Читать книгу Bad Cook - Esther Walker - Страница 25

Valentine’s Day

When I was younger and always had boyfriends who didn’t like me, I was forced to dismiss Valentine’s Day as something that didn’t matter.

On about February 6th, whichever boyfriend who didn’t like me I was with would say: ‘You don’t actually want to DO something for Valentine’s Day do you? I mean, do you actually want flowers?!’ And I would say, as my heart broke into a million weeny pieces, ‘No! Don’t be stupid’.

Then I would be doubly crushed when they really didn’t do anything. And I would sit at work on Valentine’s Day and watch as all the other girls (who had been clever and threatened their boyfriends with castration if they didn’t get onto Wild At Heart pronto and cough up BIG BUCKS) graciously and coyly received bouquets of flowers so huge they interfered with their keyboards.

And then I got a nice boyfriend, and his name was Giles. And I confessed to him everything. I said ‘The thing is that it’s not like I’m a spoilt cow and want presents all the time and stuff, but when you’re sitting at work and everyone gets flowers except you it’s just so *sniff* SO HORRIBLE *HOWL* and you feel SO UNLOVED.’ And he said ‘Okay, I’ll send you flowers on Valentine’s Day.’

That year I got a bunch of flowers so ginormous that they prevented me from typing anything for two days and everyone complained about them for the three months I kept them on my desk. I finally got rid of them on my birthday (May) when Giles sent me another giant bouquet whose fronds stretched right over from Features to the Arts desk.

But my point is that Valentine’s Day matters. I have a feeling that I’m preaching to the converted, but I want every girl to be able to say to their boyfriend or husband without fear of recrimination: ‘Valentine’s Day matters. It might not matter to YOU, but it matters to ME.’ Not paying heed to Valentine’s Day because it’s ‘so commercial’ or ‘so fake’ or whatever other excuse they come up with not to put their hands in their pockets, is like refusing to buy Christmas presents. What are you left with? Nothing. £40 (MINIMUM) that you’ll only go and spend on drink.

So it matters, it matters to ME. And although there’s so much stuff about it and it all gets quite boring, I still don’t think there’s anything wrong with doing a bit of baking in its honour. I like these because the redness of the raspberries denotes hearts and love without things getting completely mad and out of control.

Love Muffins

(i.e. muffins with raspberry and white chocolate)

Makes eight

 540g plain flour

 5 tsp baking powder

 ½ tsp salt

 2 eggs

 340g caster sugar

 140g unsalted butter, melted

 380ml milk

 grated zest of 1 lemon

 200g raspberries, plus a few extra for the topping

 150g white cooking chocolate, bashed up into small chunks

1 Preheat the oven to 170ºC and get out your muffin cases.

2 Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt and set aside. In a mixing bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugar and melted butter (make sure the melted butter isn’t too hot or it will curdle everything). Whisk in the milk and lemon zest, then carefully fold in the fruit and ¾ of the chocolate.

3 Add the sifted dry ingredients and fold together very gently. Don’t be afraid to leave the mixture very lumpy and rough – this is what will make it muffin-like rather than fairy-cake like. Also raspberries are reasonably delicate and you don’t want to reduce them to pulp.

4 Spoon the mixture into your cases and fill up to the top – unlike fairy cakes, these will not rise very much so if you leave space in the muffin cases anticipating a rise, you will be disappointed. Dot with one or two extra raspberries and some more chocolate. Bake for 30–35 mins or until a skewer comes out clean.