(There you have it: the obligatory “24” joke. I do love that series. I came to it late, but I like it a lot.)
Time to make the Canary-style potatoes. Two batches of little new potatoes get boiled. While this happens, the dressing gets made. Cumin seeds, some flaked chilies, and some smoked paprika get ground together. Garlic and Maldon salt are pounded together in a mortar and added to the cumin/chili/paprika mixture. About a quarter cup of olive oil, half a cup of wine vinegar and half a cup of sherry vinegar are mixed together, and the spices are dumped in, and the whole business is whizzed with the stick-mixer into a vinaigrette. The potatoes are drained, then halved or (in the case of the big ones ) quartered and dumped into a tureen. The vinaigrette is poured over them and they’re tossed in it: then most of it is drained off and put in a separate container, since it’s not good to leave them soaking in it until dinnertime.
Peter meanwhile finishes up with the carrots and gets busy peeling the potatoes that will go around the roast lamb. He uses the zesting tool to rough them up so they’ll get nice and crunchy in the oven. Then he finishes work on the braising liquid for the lamb (lemon juice, olive oil, white wine, water) and puts it in a little container so that Mary can pick the whole business up in about half an hour, take it down the road to her own oven, and shove it in.
I start creaming the butter and the sugar for the buttermilk cake. The voice says from the next room, “You should go have your shower and get dressed.”
Clothes? I’m supposed to wear clothes to this event? — is the first thing I’m tempted to say. But if I say it, events might start to occur which could delay the cooking. I keep my yap shut for the moment and then start to wonder what’s scorching. It turns out I’ve been preheating the wrong oven, the one with the grill in it. Doors are opened and much smoke comes out of the house, hopefully not frightening the neighbors. I finish mixing the cake while buttering and flouring the gugelhupf tin and then dusting it with cocoa as well. The correct oven is now heated: in goes the cake.
I go upstairs for my shower: I have twenty minutes before the cake needs to be checked. I open the bathroom door, and no one hiding inside jumps out and shoots me, so this plainly cannot be an episode of “24”….
