The Lemon Tart

By SARAH TOOHEY A FRIEND of mine died recently. He was 54, a married man with four lovely children. His wife and I have been friends for years. As two couples we were close. I am not going to write about the heartbreak of bereavement but rather the kindness of people. What struck me during those days of the funeral was the generosity of people. So much food was brought to their door: sandwiches, cakes, soup, and shepherd's pie. And it all helped. I am not attributing this kindness to the recession but I have noticed that people are doing more for each other these days rather than simply buying things for them. Another friend, whose daughter went away to college in September, made her a book with all her favourite recipes and presented it to her before she left. What a wonderful gift. All it took was time and love.[private] Recently, on Valentine's Day my younger daughter decided to bake a cake for her boyfriend because she had no money to buy him a gift. Of course the particular piece of confectionery that she selected to bake for the occasion necessitated the purchase of a new baking dish as well as a comprehensive list of ingredients. And naturally I had to foot the bill. (It should be noted at this point that I am not a baker. I lack the discipline necessary for the exactitude that baking requires. I lack the patience for all the complicated stages involved. I prefer to make soup because I can throw everything into a single pot, often at the same time, and measuring is not a requirement. I love soup. It is a very forgiving, nutritious and delicious offering. It can be frozen. It is comfort food without the guilt engendered by desserts and cakes. But I digress.) When my daughter first mooted the subject of baking a lemon tart for the occasion, I warned her that if she ran into difficulties it was unlikely that I could assist her. This was greeted with the Miss Piggy toss of the head and the youthful assurance that this eventuality was a tad unlikely. I was in the presence of a baking genius. The first cloud appeared on the horizon when I started to prepare dinner. I was responsible for the main course: a pasta dish with chorizo sausage and sweet pepper in a tomato and cream chilli sauce. As I started chopping the ingredients for dinner the baking event commenced. We were crashing into each other, banging into open drawers, arguing over who had priority over the boiling water in the kettle. Why had the pastry base not been prepared earlier, I asked? Because I had not come home with the ingredients in time. It was at this point that I actually looked at the recipe for the lemon tart. Well Holy God! Not one but two double boilers were required. This, I discovered, involved two large glass bowls resting over two saucepans of boiling water: on the hob while I tried to cook dinner. Not likely. But first the pastry had to be made, chilled, rolled and baked blind. And it was dinner time. I did what I always do when I can't count to ten. I used the boiling water in the kettle to make a pot of tea. Experience has taught me that there is very little in this world that is so bad that it is not made a little bit better with a cup of tea. After a quick appraisal it became clear that I could not prepare dinner while the baking event was in progress. It was also apparent that we were all starving, especially the husband, son and boyfriend. My son was getting perilously close to the bread bin, and his appetite was in danger of being ruined. It had finally dawned on my daughter, flushed of face and eyes bright with tears, that the chosen tart required the skill of a qualified pastry chef. The boyfriend was trying to talk her down from the ledge. My heart went out to her. And I had to stop myself from asking the obvious. What was wrong with Apple Crumble? So I proposed that the pastry would be made and while I cooked dinner it could chill in the fridge. (Not a bad bit of advice for the rest of us either.) A consensus was reached. A disaster was averted. Pro tem. The pasta dish was delicious. And we all ate too much of it. This, I pointed out to my daughter, was a VERY GOOD THING. We would not be able to appreciate or enjoy the delights of her tart if we had to partake of it immediately. By waiting until it was baked we would enjoy it all the more. I knew there was a part of her that wanted to kill me. We had another pot of tea before we tidied up after the dinner in preparation for the Rolling of the Pastry. My son wondered why we didn't just have Vienneta like we usually do when something more exotic than regular ice cream is required. My daughter, close to tears, screeched that she wanted to bake it for the boyfriend because it was Valentine's Day and lemon tart was his favourite dessert. The Boyfriend looked uncomfortable. I am sure he wished now that he had just said Ben and Jerryâ€Ëœs when asked the question. I felt a fit of the giggles coming on. I caught my son's eye and we both exploded with laughter. The daughter jumped up from the table and stormed off. The boyfriend looked sheepishly at us before following her. My husband looked sternly at our son and myself. For a moment. Then he succumbed to a fit of the giggles too. Tears rolled down our three faces. The husband was charged with going up to give the Motivational Speech and to persuade the daughter to finish the tart. She reappeared looking like the wreck of the Hesperus. The pastry was removed from the fridge. First the pastry was stuck to the cling film. Then when she managed to detach it from the cling film it proved impossible to roll without sticking to the counter. I suggested a fish slice. Tempers were fraying badly. I couldn't look at another pot of tea. The dog was trembling at the back door, giving me bleak backward glances. I know an 'out' when I see one. As I grabbed the dog's lead, I pressed my husband into service, persuading him that he would figure it out, before handing him the fish slice and making good my escape. The dog and I vied for pole position as we fell over each other going out the door. I think I won. We went for a very long walk. As I came up the drive on our return, I looked for signs of disaster. All seemed calm. As I opened the door I was greeted by the most delicious smell. There, on the island unit, I beheld the most amazing looking tart, dusted with icing sugar. It would have graced a Michelin-starred restaurant. The daughter was beaming, the boyfriend gazed on her adoringly, the son looked on hungrily and the husband looked, well, proud. We cut it and served it with her raspberry coulis. (That's what the recipe said.) We oohed and aahed. It was simply delicious. Nothing bought in a shop would have compared with this gift. And it struck me that if she had had the money she would never have thought of doing this. And I thought of my friend's daughter going off to college with the gift of love contained in her mother's home-made recipe book. And I recalled how my friend's grieving heart was nourished by the simple gifts of homemade food, delivered in biscuit tins and on old meat platters. We have lost a lot in this recession. But there is an awful lot of going back to basics for which I, and many others, are truly grateful.[/private]