What, we hear you cry! What are panko crusted balls? And, more the point, what have they go, to do with scones. Well, just hold on a minute and we’ll try and justify this post.
The main reason is that these wee beauties are a kind of by-product of scones. They are in fact scones without the sugar and without the fruit. Next time you are making scones just set a little of your mixture aside before you put the sugar in and you can make these little savoury balls.
Once you have rolled the dough into perfectly formed orbs of deliciousness, all you have to do is cover them with panko breadcrumbs and bake them in the oven until they’re golden brown. We know … just when you thought you knew what a breadcrumb was, those cunning Japanese come up with a new more exotic variety. Typical! Panko crusted balls are for dipping. Tasty with sour cream and chive sauce, curry sauce or anything other sauce that takes your fancy.
Bingo, scones and panko crusted balls all at the same time! What more justification do you need? Well, perhaps the main reason for making this post was to have a moan at Boris and his pals who currently rule over us. Their corrupt government at Westminster seems to get deeper and deeper in sleaze by the minute. But then that’s hardly surprising … or even news! Though they will need a bigger carpet to sweep it all under.
ABOMINATION
And here’s another justification, as if any more were needed! An article in the Guardian has been brought to our attention. It is about slab scones?!You are supposed to fill a baking tray with scone mixture then, when it’s baked, cover the whole thing with clotted cream and decorate with strawberries. Sacre bleu!
Slab scones are an abomination and cannot be allowed. The Guardian, of all newspapers, should have known better than to publish such ridiculous nonsense. As you read this we are already preparing our protest placards in the best Father Ted tradition … DOWN WITH THIS SORT OF THING!
WARNING 1: if you want to live as long as the Duke of Edinburgh do not eat too many of these. WARNING 2: if you fancy making some Aberdeen butteries set a whole a day aside.
By this time you may be wondering why we are making them. Well, principally because we were prodded with a big pointy stick by one of our Trossachs correspondents. She was brought up eating Aberdeen butteries in Burghead, one of our favourite places. It is home to one of Scotland’s best eating establishments, the Bothy Bistro … banana and bacon croissants to die for! Burghead also has two New Years. One on the 1st January (a kind of light rehearsal) and and then another on the 14th. The 14th is the Julian calendar new year and they celebrate it with Burning the Clavie.
with the Clavie King at The Bothy
The Clavie King goes all round the town to the Doorie Hill carrying a blazing barrel of tar on a pole above his head. And then the whole town dances in the street until the wee small hours. It’s great fun. Not sure if this sort of behaviour has anything to do with them eating Aberdeen butteries but it may well be a contributory factor.
Then cream the butter and lard and divide it into three equal portions. When the dough has doubled in size, give it another good knead and roll it into a rectangle about 1cm thick. Spread one of the butter portions over two thirds of the dough. Fold the unbuttered bit over half of the buttered bit then fold the rest over to make three layers then roll it out again to its original size … phew! Leave for 40 minutes in the fridge.
Yawn!
Then you do all that again using the rest of the lard/butter portions … TWICE! By the time we had done all that it was getting near our bedtime! Then divide the dough into 16 pieces and shape into a circle before putting them on your baking tray. Then leave for another 45 minutes until they rise. What … another 45 minutes? It’s now past our bedtime however fear of the big pointy stick drives us on! Finally you can put them in the oven … hallelujah! 15 mins at 200C is all they need … that’s the shortest bit of the whole process!
Trawlermen
We have no idea what these things should look like except we have heard of them being referred to as “roadkill croissants” and judging by that description we felt we had just about got it right. How do you think they taste? Surprise surprise, buttery … very buttery. Due to the constant layering, the texture is firm but flaky and not at all unpleasant. They were originally made for the Aberdeen fishing industry because they would keep longer than any other bread on lengthy trips at sea. And we can completely understand that a couple of these would easily keep a trawlerman going for a whole day. The “evil bricks of tasty” presumably comes from folks knowing that with each bite they were knocking a month off their lives but were unable to help themselves.
We had ours in various ways … just as they were, lightly toasted with jam, with a sprinkling of salt. All perfectly acceptable. However, we’ve also heard that they are excellent with cheese (preferably roquefort) or even with corned beef? Versatile or what? Anyway, with a bit of luck, the big pointy stick has been put away … for a wee while at least!
