softly, softly

I crave skin. I have the clean straw scent of my children and their little hot hands in mine but i still want the full-length friction of a man.

It is not the sex.

I love the brutal scent of man, the texture of his skin in contrast to mine, the heat we generate from just lying intwined in sleep.

*

Whatever it is that he is doing to my bottom .. it is working. It feels as if my arse has been gnawed on today.

*

Red Velvet Cupcakes from The Hummingbird Cookbook, via Joythebaker

These have a good cocoa hit, but with a marvelous light moist texture from the buttermilk. Sweet, soft and subtle .. unlike the colour which can vary from crimson to terracotta. I like the contrast between earthy chocolate and so intense, so white icing.

i have rewritten the recipe with (my) english measurements, or follow the link to Joy's place for more details.

60g unsalted butter, soft
170g vanilla caster sugar
1 egg
2.5 tablespoons cocoa powder
red food colouring - at your own discretion
.5 teaspoon vanilla extract
135g plain four
.5 teaspoon salt

Beat together the butter and sugar, until pale and fluffy. Add the egg and beat rapidly to incorporate. I love how all my cake batters shout the strong bright yellow of my local lady hens.



In a small bowl, mix together the cocoa, vanilla and 3 tablespoons of water. Add a dollop of red colour paste and blend to make a rich mud.





Add the paste to the batter, mix well to distrubute the colour evenly.

Add half the buttermilk, beat at slow speed. The add half the flour and mix to combine. Repeat with the remaining buttermilk and flour, beating until smooth.

Add the baking soda and vinegar and beat for a couple of minutes.





Spoon into 12 cupcake cases, bake at 170ºC for 20-25 minutes until springy and pulled away from the edges of the paper. Allow to sit for 10 minutes, and remove to a cooling rack.



Ice at your leisure, eat quickly before someone else does.

45g soft butter
230g icing sugar, sifted
1/4 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
150g cream cheese

Beat the butter until creamy, add icing sugar and beat, slowly at first, then at a high speed until well blended. Add the cinnamon and icing sugar and beat again, but only until just smooth.

end of the month

We were followed through the park by wood smoke scented with echoes of toasted coconut. It is the end of a busy week and in my pocket is my pay slip, the first i have received in 10 years. The sun felt hot in our hair as we chased yellowing leaves to the ground.

I love the abandon of the sprite's kicking heels in the final photo. I imagine it is me, in the clasp of a Bad Man.

intent

I arrive carrying coffee in cardboard cups, my fingers protected from the heat by crinkly paper wrappers, sachets of sugar tucked beneath my thumb.

He greets me affectionately. We exchange smiles and chaste kisses, admire the view.

It is not until i turn around to put down the paper bag containing our lunch that, there on the table, neatly aligned with a sachet of translucent lubricant, i notice the bulbous metal object. It is polished to a bright sheen, the preposterous girth reflecting the sunlight behind me in fractured curves.

I remember standing very still, startled at the intent.

I see the sturdy ring protruding from the dimpled waist, inviting the grasp of a finger or a slug of rope and above the waist, blossoming into a giant teardrop with a malevolent blunt nose, is the bulk of the toy, inevitably destined for my arse hole.

an autumnal treat

These pictures are not the prettiest, but the result is superb. It is another make-in-a-pan (my favourite kind... i am fundamentally lazy about creaming butter with sugar) cake stuffed with sticky fruit and syrupy stem ginger, keeps well (at least a week) and needs no fancy filling or icing to look spectacular. Lighter than a traditional fruit cake but reeling with healthy fibre it makes an excellent alternative to a (boring but well-intentioned) sponge cake. For a birthday boy i covered this one in chocolate ganache, but a simple dusting of icing sugar would suffice.

Sticky Date Cake (from Fantastic Party Cakes by Mich Turner)

200g dates, stoned
200g unsalted butter
300g dark muscovado sugar
2 eggs
50g chopped stem ginger
grated zest of a lemon
1 tsp vanilla extract
250g bramley apples, grated
200g self raising flour

Preheat oven to 160ºC. Lightly grease a Kugelhopf tin (ideally 20cm, although i only have a 22cm tin, which worked well)

Place the dates in a bowl and cover with boiling water. Melt the butter and sugar together in a saucepan and allow to cool slightly.



Beat the eggs, ginger, lemon zest and vanilla extract into the butter and sugar. Drain the dates and chop finely. Add to the saucepan and mix well.







Stir in the apple and flour, then spoon into the tin and bake in the oven for 1 hour 15 minutes until well risen. A skewer inserted will come out clean-ish.

Leave to cool in the tin.



For the chocolate ganache:

175g dark chocolate, broken into pieces, in a clean dry bowl.
125g fresh double cream

Heat the cream to the boil and pour over the chocolate pieces, stirring until the ganache is smooth and glossy. Pour slowly over the cake, using a flat knife to spread the thick tide of chocolate into every corner.



I love a cake with a hole - makes me want to stick something in it.

if you are not here

He pulls back the duvet, offering his flank and the length of crumpled bed. I sink, and he folds me in warmth, bare skin and soft cotton. I wriggle against his side and lie into an offered shoulder, breathe deep. He smells of strong sex; my sex.

