We all have times in our lives when we get the fuzzy end of the lollipop. When no matter how hard we try or how good we are ,life doesn`t go according to plan. Like when I had my twins, a natural birth followed by a C-section wasn`t on my birth plan to be honest, mind you twins were a bit of a surprise in the first place anyhow! I can remember being so sick and tired of being sick and tired when I was pregnant. I was teaching in York and I was as shapely as a large galleon in full sail. Double the babies meant double the hormones. My angel TA Sue would ably take over if she spied me turning green . I would bobble off , head in waste paper basket wailing I was never getting pregnant again.After a dodgey prenatal scan I was told that there might be something wrong with one of the babies. The motherlove formed in that instant was overwhelming. I swelled up to at least twice my height and choked back tears as I indignantly replied that I was keeping them whatever. It was the first time I really prayed for myself...for my unborn little flup. Not to be perfect but for me to have the strength to love and care for him whatever the outcome. My nanna gave me a painting of two cupids and sagely said "keep looking at them Clarey and the babbies will be reet." I died a thousand deaths during that pregnancy, the worry was a heavy cloak to wear. I made deals with God. When the twins were born perfectly healthy I breathed again for the first time in months. I kept my deal with God - I`m no better than anyone but I am more grateful than most. That baby who looked so malformed recently came 10th out of 120 in a cross country race, he has won 15 table tennis medals and three Football cups this season. He is living proof that little miracles do happen everyday to ordinary people like me.We live in extraordinary times.The future will be brighter for us all.

When my soul is weary stew and dumplings never let me down...

Drunken bull with stilton dumplings.

Slug of olive oil
900g rump steak cubed
1 tube tomato puree
2 red onions diced
1tbs flour,seasoned
500ml Guinness
1 glass red wine
2 carrots diced
1/2 swede diced
1 tin tomatoes
4 cloves garlic
2 stock cubes
pinch of sugar , sea salt, pepper
fresh flat leafed parsley
1/2 pint whole milk

Coat the beef in the seasoned flour and cook in a heavy pan in the olive oil until browned.
Fry the onions and garlic in a little more oil add the vegetables, return the beef to the pan and add the tomato puree, cook until it caramelises then add the wine, Guinness, and stock and tomatoes. Add the milk and balance flavours with salt , sugar and pepper. cook for 1-2hrs at simmering point with the lid on. Add parsley two minutes before serving.
Meanwhile make the dumplings- i`m such a little porker , but life`s too short to deny yourself any pleasures that are on offer!
To make the dumplings to 200g of SR flour add 100g of suet , a pinch of salt, 50g stilton(blacksticks blue is the best)a tbs of horseradish and 150ml of water , mix together to make 10 balls. Pop on top of the casserole for the last 30 mins of cooking time.
Best served with jacket potatoes, garlic bread, buttered cabbage and a couple of  pubescent hungry twins who have double the hormones and don`t I love it! xx

When Charlie the cat went missing

Happy little Christmas. It is exactly six months until we will all be lying stuffed on the sofa after Christmas dinner, can you believe it? Last Christmas our cat charlie went missing which put a new perspective on our celebrations. The children didn`t "Oooh and Arrr" when we lit the christmas tree lights. They forgot about opening their chocolate Advent calendars. Their Argos gargantuan lists were decimated to one solitary Christmas wish "Charlie come home" :(
After two stormy nights and sleepless ones at that we all more or less steeled ourselves to the fact that there would be one less for dinner this year. No cat fights for the giblets, Charlie was missing in action.
I am glad to report that a little Christmas miracle happened the night before Christmas, the most bedraggled ,dirty, feline bundle you can imagine literally fell through the porch door. He looked as though he had been trapped in a drain or had escaped a fur trader, skinny, filthy and wide eyed he collapsed infront of the fire and curled up in the kindling basket. I had to go and wake up the newly settled children to say that Santa had brought an early gift. Well they all cried , warm ,happy ,salty tears of relief and they smothered Charlie in kisses and got covered in mud and cat fur on their Christmas pyjamas. But noone minded...there are just some special gifts and magic moments that cannot be bought.


