Goodwill and cheer

Merry Christmas world. Or at least, the western/christian parts of it.

To the rest, an early happy new year, and may you enjoy whatever holidays you may instead be celebrating at this time of year.

Tasty Christmas Goodness

I think that for the end of term, I’m going to share a recipe I enjoyed baking with a friend that turned out most delicious!

Festive Almond Biscuits

• 75 g unsalted butter, chilled and chopped into pieces
• 115 g self raising flour
• 75 g ground almonds
• 100 g caster sugar
• 50 g marzipan

To make the orange sugar:

• pared rind of two oranges
• 50 g icing sugar

1. Whizz butter with flour and almonds to breadcrumb consistency. Add 1/2 of the caster sugar. Whizz mixture again until it clings together and then work lightly into a ball.
2. Thinly roll out the dough. Use festive biscuit cutters to make shapes, put 20 on battered baking sheet. Roll the marzipan into balls, lay on the dough shapes, and then top with matching dough shape. Seal edges and chill for 30 minutes.
3. Pre-heat the oven to 150 degrees (higher if not a fan oven). Bake the orange rind for 3 minutes, then cool. Mix the remaining caster sugar, icing sugar and orange rind together. Bake cookies for 18-20 minutes, cool on a wire rack. Sprinkle the orange sugar over the cookies.
4. Enjoy!

If only he’d said something..

So this is probably an awful lot more serious than I ever intended to get this early on this blog, but this doesn’t feel like the sort of thing that should be passed over without note.

A fellow student, one I knew from my seminar group, died this weekend, and not by unfortunate accident.

It’s terrifying how perfectly fine someone can seem, and yet obviously the very last thing they are is ok.

If I’m not wrong, suicide is something like the 3rd leading cause of death in guys aged 16-25.

 

Why is it we’re not doing more about this?