The calm before the storm....

This week is relatively calm, then week starting 23rd January is when you just don't want to look at the calendar because so much is written on it.  This week, all being well we get the keys to our new home in central Wokingham.  It has seemed a long time coming since exchange of contracts back in November and the offer made in September.

The process of buying a house in the UK seems very slow compared to the speed of contract writing in Switzerland.  In fact, I doubt we would have bought a house in Switzerland had we had the amount of documentation we have just waded through for this sale.  Although the Swiss have restrictions for those on some residential permits, as an EU citizen, on a C-permit, buying a house for sole use was a fairly straight forward process.  Even though I was working in a different language, I managed to understand and translate all of the communal rules and regulations, and understand the contract that we signed..  Here in the UK we have come across way more paperwork, and of course with 1 solicitor dealing with each house sale, this slows the process down.  Swiss house sales can be done through a private notary, however we found the public notary in the community in which the house was designated in Arlesheim very efficient.  The added bonus being that the land registry and the notaries are all under one roof, all the information just gets passed around the same building.  Within 4 weeks we had our Swiss sale contract complete.  Both parties meet and sign the same contract, rather then passing them backwards and forwards between solicitors that often happens here in the UK.  Then the searches with the Land Registry have to be done, and this may throw up small issues like extensions and conservatories that do not have planning permission.  In our case, the search showed that we may have some liability for Chancel repair of the local church, owing simply to the age of the land that the property sits on.  Before the summer, I had never even heard of this before.  It is best to be prepared for any liability by having an insurance policy.  This follows a case where a couple were asked to foot the bill for Chancel repairs to their local church.  These repairs totalled 1/4 million, then with legal costs of their fight ontop, the final costs were approaching 1/2 million.  It is fine in areas of land that have been well developed, like town centres, as the costs are split between the community, but in smaller settlements, a sizeable bill can land at your door and you have no choice but to pay it.  This is down to an archaic medieval law.  By 2013, all churches will have to register their interests, this could lead to a rash of claims in various communities for churches where the chancels are in poor state of repair.  It probably does not help that in many communities throughout the UK, the sizes of some church congregations are falling, and so the finances of some churches are being affected.

So, week after next for the second time in 6 months, we pack our belongings and get the house straight again.  We still have 2 rooms in a rental house that are full of packing boxes from our Swiss international move.  With such a short time lapsing, I still have not forgotten the mountain of stuff that greeted me in the kitchen once the crew had departed.  It took 3 days to get most it away.  I think its worst at the start when there is just so much of it lying everywhere, you don't know where to start.  As a reminder of just how bad it looked, I just had to take some pictures.

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3

I still remember a UK move that I did when Steve and I bought our first house together in Aylesbury.  We had been unpacking most of the day.  I recollected that the crew very helpfully said, would you like us to unpack your clothes?  We thought this was wonderful, so of course agreed.  We staggered upstairs at the end of a long and stressful day, and were about to collapse on our bed were it not for the pyramid of clothes resembling Mont Blanc that appeared before our eyes.  Thankfully, that night we had space on the guest bed.  Now after moving 3 times, since then, we say, 'No thanks, we'll unpack the clothes, please leave them in the boxes.'  At least that way we know what we are facing when we get to bed at night....


Once we have the new house in process, the handover of our rental property ensues.  We have to ensure that all the light bulbs are functioning, otherwise we get charged for the bulb and for contractor time to change it.  I suppose that is where the Swiss are quite sensible, when you rent, you are just supplied with the bare wires coming out the ceiling unless you arrange to buy the previous tenants lights.  This means no lights or bulbs to check.  We made the mistake of not buying the previous renters lights, forgetting that the ceilings are made of reinforced concrete, and a mighty drill of great power is required to get through that stuff.  It cost us the same price as the lights were worth to get them installed!
My UK checkout should hopefully be fairly stress-free as I have to supply the property back in a 'professionally cleaned' condition.  This helps me out, as it means I do not have 2 properties to clean simultaneously!  The house, the oven and carpets will all have to be done.  However, the prices are perhaps a little less than in Switzerland, I know some expat friends of who spent almost the same as their deposit to  ensure there were no deductions on handover.  I spent 3 days with my mum, and got about 180 CHF in deductions, mainly for picture hook holes in the wall, costed per hole and a dishwasher service.  In Switzerland, the tenants have to service the appliances before return, however in the UK, the landlord has to ensure they are in working order.

