Monthly Archives: January 2021

Scones, Uncategorized

Pat’s scones

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Before we treat you to a sample of Pat’s scones let us first take a look at the current lockdown situation. It isn’t getting less severe, the opposite if anything! And the end seems to get ever further away! As mouldy oldies we are getting our jabs in a couple of weeks but even that doesn’t appear to make that much difference. We can still become spreaders and it’s not until we get the second jab that the vaccine really becomes effective and goodness knows when that will be. Argh, the joys of COVID!Pat's scones

The Ununited Kingdom

Speaking of spreaders, Boris Johnston decided, a couple of days back, to grace Scotland with a whistle-stop tour. Goodness knows why? He must know that he is pretty much universally loathed north of the border. And of course the trip broke all the rules that apply to everyone else who has to live with the disastrous consequences of Westminster’s pathetic handling of the crisis. Increasingly  people realise that  many key government functions are only weakly anchored centrally. It’s London-centric credibility has been weakened and the UK now looks more and more like a fractured state. Then there’s Brexit!

Approval ratings

At the moment neither the Tories nor Labour have a snowball’s chance in hell of being elected in Scotland and as long as Boris maintains his current attitude he will remain the SNP’s most effective recruiting sergeant. Recently, in a poll, Nicola Sturgeon gained the highest approval rating of any UK politician  … and that’s in England where she holds no sway! Remarkable!

Withdrawal

So, Pat’s scones, what about them? In the last few posts we’ve done skillingsboller and we’ve done pumpernickel, neither of which have anything much to do with scones. To be fair, we have done a scone but it was from Australia.  That’s all very well but scone withdrawal symptoms eventually became fairly severe. It’s come to this, we have resorted to making our own. Not for the first time, of course, but we don’t normally resort to such drastic measures. To get the full scone experience you really need to go out and capture them in their natural habitat.  We were also having to do without the assistance of the two small Vikings we have deployed on some recent occasions. They were doing  schooling from home.

Pat made quite a large batch and then gave me two different presentations. Pat's scone with cream and jamPat's scone with cream and jamOne with a bowl of cream and a pot of homemade blackcurrant and gooseberry jam. Every thing was deliciousPat's scone with cream and crab apple jellyThe other came with  cream and crab-apple jelly. What’s not to like? Thankfully she did not ask me to judge which was best but suffice to say they were both fab! Can’t award a topscone because then that would infer that you could come and visit and sample them for yourselves … but you can’t! Nobody can! The joys of COVID!

A scone in the shape of a heartThis was my favourite. Very small and presented just on its own I think it was supposed to convey some sort of message. Aww!

Just heard that toilet brushes have become the official symbol of the Russian protests in support of Alexei Navalny. It’s a crazy mixed up world!

Keep safe everyone!

Scones, Uncategorized

Ramblings from Oz

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With the UK officially the worst country in the world for it’s handling of COVID, here’s a question! What do you do when you can no longer go out on scone adventures? What do you do when sconology grinds to a shuddering halt? And WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN ALL HOPE IS LOST? Okay, that’s three questions but you get the drift and no, the answer is not “phone the Samaritans”. The answer, of course, is to turn to our Bathurst correspondents in New South Wales. Unlike us, they have a government that does have a scoobie and, therefore, are not as restricted. They’ve sent us a wide ranging report covering isoglosses, cricketing legends and telephone boxes … and scones.. It’s modestly entitled Ramblings from Oz. You will see , however, that antipodean COVID life is not entirely straight forward either.

In their own words:

Sconeless in Sofala

Some time ago two friends of ours opened a café called the Painted Horse in Sofala, a quaint old gold mining town about 50 km from our home in Bathurst.

Julie Young in Rustic Cafe, Sofala
One of our Bathurst correspondents reflecting on normal life before her husband started taking an interest in scones. Taken at the scoreless Rustic Cafe in Sofala

They made scones to die for ! The downside is, I somehow deleted the photo I took on my phone, so there is no proof.  And there is more downside. The café closed down when Covid hit, and has been closed for the past 10 months or so. It has reopened with new owners, but no sign of our friends Nick and Kate.  We called in there a couple of weeks ago but not a scone to be seen, just some tired looking sausage rolls.

