The rocky road to a Macmillan Coffee Morning!

I think I might have mentioned that the office is having a MacMillan Coffee Morning at the office tomorrow at which I have received the dubious honour of playing "trolley dolly" although I have refused the French Maid's outfit that The Girls in the office had picked out for me......(I really am not that upset. Not sure what an impression I would have made on my new bosses in a frilly little outfit!)

On the basis that there are currently about 100 members of staff in the office (although being a Friday not everyone will be in!) there has been something of a mad dash to produce or prepare cakes to be sold. Accordingly (and given that anything I was going to prepare would be after a two hour commute home!) I decided to go for something that is very easy, and which has always gone down really well in the past......Rocky Road!!!!!

In an effort to give me a little extra time this evening I kinda slinked off a little early, to catch my train an hour early......(another hour to actually spend time at home, not in bed asleep.....gotta be good!). I watched the weather get progressively worse throughout the day in Manchester, but by 4.20 this afternoon it did seem to have calmed down massively, and at worst there were a few spots of drizzle in the sky.....so imagine my delight on the approach to Howden station to be told by the conductor that lightning had struck the station and knocked out all the signals. Stuck outside Howden, advancing at a few metres at a time meant that I ended up home only a few minutes earlier that I would have done normally (.....although I dread to think what time I would have got home had I left at the normal time)

But once home it was time to start preparing......so here we go here is a really easy recipe that has never disappointed. You will need:

100g - unsalted butter
225g - plain chocolate
2tbsp - golden syrup
2tbsp - cocoa powder
2tbsp - caster sugar
100g - Maltesers
100g - milk and white chocolate chips
100g - mini marshmallows
225g - ginger biscuits or digestives
Icing sugar to dust

This is for double the quantity

Steps:

1. In  pan heat the butter, chocolate, golden syrup, caster sugar and cocoa powder and stir together with wooden spoon.

2.             Once melted together, leave to cool for 10 minutes.

3. In a large bowl mix together all the other ingredients, including the biscuits crumbled up into mixed sized pieces.

4.           Bind the other ingredients with the melted chocolate sauce.

6.     Pour the mixture into a 20cm square cake tin and leave to set in the fridge for a minimum of 2 hours (or overnight if possible)

7.       Cut into pieces and dust with icing sugar.

Serve and enjoy.....with a nice cuppa tea!










Hope that you enjoy this recipe and the fun of making it!

Letter to a tea leaf!

Dear Sir/Madam/?

As a regular commuter, I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for the consideration you kindly displayed when you decided to alleviate National Rail of some of those highly annoying, pointless and irrelevant cables that sit by the side of the line last night.

I have to say that when I got up at 5am this morning to get to the station, I thought to myself, I really REALLY can't be bothered to sit on a train for 4 hours, to sit in an office in Manchester (this is completely true!) so imagine my delight that after getting to the station, boarding the train and sitting on it for over an hour to be told that you had removed those niggley cables and the train was going to have to stop in Leeds. Who wants to go to Manchester anyway?

And to think there was nothing else that I needed to do today other than sit at Leeds station for another 45 minutes to be told that I could either get on another train through to Bradford to then sit on another one to Manchester, or get on the same train to travel back to Hull.

So as it was I got my wish......I didn't have to go into the office today (well I did.....but rather I couldn't.....or to be completely honest I could have but it would have taken me another 180 minutes on top of what it should have taken me, and then all the fun of coming home!) As it is now it means that I now have some work to do tomorrow when I get to Manchester, approximately twice as much.

I should also thank you for my forthcoming role in the World's Biggest Coffee Morning in support of MacMillan Cancer Research. Thankfully not being in today meant that not only did I not have to sit at my desk but also that I missed today's team meeting, when roles were assigned. So imagine my delight that I got the very job that I wanted! "Trolley Dolly" with a uniform to be decided by the girls at work as a forfeit for not being in today (here's hoping that it is the short skirt, white crop top, blond wig and frilly apron.....I am told that this is a real possibility......although I assure everyone that no photographs will be taken....or if they are then they certainly will not be published!)

I am led to believe that it will however look something like this (although I cannot promise that it will look exactly like this....probably more like a shaved gorilla being squeezed into an outfit 10 sizes too small!)

So from the bottom of my heart.....I can only thank you for your kind consideration. I would simply ask that next time could you give us a little bit more notice, so that I can bring some files home.....or at least not bother getting up so early.

Kind regards!!!!!!!





The Boy!