Christmas baking for 2018

Not quite enough for that ... yet! I do go to work on an egg though: fresh egg, lightly poached, served on homemade linseed bread toasted

After hens I tried to convince Mr "M" we should have ducks (this was when I had a quarter acre garden). He wasn't haven't any of it I couldn't see why not - duck eggs make *the* best Victoria Sandwich cakes One Sunday he was at work and I went off and bought a trio When he came home from work, he remarked that the ducks from the pond in the park were particularly noisy! He went up the top end of the garden and I raced up behind him, hopefully before he spotted them: too late!
Him: "Where did *they* come from!?"
Me: "They flew in!"
Took him 3 weeks before he realised they could not fly! By which time, he was fond of their offerings
Duck eggs are great in Christmas cakes too, btw.

 

@"M"

 

It's true that when you've had beautiful, yellow-yolked organic eggs from your own hens, you never want to go back to the sad, mass-produced offerings from shops. And the hens are better entertainment than any television One thing that made a big difference to us was installing an automatic pop-hole door. It's set on an adjustable timer so you don't have to get up at some ungodly hour in the summer to let the girls out. As they're very intelligent and 'put themselves to bed' once it gets darkish, you set the door to close once they're all in and safe. It means that we can go out for the day and evening or a couple of days without any worry. There's usually a willing volunteer or two to collect the eggs Then there's the 'free' fertiliser for the garden!