A couple of interesting finds due to the painting.

A $300 electronic car key that was missing for eighteen months. By the way, how do car makers get away with charging so much for a key? It's almost like give me the car and sell me the key.

Jam, that's right, jam. We are making jam faster than we consume it. Counted one box and there were twenty-five jars ~ we had six boxes. Too many of our friends have fruit trees, I might have to sneak out in the dead of night and do a George Washington, at the very least a good prune. On the spot New Year's resolution, we will only be making sour cherry (pie cherry) and raspberry jam from now on. Oh, if any one wants some jam ...

Banged on about bangers in my previous post, the way some people over cook them. Well sausages aren't the only form of meat to suffer this fate. Take my Christmas roast, four and a half kilos (10lbs) of glorious, aged prime rump of beef.

My sister-in-law E. hosted Christmas lunch. She asked me to procure the meat, which I ordered from one of my favourite butchers, Ormond Meat & Smallgoods. The owners Zepp and Marlies are Swiss, and most obliging; they will happily cut to order any type of meat in any shape or fashion and if you care to order in advance, will age your meat too.

E. had given me the number of guests early, so I ordered the meat a month before, plenty of time to age, and picked it up two days before Christmas. Unfortunately some guests were unable to attend, so the roast was a little large. The only thing to do was to slice some rump steaks off this magnificent lump of meat, which I did quite happily, for I knew what was going to happen next.

Whenever we cook a roast, my wife D. always asks for how long and at what temperature. Unfailingly I always tell her, unfailingly she always adds more time. When I complain D. points out that she cannot eat pink meat and I can eat well done meat, when I point out that she could eat from the outside of the roast, leaving me the pink inside, her reply is that the meat isn't cooked properly, then I add that she can eat steak tartare, which is completely raw, she adds that doesn't count.

Anyway E. asked me how long and at what temperature to roast the meat, which I told her and she then proceeded to cook it longer and hotter ~ just to be safe E. even added the resting time to the cooking time.

Did I tell you the vegetables were very nice?