Gingerbread Men
It’s 10 to midnight when I reach the Costcutter looking for ginger. I’d only found a few shops open and none of them had the vital ingredient. It’s essential that I find ground ginger to mix with the bowl of flour and the saucepan of melted sugar, treacle and butter waiting in the kitchen. Gingerbread Men aren’t quite the same without it.
These Gingerbread individuals will work for the greater good; they’ll play a role in the office ‘charity bake day’. How could I leave them unformed? Their sale would add to the whopping three grand that our two London Marathon runners have to raise for the privilege of reducing themselves to pain-wracked lumps of jelly.
I will admit that I started a bit late, around 10.30 or later, as I’d been out in town. So by the time we’d finished supper I should have been winding up for bed. I’d already had to nip out on the bike to get some flour at gone eleven, so I couldn’t really leave the sugary goo and hard-won flour uncooked after I discovered there wasn’t so much as a grain of ginger powder in the house.
The Tesco, the newsagent and the half supermarket (which boarded up half its floor space after the Tesco opened) had spices, but not ginger. I found plenty of garlic granules, heaps of chilli powder, cumin and jerk seasoning, but these don’t work well in sweet biscuits. I think the shops were stocking West Indian and African spices, but not the Asian ginger. But in the Costcutter, next to the fridge were spices, and amongst the packets was ginger. Hurrah.
It’s after the witching hour and ‘Heather Mills: What Really Happened’ has long finished by the time I get home to find the girlfriend wondering where I’d been for the last 40 minutes. But with the precious spice added into the mix, my dough was ready in a trice. Then before it could be rolled out, it needed an hour cooling in the fridge. In this case, it would cool for a night.
In the bright morning light, the oven is hot and the biscuits themselves only need 10 minutes. If only I can get the dough out of the bowl. It’s transformed from a pudgy and fragrant fudge into half a bowling ball stuck to the china mixing bowl. After bending a spoon and hopelessly slapping the bottom of the bowl, the lump eventually thuds onto the sideboard.
The lump however doesn’t like rolling pins, which won’t shift anything. So I cut off small slices and massage them, they finally spring to malleable life. By now it’s Thought for the Day on Radio 4 and I have to leave at 8.15. Chop, massage, chop, massage, chop. They’ll take 10 minutes to cook, and will need to cool for a few minutes too.
At last a pile of scrappy dough. Need it, roll it, cut; gently move the figures on to the baking tray. Don’t want to lose a head. First batch in and it’s almost the hourly weather forecast. Need, roll, cut. Second batch in. By now I’m cooking porridge too, then rush upstairs to get my bag. Eat porridge, rush upstairs to brush teeth. Phone goes, it’s Anthony, he’s never commuted into London and I’m showing him how. “I’m outside having a fag” “Sure thing, one minute”
First tray into the bag. Run to the door “Hi mate, I’m almost there”, “Fine”. Second tray bagged. Tie plastic bag full of gingerbread men on outside of my satchel. Get the bike out. Let’s hope they don’t crumble on the way.
Tags: ginger, gingerbread men, London Marathon fund raising