David Cameron has ended up in the doodoo for a bit of under the table wheeling and dealing. Wouldn’t be so bad if it didn’t seem to typify this entire sleazy self serving Tory administration. Probably unfair to tar them all with the same brush, there must be one decent one … musn’t there??
More news from our Bathurst correspondents as we in Scotland gently edge towards the same sort of freedom that they enjoy. Freedom to not only leave the house but to venture further afield … and to meet people … yeah! We’re not complaining, we are very happy with the way the whole COVID-19 thing has been handled in Scotland but like everyone else we have almost forgotten what ‘normal’ actually means. In New South Wales our correspondents can at least move around the state … and this little corner of Australia is four times the size of the UK! Anyway, today they made their way to the village of Leura and the Wayzgoose Diner. And what sort of name is that anyway? In their own words:
“Today we passed through Leura, a village halfway between our home in Bathurst, and Sydney. A spot we often stop at when travelling to Sydney. As it was coffee time, we called into the Wayzgoose Diner, and decided to sample their scones. To our surprise the scone arrived in a terracotta flowerpot, in which it had been cooked. Quite a nice scone, if a little odd looking with its tapered bottom”.
A flower pot scone
Intrigued by the name “Wayzgoose”, and thinking it was some sort of Canadian bird, I googled it and found:
“A wayzgoose was at one time a celebratory dinner given by a master printer to his workmen each year on or about St Bartholomew’s Day (24 August). It marked the traditional end of summer and the start of the season of working by candlelight.”
Working by candlight … those were the days! Our correspondents also sent these clippings about the Country Women’s Association (CWA) from the Sydney Morning Herald.
Sconversations for the anxious and depressedKnead to know
In another cutting a Mrs Whitton explained that the secret of a perfect scone “Don’t knead the dough. Don’t fiddle or keep laying or touching it”. You have been told!
Mrs Whitton and a tray of 40 scones
As always, a huge thanks to our Bathurst correspondents. But, would you believe it – another Aussie report has just come in! This time from our Brisbane correspondent. We think the intention was to assure Pat and I that not all Australians are as boorish as him.
Apparently, at a recent function, he was belittled, berated and generally ridiculed by colleagues for putting jam on top of the cream on a pikelet (crumpet) he was preparing to eat. Serves him right … not going to get any sympathy from us. But good to hear that Australia is not indulging in those devilishly delinquent Devon ways.
Back in the UK, Boris promised that everything would go back to the way it was once Brexit was achieved. And so it has, one of the few promises he has kept … rioting on the streets of Northern Ireland. Thanks Boris, you could do well to heed Mrs Whitton’s advice.
Whenever we are finding it difficult to bring you fresh scone news we can always rely on our Bathurst correspondents to save the day. They have done it again! This diverse report covers phone boxes, jewellery, handbags and, lo and behold, girdle scones. You know how in the UK at the moment there’s nothing much going on well you’ll be glad to hear that there’s nothing much going on in Australia as well. So no need to fret that you are missing out. Therefore, in the absence of anything going on anywhere our. correspondents said “we’ll just rattle on about a few things … Aussie ramblings”.
“We have just had a week in Victor Harbour south of Adelaide, with our son and family who live in Alice Springs. We do this every couple of years around Christmas time. They drive the 1500km down from Alice and we drive the 1100km across from Bathurst. Halfway between Victor Harbour and Cape Jervis we spotted this old telephone box at someone’s front gate. Not one of your cast iron jobs, just timber.
definitely not made in Falkirk
Our son, James, works in leather, making shoes, belts, wallets, handbags, and other bits and pieces, whileElliat, his partner, is a designer, working in jewelry, furniture, and anything else you can think of.
Today Julie cooked a batch of girdle scones. I seemed to have deleted your blog which may or may not have had the recipe. Not to worry, Julie looked them up on the internet, and, voila, with some butter and cheese we had a delicious lunch.