Covid 19

We are surviving pretty well Covidwise, just a handful of new cases every day in each state.  As soon as there is a bit of a flare-up in one state or another, the state Premiers start closing borders willy-nilly. We were supposed to meet our son and family at Victor Harbour, south of Adelaide this week, then bang, the NSW/SA border slammed shut and we had to cancel our house booking.  Then two days later the border was reopened.  All is not lost though as we have re-booked for the end of February. Here’s hoping we can get through then.

Isogloss

Not a word I had ever come across.  But your bit about how “scone” is pronounced in Ireland a few blogs ago was intriguing. You may recall that I referred to the town of Scone in one of my poems.  Well, Scone is pronounced to rhyme with “phone”. Here we have to take issue with our correspondents because normal pronunciation for the former home of the Stone of Destiny is actually “skoon”. Such are the  linguistic problems with English

Scones

Today we drove down to a place called Berrara where friends have a holiday house right on the coast.  scones in BowralWe are here for a few days, as travel within NSW is not restricted by Covid.  On the way we had morning tea with Julie’s sister and husband who live in a town called Bowral, which incidentally is where Donald Bradman started his cricket career. What did we get for morning tea, you guessed it, scones, of the savory kind, with cheese and fennel.  No faux pas on my part this time, wanting cream and jam, as was the case with the pumpkin scones of yesteryear.

Phone Boxes

Telephone box in Kangaroo ValleyAnd on the way, what should we see, not one, but two red phone boxes, sort of Siamese twins, in a town called Kangaroo Valley. Complete with black box and buttons A and B.  Not sure if they were actually working phones, or just a tourist prop, as Kangaroo Valley is a bit of a tourist trap. Never seen anything like that before. It certainly was not made in Falkirk.

As ever, we are indebted to A&J, our Bathurst correspondents. Your contributions are always extremely welcome. We also envy your ability to leave your house … forgotten what that’s like! It’s ironic  that Trump has gone and we still can’t go out safely!

Remember Gordon Brown, former Labour PM who was wheeled out by the Conservatives to spread gloom and doom during the 2014 Scottish Independence referendum. The Conservatives were too scared to come north of the border. In the style of Trumpery he told lie after lie and promised all would be well if we just stuck by the Union. Well, like the Creature From The Black Lagoon, he has emerged again to tell us that the UK is a failed state. Tell us something we don’t know Gordon. Scotland was telling you that in 2014 and has regretted heeding anything that came out of your mouth ever since.

“Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face, Great chieftain o the puddin’-race!” Tonight is Burns night which brings about the annual cull of hagisses. It’s the only way to keep the numbers down. We’ve only got a small one and it’s even smaller once the legs are off. Slàinte mhaith, enjoy yours!

Scones, Uncategorized

Scottish empire biscuits

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Having brought you Norwegian boller and German pumpernickel we thought something Scottish was somewhat overdue. So here we bring you Scottish empire biscuits! In some places they are called German biscuits but their origin actually lies with the Austrian Empire.

preparing empire biscuits
empire biscuits before assembly

These are a family favourite and always near the top of the list when visiting local cafés.  They are made of two shortbread biscuits glued together with jam, (like a jammy dodger)  covered with white water icing on and topped off with a glace cherry. Remember “topped off with a place cherry” for later. You can get a recipe here. 

Sensible human beings
preparing empire biscuits
one sensible human being icing empire biscuits

We made them with the assistance of the same two small Vikings we utilised in the skillingsboller post. Of course Scottish empire biscuits should ideally be made by a Scottish person. Both these small Vikings are a wee bit silly but thankfully they are half Scottish so if you add both these halves together you end up with one sensible Scottish human being … yeah!

Thrift

We started by making the individual biscuits then sticking them together with some jam before the fun part … icing. My mother was champion baker in Falkirk over many years and her name was on the trophy so many times it became embarrassing.  She used to make great empire biscuits and when entering a competition she always used at least half a cherry on top. And she would win first prize! When baking for the family, however, she gained notoriety by ever putting one sixteenth of a cherry on top. Such duplicitous behaviour typified my upbringing … it’s amazing I ended up as the well rounded character you know today. Her extreme thriftiness meant that, sometimes, I was even forced to help her cut them up! 

