What The Hell Is Going On???

...Is a question many of you have been asking I'm sure.....thank you anonymous for the question and Helen. Yes it's been days since I posted last and even then I neglected to answer the questions about the coloured sugar.....what gives???

I can only say that I am right in the middle of a bout of not really caring about work at the moment!! To be honest, my 'get up and go' has got up and gone! Do i know why? Yes.....as it happens I think I do.
Am I going to tell you what the reason is? 'fraid not! But fear not, I'm hoping that this weekends cookery will kick me back in to touch, if not, still fear not as plans are afoot to solve my dire posting record of the last few weeks........watch this space for more (I hope!)

What have we done in the time since we last spoke?

Quite a bit as it happens (all of which will give an indication of how much my get up and go has gone, as in the past I'd have bee posting like a nutter about it.)

A brief day trip to La Belle France for a top up of ingredients for the cookery


No we didn't buy this chap - even though I wanted to, but we did manage to get some of these:



Fresh almonds! Which I've never seen for sale in a supermarket over here. As it happens the trips to France for shopping are always a little distressing for us.....the cost of petrol, the channel crossing and all of the shopping we buy - cooking wine planned to last until the October weekend, salt, vinegar, some bacon, butter and assorted 'odd' ingredients ....all comes to less than it would cost to buy the same amount of wine from a supermarket in the UK!?!?! That's the main reason that we do it......and for lunch........and in this case we drove through some of the area that held the Field of the cloth of Gold meeting between Henry VIII and Francis I, so even the travelling wasn't wasted time.

What else?.....Well last Thursday saw the official opening of the new Henry VIII exhibition at Hampton Court......champagne and canapes were to be had (shame I don't like champagne really) and a good look at the new exhibition.........worth a visit if you come to Hampton Court to see the Field of the Cloth of Gold and Embarkation paintings extremely well lit for the first time in a while.

Oh, and Robin and I ran an adult education day on Monday....practical cookery in the modern kitchen, teaching the techniques needed to cook 3 dishes:



(These images have been altered to protect the innocent!)
Was it a success? I think so....it was two courses, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, both did similar dishes and all the ladies involved seemed to enjoy themselves, only the evaluation forms know the true answer though. 16th July sees another day of the same so fingers crossed it goes just as well.....will there be any more? Not at the moment, circumstances beyond our control make running these courses very difficult and until these issues can be ironed out then we won't be holding any more practical cookery courses. That's not to say that there won't be any more adult education.....far from it, check out the Historic Royal Palaces website for details (shameless plug eh!) We are in the middle of setting the courses for September 2007 to May 2008 at the moment, which will include evening talks by members of the kitchen team on Christmas food (the fact and the fiction), the fascinating history of chocolate and an evening guided tour of the kitchens (out of the public hours) with a little look behind the scenes as well we hope.
On top of that there will be a number of whole day courses on topics including...Interpreting the kitchens; the hows and whys and sports, games and pastimes which will include hands on sessions playing some of the games discussed as well as a trip around the Palace to see where such games would have been played.

Well that's the advertising done with.....now what about this weekend?
The plan is to do a bit more experimenting than usual, along with a lot more recording both photographically (recording all the stages of a recipe for instance) as well as temperature readings, weights and the like. There isn't a menu as such to share with you as it very much depends on what the weather is like over the weekend......why? Too wet and there isn't much light in the kitchens to photograph by and so we intend to play it very much by ear.

Examples of what we'll try to do.......how long does a 2 gallon pot take to boil? If a recipe says it can be done with pork OR beef, which tastes better or are they both equally as good? Can we finally get some of the recipes that have failed in the past to work or not.....these and many more questions will, I hope, be answered over the weekend.

If you are thinking of visiting this weekend then i look forward to seeing you.....just remember that the RHS flower show is on though and the roads WILL be very busy.
Same rules as always for posts over the event....text only with pictures to follow I hope.

(phew......that's blown the cobwebs out!?!)