SMILES.

INGREDIENTS

• 450g plain flower.
• 1 teaspoon of salt.
• 8 eggs.
• 600ml milk.
• About 8 tablespoons of virgin olive oil and a bit of butter.
• Salt and pepper.
• Nutella.
• Peanut butter (smooth or crunchy).

METHOD
This is 15 minutes of doing things whilst the oven reaches temperature. Fit this in or around whatever else you’re cooking.

1. Get 2, 12-hole, 1 inch deep cake tins and put a bit of olive oil into each of the 24 holes. Then add a tiny bit of butter as well. And a pinch of salt and pepper to ONE tray of 12. Put them in the oven.
2. Heat the oven to 200 degrees centigrade or gas mark 6.
3. Sift the flour and salt into a large bowl. Add all the eggs and half the milk. Beat for about 3 minutes until you have a smooth batter.
4. Add the remaining milk. Beat for a further 2 minutes and leave.
5. When the oven is at temperature (after 15 minutes), beat the batter for 1 more minute.
6. Take the trays out of the oven. They should be sizzling. In the UNSEASONED tray add a teaspoon of peanut butter to 4 of the holes,  a teaspoon of Nutella to 4 of the holes and a teaspoon of both peanut butter and Nutella to the remaining 4 holes. Distribute the batter evenly across the 24 holes and put back in the oven for about 20 minutes. Keep an eye on them through the glass door (don’t open the door until the end or they’ll likely collapse). Once they rise and go to a deep brown across about 50% of the surface they’re done.

This is enough for about 24 quite big Yorkshire Puddings. 12 savoury. 12 sweet. Remember which are which.

(I am probably suggesting you do things you already do, or have done before. There is value in this though. Because I am reenforcing that you are also a culinary genius like what I is).

Arse

Yorkshire Puddings are a right pain in the arse to prepare for. All that faffing about.

And then the stress starts. Sometimes they come out like balloons. Sometimes like bloody Play-Doh.

They affect me mentally also. I talk to them as they are cooking, both collectively and individually. I kneel down with my palms on the kitchen floor, crab-like. Everyone stays out of the kitchen at this point. I insist on this (though I am almost always ignored).

I peer through the glass and address the soon-to-be Puddings collectively:

“C’mon. C’mon. C’mon. C’mon. C’mon. C’mon. C’MOOOOOON!”

And individually:

“You. You. You. He’s rising. Why aren’t YOU rising? You’re in the same fecking oven. Shit we need a new oven.”

Things like that. Head to one side. Still on my knees.

24

I like these 24 little things though. Lisa smiles when he gets them. She says she’ll just have 2 (then ‘just has 4’). Izobel isn’t sure what they are yet (she’s 2) so gives them to the Colin or Frank (dogs). I am going to see what she thinks about the Nutella ones for the first time today though. I’ll report back.

Later on, Lisa then remembers the sweet ones so has ‘just 2 more’ (which means ‘just 4 more’). Then Lisa runs around and jumps up and down for the following three days to work them off. (However the remaining 12 or so Yorkshire Puddings in the fridge somehow disappear in the coming days too… So I’m not sure how that works).

Busy

Anyhow, forget all that. In the real world, I am far too busy for all of this. It’s just food and you can buy Yorkshire Puddings frozen. I’m too busy to spend buggering about with home made Yorkshire Puddings with the family. I run two businesses. I have meetings. People rely on me doing things so they can do things too. I need as much certainty in business and in life as possible so why would I spend my precious time doing all of the above when I could end up with Pay-Doh? It doesn’t make any sense.

Two things

1. That last paragraph is utter bullshit.
2. I do it for the smiles.