Good morning everyone,

How are you doing? I expect that wherever you are in the world, things are pretty weird, so I hope you and yours are staying safe through all of this. It's hard, but here's some good news: the amazing Margo of Margo of threeweeks fame has made a spreadsheet to help us share tips and projects to keep us all sane. Please join our spreadsheet community for the common good 💪💪💪:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vxQJJooQ1cjj-PRpaKeK-CtzSaxDZ2Vfy-FbVSpdw3g/edit?ts=5e6c19b6#gid=0

If you are a parent and have ideas for things to keep kids sane/entertained, that would be especially good. This week my thoughts have particularly turned to parents, and to parents who are working from home while their kids are under their feet and bored. I am sorry if this is you and good luck with it all. It reminds me though of a time that I very vaguely remember – I must have been three or thereabouts. There was a time when, for no clear reason that I could see, my dad was in the house way more than usual. He'd take me for a walk every day, along the little river at the back of the estate we lived on. One day we collected watercress and took it home, and my mum made soup with it. On another day, we walked through a gate that we'd not been through before, and I said "is this further than we've ever walked", and my dad looked at me and smiled and said "yes darling, this is further than we've ever walked."

Absolutely halcyon days. Perfect.

Anyway, recently – maybe 18 months ago – my dad said to me, "you were very young, but do you remember when [employer] was making everyone take unpaid leave for two weeks at a time and me and you went on those walks along the burn?". It made me realise that these times of, for me, absolute magic, must have for him been conducted at an incredible pitch of stress; one small child, another on the way, a mortgage, suddenly half the salary you were expecting for a month.

Where I'm going with this, I guess, is that when you talk to your kids about this in the future you might say "do you remember that time of plague, when everything was awful and so stressful" and they will say "you mean those amazing times of unfettered ipad access and you were always there bringing the funtimes, they were beautiful, it could have lasted forever."

The watercress soup is obviously a big part of my memory here, and the watercress season is upon us, so might be a nice idea to make a peppery green soup with watercress you collect or buy in a bag. As a Delia Smith recipe, this is quite likely to be the actual recipe my mum made all that time ago:

First of all melt the butter in a large thick-based saucepan, then add the prepared leeks, potato and watercress and stir them around so that they're coated with the melted butter.

https://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/seasons/what-should-you-be-cooking-in-march/watercress-soup

Here's a fun thing to do with maybe with older kids, or you don't need kids for this, it's hard enough for you to master making these biscuits:

These are from Bee's Bakery. Bee is both Scottish and an incredibly lovely person, I bought jammie dodgers from her one Christmas. Here she is, talking about food trends and science:

Berrie’s science background is not forgotten. She credits lab work for her attention to detail, and her patience. 'Science projects go on for years, so you have to have commitment,’ she says. 'We get orders for thousands of cookies at a time. That takes days and days, so you have to be able to see it through.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/10692072/Word-of-mouth-Bees-Bakery-cookies-and-cakes-with-a-difference.html

Love to all,

A xxx.