Pasta all’amatriciana; chocolate sponge pudding with chocolate custard and cream

When I write my autobiography, or possibly my first book of non-fiction, I’m going to call it “Your Call Is Very Important To Us, And Other Lies”.

From which you may correctly deduce that I’ve spent most of this morning on hold to various customer service departments, getting slowly more irritable and more sorry that I can no longer drink alcohol. After a lot of irritation and some minor panic, and far too much back-and-forward, mum’s bank confirmed to its satisfaction that mum is who she says she is, and that she is in possession of her bank card, and so we will be getting groceries before Storm Éowyn rolls in, which should be a relief to anyone who doesn’t want to read about meals of dry bread and rain water.

Before that derailed our morning, mum had been looking out at our rain-sodden garden and saying how glad she was that she had had a chance to get outside and do some gardening, and I’m glad too because it makes me happy to see her so happy “pottering about”. Unfortunately, she also keeps saying how disappointing it is that we didn’t put our green waste bin out in time for collection, which is my fault for not checking online to see if they collect this early in the year. Thankfully they collect every two weeks, so it won’t be that long before the bin is emptied and mum can start the enjoyable (to her) process of refilling it with bits of dead and dying foliage.

(Which reminds me that I intended to put some fresh basil from the increasingly sad looking plant in the kitchen into last night’s dinner. Oh well, way too late now.)

Last night’s dinner was pasta all’amatriciana, which is pasta in a sauce of tomatoes, chillis, and bacon (probably pancetta in the original recipe, but British back bacon in this case). This was very much a cheat’s version, using a jar of tomato and chilli sauce (Loyd Grossman brand, as usual), which worked really quite well: the chilli heat is mild enough for mum, but has a good flavour on its own and is even better with additions – in this case, fried bacon and onion mixed in, and a load of grated cheddar on top. (Apologies to all the Italian skeletons dizzy from spinning in their graves at the concept.)

After that bit of carb loading, I reminded mum that we had a new batch of microwave-ready steamed puddings scheduled for delivery and we needed to clear some cupboard space for them by eating the ones we already had. (Any excuse will do, right?)

Mum had her usual golden syrup one, and I had my usual chocolate melt-in-the-middle one: both are made by Aunty’s, a brand available in both Sainsbury’s and Tesco, and probably in other places, which are surprisingly good for the budget price (under £2 for a pack of two). I added some chocolate custard to mine, to give me something to write about as I have written about the puddings before: it’s Ambrosia brand and is so good I had to resist having the whole tin-full and licking the lid. The latter would have been a particularly bad idea as it appears we don’t have a proper can opener and I had to ask mum to use the ‘stab’ type one I remember from my childhood but have long since forgotten how to use, which leaves a sharp, ragged edge round the lid. A proper can opener has now been added to my mental list of things we need for the kitchen, in preference to relearning how to use a device so old I can’t find pictures of it online to show you what it looks like.

And so, with rain already hurling itself at the windows, I will bid you farewell for now. If you’re in the UK, please take care of yourself and stay safe in the forthcoming storm, about which I am valiantly resisting making LOTR jokes and exposing my barely concealed nerdy side. 🐎