This used to be the name of coloured sprinkles you could buy to put on cakes and ice cream.
I was thinking of it today as the number of my followers has today exceeded the number of posts I’ve put up - more than 1000.
Michelle Obama and Justin Bieber have millions of followers for their Twitter tweets. I wonder whether they alter the content to match the interests of their fans? I don’t expect so!
But I want you all to know that I look at what you do and take note of what you are interested in.
Have a nice weekend!
Italy today
A few days after my return, Northern Italy was hit by a massive earthquake. Six people died and thousands had to flee as buildings were turned to rubble. Enormous damage has been caused to centuries-old palaces and churches, leaving rubble over the streets of Bologna, Ferrara and the town of Finale Emilia, where this clock tower was devastated.
Apart from the human and architectural cost, the Italians have suffered the loss of 300,000 wheels of Parmesan and Grana Padano cheese. Each one weighs about 38kg (84lbs). The cheeses were aging in warehouses that were heavily damaged. The expected financial loss is about £202 million or 250 million euros.
(The photo of the shattered clock tower comes from The Daily Telegraph).
Warmed by the sun
Houses in Tuscany are painted stucco. Most are variations on a golden colour: yellow or apricot. This rose coloured one is in the walled city of Lucca - a gem not to be missed.
The ancient walls remained intact as the city expanded and modernized. As they lost their military importance, they became a pedestrian promenade which encircled the old town, although they were used for a number of years in the 20th century for racing cars.
Today you can walk along the top in between lines of trees, looking down on the buildings below.
To look at more pictures of Italian buildings, click on the picture. I guarantee it will make you happy (unless you are a totally miserable person who doesn’t enjoy anything!)
Italy as it was
Last week I was in Italy. This is the house where the composer Puccini was born in 1858. He wrote many famous operas including Tosca and Madame Butterfly. If you’ve never heard opera, you may think of it as inaccessible, but as you walk round the house - now a museum - you can see Puccini’s notes on his music scores and suggestions for how the tenor Caruso and world famous conductor Toscanini should interpret his work. All the while the heart-rending music of La Boheme is playing in the background. A bit different from the rock and pop you hear while walking round shops.
Puccini’s operas are tragic - reminding us that art simply reflects the sadness of life. Click on the picture to listen to something that is as moving today, as when it was written over a hundred years ago.
The real thing…. or what?
This is a picture of lemon blossoms and fruit, growing on a tree in Italy. I’ve just received some PR information about a drink called Orangina. Here’s what they say about it:
The original taste of the Mediterranean. Packed with natural pulp and real orange pieces, it’s made of a blend of four citrus juices. It has no added colour or sweeteners.
Dig a little further and you’ll find that Orangina contains mostly carbonated water and only 12% citrus juice. As for the sweeteners, it has high fructose corn syrup, which has been the subject of several scares. Click on the picture to read more about it.
Meanwhile, if you’re thirsty, you’d do better to eat an orange and drink a chilled glass of water with a slice of lemon in it.
Happy Monday?
Does it depend on the weekend you’ve just had, or the week ahead of you? Are you thinking what to make for dinner, or are you young enough not to give it a thought, with all your meals provided by someone else?
Either way, why not take a little time to play? These are meringues, bananas, medjoul dates and crackers filled with cream or mascarpone - the most delicious Italian cream cheese.
You don’t need a child to do it with you, but it helps! For more ideas on kitchen games and experiments, click on the picture.
Great ideas
Sometimes they seem to come from nowhere. The picture is reblogged and has been seen over 30,000 times.
When it comes to great thoughts, they can come from surprising sources: here are three, from an actor, a statesman and a football manager. I hope they will make you smile, or stop and think:
“Books are no more threatened by Kindle than stairs by elevators.” - Stephen Fry.
“I am easily satisfied with the very best.” Winston Churchill.
“The great barrier to success is the fear of failure.” Sven Goren Eriksson.
The picture is “Rainborough II” by Aakash Nihalani
(via aakashnihalani)
Spring magic
A clash of colours but a perfect mingling of flavours. Here’s an idea of what to do with a ripe passion fruit. You can just eat it with a spoon. Or cut some strawberries in half, and if they are out of season and not too ripe, sprinkle over a little sugar. Add a squeeze of lemon juice. Then spoon over the flesh and seeds of a passion fruit. Cover with clingfilm and leave for an hour or so for the flavours to mingle. Magic.
Passion
This is the flower of the passion fruit. The plant is said to be easy to grow (mine happened by accident to appear on the right facing wall). The flowers are so perfect. Click on the picture to see a different purple variety which is lacy and delicate - far superior to the much feted orchid.
Then scroll down to see the ugly looking fruit it produces.
The fruit of the passion flower
Unlike almost every other fruit where the skin is smooth, a passion fruit is only ripe when it is wrinkly. It doesn’t look too exciting when you cut it open - a soft, orangey centre with pips.
This one is definitely not ripe. It needs to be left for another 4-5 days till the skin wrinkles and the flavour develops.
Fear of frying?
Anyone knows it is messy and risky. Hot oil spatters everywhere; your clothes and hair smell of frying and then you’ve got all the clearing up.
Would you believe you can cook chips (french fries) from cold oil? Savvy cooks all know the oil should be fiercely hot before you start, but amazingly this method works. 15 mins from start to finish - totally delicious chips and almost no mess.
You have to try it: click on the picture to find out how it’s done.
The bit that wasn’t ‘ate’
The cake originally had the word ‘chocolate’ but as you can see, half of it has been eaten! The word was done by putting covered alphabet cutters on the sponge cake and then sprinkling over icing sugar. You need to lift off the cutters very carefully…
More is more, so you need chocolate sauce on top. This is made by simply melting a bar of good dark choc, a little golden syrup and a knob of butter in the microwave.
Pastry - not just for pies
One of the joys of working at home is that I have time to play. All you need for this is:
- some pastry (home-made or rolled out bought pastry is fine)
- then, unless you’re very handy with a sharp knife, a set of metal alphabet cutters.
Click on the picture to find the details. They’ll cost you the same price as a novel, or two tickets on the London Underground, or a few coffees at Starbucks.
Once you have the letters you can use them to cut out ready-to-use icing or even pieces of carrot or apple. The pastry letters were baked at 190C/380F for about 10 minutes on a sheet of baking paper.
A thousand pictures!! That’s enough to fill a book, or more. Every day for two and a half years, I’ve been putting up an illustrated post on The Armchair Kitchen. Coming up next are three of my favourites.
Thank you to everyone who is following - especially those who have joined since the blog was included on Tumblr’s Food Spotlight. If anyone wants to look back through some of the 1000, click on Archive on the right and you can see what you’ve been missing.
A surprise?
A couple of years ago, British author Ian McEwan conducted an admittedly unscientific experiment. He and his son waded into the lunch-time crowds at a London park and began handing out free books. Within a few minutes, they had given away 30 novels. Nearly all of the takers were women, who were “eager and grateful” for the freebies while the men “frowned in suspicion, or distaste.” The inevitable conclusion, wrote McEwan in The Guardian newspaper: “When women stop reading, the novel will be dead.”
Is this a surprise? Surveys consistently find that women read more books than men, especially fiction. Explanations abound, from the biological differences between the male and female brains, to the way that boys and girls are introduced to reading at a young age.
What about blogs? Are there more women tumbling than men? Are men more or less interested in reading about food?
Tell me what you think. I’d love to hear from you. Click on the Ask me Anything button and let me know your views.
The research in this post is reblogged from wordpainting:
Find more details by clicking on the picture.