Morrisons
We are of course familiar with the food chain, having had many trips to Aberystwyth and St Andrews in the 10 years since Rebecca and family moved to the UK. However, you might not be as familiar with our Morrison, to wit, our prime minister, Scott. Scomo to his mates, of which I don’t claim to be one. He is currently in the poo over his misogynistic leanings, glossing over rape allegations, and general lack of statesmanship.
Welsh Cakes or Sausage Rolls
We have of course sampled Welsh Cakes many times when visiting Aberystwyth. However, they don’t hold a candle to the sausage rolls found there. Five for 2 pounds, proper sausage meat, incased in delicious flaky pastry. I am yet to find an equivalent in Australia”.
New health food
So it would seem that Australia’s politicians are not a whole lot different from many of our own. Well, blow me down! As always, many thanks to our Bathurst correspondents for keeping us in the loop and Julie’s girdle scones look fantastic. Shortly after their report came in, however, we got another from their buddy who rides shotgun – New South Welshman. He alerted us to this fantastic piece in ABC News on the wonderful health benefits of eating scones. Just look at this headline:
“Laughing, keeping busy and baking scones are the secret to a long and happy life, according to Bundaberg’s “Scone Queen” Dorothy Collishaw. Raised in a Maryborough bakery shop and winning her first baking prize more than 90 years ago, Mrs Collishaw has self-raising flour flowing in her veins and still actively bakes for QCWA meetings and functions.
In 2019, Mrs Collishaw was named an ABC Scone Master as part of a radio series celebrating Queensland’s most passionate scone makers.
This led to the QCWA Bundaberg Branch hosting a highly successful “Scone Festival”, publishing a scone recipe book and even the annual national “Scone Day”on the day the organisation was formed.”
They certainly know how to celebrate scones in Queensland. So there you have it! If you want to live to a fit and healthy 100 just laugh, keep busy and eat scones.
Portmasamba
After we cast nasturtiums in our previous post at the sanity of the good folk of Portmahomack, Lyn got in touch to set us straight. “As a member of said Samba Band – PORTMASAMBA- and proud resident of The Port, I wish to reassure all other readers that we in The Port are of sound mind at all times; of wise stock; and welcome folk of all definitions to our beautiful village”. Well, of course, we knew that Lyn. The Port was very welcoming to us and we can’t wait to return.
Portmahomack front overlooking the beach3. year old Vivienne at Tarbat Ness
Following our previous post on Welsh Cakes you will all be pleased to hear that “Slightly Miffed of Portmahomack” is now “Delighted of Portmahomack.” Although “delighted” she felt that perhaps we should also cover Laverbread, a seaweed delicacy and the essence of a good Welsh breakfast. By now readers might be thinking that Portmahomack folk must all be slightly mad. The title photo is of some of them down by the harbour passing the time on a very wet afternoon. Reassured??
So, laverbread is made with seaweed, where on earth are we supposed to get that? Just pop down to the coast and pick some? No, no, no, laver is a special kind of seaweed and you can only get the good stuff on the coast of Wales … apparently! Oh, or in a shop … an online shop, The Fish Society shop to be precise. They will cater to all your seaweed needs! Don’t say that we don’t go that extra mile for our readers.
as it comes from the Fish Society, out of the packet and mixed with oats
Dulse and all that?
Suffice to say we ordered some laver directly from Wales so that the ensuing laverbread would be as authentic as possible. The things we do to placate these Portmahomackians! You’d think they would be too busy watching whales and dolphins? The laver arrived in an alarmingly large box … we didn’t really want a whole load of seaweed so we were relieved when the large box contained only a very small sachet of frozen laver. Once, when I worked in Belfast someone (they shall remain nameless) gave me some dried dulse. It was revolting! I only had a little but I could still taste it three days later! And that pretty well sums up my seaweed eating career so far. Would this laverbread thing be a better experience?
There is no way that laver could ever look appetising … a kind of dark green sludge. In fact it makes you wonder who thought it was a good idea to eat it in the first place? Anyway, in the interests of expanding our reader’s laverbread knowledge we set about making some. Couldn’t be more simple really … mix it with some oats and lightly fry. We had it with some crispy bacon and a fried egg. Interesting in that there was no strong taste, just slightly salty perhaps. Some people compare the taste to oysters, or olives. We ate it all, however … it’s good for you apparently!
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Laver, laver everywhere!
