Hello everyone, hope you are all well and enjoying an Indian summer. I’ve been busy this month finishing off the sixth and last in the Champion Street Market Series. So sad. I shall be sorry to say goodbye to all these characters I’ve come to know so well. And yet . . . I’m quite excited about the new project I have in mind, but more about that later. This last book in the series will be called Lonely Teardrops and it’s the story of a girl who discovers on the day of her beloved father’s funeral that the woman she has always called Mam, isn’t her mother at all.
Meanwhile, the new book out
this month is the paperback of Candy Kisses, so you can all rush out and buy it
for Christmas.
And thinking of Candy Kisses, and with Christmas coming up, here’s a recipe
for the grandkids.
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Old
fashioned Mintoes Boil syrup, margarine and sugar for 2 minutes. Stir in 3 parts of the milk. Put the rest of the milk on to a baking board and turn toffee mixture on to it and knead. Roll into strips and cut into pieces with scissors. Delicious. Still with Christmas in mind, and I hate to say it but it seems to come sooner every year, how about a fat-free Christmas pudding? I’ve been making this recipe for years. My family love it and nobody ever suffers from indigestion. Give it a try. It will make you feel so self righteous. |
Life in Spain
Everyone is getting back to their winter activities, now that the heat of summer
is behind us. I’m taking up my
pilates and yoga again. David is treading the boards with a local am-dram society,
and walking the mountains each Tuesday morning with his walking group.
The Spanish are currently celebrating All-Souls Day.
Some take their wine and tapas to commune with the dead on All Hallow’s
Eve, and on the day itself, the cemetario is packed, the flower seller is busy
and they hold a special service to their loved ones.
No mention of witches, although these do form part of the mythology in
the Asturias and in Galicia in Northern Spain, which is very Celtic. Even the scenery there reminds me of Wales, Cornwall and
Ireland. Lots of rolling hills,
fishing villages and sea frets.
We too have put our clocks back, which means that Mr Black Wheatear, who sleeps in our patio heater, is going to bed an hour earlier. We always have to check that he’s not in residence if we want to put it on, and he gets quite cross with us if we have people in for dinner. He sits on the rail and chirrups at us every now and then, as if to say, that’s enough wine and chat, it’s time you all went home so I can get some sleep. He has been known to fly right over our heads and go to bed anyway. Mr Robin has also turned up again. He arrives every autumn around this time, having spent the summer in the Lakes or Birmingham. The bee eaters have gone back to Africa, as have the swallows and house martins. But the black wheatears and the black redstarts will stay with us all winter. We also have orphean warblers and crested larks.
| Fat-free Christmas Pudding 4 oz prunes or dates 4 oz candied peel 4 oz grated carrot 4 oz fresh wholemeal breadcrumbs 4 oz sultanas 4 oz raisins 4 oz currants 1 cooking apple, chopped ½ allspice ½ tsp ground cinnamon ½ tsp ground nutmeg ½ tsp ground cloves juice and zest of 1 orange and 1 lemon 2 oz chopped hazelnuts or flaked almonds 4 oz self-raising flour 6 oz dark muscavado sugar 2 large eggs |
Method
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David and I are off to the Lake District to spend
Christmas with our daughter, which we’re greatly looking forward to as we
don’t see her too often. We’ll
have to wrap up. It will be a good
deal colder than here in Spain, although I’m not hopeful that it will be
white. I can remember some wonderful white Christmases in the past, with my
girls on their sledges and building snowmen.
I remember one when our water pipes froze and we had no water, only wine
to drink. Shame!
It was the best Christmas ever. One
of the joys of Christmas, of course, has to be all that lovely food.
I adore turkey, even the leftovers, and I confess I’m a sucker for
Christmas pudding. I’ve been
making this recipe for years. My
family love it and nobody ever suffers from indigestion.
My daughter, who is a catering manager, now uses it for The National
Trust. Fame at last!
It’s not too late, so why not give it a try?
It will make you feel so self-righteous, and it really is delicious.
Who Do We Think We Are?
Last month I talked a little about my grandfather’s family, and said I would
mention my grandmother’s next time. The Saltonstalls came from the Parish of Halifax and I’ve
traced them back with certainty to 1686, that is with the help of documentary
evidence such as baptisms, marriages or deaths, monumental inscriptions, or the
passing on of land. They were
mainly weavers, or websters as they were called then, and in the early days
cattle men and skinners. There is a
famous family of Saltonstalls, who could boast seven knights amongst their
number, one of whom was Lord Mayor of London, one governor of Connecticut, and
another went out to the New World on the Winthrop fleet in 1630.
One was a judge at the Salem Trials, and another lost his entire fleet in
the American War of Independence, which was rather careless of him, don’t you
think? There are many more who made
good marriages into the minor nobility of England. Some of course were thieves and vagabonds, were involved in
slavery, or exported to Australia for stealing. Another spent 13 years in the fleet prison and I can’t yet
discover why. And they all
originated from this small corner of Halifax.
It’s great fun discovering their history and trying to link up my own
Saltonstalls with this illustrious band. Maybe
there’s a royal in there somewhere, you never know. Have you found links with the nobility, or the criminal
fraternity? Do let me know if you
have.
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