As someone who’s half Italian, today is one of the days when I regret Britain’s Puritan past. While the rest of Catholic Europe revels in masked balls, fancy dress, copious alcohol and Nutella*, we British make do with a few pancakes, made from the abomination that is pancake mix, chastely consumed in front of the telly.( A propos, could someone please explain pancake mix to me? How exactly pancakes possibly be any simpler to make?)
Anyway, Shrove Tuesday was one of the family celebrations that I had in mind when I decided to have a baby. So this morning I gave the Husband strict instructions to come home from work as early as possible, so that we could sit down as a family and enjoy pancakes for the first time with our rosy-cheeked, gaily chuckling, daughter.
The Husband, of course, returned home late. I, of course, was in a foul mood because the Minx had been grizzling all afternoon. The Minx, cheeks rosily-sore with snot, was in a foul mood because I had been grizzling all afternoon.
Nevertheless I dusted down my trusty copy of Delia’s Cookery Course and mixed up some pancake batter, thinking what a model mama I was to be working on building those all-important family traditions. At which point the Minx promptly threw up the so-called chicken korma out-of-a-jar which she was being fed (her current cold is giving her certain cough/food/drool management issues) and then turned up her decided little nose at my delicious pancake with apple puree.
So she was packed off to bed and we spent the rest of the evening making and eating pancakes (with lemon and sugar – I am incapable of having Nutella in the house) while working on the mirror mirror website. Carnival indeed.