optimist prime
we are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the starsArchive for food
Christmas bakefest #2 – Flourless orange and almond kugelhopf
Here are the Christmas kugelhopf I just baked.
Four for me, but still over a dozen to take to Ma B’s.
the best recipe I found was from the shecraves blog, and I used a Seville orange, a pink grapefruit and a few clementines in this batch. The icing is just come-as-you-please lemon.

Christmas bakefest #1 – Cannelés Bordelais
I first had these incredible little chewy cakes at Borough Market over a year ago, and after extensive research tracked down the silicone moulds from a cake suppliers in Paris (after trying mini muffin tins with no success – apparently using copper moulds is ideal, but expensive!)
They are fiddly, smoke out the kitchen and take over a day to make; but the homemade results are even better than the market versions – like a sweet vanilla and rum custard made into airy confection. There’s quite a good recipe here.
I was going to post pictures of my little shots of goodness, but I’ve eaten them all or given them away in Xmas bundles, so the image is courtesy of paperblog.

An MPU that actually made me stop and watch
Checking out the questionable new Saatchi ad for Guinness on Creativity Online, and down in the bottom corner I spotted this great little ad for the now corporation in NYC.
Dunno what they’re REALLY trying to get at here, and it obviously helps a lot that the placement gives it just a teeny bit of context, but my god did I watch it over and over again.
Guess I’m just a sucker for mucking about with food – its so wonderful and visceral.
Anyway, they lose something in the translation from ad format to movie, but you can catch the MPUs as Facebook films here.
its a veritable variance of vegetables!
these little piggies went to market…
Place:The Royal Agricultural Show at Warwick.
Reason: To spend some time observing children on the McCain Potato Story bus, before getting started on the site design proper.
It reminded me so much of school – the smells, the men wandering around with farm coats and wellies… and with jousting to boot it was a pretty spectacular day trip – just a shame it was dumping down for most of the day…
Had some great sausages from Thirsk in Yorkshire, and brought home 3 packets for a fiver. Highly recommended, from Debbie and Andrews.
It was an incredibly grounding experience, standing in the drizzle, with sausages in hand, looking at these gorgeous little piglets and thinking about the importance of understanding and respecting where your food comes from…
want some tuna?
This is an advert for a tuna brand from Thai TV… kinda creepy but appealed to me somehow… their surreal nature reminds me of the WCRS 3 tv ads. I’m really unconvinced that it would make me want to go out and buy a can of tuna, more like go and rent a David Lynch film.





