Let's Pretend For Once That This Is a Food Blog

It's New Years Day & I'm sitting on a couch in the beach house in Macmasters Beach listening to the tortuous sounds of cicadas who I'm told are making that noise in order to attract mates. Never mind that they are also attracting predators like birds & skinks .
I've just finished eating a slice of v. fat fruit toast that is strangely called "cafe style" on the wrapper.
Maeflower & Tacitus have both just finished eating a ciabatta style sandwich featuring garlic oil infused Serrano ham with a perfectly formed runny egg, goats cheese which I could call chèvre if I felt like lapsing into Franglais, topped off with continental parsley.
This beach holiday has been all about Food -talking about it, buying it, reading about it & actually eating it.
Of course I'm terrified that away from my usual rigid regime of quasi-fasting two days a week, I'm ballooning at a terrifying rate. I keep standing sideways in front of the bathroom mirror to see if there's any change to my girth. Or if I'm growing any more back boobs. Or double chins. Or tuck shop arms.
I must stop this, I'm grossing myself & possibly you out.

Back to food :
* Maeflower got me on to a v popular food blog called Pioneer Woman by Ree Drummond from Oklahoma, who shows you step by step how to make mouthwatering dishes like frittatas featuring amazingly clever photos of each ingredient that makes even unpeeled brown onions look alluringly mouth watering. There were all sorts of sections - one on her husband, a real life cowboy dubbed Marlboro Man, another section on home schooling which she does with her four kids & yet another section which gives advice to readers.
I immediately wanted to start up my own version of Pioneer Woman which I could call SelfObsessed Woman.
* We have been frequently barbecuing as Tacitus received a WeberQ from his parents for Xmas. Apparently, it's the only barbecue to use. Last night we had five different types of meat plus large oversized mushrooms stuffed with garlic butter.
* a few days ago I ate a meat pie from a cake shop which was totally scrumptious & made me slightly nostalgic for my childhood where I happily scoffed pies & sausage rolls with tomato sauce & lamingtons & potato scallops & chips with gay abandon.
* today at Erina Fair Shopping Centre, which is the world's largest shopping centre because it's on only one level we saw the first sign of Easter with the sale Hot Cross Buns, in both the chocolate & the traditional flavour. It is January 1. Pathetic.
* I gave Maeflower & Tacitus the iconic Elizabeth David's French Provincial Cooking book for Xmas. I can't recommend this book & indeed all her other titles enough. Who knew that there were so many ways to cook oxtail? I don't even know what oxtail is. Surely it's not the tail of an ox?
* whilst the other two have surpassed themselves serving up scrumptious meals, I've made a couple of v average chicken casseroles that have managed to be weirdly watery & dry at the same time. How depressing. Does this mean that I'm not qualified to start my own food blog, I wonder? But maybe I could have a Bad Food Blog, featuring terrifying photos of the monstrous head of a boiled cod languishing in a limp egg sauce. Or fried eel nauseatingly flavoured with sprigs of sage.
* Mae told me that her favourite dessert was a slab of vanilla ice cream between two pieces of toasted multigrain bread. I totally believed her.
* I realised I'm addicted to hors d'oeuvres type food like fruit cheese on water crackers which is probably a little down market to be strictly speaking called hors d'oeuvres. But also any kind of pate except for tuna flavour.
*bon appetit!