Scallops
To give it a fair crack of the whip, at night Pat made me scallops with a pea purree and laver sauce. This was fantastic! Hard to know what was actually going on but the laver seemed to give it a slight salty edge that went well with the rest of the dish. Huragh, a mini laver triumph!What else?Next day we had an omelette with potatoes and laver. That was excellent as well though I suspect that the omelette would have been none the worse if there had been no laver in it. In Wales laver is sometimes referred to as Black Gold, or the Welshman’s Caviar. Apologies to all laverbread aficionados but we are not at all surprised it hasn’t caught on in Scotland.
Yesterday, the news that Nicola Sturgeon was cleared of any wrongdoing in the Alex Salmond affair has been greeted by the Tories with all the same good grace that Trump accepted his election defeat. Politics will always have divisions but there seems to be a lot more division elsewhere in the world today … skin colour, gender, ethnicity etc. The other day we got an note from singer songwriter, Carrington MacDuffie. It was a quote from Mohamad Safa. “Our world is not divided by race, colour, gender or religion. Our world is divided into wise people and fools. And fools divide themselves by race, colour, gender or religion”. Seemed kind of apt don’t you think? So how come it’s the fools that get to rule the world? Or is that being unduly unkind? All very well for us armchair critics … they are probably all doing their best, poor sods.
Me at Tarbat Ness lighthouse, Portmahomack looking towards Wales for more inspiration
Morrison’s afternoon tea box, okay, maybe this is the actual bottom of the sconology barrel? We have, of course, been here before. About eighteen months ago we were at Morrison’s Café and not only that, we had two mini-Vikings with us. We were buying costumes for Halloween so that we could go round our neighbourhood scaring everyone half to death. Remember … we were once able to do that! Before COVID and Brexit that was called ‘normal’. Anyway, the mini-Vikings abandoned us on Saturday so that they could go back to school in London. Pat is, once again, flying solo on the baking front.
Surprise
Coronavirus restrictions mean that we are still not allowed to go anywhere. Mind you, everything is closed so there’s nowhere to actually go anyway. In these circumstances we thought it might be worth trying Morrison’s Afternoon Tea Box. The advert looked quite good (see title picture) and it was only £20 or £25 if we wanted to upgrade it with prosecco. And it would be delivered to our door at no extra cost. Predictably perhaps we upgraded … why not? It arrived bang on time and we were excited to see what it would actually be like. We were more than a little surprised, however, when we opened the box and saw what we had bought.
DIY
It wasn’t so much an afternoon tea as an afternoon tea kit. More a box of groceries from which it would be possible to make an afternoon tea if you were so inclined. A whole loaf, a jar of pickle, two boxes of cakes, a large chunk of cheese, a packet of ham, tea bags, carton of milk, big pot of jam and a large (burst) packet of lightly salted crips. Enough to make afternoon teas for a small army. Crickey, we could have just gone to the shop and bought all this stuff.
We decided to look it all up online and see how much it would have cost if we had done that. Sad, we know but we had nothing better to do! You will see from the results that we would also have been cheaper. We would have saved £0.48. To a tight-fisted Scotsman that’s equivalent to at least two mouthfuls of beer. We really don’t know what Morrisons is thinking about with this product. To be fair, when we went back and checked the advert it did list everything underneath the picture. We should have looked more carefully.
Anyway, once we had recovered from the realisation that there was nothing else for it but to knuckle down and make our own afternoon tea. We duly set about making the sandwiches, decanting the cakes and unpacking the scones. Eventually we sat down to relax in front of the fire with the fruits of our labours.
Experience
It wasn’t like any other afternoon tea we have ever had but all in all it wasn’t that bad. Maybe it was the fact that we had been more involved or maybe it was just that we were nice and cozy and catching up with missed episodes of Coronation Street. Who knows? The scones were okay but nowhere near a topscone. Of course, there was enough in the box to make several more of these afternoon teas but I don’t think we’ll bother. Putting it all down to experience … read the ads carefully!
So the mini-Vikings are delighted to be back in school with their friends, a huge relief for the home-working parents. Meanwhile Boris Johnson is reportedly building a £9m bunker beneath the Cabinet Office for use in emergencies. Is he thinking of when he refuses another independence referendum for Scotland. He might need it.