It will be nice once more to get our own space back....

Dreikönigstag, 3 Kings Day

In the UK, the 6^th January perhaps is a day like any other, the only significance being that for those of us who are superstitious, the Christmas decorations must be tidied away, otherwise bad luck will follow. In Switzerland, they will be celebrating Dreikoenigstag.  Alice loved last year, as she was king twice over, so that meant being able to tell everyone what to do and having 2 plastic kings hidden in her bread and wearing 2 different crowns.  Alice has a good memory and reminded me it was the 3 Kings Day in Switzerland today.  Of course, today would not be able to go by without the making of a Dreikoenigskuchen.  Easily bought in Switzerland in bakeries and supermarkets, but the expense led me to start making my own in the last 2 years of our 8 year stint there.  I started my dough off this morning before taking the girls on the school run, and completed the rise and bake when I got back.  I was also thinking of Kim who I know will be going to Kueblers in Aesch to get an exclusive Fasnacht figurine bread, very special.  Normally, though a bread circle consisting of 8 or 9 buns baked together are eaten on this day.  I like to add lots of sultanas and some ground almonds or marzipan to my dough, I am missing the high gluten flour they use called Zopfmehl  and their mini blocks of fresh yeast which makes for very soft bread.

My recipe for  Dreikoenigsbrot or 3 Kings bread can be found here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/55816924@N00/4250748400/in/set-72157623726439904

With Christmas in the bag, we are now feeling suitably relaxed as the hectic preparations, buying and wrapping has ceased. …  Surely none of us would be thinking about how long we would have to wait for Christmas 2012….. or may be not….

A question asked by my youngest last night as she lay in bed thinking of good excuses as to why she shouldn’t be asleep;

 ‘Dad, how many days is it until next Christmas?’  

My husband cunningly turned it into a maths question, and she almost worked it out, had she not realised it was actually a leap year this year…

I would not perhaps necessarily be thinking of when Easter will happen either, but it seems the minute Christmas was complete, Tesco and Morrisons both got their Easter displays out the second the wrapping paper was emptied from the shelves.  I found that a little depressing.  There is no breathing space now between major celebrations as there was before, even hot cross buns are available all year round.  In Switzerland they could not do this, as they had Valentines Day and Fasnacht Lenten Carnival scheduled in before Easter, so Easter eggs came into the shops nearer Easter time, the Swiss seem able to wait til March.  We have Easter eggs on the shelves in the first week of January, that just seems wrong to me.

We decided to have a quiet family Christmas, and squeeze in seeing the family either side.  Although my mum always insisted on breaking the Christmas Day dinner Turkey rule, I still like to cook turkey on Christmas day. I am not sure whether it’s because I am a stickler for tradition, or whether it’s because as a child we were given anything but Turkey at Christmas time, and perhaps now subconsciously, years later, I am now making up for that.  I do agree with my mum that Turkey is essentially quite a boring meat, so why an earth do so many people want to eat this on such a great day of family celebration?  We ate everything from goose, to pot roasted pheasant and ribs of beef and they were, I must admit, way more tasty than a Turkey dinner.

Perhaps I stick with traditional because it is also easier.  I always like to have the tangy cranberry port and orange sauce along with pigs in blankets, and devils on horseback, which my girls love to eat; prunes wrapped in bacon. I adore parsnips, and in Switzerland and in France, these neglected root vegetables were relegated to pig food status, mainly as this was the only option available to many during WWII.  Now parsnips are not universally adored.  The low demand meant that my parsnips cost me about 5GBP for 2-3 rather large and woody specimens!

