Journal Part 2

This is the second installment, sans photos and conversion charts referred to at the end of document. The link to the charts is there though.

Excerpts from an English Expedition Journal,
Part Two

March 6 a.m.: Who said it rains all the time here! It’s a beautiful sunny day but I did get the day off to a less than auspicious start by frying my curling iron. Apparently, the adapter did a less than stellar job of adapting and the top blew right off it and left a wicked, burned plastic smell in this beautiful guest room and slightly beyond. It really stinks. Wonder how long that will last?

Oh, well, Richard bought a hair dryer (at the behest of his daughters) for my use so I will have to make do with that. I may get the courage to try my curling brush later but considering the untimely demise of its mate, I should probably wait a bit.

Afternoon: Resting and relaxing time is over for now. I felt refreshed when I awoke and after the curling iron fiasco, we had a leisurely breakfast and now we’re heading over to Maldon for a quick tour. (Essex has so many of these history-rich places that it would take months to explore them thoroughly.)

Maldon is a small village located on the Blackwater Estuary just before the river runs into the North Sea. It’s known throughout the UK and several other parts of the world as the foremost modern-day center for Thames sailing barges. It’s also a favorite retreat for many, some coming just for a day and others staying longer. Its beauty has made it the sight of several productions filmed for television. It’s also home to the patriarchal stavropegic Monastery of St John the Baptist, a monastic community for both men and women.

Among many special events held there each year is the annual "Taxi Day" when mentally and physically disabled children from London are driven to there in London Black Cabs for a day of activities and a meal.

This event dates back to 1952 when a London cab driver visited Elizabeth Fry Special School in Plaistow and was inspired to do something special for the young patients there. He wrote to each of Essex's sea side towns in his attempts to arrange an outing for them and the only one willing to help was Maldon. Taxi Day was soon established and has remained a tradition since then.*

The weather remained sunny and beautiful if a little windy. We strolled through town and walked down the promenade along River Blackwater to the bronze statue of Brythnoth, Earldorman of Essex. Brythnoth was hero and loser of the Battle of Maldon in 991. Although he lost the battle, along with his head, Brythnoth was considered a hero because he inspired the Saxons to resist marauding Vikings.

Evening: Richard’s daughter Joanne joined us for dinner tonight at The Fox and Raven in Chelmsford. The building still retains the character of the converted nineteenth century farmhouse that houses this traditional English pub. All three of us ordered Scampi and Chips (French fries). For dessert, we shared Profiteroles. They were okay but a little disappointing. The rolls were much larger than you normally see with this recipe and I think perhpas not quite as good as the smaller ones.

We stopped by daughter-in-law Julie’s home later to meet Julie, her friend Ian and children Joseph and Amelia. I am on Julie’s Facebook friend list so I felt I knew her a little already. The family members I’ve met thus far are lovely and the children are sweet and well mannered. It’s been a full day so I’m signing off for now. I shouldn’t have any trouble sleeping tonight for sure.

*This explanation of Maldon history is for information/explanation purposes and was not part of my journal. I researched it to satisfy my personal curiosity and found several interesting articles, especially about ill-fated hero Brythnoth.

I knew English Chips are pretty much like American French Fries but found them fatter and fluffier with no preservatives. Unfortunately, many of the restaurants there also emulate Americans by using a frozen product. If you want to make really English Chips, follow these directions. All you need is potatoes, peanut oil and salt.

English-style Chips

Potatoes
Oil
Salt

First, peel the amount of potatoes needed and slice them into chips about half an inch long and half an inch thick. Cut these slabs into slices a quarter inch wide and place in a bowl of cold water deep enough to cover completely.

Pour cooking oil into the pan to no more than one third deep and let it heat while potatoes are soaking. When it reaches 375ºF or a small piece of potato dropped in floats. If you do not have a thermometer, just drop a small piece of potato in the oil and if it floats, the oil is hot enough.

Dry the potatoes thoroughly, place in a frying basket and lower them into the oil slowly until they chips are covered and bubbling has stopped. Cover the pan and cook the chips for 6 minutes. This blanches the potatoes and does the actual cooking but they should not be brown at this stage, just cooked. Remove the basket of chips from the oil and allow it to back up to around 390ºF.

Lower the chips back into the reheated oil and allow to brown. (This should take just a couple of minutes.) As soon as chips are golden brown, remove them from the oil and place on paper towels in a serving dish. Let drain a few second, remove chips, sprinkle the chips with a little salt and serve immediately before they get go soggy. Paired with battered fish and malt vinegar, this makes an authentic English Fish ‘N” Chips meal.

Profiteroles
(Chef Gordon Ramsay’s recipe)

Ingredients:
Choux pastry
125 ml milk
200 ml water
150g plain flour
1 t. golden caster sugar
1/2 t. salt
100 g unsalted butter
4 medium eggs, lightly beaten
Chantilly cream
1-1/2 of a vanilla pod (bean), split
300 ml whipping cream
1-2 T. icing sugar
Chocolate sauce
200g good quality dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids)
30 g unsalted butter
3 T. clear honey
125 ml full fat milk

Method:

Preheat the oven to 200˚C/Gas 6 (392ºF). Sift the flour and salt into a bowl. Place the milk, coldwater, salt, sugar into a pan and set over a low heat. Once the sugar and salt has dissolved add the butter. Once the butter has melted, bring to a rolling boil. Turn off the heat then tip in the flour and beat vigorously with a wooden spoon. As soon as the mixture starts to come away from the side of the pan, stop beating and tip onto a plate to cool.

