There are some things that I never really thought to include on my site. Poaching eggs was one of those things that I presumed everyone knew how to do although it was something that I hadn’t done very much until recently. All of this anticlockwise or clockwise water swirling action  put me off and the idea of wasting several eggs in the pursuit of doing one perfectly poached egg was something I thought was best left to the professionals.

Then on my story about Whisk & Pin a reader commented about the difficulty in poaching eggs so I realised that there may be more out there that have wasted countless eggs, swirled vinegared water, prayed and crossed fingers. This method is a foolproof one and one that has been successful for me ever since I came across it in the new Masterchef cookbook and they have noted that this is how the professionals do it.

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I know I scared you there for a moment didn’ t I? Don’t worry Dear Reader, this hasn’t turned into a health and well being blog.  Rest assured I followed this brunch up with a slice of bacon and a poached egg. This is more my softly, softly approach to health and fitness although I should divulge my lack of credentials for this task. I’ve never been hired in a professional capacity to offer fitness advice – my inherent laziness prevents me from doing this. Not so much a code of ethics but a code of incompetence.

Case in point: we recently went to Jenolan Caves in the Blue Mountains over the Christmas break and there were three different leves of cave tours from easy tracks to strenuous. I leaned over and whispered at the the woman behind the ticket counter:

“Umm look I’m able bodied but very lazy. Tell me honestly, which level would suit me?”.

She laughed – perhaps she has heard this before, and gestured at the crowd in the line behind me. There were pensioners, the middle aged and small children.

“I think you’ll be fine with the strenuous level dear” she said chuckling.

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I remember the very first time I cooked in front of a crowd. I was under a metre tall and my age was in single digits. My teacher had decided to do a cooking-at-school day. No wonder that with ideas like this, Miss Adams was my favourite teacher. The fact that she had a Farrah Fawcett do, flares and cork platforms which was the epitome of style at the time also helped and I also liked the sound that her bracelets made when they clanked together as she wrote on the chalkboard.

I was assigned the pikelets. Having never eaten them before and being plied with Chinese food during my childhood, these were quite a reveleation to me. Somehow, using a few ingredients, we measured, mixed up a batter and dropped them in the electric frypan and a minute or two later, out came fluffy delicious to eat pikelets. And of course we had real butter. Having grown up on margarine as my father felt that butter wasn’t good for you, the taste of real butter was intoxicating. I still recall standing there nibbling on a buttered pikelet in a blissful state wondering how on earth a bit of mixing and measuring produced something so good. I suppose this was my cooking revelation.

I’ve reproduced the recipe below as it was given to me – I call them kid proof directions. I have adapted the plain pikelet recipe to include nutmeg and have added fruit mince to it which I think makes the Christmas holiday last into another day. Today is a day where fortitude is necessary should you be engaging in some hand to hand combat. No I don’t mean a Christmas with relatives gone wrong. You know what I mean – the post-Christmas Boxing Day Sales.

So tell me Dear Reader, I’d love to know, how was your Christmas? What fabulous things did you eat and what exciting things did you receive? I was lucky enough to receive this gorgeous Rabbit lamp, an Alannah Hill headband, 30 Rock on DVD and a brand new television to watch Dexter and Mad Men on from my beloved Mr NQN!

Nutmeg Pikelets with Fruit Mince

An Original Recipe by Not Quite Nigella

1. Mix  1 cup self-raising flour, pinch of salt, 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg and 1/4 tsp bicarb.

2. Mix 1 egg,  1 cup milk, 1 tsp vinegar and 60g butter.

3. Add 1 to 2, stand 5 mins.

4. Heat a frypan on medium heat and add butter and oil to the frypan. I used egg rings to try and keep them as circular as possible although I do think there’s a real charm to a freeform pikelet. Once the top has started bubbling, carefully flip over and cook other side.

5.  Spread with butter and top with 3 tablespoons of bottled or homemade fruit mince or as much as desired.