What I cooked last night.

Tracy, the gin and tonic thief, submitted the following recipe to this year's most important publishing event, the kindergarten cookbook. Ingredients 250g butter, softened ½ cup icing sugar, sifted 12/3 cups plain flour ¼ cup rice flour Baked in a pre-scored round for easy dividing into segments, the secret to this shortbread is kneading the dough minimally, resulting in the crumbly texture characteristic of traditional Scottish shortbread, not found in the commercial product. Children love a segment of this shortbread with milk for morning tea. Method: 1. Beat butter and sugar in a bowl with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. 2. Sift in flours and combine well with a wooden spoon. Press dough into a ball. Lightly knead. Over-kneading will result in too fine a crumb. 3. Cut dough in half. Shape into two balls. Pat into rounds one centimetre thick. 4. Place rounds on a greased baking tray. To decorate, pinch edges with floured fingers, score radially into ei...

The first warm day. It was latest arrival of spring I can remember. I sat on the beach reading the weekend broadsheet while the boys tore up and down the sand. Then, following a story I had read them earlier about a windstorm blowing a beach away, they threw it. I was the victim. The idea was I had to use the paper as a shield or a tent against the gale of sand. It worked well for them. Next morning my pillow was full of sand. Tracy joined us with the small one. The gale had subsided by then and they were ready for afternoon tea. Their mother produced fresh shortbread, still warm with the characteristic grainy texture provided by the use of a combination of rice and wheat flours. They sat and munched while the small one blinked tiny eyes at her first view of sea. What do they think? Later, I walked back to the house with Tom through quiet ti tree-lined streets. It was unnaturally still. Dead. Not a car. Not a human. It was a ghost town. It must have been early in the last quarter o...