Return the mixture to the pan, then gradually beat in the eggs, a little at a time, mixing well between each addition, until you have a smooth paste. (Alternatively, transfer the mix to an electric mixer and gradually add the eggs while the mixer is running on a low setting).

Line a baking sheet with greaseproof paper. Spoon the choux pastry into a piping bag fitted with a large plain nozzle (about 1.5cm in diameter). Pipe a small blob of the pastry mix under each corner of the greaseproof to keep the paper in place. Now pipe about 20 walnut-sized balls onto the baking sheet, spaced well apart. Level the peaked tops with the tip of a wet finger then bake for 18-20 minutes until well risen and golden brown.

Remove from the oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely before filling.

For the Chantilly cream scrape the seeds from the vanilla pod (bean) into a large mixing bowl. Add the cream, and icing sugar then whisk together until the consistency of a soft meringue with floppy peaks. Spoon the cream into a clean piping bag, fitted with a small plain nozzle. Pierce the base of a choux bun with the tip of the nozzle and pipe in the cream. Repeat with the remaining choux buns.

For the chocolate sauce, break the chocolate into small pieces in a heatproof bowl. Place the bowl over a pan of simmering water and heat. Add the butter and honey stirring from time to time, until the chocolate begins to melt. Gradually whisk in the milk until you have a smooth sauce and warm through. Serve the cream-filled profiteroles with the hot chocolate sauce drizzled over. Makes 30 profiteroles.

NOTE: Profiteroles, a/k/a Cream Puffs with Chocolate Sauce, can also be filled with a shrimp

mixture of other savory stuffing.

FYI: Icing sugar is powdered sugar; full fat milk is the same as whole milk; caster sugar is superfine sugar; golden has some molasses in it but is not the same as brown sugar. You may use regular caster if you cannot find the golden variety.

You can find conversion charts for temperatures on the Internet or just multiply the Centrigrade temperature by 9, divide the total by 5 and add 32 to this figure to get its Farenheit equivalent. I dug this out of some vague recess in my mind and used it while I was in the UK until I got to the point I could estimate the equivalent when I wanted to know atmospheric temperatures. The charts below will help make conversions if you wish to try this recipe. You may wish to keep these for future reference as I will be sharing other British recipes in this series or bookmark them at

http://www.jsward.com/cooking/conversion.shtml

Ouch!

Sorry about the a/c. Four years doesn't seem very long for a compressor to last, especially one made by a so-called reputable company.

On a different note, have you lost any more cows or wrenches lately?

Easy come, easy go

It must be a cruel joke that the universe plays on you, when you look at your savings account balance and think wow, we're finally building up our savings again, then your AC compressor goes out and you find out you're going to have to fork over approximately 1,000 dollars to fix it. *sigh* Oh, well, that's what savings are for, right?

No Problem

I survived Saturday evening nicely, thank you. The girls were very good if you don't count Little Bit throwing a glass of water on her sister. Twice.

They didn't give me any real problems though. Of course, I didn't make them go to bed either so that probably helped. I did help them get a bath but I left the bad stuff like bedtime to Mommy and Daddy. I claimed a grandmother's prerogative. :)

I'm beginning to wonder if Atlanta is all thunder storms and trees falling. It does seem that we're having an inordinately large number of both this year.

I suppose this too shall pass. My company will be here in a few weeks so maybe it will have leveled off by then and we'll be able to get out and about and do some exploring.

Thanks for the evening

Well, it was a very nice, relaxing dinner out. Especially nice was the gift certificate DH won for Chili's and the 30 dollars my dear brother contributed, so we had a good meal and leftovers for today, to boot! Definitely would like to do an evening out more often, if mom's not too afraid after Saturday to come back!!

Rarely a dull moment here!

I have to say I saw a different type of spring blossoms today, not like any I can recall recently. Blakes, located diagonally from me, caters to a slightly different clientele. There's always a crowd there and it gets quite interesting (and loud) from time to time. The windows there are usually open and the crowd often spills out front. When I walked over to Gilberts to have brunch with my son today, the sidewalk was filled with lots of colorful dresses and hats with pretty flowers on them. Unfortunately or fortunately, depending upon your perspective, most of those wearing the beautiful hats and dresses also wore athletic shoes and needed a shave. Face and legs! Whatever floats your boat, I guess, but some of the dresses were really pretty.

Need to Stop Dawdling

I definitely have to stop dawdling in the mornings if I am going to walk in Piedmont. The later it gets, the more weird characters come out. It makes me think of horror movies when vampires and zombies start coming out after dark. By midafternoon, the entire dynamics has changed so I'm resolving to start my walks early. Very early.

I told Thirtysomething I would watch the girls tomorrow evening so she and hubby could have some private time together. Did I really volunteer for that?