Scottish empire biscuits
empire biscuits

Anyway, enough of my rather silly mother, our one sensible Scottish human being had particular ideas about decoration. No glace cherries of any size (we didn’t have any) but all sorts of unicorns, rainbows and jelly tots instead … just  little bit silly. Must be the Viking side creeping in! We could be super critical about the shape and finish of the end results but we don’t wish to hurt anyone’s feelings. They were absolutely delicious. At least as good as any we have had anywhere! A mini triumph for a sensible Scottish human being!

These biscuits became known to more global audience when they featured during a hearty meal in Pixar’s Scottish fantasy film Brave. And once Scotland, as one of the last colonial remnants of the British Empire gains its independence, they may become known simply as “Scottish biscuits” … yeah!

Celebrations

With only hours to go before Trump leaves the White House, it is cause for celebration. Not only that but it’s followed a few days later by an even bigger one … Burns night.

wild haggis
wild haggis in the Highlands

Since millions of haggises will be eaten by Burns’ officianados toasting the life and times of our national bard we feel, particularly for our overseas readers, that some reassurance is required. Although there are some people who actually do go out and hunt haggis it is essentially an unnecessary pastime. You can find tips on how to catch a haggis here. The truth of it is that haggises have the same sacrificial instincts as cliff jumping lemmings. However, haggises stampede down off the hills and jump directly onto plates all over Scotland. No cruelty is involved … honest!

Scones, Uncategorized

Devil’s Fart

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No, we are not talking about Boris or Donald Trump! Devil’s fart is probably more widely known as pumpernickel, a dense German rye bread that’s name actually means “devil’s fart”. Apparently it has flatulence inducing properties. Never having experienced flatulence we thought it might be interesting to try it! pack of pumpernickelAnd if the packaging is anything to go by it may have other properties as well!! Okay, okay, if this all smacks of desperation then so be it. London is in danger of being overwhelmed by COVID so restrictions are becoming ever stricter everywhere. Who knows, the way things are going, we may not be allowed to look out the window, never mind go on sconing adventures.

Internationalism

The implications for our readers continuing education is worrying, however. Hence, following our previous post on Norwegian skillingsboller, we now bring you the German devil’s fart. It comes courtesy of our Münster correspondents who gave us some as a present. Many thanks to them for introducing us to pumpernickel and helping expand the cultural horizons of our readers.

Bad smells

It used to be found only in north west Germany but now you can get it pretty much anywhere. That said, European and American pumpernickel are different. The American pumpernickel has added ingredients and a higher baking temperature to provide shorter production times. Why oh why does the US need everything ‘fast’? Just chillax and do it properly! Perhaps, with Trump and his compadres only remaining as a bad smell, they may be able to do just that. Or is that wishful thinking?

pumpernickel unwrapped
Pumpernickel loaf unwrapped

So how do you eat pumpernickel?  As novices we started by slicing it the wrong way, before realising it was already sliced. It’s pretty solid and a little bit sticky so tends to appear like one solid dark block when it’s unwrapped. A bit like a pack of cheese slices. Not an auspicious start but how would it taste? That’s all that matters after all! In order to give it a fighting chance we decided to try it with a variety of toppings – cheese and ham, cheese  tomato and chutney, salami and mustard … and lastly just with some homemade plum jam.

