5 | Cold comfort

Just a spoonful of sugar

A few days ago, I ventured the furthest I have since the beginning of lockdown, all the way to deepest, darkest Hounslow – a two-hour hot, masked round trip on the Tube – to take my Life in the UK test.

If you’re not familiar with this Sisyphean task, this glorified government pub quiz determines whether or not foreigners have absorbed enough British history, culture and constitutional law to be allowed to stay in the country indefinitely. Dutifully, I’ve spent the last two weeks bulking up my knowledge of Henry VIII’s wives (Catherine, Anne, Jane, Anne, Catherine, Catherine), the number of of MSPs (129) and the composition of Welsh cakes (flour, dried fruits and spices).

My brain, it turns out, now has the consistency of watery porridge. I’ve felt my faculties impaired since my coronavirus infection: I’ve struggled to remember words in English, mixed up homonyms with gay abandon, and been unable to read the small print on food labels. My memory has become sluggish: an oiled slope into murky waters for any new facts thrown at me.

I am, in a word, incapacitated, facing the sudden realisation that I will never really be the same again, just as our worlds start to open up. I fumble in the dark for a sense of purpose. I am lost, and grieving, as many of us are. And so I’ve little to offer this week, save for a few spoonfuls of cold comfort.

This week…

Watch A baffling German exposé on the making of long eggs

Breakfast Like a Studio Ghibli character

Check out This job description for my future husband

Mousse au chocolat

One of the great regrets of my life in the UK is the lack of good chocolate mousse in the supermarkets. No salted caramel, no gummy ganache, no cream – in France, what I’m after is labelled ‘à l’ancienne’, and has the comforting texture of a classic. My mother used to make hers from a recipe card from the 1970s, which happily called for strong coffee and a splash of booze. I roughly use the proportions from the back of a bar of Nestlé dessert chocolate, though they’re easily adjusted to taste.

200g dark chocolate
6 eggs
100g salted butter
100g caster sugar
3 tablespoons strong coffee, cooled
1 generous tablespoon of rum, or hazelnut liqueur

Separate the eggs, setting the whites aside.
Whisk the egg yolks and sugar until they’re fluffy and doubled in size.
Melt the chocolate and the butter in a bowl placed over a saucepan of simmering water. Allow to cool a little, then mix carefully with the egg yolks, coffee and spirits.
In a large bowl, beat the egg whites with a sprinkle of salt until they’re stiff. Fold about a third of the egg whites into the chocolate mixture, then gently mix that into the remaining egg whites with a large metal spoon until the mousse is smooth and dark. Divide into individual ramekins, or – should you need to press your face into a chocolate pillow – one large clean bowl. Chill for a few hours, ideally overnight, and eat, slowly, in bed.

That’s it for today. Coming up soon: coconuts, knives and cooking with leaves.