Burying my face in his armpit is like pressing my nose deep between my thighs, a familiar scent redolent of hours spent in his arms and under his belly. He reeks, from his ear through to the smooth skin of his elbow that cradles my neck, down to his wrist, which i now remember was stoppered deep inside me last night, his fingers ceaselessly stroking in the tight cavern of my cunt while i wavered on bent knees, simultaneous appalled and yet delirious at the swathes of liquid released, a curious feathering of my funnel every time he pressed a certain spot, ripples of wet heat seeping from between our pressed flesh and saturating my legs, his arm.

pulled

I officially have whiplash, courtesy of the running man on the beach.

My neck hurts when i come, but it does not put me off those nightly (and sometimes daylightly) rituals. Sometimes i need to lay down my head to rest the nerves, other times i just want to weep. I discovered that the steady centrifugal force of a fairground ride can be strangely therapeutic, pressing my chin to my shoulder in a strong stretch; I avoided the dodgems.

I know that having my hands tied behind my back would be agony (i'm unfit for purpose) but it doesn't stop me smiling at the thought.

don't:stop

I trotted home from work this morning with emergency supplies of eggs and icing sugar in my bag, all set to make another 2 dozen fairy cakes for the afternoon party. I could see my neighbour cleaning his car, all set for a conversation i don't have time for.

He waves.

I wave back, determindly sticking my key in the hole.

He starts to walk over.

"I need to pee" I say, "can't stop."

"Will this do? " he offers, cupping his hands.




I'm not sure what i am waiting for, or why. Or perhaps i can't do anything but wait for it all to break down about me. I hate that i am so ineffectual.

plump gold

250g ready-to-eat dried apricots
25g blanched almonds
1 tablespoon runny honey
2 large oranges
1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Use a small sharp knife to make a slit in each apricot, push an almond inside as a replacement stone. Put the apricots in to a small pan with the honey and a few thin strips of orange peel, and the juice of the two oranges. Add a teaspoon of vanilla essence (i found a bottle with vanilla seeds, which adds a delicate speckle to the gold).

Allow to simmer very gently for 30 minutes, by which time the apricots will be fat, soft and very juicy. Allow to cool. Perfect served cold from the fridge, with cream.

Stuffing each sweet, sticky dried apricot with a creamy white almond; the kernels look like a hint of spume in a cock's slitted eye.

it has been one of the dreadful, slow suffocating days. I absented myself from the house to allow the children to spend the day in their home with their dad, a peaceful opportunity to indulge myself that begins with realising that i won't grow old with the father of my children, and how it is so easy to get fucked but how much i would like to have someone want to hold my hand while walking down the high street and how, on the eve of my first proper job in a decade, i would really like to have a hand stroke my hair and tell me it will be ok.

smothered shanks

The days are getting cooler, and my cooking is changing, along with the colour of the trees outside my bedroom window, and the pattern of my days. Less time, but perhaps better times.

I like one pot meals, particularly when the ingredient list is gloriously short. I used 2 shanks for me and the 2 children, but generally allow a shank per adult. Original recipe from Lindsey Bareham's Just One Pot.

2 (or 4) lamb shanks
garlic cloves, unpeeled (2 per shank)
3 tbsp olive oil
2 large onions
thyme
4 medium potatoes
3 carrots

Make a deep slash in the meaty part of a lamb shank with a thin-bladed knife, and stuff with a garlic clove. Repeat with remaining cloves. Heat the oil in a sturdy pan, and brown the shanks briskly on all surfaces.

Peel, halve and thinly slice the onions. Remove shanks from the pan to a plate and add onions to cook in the oil. Season with salt and pepper, stir briefly, cover and leave to colour for 5 minutes. Replace shanks and a good pinch of dried thyme (or fresh). Add 450ml of boiling water and bring to a boil.



Peel and halve the potatoes, tuck in around the shanks. Allow to simmer, over a low heat, covered, for about an hour, longer if necessary, if the shanks are big and meaty. A half hour into the cooking i added 3 large, peeled and sliced carrots.

I have an enormous orgasm hangover; a throbbing head from dehydration, tight muscles in the back of my legs from shuddering tension, my hips creaky - i'm not going to put my hand between my legs to check the state of my pussy - and a certain stiffness in my jaw. I can even feel the excess in my belly, where my stomach muscles quivered and heaved. It is not as socially acceptable as a drink hangover but much more preferable, in my eyes.

my space

I woke this morning lying diagonally across my bed, corner to far corner, splayed as wide as long limbs allowed. I was vaguely aware of at least 3 of my extremities hanging over the side of the mattress. Later explorations revealed pillows spread across the floor and the smooth shell of a spent vibrator nuzzling my neck. I know from the XX nights that i have spent sleeping beside another in the past 12 months that, when sharing, i will curl obediently into a corner of the bed sleeping like a contented dormouse, but otherwise my bed is my total domain.

I lie as i woke, a feline stretch across the rumbled sheet, shades of summer skin in early morning light. The silent vibe i now hold to my lower belly, the slight curve cupping my profile.

I imagine he is watching and my legs press further apart, heels seeking purchase. The toy doesn't move, but my hips do - a slight lift that steadily increases in pace and fervour. I try to linger on the pleasure but i am impatient; once my pussy senses a conclusion i am beyond delay.

I focus on his examination of my blossoming flesh. Oblivious of the silent toy and my still hand my pelvis rolls my favourite pace until the throb becomes a victory convulsion and his name spits from my tongue.