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Recipe Rifle's Christmas message
I would say it had been a joyous year, but it hasn't. I mean, not especially. I would say that it has been an eventful year, but it hasn't. I would say that it has been an annus horribilis, but it...
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Bread and butter pudding
My mind has gone. I felt it fading away about two months ago but it's really gone now. Bye bye. I can't read anything and am starting to do things like order 5 of the same thing on Ocado when I only...
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Pippa's Rainbow Cake
I sometimes worry that I might be a witch. It would make sense - I am not totally unsinister, with my weird red hair, beady black eyes, fearsome straight nose and strong Welsh ancestry (full of...
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Mushroom cappucino
I hope you realise how lucky you are to have me. How hard I work on your behalf. Do you know how much washing up there is involved in this little jig? I mean, I could just eat takeaway every night but...
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Gravadlax
Hello and welcome to part II of my Celebrate cooking odyssey, where I tell the tale of how I cooked three things from Pippa Middleton's book in one evening and almost had a nervous breakdown. Today is...
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Raspberry souffle
These raspberry souffles nearly gave me a fucking heart attack while I was making them. They are absolutely the most complicated thing I have ever made. Anything that involves an instruction to "be...
View ArticleButternut Squash Lasagne
I'm sure you get the picture now: Celebrate is a pretty good book and you ought to buy it if you like the sound of it. But just for laughs here's one last recipe from it, for a butternut squash...
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Posh peas
In my brief but intensive 2-year study in parenting I have arrived at the conclusion that when it comes to children, it's all about picking your battles. It is so easy just to spend all day shouting at...
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Salmon en Croute
I had salmon en croute once at someone's house and it was absolutely disgusting. The cook had failed to use any salt, because they are the sort of person who thinks that any salt kills you stone dead...
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Aromatic pork belly hotpot
My husband absolutely loves Chinese food. If you want to make him seriously happy, ring him up and say "Shall we go out for dim sum?" This year for his birthday I am going to make a thing happen that...
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French breakfast
I had a nightmare last night: it was that my husband said that if I didn't want to have any more than two children then he was going to go and have more with someone else. He was very matter of fact...
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A Birthday Cake
A small personality flaw both my husband and I display is haste. We fuck up otherwise simple tasks just by going at them fast, angrily, drunk, twenty minutes before we have to leave the house. There...
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Celeriac slaw with goat's cheese "croutons"
Every so often, I like to remind my husband exactly who is boss in this little domestic disaster we call home. I think he thinks it's him. And that's fine. Most of the time, I like to encourage him to...
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Luxury potato
There is a time in life that all mothers dread. It's worse than childbirth, because it goes on for longer, it's worse than breastfeeding, because it comes out of the blue. It's worse than looming...
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Another chocolate cake
My husband has been away filming in Canada for the last week and I have surprised myself by not having a nervous breakdown and not having to go and live at my mum's house. I really am surprised about...
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Chocolate nests for Easter
I don't know why this photo has come out blueIt occured to me the other day that I might be a tiny bit of a control freak. I arrived at this conclusion while thinking the other morning about why is it...
View ArticleLakeland
There come moments in life when you have to be realistic about who you are and what you are actually like, rather than nursing febrile projections of what you hope and dream that you are like. The...
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Cheese scones
There is this girl I know - not very well, I just follow her on Twitter - and the thing about her is that she is about to have her first baby, like any day now. And the reason that she is on my mind is...
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Lamingtons
These are amazing! Lamingtons, they are called, and they are squares of plain sponge sandwiched together with raspberry jam, covered in chocolate and dipped in DESSICATED COCONUT. I mean how much more...
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Stuffed rolled pork loin
I woke up feeling terribly gloomy yesterday morning. I felt awful and depressed and really unable to get out of bed in a way that I haven't since I had morning sickness, what feels like several hundred...
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