Honest, officer!

selection of pumpernickel bitesThe bread itself has a grainy texture and a slightly sweet flavour that’s unusual but quite pleasant. Pat gave top marks to the cheese and ham. My preference was for the salami and mustard though all of them were actually very good. Will we be rushing out in search of devil’s fart? Well, if we cannot go out for scones then we can hardly go out for that. What would we tell the police if stopped? We’ll let you know about the flatulence … or maybe not!

ps: Our pumpernickel was a present and this week we received another. A parcel of framed photos from fellow photographer Dave Hunt. He operates from his Wildgrass Studio in beautiful Glen Lyon and specialises in vintage and fine art photography. Some time back we helped him experiment with his wet plate collodion technique. None of this instant digital nonsense for Dave, no, no, no!  He has to coat a plate of glass with light sensitive material, expose it in the camera while still wet and develop it all within about fifteen minutes. If it’s not quite right you just start again … simple!wet plate photo of Pat and I

He misplaced the plates during a house move but found them again recently and sent them on. How can we describe the results? “Brilliantly vintage”, perhaps … just like the sitters! The wonderful thing is that the 5″x4″ plate is completely unique … not another like it. Many thanks Dave, we love them all. Dave also says that these images should last for 200 – 300 years … and to let him know if they don’t. If you find life a bit too fast you can find out about this technique at one of Dave’s workshops. Can’t guarantee he will have such fantastic subjects though.

Scones, Uncategorized

Skillingsboller

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2020 wasn’t exactly a year to remember what with plague ravaging the country and mad politicians reaching new levels of lunacy. These things are mere trifles, however, when we tell you that the government has now told us to cease all sconological research forthwith! Sacre bleu! Okay, they didn’t actually get in touch with us specifically and tell us to desist  but they may as well.  Current COVID restrictions mean that we are not supposed to leave home except to care for others. We thought sconology fitted that brief perfectly but apparently, it doesn’t!  So, in order to further your knowledge and broaden your cultural horizons we bring you skillingsboller … a sort of Norwegian scone equivalent.

Happy New Year

But first we would like to wish a happy new year to all our readers and correspondents, we hope that 2021 is much better than the past year. 2020 was memorable for having absolutely nothing whatsoever to commend it. A complete disaster. It did, however, serve to demonstrate the difference between the EU and the UK.

The ‘U’ stands for ‘Unity’ in both their names but the five years of negotiations combined with coronavirus have had opposite effects in both states. On one hand the 27 countries of the EU showing admirable unity with a show of democracy in action. On the other hand the totally undemocratic UK falling apart at the seams with it’s ‘Unity’ under unprecedented strain.  All seventeen of the most recent opinion polls showing a clear majority in favour of Scottish independence and N.Ireland, is now left  closer to Dublin than London. Even England’s long-standing bedfellow, Wales, is getting fed up up with the Boris shambles and Westminster’s inane dictatorial style. And lo-and-behold, on top of all that we now have part of the Tory party launching a campaign to rejoin the EU. Aaargh! As messes go, this is pretty messy.

Coffee and boller

Enough of all that! Thanks to a Viking son-in-law we used to spend a lot of time in Norway. Being there was fantastic but of course there were no scones. They did however have boller (pronounced ‘bolly’) which are to Norwegians what croissants are to the French or scones are to the Brits. They are made with cardamon spice and can often have raisins or even chocolate chips in them. Absolutely delicious. We became addicted and ‘coffee and boller’ quickly became part of the daily routine.

On this occasion, being at home without access to boller or scones of any kind, we decided to make skillingsboller. It’s a derivative of boller,  a kind of cinnamon bun. Obviously you need a recipe but you also need the help of one big Viking and two small ones. This may be a problem for most folks but not for us … because we are blessed with all three!

rolling out the boller mixture

Don’t make skillingsoller if you are in a hurry. It’s not something you can rush. It takes 2-3 hours at least. But then, why would you be in a rush when you can’t even leave home? Get baking! Be warned though, if you decide to utilise the two small Vikings it can take even longer. Particularly at the icing stage!

Suffice to say that the resulting skillingsboller was absolutely delicious, a major triumph for all concerned.

What do you want?

Emboldened by success our Vikings then went on to make normal boller. holemade Norwegian bollerDon’t they look delish! If you can’t be bothered making them you can always visit United Bakeries in Oslo. There, you will find lots of boller of all kinds and a huge bowl of strawberry jam that you just help yourself to. Ah, memories! Boller is not a scone but if 2020 taught us anything it was that sometimes we can’t have everything we want. Hopefully in the not too distant future we will all have the ability to travel again and get what we want, what we really really want … sorry! Until then stay safe  wherever you are!