Cracklin' Rosie...

After all the celebrating of Miss R's birthday over the weekend, I must confess to being quite relieved for Monday to rear its ugly head.  You see, because Miss R had been away for her birthday (pedalling around the Isle of Wight in a tutu) she had decided to have a Sunday evening barbecue so that she could celebrate with her many lovely friends and her loopy family (I include myself in the latter group).  'Bring a sausage', she said, 'I'll supply the rest.

Well we did a bit better than that and brought sausages, burgers and some homemade crackling.  The crackling is the husband's speciality and it is rolled out on all special occasions. Every now and again, he books himself in for an afternoon of butchery.  Now I full appreciate how odd this sounds, but who am I to complain when he walks through the door with bags of roasting joints, sausages and foot square slabs of crackling.  

So a whole twenty minutes was spent massaging oil into it (I am still talking about the crackling here).  He won't be rushed at this part of the preparation, and when the poor crackling has been massaged within an inch of its sorry life, sea salt is sprinkled liberally over it, and into the oven it goes.

So we were late.

The crackling had to have its fat drained twice, and then it was patted with kitchen roll before being chopped up into bite size pieces.  How do I know they were bite size?  Well, the husband managed to eat four or five pieces before it made it into the bowl, so I made him put it into the boot when we left to ensure that there was some left for Miss R's guests.  

The party was in full swing when we got there, and the bowl of crackling was snatched from my hands and promptly did the rounds.  I saw it sitting on the dining table, and headed over for a small piece.  Just as I was about to dip my hand in, I was intercepted by the Mother and Mrs Jangles, and I watched with dismay as the bowl disappeared again.

The next time I saw the bowl was when it had been washed up and was drying on the draining board.

'Wasn't my crackling good?' said the husband.  Well I wouldn't know seeing as I never got a bit, but secretly I was quite pleased as it probably meant that another visit to the dentist wasn't on the cards this week.

Going back to the party, it was absolutely wonderful, and when you get a group of people together who have something in common (loving Miss R in this instance), something magical happens.

The crackling disappears...



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