So, today is St Valentine's day and quite an extraordinary thing happened. I'm having a friend over to dinner later in the week and I'd decided to have a go at making my own ice-cream. Having shopped til I dropped in Tescos...I decided to treat myself to a morning with the paper in one of those hideous American coffee chains. I sat myself down, steaming Americano and biro in hand to hopefully finish the G2 crossword in one foul swoop.
I was quietly getting on with 9 across, when this tall skinny guy walked in and smiled at me. He was wearing trendy skinny jeans, one of those kooky rock star hats and his arms were covered in multicoloured tats. They were actually covered because you could see his blonde arm hairs sticking out of the blue ink. The lady next to me was waiting for a friend and he asked if him and his friend could sit there until she arrived. I picked up on the South African accent straight away. Actually, he looked a bit like Elvis Blue (I told him that later), winner of South African Pop Idols. So, back to the narrative. He introduces himself and his friend. I can no longer concentrate on my cross word. In the space of a few moments he had this lady's entire life history. He really had a gift for allowing people to open up to him. She told him she was a carer for disabled children and childminder. He then asked her how she found her work and she said how happy the children made her, how much a smile from one of them meant. He remarked that it was a really love centred approach that she had. The conversation turned to love, well it is St Valentines day so that's not so unusual. Did she have love in her life? She said she loved her husband, had a son. And he was like, I mean real love. He had a look in his eyes though of kind of Christian zeal. I really thought the conversation was heading for evangelising. It seemed a shame to spoil a genuine human connection.
He then asked me about myself. Did I think people loved each other. I knew where he was going, so instead of saying I'm a Catholic, I said 'Are you from South Africa?' He was like, no one's ever asked me about myself. He looked caught off guard. He told me he belonged to a biker's group. He volunteered in a care centre for disabled children. He was from Durban by way of J'berg. He told me what it was like...then we talked about Cape Town.
I feel slightly guilty for derailing him from what I'm sure he was up to. His friend was wearing a cross. You know it's lovely to have a Christian connection with a stranger. A good friend once had one with a white van man guzzling coke and listening to Christian rock. He had tapped on the window and said 'Excuse me, is that Christian rock?' Back to the story. But, I think if we had had that, it could have ruined the moment of the human connection between all four of us. Maybe lady waiting for her friend was a Christian...you don't know. The woman sitting next to me was just an ordinary middle aged lady. Tattoo guy was wierd in the sweetest way. When tattoo guy left, her friend and her went back to the ordinary business of moaning about their husbands and sons and the rowdy neighbourhood kids. It struck me as funny that she had shared how much love she felt for the kids she worked with, then went back to normal so quickly.
Y'day at mass the sermon was all about the fact that love is a choice. Love is a labour. Have a go at making lemon and white chocolate ice-cream. Churning the ice-cream to prevent ice crystals forming is also a labour of love.
1) You need to zest 3 lemons and juice 2.
2) Whip 500ml of cream with the lemon zest and juice until soft peaks form. Put in fridge until needed.
3) Heat a large bar of white chocolate over gently simmering water. Scold a mug of milk and whip into melted white chocolate.
4) Whip white chocolate into lemon cream. Whip in 3 egg yokes. Leave to cool.
5) Place in tupperwear box in the freezer. Every half an hour until set shake the tupperwear. It's a labour of love!
