Eventually the happy ending

This was a proper chapter of annoyances, none of them based in the recipe. But fortunately the actual product was nice. 

Annoyance one was having this a day early because I'd forgotten to defrost something else, ugh. Luckily this was easy to pivot to (are you seeing pivots everywhere in your life? We are getting obsessed with them at work. Always with the pivoting). 

Second annoyance was simply how much mess I made. I think my brain was otherwhere - we've started talking about future working patterns. Not just the twitchy return to the office, but what our working patterns might look like for the future, now we know the world doesn't fall apart working remotely. I'm very confused about what I actually want, and how it'll fit in with what other people want. Slight progress today, in fact, but yesterday I was in a bit of a tizzy. 

Thirdly, I just had a frying problem. Those happen, never mind. 

Otherwise, this was great. It's really about using early season fresh sweetcorn, which is *so* nice. I got these on Saturday and they were still utterly sweet and delicious. Almost a shame to turn them into corn cakes, but that was the plan, and I did it. 

 

The batter takes a load of sweetcorn kernels, and I managed to spread them lavishly across my work surfaces in cutting them off. 

The rest of the batter is eggs, flour, polenta, some melted butter and seasoning. Simplicity. Just blitz the lot, not too much, so you have an unattractive lumpy yellow batter. Try not to tip egg down the side of the goblet, or flour all over the work surface, or polenta onto the floor. I managed not to spill the melted butter. Calling it a win.

Things improve now. You want to make small cakes, c4cm across, in a frying pan, cooking them till the base is firm, then flipping to finish off. They take a bit longer than you might (I did) think, probably 4-5 minutes for the first side. But then, I really didn't warm up the pan enough before starting, so perhaps it's quicker if you do it properly. They do go a satisfying gold colour when you do them properly though.

The plan for these was excellent, though - to have with hot-smoked salmon, a bit of watercress, a splash of creme fraiche, some dill. You could add salmon caviar, says the recipe helpfully. I didn't. It's only Wednesday night dinner. Probably delicious though....

A tad autumnal? Perish the thought. Late summer it is, still.