets too cold, too wet and too miserable? DO-NUTS!!

Like Father Like Son

I always remember playing with Matchbox cars when I was a kid, and little diecast models still fascinate me today.  I realise I must have been fairly lacking in the imagination department as a child, cos whereas most kids probably had their cars flying off to space, defeating Decepticons and running away with She-Ra I just drove mine around and made car parks.  Perhaps that's where Alfie gets his OCD tendencies from?

Anyway, with my car parking past it gave me great pleasure to watch Alfie doing this the other day!

And yes, he does have cow print nappies!