Eating like a Princess

My Mum and sister were in New York last week and I had a craving for bagels. Norwich is not New York but the festival is on and loads of exciting things are happening, so lets pretend! I have been volunteering, spending my time helping out at events like Electric Hotel, a really ambitious contemporary dance piece, and the Red Ball Project. The other day I got to control a carousel - I was actually in charge of pressing the buttons to make it go round - childhood ambition achieved!

I followed a suitably authentic recipe in Denise Phillip's The Jewish Mama's kitchen. The results did not taste any worse for me being neither Jewish nor a Mama. I got to use the dough hooks on my whizzer for the first time whilst mixing together the flour, egg, oil, sugar, water and yeast. Dough hooks are part mesmerising and part ominous-looking. Whirr-whirr-ooh-err. The only hiccup in the procedings was that the first batch I baked got well and truly stuck to the greaseproof paper that the recipe had told me to place them on. The boiled bagels created a glue-like effect and thats how the first 6 lost their bottoms. Oh and also, the bagels were supposed to float to the surface after 2-3minutes in boiling water but they were floating when I first put them in the pan so maybe they got even more buoyant? I have no idea, answers on a postcard please.

Smoked salmon, cream cheese and cucumber bagel for my eating like a Princess tea!

We are in the middle of asparagus season so I treated myself to a lovely bunch. Boiled and twice-buttered, following the 'if you can't see it then it isn't there' rule that also applies to crumpets, this is the classiest way to eat your greens. Om nom nom.

My little brother turns sixteen this week. He has already overtaken me in the height stakes, anything could happen next! I baked him some chocolate chip cookies and posted them first class, haste post haste. I think the cookies tasted best still warm from the oven and the girls and I were super-restrained in not eating them all before they made there way to the letterbox.

P.S. I had my first and final exam last week so I am free from university commitments for over three months, an intimidating expanse of freedom. I've made a ludicrously ambitious list of things I want to learn to bake over the summer. Bagels were top of the list. Big tick. Watch this space!