The Proof of the Pudding...

What do you do with a little girl ("Mummy I'm a grown-up, right?") who skips any dinner at the thought of any sugary pudding ("Tara, you've got to eat 5 more spoons full of your dinner to earn points for your pudding!") at Christmas? You buy her plenty cakes when you're out for coffee? Perfectly correct. But above all, you introduce her to the Christmassy art of baking. Not that I remember a single recipe of all those that we baked with our mother when we were kids, but they are easily gotten hold of (Christmas Baking with Children - recommended!).

Now, the dough comes first. I proceed like this: Prepare the dough in child's absence. Then, while trying to cook some dinner with one had, clutching a five-kilo nursing baby to one boob with the other, somehow manage to knead and roll the dough with the aforementiond first hand while supervising Tara's cutting out of cookies and helping out with, ideally, a third hand. Half way through I accept the fact that I cannot stop the flour from going onto every inch of floor and into every crack that presents itself on tables or chairs - I've reached the maximum of my multi-tasking abilities! For that reason, too, the decorating is postponed to the next day. I need a break! (Tara is upset.)

Decorating cookies in five easy steps:

1. Place infant on next-best surface that presents itself in order to free hands. Get out cookies and remaining ingredients as quickly as possible. Note: Placing infant on table in presence of older sister is a bad bad bad idea as older sister will pull infant off table in a well meaning attempt at placing as many kisses on her little brother as physically possible. Before disaster hits, proceed as follows: Take a picture for the blog, THEN save the baby and place him somewhere safer. Feel guilty for only the briefest of moments; we got cookies to ice.


2. Get daughter to prepare icing. Note (1): Baby safely stored in background. Note (2): It does NOT help to inform Tara that icing consist purely of sugar.


3. Follow instructions to "spread icing thinly onto each biscuit with a knife." Then, "sprinkle on decoration." Note: Baby in background, stored safely, happy.

"Tara, show me your first biscuit!"

3. Add more water to sugary icing; we're way too slow and it's dried before we get any decoration on. Actually, we're way too slow at anything and anyway, the intructions are ridiculous. Drop them. Following her first biscuit, Tara has stopeed decorating and has started eating; first her biscuit, then the sugary decoration. Bit by bit. Slowly. With great appetite. I'm doing this alone! Proceed as follows: Chuck all decorative sugary elements into one bowl. Dip cookie in icing, dip cookie in decoration - done - next. Note: Baby, stored safely, is NO LONGER HAPPY.

Hmmm, pink sugar, bit by bit

4. Pick up unhappy baby, clutch to chest and insert nipple into infant's mouth to lighten his mood. Proceed with double dipping process one-handed. Note: Tara has found a way of speeding up her sugar consumption as well, as pictured below. Great. We're nearly done.

Hmmmm, pink sugar, by the tongue full

5. We're done. Leave cleaning to the man of the house and get biscuits out of the way so some get to make it through to the next day. Find somewhere safe to put baby and make some dinner, quickly, in case the child that's just eaten half a ton of sugar can be persuaded to have some real food. Note: Put away £2 for dentists' bills later in life. We'll be paying for this. What's wrong with nuts and oranges, anyway? They're much tastie, and much, much easier to prepare for eating!!!

Mummy, my pink sugar is all gone!

So then, as the saying goes: The proof of the pudding is in the EATING! I've had to try that sugary stuff my daughter loves so much myself. It doesn't taste of sugar, it doesn't taste of pink. It tastes of CHILDHOOD!

(7.12.)