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inlandsea saved my madeleine pan!

Yes. I really am that gay.

I made lemon madeleines to smuggle in to Harry Potter on Sunday, and then I tried to make candy. stitchinmyside seemed to like the madeleines, but the candy was a failure that I didn't visit on anyone but the guilty confectioner himself.

Mainly, I burnt it. I learnt to make candy by being on welfare and having nothing sweet in the house but sugar and nothing to mix it with but margarine and skim milk powder. I learnt without the aid of a candy thermometer, using a glass of cold water, a copy of Fannie Farmer, and a lot of free time. The trouble with candy is the moment you think "I'd better take this off or it will burn," is exactly one moment too late. So this candy was glossy and brown, but tasted like perhaps it had been rescued from a Wonka factory fire.

Then, there was too much butter and not enough sugar, so that when it cooled a translucent layer of sweetened vaseline formed on the top. The layer beneath was so chewy that it could pull out your entire jawful of teeth, bonded into one tidy appliance.

Even if the candy had come out all right in consistency, the flavouring was... odd. I started with nuts but kept reflexively wanting to add lime, so I did, and though my improvisations are usually at least acceptable, this juxtaposition (along with the charcoal note) was the wrong end of peculiar.

And worst, since I had to pour it somewhere, I poured it out into the madeleine pan. I thought, vaguely: it's shiny and it was recently greasy. I'll just pop it out when it's cooled. The result was four wedges of what appeared to be pecan-studded cast resin, firmly bonded to my pan. Woe.

In my grief, I could make no immediate attempt at rescue.

stitchinmyside suggested running hot water onto the back, and then inlandsea came to the notion on her own, and applied it. And when I came home on Tuesday night, there it was, shining and silvery and scalloped and saved.

Sweet.

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