  Even though I am not a big fan of Brussel sprouts, those lovely little green spheres of goodness still get an invite to be part of my dinner.  Alice my youngest loves them, but not surprising considering she likes everything cabbage.  My eldest, Laura takes more convincing, although she did add an extra sprout to her obligatory minimum of 2 this year, purely voluntarily I might add.  I think it’s important never to give up retrying flavours with children.  I always tell my two if they don’t like it, they have to try it at least 20 times before they can say they don’t like something (I back this up by saying that they have researched this, and of course they never count how many times they have actually tried something, so it’s a clever rouse….).   Yesterday was testament to this, as the cranberry sauce that both of them declared that they did not like on Christmas day was sweetened with a little sugar and had slow cooked red onion and balsamic vinegar added, and that went down very nicely.  In fact, seconds were asked for!  This was loosely based on an idea from Jamie Oliver, see this recipe:

http://www.channel4.com/4food/recipes/popular-cuisines/british/sausages-with-threeveg-mash-and-cranberry-onions-recipe

 I possibly like the post-Christmas relax more than the day itself.  I suppose like my mum, I now realise how much work goes into the day, and it’s hard to sit down when there are so many things to prepare, and this is not something that I associate with Boxing Day, leftover day.  I do admit to speeding things up with my 2 willing helper girls this year.  Both armed with kitchen knives they helped me prepare the vegetables whilst listening to the choir from Kings College, Cambridge.  I will make a note of this and hopefully it will become a Christmas family tradition, rather than me cooking in the kitchen all on my own.  My husband definitely loves the Christmas dinner the best, however I still like the left overs in the days that ensue.

With an emphasis on reduction of food waste these days, I relish the chance to make the amazing amount of food generated by Christmas last for as long as possible by making turkey and or ham into something tasty to eat.  On the day, the carcass gets put straight into the slow cooker, and the remaining meat divided into small bags and frozen so there is less risk of OD from turkey.  We ate a Kelly Bronze free range bird, this year, so yes the meat was more expensive that the run of the mill supermarket bird, but it enthuses me more to make good use of the meat.  So my Turkey plan as follows:

Christmas Day:  Roast Turkey 5.25kg bird cooked and partly eaten

Boxing Day:  Cream of Turkey soup and rolls made from slow cooker stock

27^th December: Meal for 8 from leftovers with my sister-in-law, so make Delia’s leek and turkey flan: http://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/type-of-dish/flan/turkey-flan-with-leeks-and-cheese.html

Using the frozen meat:

Succotash turkey,  http://www.deliciousmagazine.co.uk/recipes/succotash-turkey-bake

but being frugal, did not buy the soup but made the Corn chowder for the base, as I had all the vegetables, (see last post on this thread:  http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/recipes/705297-Does-anyone-have-the-Covent-Garden-soup-recipe-books/AllOnOnePage  )

Then added some grated cheese to the top, leftover from the cheeseboard.

Turkey Pie: Vikki just for you, here is a chicken pie that I like, you do not necessarily need shortcrust for the base, I just make a single crust pie with a puff pastry lid (if you can get Betti Bossi’s Butter Puff pastry all the better for my Swiss readers…) http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/22949/country+chicken+pie

I also bung in the leftover stuffing into this pie too.

Turkey curry is also planned with some Naan I got for less than half price as no one wanted Naans for Christmas day dinner it seems.

Then one more bag of Turkey to think about what I will do with, by then everyone may sick of turkey by then! That will also be 7 meals out of my Turkey which is not bad going…..!

The Christmas cake was simply decorated in random snowflakes by the girls this year, mainly because all of my cake equipment is sitting in removal boxes.  Hopefully by my next post our move to our new house will be complete and for the second time within 6 months I will be unpacking removal  boxes!