Christmas pudding icecream

I am not a great fan of Christmas pudding but this is a great way to make an amazing ice cream with any leftover pud.

1 tub of very lovely vanilla ice cream
1 bowl of leftover Christmas pudding
slug of brandy
slug of baileys

Mix all together and put back in the freezer for a grown up ice cream when it has set. I pour a small glass of baileys over the top. But then again I am completely over the top.
Happy little Christmas.xxxx

What`s for dinner Clarey?: Saturdays are sacred in our house. No running arou...

What`s for dinner Clarey?: Saturdays are sacred in our house. No running arou...: Saturdays are sacred in our house. No running around in search of a hair brush or knickers  (not required at the weekend!) The gentle fug of...

Saturdays are sacred in our house. No running around in search of a hair brush or knickers  (not required at the weekend!) The gentle fug of the central heating steaming up the windows as we wake up to a mizzle. Yes the rain it raineth everyday in the Lake district. I don`t mind, if I don`t have to dodge the puddles alone.Often  I wake up to find a family bed has sprung up over night. The three children, the three cats a Ken who has lost his Barbie and is sticking into my back and of course Mr N all golden floppy haired and dreamy. I lie on the edge of the bed excruciatingly uncomfortable but just marvel at the lot of them, like a pride of lions all dozing ,lazy limbed and lovely.I bow to the king, curtsey to the Queen and show my knickers to the Kendal massif as I bob past the window and pad downstairs in search of the papers and some Earl grey. Bacon and sausage muffins for brekky then we skip down to the Town Hall for ballet. I sometimes peep through the curtains a real peeping Mom and spy on Jemima whirling around in her purple lycra catsuit practising her nutcracker/Olly Muirs fusion dance for her latest show. It is my happiest time of the week . I am not late for anyone or anything and noone is cross with me today. Saturday I love you.


Big omelette for lunch.


A white onion sliced
1 yellow pepper sliced
butter
2 cloves garlic crushed
1 ring of chorizo sliced
handful of mushrooms sliced
6 eggs
2 cooked waxy potatoes
cubes of Manchego cheese
splash of cream or top of the milk (if you are lucky enough to have a milk lady who brings you bottles)


Whisk the eggs and cream with a good sprinkle of sea salt and black pepper.
In another pan fry the onions, pepper, garlic and mushrooms and chorizo in a little butter until all soft
then stir in the eggs and dot with cubes of cheese and potatoes. Cook slowly until hot all the way through , finish off under a hot grill.


This is great hot and an leftovers(unlikely in our house ) are equally delicious cut up like a cake.


Keep Saturdays sacred, eat what you like , drink what you like and spend the day for once with people you like! xx

When I was a lass I worked on an outdoor market stall in York selling fruit and vegetables . Every Saturday morning my very grumpy older brother Tim would press the ejector seat button as we approached York Theatre Royal and I would scamper off down Petergate running past the Minster which stood like a huge golden pile of stilton cheese, not appreciating its grandeur or that I was growing up somewhere magical. I loved the market stall from the start. The smell of the fruit as you unwrapped it, the tree frogs who had hitched a lift in banana boxes, trimming caulis with a stanley knife, oh it was a glamorous job.A very kind lady called Barbara looked after me on my first day and showed me how to spin the brown paper bags  full of Jersey Royals and add up 10 items in my head at one go.The customers were seven deep in those days before supermarkets had smothered the market trade. Lots of handsome students would come and buy squashy tomatoes and would ask me to write my telephone number on those brown paper bags!When it was raining the tarpaulin sheets would bulge with water and we would get a broom handle underneath and splash any sourpusses as they scowled past. I can remember sitting on the back of the stall eating Custard apples with a spoon and feeling deliciously rich with my 17 pounds pay packet. The fish market was opposite and my friend Becky Davidson would get us free fish from the boy who worked there. Anton the Dutchman on the flower stall would bring me flowers wearing wooden clogs. My boss John Mannion and his wife Jean were and still are the most lovely couple, they both have beautiful rosy complexions from 40 years of market life. Even today if I walk past their stall with my children they will give me a peach or a cauliflower and I breathe in the kindness of Newgate market and know I am home. Happiness rests on such random things as a free cauliflower given with love from someone who knows my name.