If you are wondering where the girdle scones are in the title photo, they are in the tummies of the two mini-Vikings. We went the short distance to Blackness Castle for a picnic and they had girdle scones filled with ham and cheese. It was definitely a top girdle scone award according to them.
One of our mini-Vikings was born in Norway and is super proud of that. The other minnier-Viking was born in England and is super proud of that. As they read the information boards the miniest-Viking became troubled by the realisation that this castle, which she loved, had spent a lot of time under attack by the English. She is half Scottish but we could see that she was seriously conflicted. Quite tricky for a five year old. Mind you, us older ones weren’t too happy about Oliver Cromwell wrecking it in 1650 either. All that was completely forgotten, however, when the picnic was produced.
Fussy pigeons
Anyway lets go back to the beginning. Since we have been expanding reader’s sconological education with traditional oven scones and more recently drop scones and tattie scones, Pat thought she should have a go at girdle scones. The last time she tried them was when we were first married and living in a first floor flat in Edinburgh. We always put our stale bread out on the window sill for the birds. When the girdle scones didn’t turn out too well we put them out as well. Not even the pigeons would take them. This memory was still vivid as she launched into this second attempt.
Happily, years of baking experience meant there was a much happier outcome this time around. If they look a bit like tatties scones that’s because they are quite similar except, of course, there are no potatoes in girdle scones and there is a little baking powder to make them rise.
girdle scone with ham and cheese and next day with fry up … yum
Many years ago, when I was a mere sapling of a student, I worked as a labourer in the oil refinery at Grangemouth during college holidays. Every morning a truck would pick me up in Falkirk High Street. It had a tin hut thing on the back. There was no door but inside there were wooden benches running down each side. A little bit later the truck would stop at a model lodging house where a squad of Irish navvies would climb on board and join me in the hut. These guys regarded puny students as fair game so I probably got more than my fair share of ragging but really, they were the salt of the earth.
A singular woman
I tell you this simply because the lodging house had a woman who came in and made the men their packed lunches. I’ll never forget it because every day it was exactly the same. They all had a full girdle scone filled with great slabs of red cheddar cheese. For all the months I worked there I never saw them eat anything else. Suffice to say that Pat’s second attempt at girdle scones was much much better than the first.
A mystery
In spite of the delicate nature of Anglo/Scot relations our visit to Blackness was great fun. But it highlighted an ongoing problem that we were totally unable to resolve. How to get the miniest-Viking to wear a jacket in a way that covered more than just her forearms?
If anyone has any suggestions we would be delighted to hear them.
Just as Scotland enters a phase where it has its best ever chance of achieving the same respect that all independent nations take for granted, it is beset by a scandal. It revolves around personalities and technicalities of who said what to who, where and when. No bearing whatsoever on Scotland’s case for independence but with the media in a feeding frenzy, it undoubtedly will. Fingers crossed good sense prevails.
.Okay, we’ve been eagerly awaiting Nicola Sturgeon announcing that we can all go as one big family on holiday to Inverness. Unfortunately she is being super cautious so we will just have to carry on crossing our fingers and hoping that the vaccination programme makes it all possible by Easter. Children went back to school yesterday in Scotland and in England on 8th March, so overall there are increasing reasons for optimism. In blog terms, however, it means that we are descending ever closer to the bottom of the sconology barrel. This post is all about tattie scones.
A potato scone or tattie scone as it’s known in Scotland, is fairly far removed from the oven scones that form the already rather feeble excuse for this blog’s existence. They are, however, scones so we have to give them their due. They’re just not what we are accustomed to. Our readers in the nether regions and far flung crevices of the world will probably be wondering what on earth we are on about. But what else are we supposed to do when we still can’t leave home.
Canny Scot
Anyway, one day the two mini-Vikings who helped us make drop scones in the previous post were having dinner at our house. Pat had made them mince and tatties, an ever popular dish that never usually fails. Suddenly, one of them (as five year olds tend to do) announced loudly that she didn’t like potatoes any more. Rather than go through the rigmarole of explaining about starving children in Africa, we decide to give her bread instead. That was fine but, of course, it meant that we still had some left over mashed potatoes. Pat, canny Scot that she is, put them in a bowl in the fridge.
