Something cool happened last night. Sitting at the pub with Barney he tells me, "Hey Pands, on Christmas morning, you should come over early and we should make savoury toast and sausage rolls before we open the presents."
You have no idea how happy this made me.
I'm not a fan of Christmas. Never really have been. I don't do the tinsel and fairy lights. I'm a least line of resistance type person.
But I do like Christmas Baking. Also, as I have half of December and the first week of January off, I'll have a bit of time do to some baking.
I've never made sausage rolls, but how hard can they be. I've seen a recipe on RecipeTinEats - everything Nagy puts on her website is pretty much foolproof.
Savoury Toast, or what I call cheese savouries, is something Barney and I had in our childhoods. The Tasmanian version has the bacon mixed into the cheese mixture, while the South Australian version has a strip of bacon on the top. (Barney also doesn't get how I love cheese savouries with canned tomato soup - I think it's just perfect that way on a cold winter's night.) Barney puts tomato sauce in his mixture, I don't. I probably put more Worcestershire Sauce in that most people see as necessary, but that's how I like it.
Then there's the other Christmas baking to do. I'm thinking of doing a round of biscuits for my stairwell neighbours, who are all lovely. I've found some little things for Leila, the little girl next door, but her parents are from Taiwan - I'm hoping they like my yo-yo biscuits - Grandma's recipe. Just a small batch for them, and the two guys downstairs. As neighbours go, I'm very lucky. Quiet, considerate and friendly without being over the top. What more do you need?
Part of me would love to be on Christmas Pudding duty (but Blarney doesn't like it). I'll probably get to glaze the ham on the day, as that is one of my designated jobs.
And part of me would love to make a batch of Afghan biscuits. Another of my grandmother's recipes that have disappeared into the ether - and yes, my grandmother died twenty years ago in January, but still.
Maybe I could find a recipe and take some of these around to the drinks on Christmas Eve that Gloria and Gaynor are thinking of holding.
For somebody who really doesn't like Christmas, I'm getting irrationally excited. I haven't baked anything all year. My inner cook's assistant has been champing at the bit to get baking again. I've missed it.
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