Well, friends - dear friends all of you - it's rare to find me speechless so savour the moment!  The way you've all got behind me and thought of me and prayed about me.  Completely just kept me going when I felt so frightened.  Your comments and emails meant the world to me.  Thank you.

I actually got around to making some sausage rolls today, that staple of the British Christmas which we don't usually bother with because our tums will only hold so much, even at Christmas.

However, Delia Smith - my guru - did a Quick Flaky Pastry on telly and I just had to try it.  What better excuse when Ray next door told me where I could buy the "best Lincolnshire pork sausage meat in the county".  I'm not really a sausage fan but Keith is so I made Delia's pastry which involved grating frozen butter into plain flour and filled it with Ray-next-door's sausage.  To the left is the result: light, crisp, buttery, melt-in-the-mouth pastry, beautiful spicy, herby sausage.  I daren't really print the recipe because it'll be copyrighted within an inch of its life and Delia's recipes just never need tweeking so I can't do that and call it my own.  Trust me, they're yummy!  


Keith wanted to make something for lunch.  It involved peeling potatoes and slicing them thinly, and then layering them in a casserole dish with smoked bacon (chopped), small mushrooms (sliced), strong cheddar cheese (lots of it) and double elmlea (cream substitute).  Then he sticks it in the oven and bakes it until the potatoes are tender and the cheesy sauce bubbling.  I did take a photo but it made it look a bit burnt (which it wasn't) so I've deleted it.  But a plate of that was exactly the thing for a freezing cold, snowy day.  All the nicer because I didn't make it myself

I know people in other parts of the world have worse weather than us but right now it feels as if this is the worst weather to hit anywhere!  Snow, ice, freezing fog, minus temperatures.  Oh for goodness sake it's winter so this is how it should be!   I've seen it written in the gardening columns:  the gardens are busting for a good old freeze-up to get rid of some of the bugs.  We whinge when we get grotty summers and then when the weather does it right for once we STILL whinge!  Let your kids play in it, let them toboggan and have snowball fights, let them wear holes in their gloves.  If the next great British freeze is as long coming as this one they'll only get one go at it in their childhood.

Talking of snow!  I've been watching Holby City whilst typing this.  It's supposed to be Christmas (cut to outside shot) brilliant sunshine and leaves on the trees.  I don't know, did the BBC think no-one would notice??  Or has the BBC had the date of Christmas moved and not said?

xxx