Schnitzel déjà vu

We make another early start, because Wednesday is a Poppy Seed day and Felicity seems to have got over her grumpiness and has decided to go. We collect Dolly and Teddy for a quarter past nine and make our usual circuit of the Westwood, it is cooler today and cloudy, in the woods we meet Pat and a friend, with her new Labrador Ivy, who is as enthusiastic a rabbit chaser as the terriers. Pat comments on a Tarzan swing that some boys have set up from a very high bough of a chestnut tree, she cannot figure out how they have got it so high. I resolve the problem for her, as a boy I would fire an arrow from my bow with a light string attached and then tie the string to a rope and pull the rope over with it. When I tell her this she says she is miffed, as I have spoiled the mystery for her, like telling her that her dad is really Santa Claus. I return the dogs to Two Riggs and pausing to buy eggs from Walkington Manor Farm Shop, park down North Bar by twenty five past ten and then walk to the Poppy Seed with Norman. Felicity is already there, eating a toasted teacake and immediately we fall out again, or rather she falls out with m, when I enquire how she got on at the podiatrist yesterday, she says OK and I make the mistake of asking if Felicity asked her to look at her gait, as she has been walking lopsided since she had a suspected TIA, or ministroke, two months ago. She obviously never mentioned it to the podiatrist and now is in a sulk. Thelma arrives and tries to console her, but without any success and Hanne turns up about ten minutes later and Felicity complains to her about my lack if sensitivity. The Great Dane tells her that she also thinks that she is giving up the ghost, and needs to take more responsibility for herself. To be fair to Hanne, she had a polyp removed from her inner eye yesterday, but is still here today and driving to Bawtry this afternoon. She walks her talk! Felicity says she is tired and wants to go, so I offer to fetch the car and run her home, but she insists on calling a taxi and then stomps off in a temper. I start to get up to help her, but Hanne stays my hand, "look at the way she is walking!" she points out. And it is true, the old girl is walking straight and true, not using her stick and striding to the cab. "It is what she needed to get her going again", says Hanne. The two of us are probably Felicity's best friends, and real friends sometimes have to tell you things you may not always wish to hear. Nevertheless we have had more pleasant coffee mornings. I take Norman home and then do a little rapid housework, tidying up and cleaning the kitchen and the bathroom, before Laura comes after school. Later, around one o'clock, I drive to the leisure centre and swim a 2,000m medley programme, the pool being fairly quiet until a school class arrives around two. There is just time for a pot of tea and a teacake and then I have to drive to Molescroft to collect Laura, arriving ten minutes early and then shivering while I wait in the playground, as the temperature has dropped by ten degrees. Laura wants to drive straight to Tickton and begin cooking, so we do just that. I have Army rules for cooking, first we wash our hands, then we wipe down all the surfaces we will be using, and then we check that we have all the ingredients and utensils that we will need for the dish. When making schnitzels there are quite a lot of these, but first things first, we put the oven on to warm up, because we are serving them with oven chips and salad. The next task is to beat the egg in which we will dip the pork after we have beaten it flat, just before coating it in breadcrumbs. Laura has never used a whisk before, so I have to show her how to lift and beat the egg, rather than stirring it. It takes a little while, but she soon gets the hang of it and I explain that is better to season the whisked egg than the meat, as it provides a more even covering. The bit she likes the best is thwacking the pork with the tenderising hammer and soon we have three, large, flat and beautifully coated schnitzels, ready to fry, lying on a large serving plate. The oven is ready for the chips, so we pop those in and then put two of the schnitzels in a large skillet to fry, with a little butter and olive oil, the pan not being big enough to take three. While these are cooking, we dice tomatoes, spring onions, cucumber and lettuce and then toss it in a vinaigrette dressing, which we make by adding a little olive oil, lemon juice and salt and pepper to the salad bowl. By five o'clock we are ready to eat, so I give Normy his tin, and then we plate up our meal. The schnitzels are enormous and almost cover half the plate, giving the illusion of lots of meat, when really it is a modest pork steak, flattened to twice its size. Laura really does love them and clears her plate, as do I, although to be fair, we only made a handful of chips. I serve Morello cherries with yogurt for dessert, from a large jar I bought at Morrison's yesterday. Later we wash up, but there are only the dinner plates, as we cleared as we went when cooking. After dinner we fry the remaining schnitzel to give to Sam, who will be arriving with Rebecca after her swimming lesson. The great thing about schnitzels is they are great cold, as well as hot. Sam arrives with Rebecca around six and at first, Rebecca wants to go straight home, but I give her my iPad and soon she is happily shooting video footage of everyone. The girls all leave about half past six and Norman and I retire to the Garden Room, where I read until bedtime.