You know it's Christmas when
a) the pianist in David Jones is playing carols instead of the Moonlight Sonata or I Could Have Danced All Night.
b) you're momentarily blinded at the wheel by the sun reflecting off the tinsel in the neighbours' rose bushes.
c) you can't even get into the corridor where the loo is at Myer, because it's full of what turns out to be a single extended family of young women and small, crying children clutching helium balloons who have all decided to go to the loo together.
d) you realise you've put your hand up for potato salad and trifle, which means you'll have to make both mayonnaise and custard, which means a trip to the Central Market in the middle of the Christmas crowds to get the good free-range Kangaroo Island eggs. Again.
e) you've got little paper cuts all over your tongue.
Memo to the Smith Family and the Salvos: the cards are very nice, dudes, but could you do something about the edges of the envelope flaps?
21 comments:
Christmas. Gah. I am such a grinch.
As an aside, I don't know if you read the comment threads at Twisty's (I generally avoid them these days: though Twisty is a genius beyond compare the comment threads make my eyes bleed).
Nonetheless, I perused a thread there earlier today and came across this blog:
http://spinningtumor.blogspot.com/
Thought you might remember Liz and want to see how she was doing.
I know you have high culinary standards, PC, but why not just fudge the custard and mayo?
(But don't mix them.)
We've decided to have the whole shebang here this christmas to save travelling with the kids. I could regret this.
I also second Elsewhere - premade mayo and custard are the go. Most people are so busy eating too much they don't even notice. Well in my family anyway.
Someone called me Scrooge today. Am I blindly contrarian?
This Xmas caper has me boiling. Couldn't be bothered. Even my WeatherPixie has a bloody Xmas tree stuck off to one side.
Bah, humbug!
Ignore those fools. Those fools! Don't fudge the custard or the mayo. The buying of eggs is the tedious part, people - not the making of mayo (very easy) or runny (non-baked) custard (easier). And if you fudge it, someone will be sure to ask you if it's home-made. Which will just wreck everything.
What do you think, children? Should I peep into Sean's Holiday Blog?
Kate, thanks so much for the link to Liz; went over there immediately and read the whole thing. I knew she wouldn't be able to hold out indefinitely from blogging -- clearly an addict -- unless she had actually died, and that seems quite a long way off by the look (and, more to the point, the sound) of her. What a woman.
Liam, yes, I know, but a bit of wet sponge is something one has to get up and get, whereas one's tongue is just there, handy. (Hello, have we wandered onto a different sort of site by mistake?)
El and Mindy, I have indeed considered fudging the custard and mayo. The mayo is actually not that hard, and much superior to anything in a jar, but cucky is tricky. Paul's do make a rather nice one, if I get caught short.
Dean, I have to confess I was charmed when the tree showed up with the weatherpixie. Couldn't you find something about Christmas that you like and focus on that? The King's College Choir do mean carols.
I'm looking forward with extra special fervour to the Airing of the Grievances this year.
Colour me quite depressed about the whole thing. This comment thread certainly cheered me up though, and the stale glace cherry soaked in Napoleon Brandy on the top is Sean's Holiday Blog. Nothing like a bit of spam at Xmas!
My mother nominated me for the entree (because I always do it), my sister-in-law said she'd seen some peking duck somewhere near her place, and she didn't mind getting it. I now have no job to do. For the first time since I was about 13 I have no Christmas cooking responsibilities. This is both a relief and very strange.
I'm sure next year I'll be back to puddings and the rest.
Just a warning: don't click on sean carter's blog. I happened to click on something on this blog and my browser went berserk, finally shutting down. There's a whole lot of nasties on it. Beware!
Thanks very much for that warning, Dean. The little sod, whoever he is. I left the comment there for a laugh, but I will trash it at once.
Totally unrelated comment, so I apologise in advance. (And, for the record, I'm posting here rather than in your most recent blog entry, since the latter seemed far too serious for the trivial matter I'm about to raise.) Anyway, since it's clear you're from Adelaide, can you clear something up for me: would it be fair to say that The Advertiser is SA's state newspaper? Just wondering if it's akin to The West Australian, say, or what else you folks might be reading for local news, if not The Advertiser. Thanks.
"would it be fair to say that The Advertiser is SA's state newspaper?"
depends how you define fair.
See you at the market, PC. Would offer to give you a carton of eggs, but I'll be needing them for the ice-cream meringue thing I am sort of thinking of doing.
I always hit the submit/publish button before I've finished...if you go to the market the day before Christmas it is usually very calm. They might have run out of eggs, but it will be calm. It was the year before last, anyway.
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Why no archives, Pav? I found your Grannyvibes post again via Google, but still...
Cast Iron Balcony
Anon -- yes, it'll be real cucky and mayo. My sisters can tell. (Not that either of them ever makes either.) Other Anon, if you are not the same one: Yes, the Advertiser is SA's major newspaper. Hard to believe, but I gather the Western Australin is also cr*p. Other papers here are the weekly Independent Weekly, the fortnightly Adelaide Review and the weekly Messenger Press, the local-council paper.
3C , an icecream-meringue thing sounds divine. Will there be raspberries also?
Helen -- there are archives, in sidebar under 'previous posts'. (In some browsers, they end up down the bottom of the page, don't ask me why.) If you mean 'why no searchable archives' then the answer is because my tech skills are below zero. The other answer might be becase the free basic non-beta verison of Blogger I'm still using doesn't do searchable archives. But they are there.
Shit you're right, there is is. Definitely wasn't there before. it must have b een a transitory browser display thing at this end.
i would have thought that with a blogname like Pavlov, you would be required to make something involving meringue (and somehow I envisage cream and fruit in there, don't ask me why...)
Good word ID -- gepilep
Cast Iron
I always assumed/understood that we weren't supposed to seal the envelopes on cards going at the concessional postage rate. That obviates the danger of paper cuts.
Your problem also demonstrates how dependent we've become on self-seal envelopes and stamps in our regular correspondence, as our tongues have become unaccustomed to the struggles with the Chrissy card envelopes.
My best mate made a Jamie Oliver pav the other night for dessert at her own birthday dinner. Home-made meringue base (crisp not soft), King Island cream, strawberries, raspberries and toasted hazelnuts. We thought we had died and gone to heaven.
I cry when I can't buy Kangaroo Island eggs and couldn't help worrying about the hens during the recent fires there. The flavour and texture is the best. I have just found a pav recipe with passionfruit cream and fresh raspberries, drool.
Is that a photo of your trifle, mate? it looks fab. my mother has made trifle for years and I hate it - horrid chemically red jelly, crap canned fruit, horrible store-bought custard, sloppy cream. We used to live in Fiji and trifle in the horrible heat there, where it was really difficult to get the ingredients has ruined me for trifle.
But if you (or anyone else) has a recipe for a lovely trife like the one in your photo, I'll suprise my family with it...
incidentally, my mother is diabetic, so if there's a low-sweety option...?
Alas no, that is not my trifle. (STILL no digital camera, thanks to the ATO. Bastards.) My trifle (at least the one I'm going to make tomorrow) is an adaptation of the Jane Grigson Fruit Book banana one (NB re low sugar -- I think you'd have to use all the usual substitutes to adapt). Actually I think I might do a whole new post for this recipe -- see Dec 23.
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