Squidlishious

We had this for dinner tonight, not for the squeamish but Jemima lapped it all up!

3 large suid- cut into rings with kitchen scissors
plain flour
salt pepper and chilli flakes
oil for frying

Cut the squid into rings dip in the seasoned flour and fry until crisp in a chip pan of oil.
Serve with a big squirt of lemon and chunky chips ,garlic mayo and rocket dressed with a squirt of lemon and drizzle of olive oil. A little piece of heaven made with my market memories in mind.

The first dinner I shared with my husband when we were still teenagers at university was a chilli. I distinctly remember turning up at his student hovel , loitering on the doorstep brandishing a melon.
His flatmate answered the door and he twisted a cheeky smile and commented "nice melons" before shouting incredulously that Matty had a visitor and she was female!! I think all his mates thought that he was gay as he had lots of eccentric Bridesheadlike chums whom he went to Classical concerts with and had picnics with on top of mountains. So a busty little Yorkshire terrier on the front step was a revelation at Netherton Road. The date didn`t go too smoothely , probably because Mr N didn`t think it was infact a date at all. So after he failed to buy me a Magnum at the cinema and only offered milk as a beverage to accompany the chilli I happily stayed on the top of the double decker on our way home and softly turned down his invitation for coffee( which would have really only have been a cup of Maxwell house!) I returned home to my little street house in Moss side and got into bed with my best friend Emma for tea and toast and a date post mortem.
"I`ll never see him again", I chuckled. She was our bridesmaid. And 21 years later he still is lacking an empathy chip but is a rather lovely Daddy and Husband. So sometimes it`s all mapped out for you whether you bring a melon with you or not.

Carrot and chilli soup

A bag of carrots chopped
a kettle full of boiling water
1  chicken stock cube
3 cloves of garlic
1 bunch of coriander
1 tub of extra hot chilli hummus
single cream
salt, pepper, pinch of sugar, splosh of sherry

Boil up the carrots with the stock, water and garlic. Season with S&P and a pinch of sugar and whizz up. To finish stir in the fiery hummus, small pot of cream, sherry and chopped coriander.

Serve with hot buttered granary toast in towers, like at Bettys cafe in York where my heart lies.

Happiness

"When I grow up I want to be happy, Mummy."My little Jemima told me the other day and in a moment of absolute clarity I suddenly realised that`s what I want to be too when I grow up. Well there`s practically no chance of that...growing up that is...but being happy that`s another matter.
Happiness rests on such little things, a smile from a complete stranger or someone letting you in in a traffic jam. Having the time to tuck your little ones in and tell them a story without rushing downstairs "to do some work". When we die or are close to dying we will not lie on our deathbed lamenting that we didn`t spend more time at work or writing school reports. We will only wish that we spent more times with the people we loved and that we let them know unequivocally that we loved them , that we would have gladly died for them or at least taken a bullet for them in true line of fire Clint Eastwood fashion.
My name is Clarey and I`m a tired out teacher I admit it. This time of year, exam time, is truly testing for all - IQs are all well and good but can character,heart and passion be graded? I think not. The only judgement at the end of the day that means a thing is how we might be remembered after death, how generous we were with our time and our affections and are kindnesses. I`m an advocate for Life and living it and don`t worry too much about my demise. Life is short and harsh and horrid at times but when your little girl gives you great insight into what truly matters and what doesn`t, that is a massive reason to be  a happy grown up- safe in the knowledge that the job of  Mother is one you  might get an A* for .

Cauliflower cheese

A Nursery favourite that all my brood wolf down .

1 cauliflower
1/2 pack extra mature cheddar cheese, grated
1/2 pint milk
1 knob of butter
1 tbs flour
1 courgette sliced and fried in butter
1 tsp English mustard
A handful of gammon chopped

Boil the cauliflower florets in salted water until tender. Meanwhile melt the butter and add the flour when it has cooked out, blend in the milk and make a white sauce. Add the cheese and mustard, gammon and courgette and pour over the caulifower. Add a little more grated cheese on top and whack it into a hot oven until bubbling. Cheap as chips and so delicious, whoever you feed this to will know that they are loved.