Next day she announced that she was going to attempt something she had never done before – making tattie scones. Wow! Not sure that tattie scones could be classed as a Scottish delicacy but they are certainly very popular as part of a breakfast fry up. A packet of tattie scones does not cost a lot but they are simple to make.
You can get a recipe here but Pat simply added added a pinch of salt, a little butter and some milk to the left over mashed potato before finally adding a little flour. She then just patted the mixture out until it was roughly round in shape before dividing into quarters. Then they were transferred to a hot lightly buttered griddle (large frying pan would do) where they cooked until ready.
Ulstermen
Some people like them hot with just a little butter. Others actually prefer them cold with butter and jam. When we lived in Northern Ireland they were known as potato farls and formed an essential part of an Ulster fry. That’s something that Ulstermen have every morning but which would keep any ordinary mortal going for about a week.
The finished article
A first
Next morning, we decide to have our own fry up. It was an altogether puny affair compared to an Ulster fry. But at least we could sample Pat’s first homemade tattie scones. The scones were heated in the frying pan along with everything else.
We regard fry ups as a relatively rare treat. So needless to say the whole plateful was consumed with more than a little relish. Tattie scones were superb. Well done Pat and thanks to one over fussy mini-Viking without whom we would never have made them.
Do you sometimes find yourself wondering if the past year has just been a dream … a not very nice dream. And that you will suddenly wake up and it will all be over? After a while the whole COVID thing gets to you like that. One of the Australian aboriginal Dreaming stories tells of Baiame, a creational ancestral hero.
2,192 ft high Mount Yengo, the Uluru of the east
He came down from the sky to find the earth bare and dark. He decided to make it light and created plants, animals and rivers to make it beautiful. When he finished he jumped back up to the sky and, in doing so, he flattened the top of Mount Yengo. It’s a sacred site and you are requested not to climb it but we think the world could do with another visit from Baiame … there is much in need of attention. We tell you all this because at the foot of Mt Yengo is the Myrtle House Cafe where you can get scones. Another sacred place, perhaps?
Freedom
And how do we know all this … our Bathurst correspondents, of course. Once again we are indebted. If it wasn’t for them we wouldn’t have a clue what was happening sconologically down under. Their latest report started by telling us that cricketing legend Don Bradman actually started his career trying to play his first love, tennis. They soon get down to the scones, however, and end up here in Myrtle House. Bear in mind that our correspondents, although restricted by COVID, have much greater freedom to travel than we do. In their own words:
“On the road again, this time going north to our niece’s farm at a little village called Laguna on the Broke Road in the Hunter Valley. Erica and husband Brett and three small children have just moved up here from Sydney to escape the city rat race. Great for Covid protection as well.
the Fresh Denman cafe
On the way we lunched on bacon and egg rolls at a café called Fresh Denman, preceded of course by a scone entrée. The scone looked great but faded a bit on the tasting, maybe a 5 out of 10. Certainly not a top scone, perhaps a middling one if that term that can be used in scone hierarchy.
Lemonade
A couple of days later we had breakfast at a café called Myrtle House in Wollombi, just north of Laguna, starting of course with the obligatory B&E roll. “Do you also serve scones” I asked our waitress. “Of course we do mate” came the reply. “In fact, they are made to the famous Country Women’s Association (CWA) recipe, lemonade and all”. After that we had to order a serving. Better than the Denman ones, but a slight taste of sourdough, must have been the lemonade. 7 out of 10.
The Aboriginals believed that the entire world was made by their Ancestors way back in the very beginning of time … the Dreamtime. The Ancestors made everything and therefore everything is sacred and must be treated with respect. What would the Ancestors make of the current wrangling between the EU and the UK over imports and exports to N. Ireland. In fact, what would the Ancestors make of anything these days? Perhaps the world would be a nicer place if we took a leaf out of the Aboriginal’s book.
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!
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. One with a bowl of cream and a pot of homemade blackcurrant and gooseberry jam. Every thing was deliciousThe 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!
This 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!
by Bill and Pat Paterson and is about finding good scones throughout the world, with a little bit of politics
