what life? what life? what life?

When I was young, I used to think that your life begins in your twenties. I used to picture myself living in condo by the beach while people in roller skates whizzed by my front door only slowing down to admire my shiny mini cooper. Now you might think that these are the absurd delusions of a 12 year-old girl but I can honestly tell you that these thoughts lingered until at least the last year of high school. I blame Will Smith of course, as you do. Specifically that one song in which he says miami a lot.

Real life is much more mundane, yes? Two years into my twenties, I've yet to graduate from college, find a job that doesn't require me to drink 10 cups of coffee just to get through, or be in possession of a mini cooper. NO MINI COOPER. Where did I go wrong? Why do I have so little to lose? In the quest of having it all, I really have nothing at all. If I die tomorrow, the only thing I'd be remembered as is as my parent's smart ass daughter. Which is not a lot, since being that is practically a birthright. See ma, I know my impudence doesn't amount to anything.

I sound like I'm complaining again. Well, I'm not. In the likely scenario that I'd be alive tomorrow, life would actually be pretty good. It's getting there. Not that I know where there is, but it's like when you're going down a really long country road, let's say on a bike. It's hilly and quite bumpy, but as you go along the view gets nicer and nicer. So by inductive logic, however frowned upon by your team-deductive college professors, you can only assume that you're going somewhere awesome. And you don't even mind the bike, cos you know your ass will be nice and sculpted by the time you get there. This is how I choose to see it. 80 percent of the time. The other 20 percent I'm not going to mention, since it's quite dreary, but lets just say it involves a very large and constantly swirling black hole.

Anyways, poorly constructed analogy aside, why the sudden cognizance of things impending you ask, my dear imaginary friends? Well, I just turned 22 a couple weeks ago. It was a good one. We had mexican. I saw some people I haven't seen in a while, some longer than others, overall a nostalgic week. I've come to realized though, now that I'm older,not having expectations for birthdays, makes it extra nice when they turned out to be good.

my partners in crimes and me

And this one reminded me, maybe my life haven't quite turned out the way I expected but maybe that's not a bad thing? I mean, I used to love S Club 7 and mcDonalds ice cream. What the hell did I know?

a little relapse..

Okay. I'm afraid I've been a little reluctant about writing here today. See, I know the only recipe I have up my sleeve this week directly contradicts my last post (scroll down for a reminder). I know this. But I just can't help myself. It's like they say, once you go black you never go back. But like, replace black with desserts and you'll have a much more diplomatic, albeit less catchy, sentence.

Will you hear me out anyway?

You will?

Thanks.

So I set out looking for a great steak & kidney pie recipe just because I use to love them as a child and you know I have that thing for nostalgia and childhood longings, but as it happens, this recipe, like all things great and urgent, came through one of my rss feed. It was of the very humble and sorely underrated crumble. 

It came courtesy of one of my favourite british food writer, Mr. Nigel Slater. If you love heartfelt cooking and childhood memoirs, you will adore him as much as I do. Trust.

Strawberry Apple Crumble served w/ Cold Vanilla Custard

I decided to do this recipe in two parts. One for the crumble another for the custard. I know a custard recipe seems a bit redundant at this point, but this one sets just a touch firmer than your usual pudding.

Strawberry Apple Crumble

adapted from Tender Volume II by Nigel Slater

Obviously you're going to have to make the custard beforehand to have it ready when the crumble's done. So lets start with that.

Vanilla custard:

• 1 vanilla pod, scraped
• 1 2/3 cup heavy cream
• 3 egg yolks
• 4-5 Tbsp sugar, depending on how big of a sweet tooth you have of course.

Firstly, heat the cream in a pan, per usual do not let it boil or bubble in any way. In a separate bowl, whisk the egg yolks along with the sugar and vanilla until all are well incorporated. This might take longer than you'd think. Pour the hot cream into the yolks in a slow steady stream, all while still whisking the yolks. When all the cream is well mixed into the yolks and sugar mixture, pour them back into the pan and heat once again.

Now this is where you need to be careful, use super low heat and just keep stirring until it starts to thicken. If you see the mixture starts to separate, it means you've left them on the heat for too long or the whole thing is too hot. If this happens, don't fret. Just pour the mixture in a food processor and blitz until they're silky smooth. Pour them in a bowl and let them cool before popping them in the fridge.

For the crumble top:

• 95 grams butter
• 150 grams all purpose 
• 45 grams sugar

For the fillings:

• 50 grams butter
• 75 grams sugar
• 3 Granny Smith apple peeled, chopped and seeded
• 200 grams fresh strawberries, chopped
• Juice of 1/2 lemon

Put the butter in a hot pan until nice and melted before adding in the apples and the sugar. Stir and make sure the apples are all sitting in one layer. Turn the heat down to low and leave them to cook for a while. The juice from the apple should have the consistency of syrup and when your apple starts to color a little, you'd know its done.

Put the apples in a baking dish then place the strawberries right on top, nice and evenly. Sprinkle some sugar and squeeze your lemon over the whole thing.

To make the topping, put the butter and the flour in a medium bowl, and rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips until the mixture looks like fine breadcrumbs (you could do this in a food processor, but be careful not to over blitz them).Distribute the topping evenly over the apples and strawberries. Bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour, or until pale golden.

Yield: 1 9-inch pie plate