Dear Reader

It must be spring. Pale pink magnolia petals are drifting through the warm fragrant air. A few float over me, landing on the table where I write.I look up at the fragile flowers above and am struck by their delicate beauty and by how even the slightest breeze sends petals falling, unbalancing the perfect wholeness of the flower.

Across the road, a dozen white cockatoos have just alighted on a tall bushy conifer, reminding me of partridges in a pear tree. Some are screeching with joy. Others are clasping a small brown nut in their claws and chomping away, making a dreadful mess underneath. Their bright yellow cockscombs expand and contract with delight. A couple are swinging upside down on the electric wires which cross the street. Such joy! Such appetite!

Yes, it must be spring. The spring of my fiftieth year.

I recall that lovely short poem by the Japanese poet

"I went out into Spring
to gather the young herbs
So may petals were falling
drifting in confused flight
that I lost my way"

And suddenly I realise how lost I have been feeling, how long it is since I have felt joy and delight. I had thought this would be a year of consolidation, of weaving together the various strands in my career. Instead I have spent much of it fighting my way out of a black hole, trying to find a new direction.

It started with a phone call at the beginning of the year from my young male editor who told me breezily that my weekly food column was being relinquished. In one fell swoop my bread-and-butter - and I don't mean the pudding - disappeared down the gurgler. Weekly income gone, career on hold. I stood there, staring down that hole, feeling dizzy. Such cavalier treatment is nothing new in the world of media - and I was particularly vulnerable because I was a freelance contributor working from home..

These letters are to take the place of my weekly column and to share with you some of the new discoveries I continue to make in the wonderful world of food and wine.

Back to current postcard

Blowaway Sponge with Flower Petals

This cake is so airy and light that it's guaranteed to give joy and delight. For an ode to spring you can decorate the top with pesticide-free rose petals - or pale pink magnolia petals.
And hey, what a triumph to blowaway the blues!

4 eggs, separated
pinch of salt
100g castor sugar
65g cornflour
2 tsp plain flour
1 tsp cream of tartar
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of sode
icing sugar for dusting
300ml thickened cream
1 tsp vanilla essence
fresh strawberries
flower petals

Grease and flour 2 x 20 cm cake tins. Preheat oven to 190
degrees celcius. Whisk the eggs whites with the salt until
stiff, then gradually add the sugar until thick and glossy.
While still beating, add the yolks one at a time and continue
beating until mixture forms a ribbon on top when you lift the beaters.

Sift the remaining ingredients and fold gently through the egg mixture.
Bake 20 mins or until the top springs back when touched with a finger
and the cake has shrunk slightly away from the sides of the tin.
Turn out immediately onto greaseproof paper which has been dusted
with icing sugar. When cool, spread tops of both cakes with the cream
which has been lightly whipped with vanilla. Place one cake on top of the other. Strew the petals over the top.

Dust with sugar - as if your life depended on it.