Nice buns

This week I started my first job since leaving Marie Claire on June 1 2010, and I must say it was about 1,000 times more fun.  In spite of all the years I've written and edited copy about restaurants and food, I've never worked in a professional kitchen (apart from one hilarious day on breakfast service in Glenys's restaurant kitchen in Wellington) so it was a completely new experience. It was very busy, fast, hot and tiring with the whole shift spent on my feet, but everyone was really friendly and fun and most importantly patient. Poor Walter, the supremo pastry chef, must have been biting his tongue as he repeatedly showed me how to make his amazing meringue pigs. More than once he scraped my attempts off the baking tray and back into the mix to be redone.  My explanation that mine were not pigs but mythical creatures didn't little to change the fact that they were supposed to be pigs, not unicorns. I also got to glaze bakewell tarts, ice cup cakes, make brownies, bake cookies, ice lemon drizzle cakes, finish bread puddings and best of all - put jam in 150 doughnuts. I spent the second day in the shop kitchen making savoury stuff for the lunchtime rush including scotch eggs (it's all in the wrist), a huge pot of spicy lentil soup and sandwich fillings. I was back in the bakery at 6.30am on Saturday helping Walter finish and ice more cakes and biscuits and got to make macaroons. The smell of all the pastries, croissants and brownies coming out of the oven is almost irresistible so I've discovered it's important for me to remain calm and not stuff everything in my mouth at once if I want to avoid turning into Jabba the Hut. We are allowed to help ourselves to anything for lunch, so I was astonishingly sensible and turned my back on some warm Chelsea buns and instead had a bowl of roast vegetable soup. Such restraint. Here's a small display of some of my wares brought home for afternoon tea. See if you can spot the unicorn.