We have pancakes (aka drop scones or pikelets) for our Sunday breakfast, which entails me making batches of pancakes while the Other Half and the boys tuck in to the earlier ones.
Today, we had to start a new jar of jam so the Wee ‘Un picked a jar of clearly labelled Gooseberry and Elderflower from the larder cupboard, then took it to the table.
As I was cooking, I noticed the Other Half trying to lever open the lid of the jam with a knife, which is not a good idea as it distorts the lid and makes it impossible to re-use in the future. It’s also dangerous.
I also vaguely noticed the OH and the Big Lad eating their pancakes with jam, while the Wee ‘Un slopped honey all over his.
When I finally finished cooking the last of the pancakes, I went through to the dining room, sat down, took a pancake from the pile and buttered it.
Then, chatting to the OH as I did, I took a spoon of jam from the jar and spread it over the pancake without paying too much attention.
I did think it a little odd that the OH had her face turned down toward her plate, while trying to covertly stare at me from under her eyebrows. But she can be a bit funny at times, as I was about to find out.
As I lifted the pancake towards my mouth, I had just enough time to register that the jam didn’t look quite right while there was a strong smell of vinegar and spice.
Too late!
I bit into the pancake, realising immediately that I’d just bitten off a chunk of pancake smeared with chutney.
“Phwoar!!! That’s not jam,” I spluttered.
The OH look both surprised and unsurprised at the same time.
“It isn’t?” she asked. “I did wonder how elderflowers could taste like that, and it did taste a bit funny. But I didn’t want to say the jam was strange.”
The Big Lad chimed in.
“I said it didn’t taste right, Mum.”
The Other Half was now looking sheepish.
“I did think, ‘oh **** this jam is going to last a long time’.”
That did it. We all burst into laughter.
“Why didn’t you say anything,” I asked.
“Well, you put a lot of effort into making the jam, and it’s supposed to be nice, so I didn’t want to say anything.”
The OH would rather eat funny tasting jam and persuade the Big Lad to eat his portion as well, rather than say something and risk causing offence.
Argh! Talk about a woman moment. (It reminded me of the time when I worked in an almost all-women office and they sat around eating bad cheese for 20 minutes as no one wanted to mention it tasted gross.)
By this time, the OH had streams of tears running down her face, was clutching her side and was laughing madly.
“You do realise this is going to have to go on the blog, don’t you?” I said.
Cue even more hysterical laughter.
“I wasn’t even sure if you’d notice. I thought maybe it was supposed to taste like that…”
Elderflower jam that’s supposed to taste like rhubarb chutney? Now I do make some interesting food combinations but I think that would be a step too far.
I only needed to remind her that the label was in her writing to send her off into more fits of laughter.
Sigh.
Still, all I’ll need to do when she’s having a pancake in future is ask, “would you like jam with that?”
Savoury pancakes!
Have you blogged about Gooseberry and elderflower jam? I tried a search but drew a blank. I was wondering how you get both at the same time as I thought elderflowers would be over by the time gooseberries are ripe.
I’m a fan of elderflower cordial and champagne and elderflower jam sounds like a great idea to try this spring.
The recipe is not on the blog as it’s not one of mine. It’s based on one from the Foody. The couple of changes I made to the recipe can be found on the link towards the top of the post.
We pick the elderflowers and freeze them in a plastic bag so we can use them for up to six months after picking. In fact, we still have a few left plus a couple of bottles of elderflower cordial.
yum, i would love chutney on pancakes, i eat spicy chutney on everything from toast to cheese and crackers, and sometimes i eat it out of the jar.
So was it a practical joke by your OH gving you the wrong jar, or did you label it incorrectly, or did you mess up the recipe when you cooked it? I’m all confused.
She mislabelled the jar last year so it’s been sitting in the cupboard ever since. The Wee ‘Un took it out of the cupboard and put it on the table. The OH open the jar, spread it on her pancake and gave it to the Big Lad to put on his, then she ate her pancake.
She didn’t say anything to me as she didn’t want to be impolite or cause offence by saying “ugh”. She also didn’t want to query the taste as “maybe it should taste like this”. She also failed to consider that perhaps it didn’t taste like jam because it wasn’t jam.
In other words, the OH stayed silent because she thought it was the nicer of the options. A woman moment, in other words. And she agrees with that summation, saying “it’s how we’re trained”.
It has caused a lot of mirth this morning. We were cutting up wood at one point, next to the road, when she burst out laughing and laughed so much she had to lean on the drystone wall to get her breath back.
I thought it was funny, too, but obviously it’s not one of those incidents that other people see any humour in. Oh well, it will give us a laugh for some weeks.
Hi folks, I can certainly see the funny side and I am finding it hard to wipe the smile off my face. In fact the laughter is with me too.
Well done OH!
Oh so fun! I must admit that I am used to having my pancakes with Vermont Maple Syrup on them. We are heavy into sugaring this time of year and mixing maple syrup with chutney might have been the answer to your taste issue. Thanks for the laugh; I probably won’t try chutney this morning for breakfast, but I will think of you when I eat my waffles.
Gooseberry and elderflower home-made jam is fabulous…..what a disappointment to find it was really chutney….blow!
It is funny - but I can tell you it’s not just a woman thing. My husband is quite the cook, but never uses a recipe. In the early years of his cooking he made a soup and his whole family sat down to dinner. His step-father just kept sipping really small spoon fulls, while after one spoon full and a few minutes of avoiding her soup, his mother finally blurted out that it was horrible - they all turned to his step-father who said “Well it is, but I wasn’t going to say anything”…
then again - he’s a “Southern Gentleman” as we in America call the men who’ve “been trained” (like your wife) to always be polite and never cause offense.
It seems like you have quite a Quality Wife - if she’s willing to be the first to see the humour in the situation.
Lol, that is funny. My grandfather recently went through that when we had bought him some shortbread cookies. We were thinking 48 oz of cookies good deal, my mother bought it. Grandpa opened it, expecting cookies, it was cookie mix. Powder and dark chocolate. Let’s say he wasn’t too thrilled.
I did make the cookies, not to well. But he ate them.
I know now not cook them as long.
I take y’all don’t put maple syrup on pancakes ?
My family also uses strawberry or pecan syrup.
I don’t think I’d be game to change her from the OH to the QW!
LOL
We put my OH’s slip down as a ‘Senior Moment’
He poured two ‘tidy’ G & Ts and then added ice cubes and the slices of lemon which we freeze for just such an occasion…. trouble was that he wasn’t paying attention and the lemons turned out to be frozen chunks of turnip.
Enough said…. but we still split our sides laughing about it!
Ahhh. Good stuff. I like the looks on our children’s faces when something doesn’t taste how it is supposed to. Then there’s that moment of awakening when they realise they can laugh about it.
Regards, Gary
Yeah, I cooked Yorkshire puds one Sunday, which is usually the hubby’s job, only I opened the oven to check on them, so they deflated & ended up dense as dumplings. When I served them up, my son exclaimed ‘Wow mum!’ -pause- ‘what are they?’. We creased up, as you do.