A date with Sarah-Kate; Kate’s home truths

Sarah-Kate say s cheerio to great tastes from the past

Iseem to spend half my life wandering down memory lane these days. And the more I wander, the more the lane seems to flow with milk and honey, sweetsmelling jasmine swaying overhead in the sun, birds whistling, puppies rolling in the grass ... Well, you get the picture. What can I say? Sometimes the past is just a nice place to hang out.

My latest wave of nostalgia’s been prompted by none other than a packet of gingernuts. My very own ginger nut brought them home one day saying he had stumbled upon a most fabulous discovery. During a cheese and cracker situation at his work, they ran out of crackers but still had a lot of blue cheese. Not one to be put off by such a paltry obstacle, the Ginger scrabbled around and found the gingernuts, then employed the blue cheese atop the spicy sweet treat. He re-enacted his discovery at home and, oh, my heavens, next level amazement! This is a really good combo.

But once we had the gingernuts in the house, I found myself ignoring the cheese just to dunk them in a good old-fashioned cup of tea. What next, I thought to myself? Milk arrowroots made into a sandwich with butter in between?

Next minute, I was at a swanky food market and found cheerios. Cheerios! I thought they’d been disestablished or whatever happens to food when someone discovers it’s only made out of things you possibly shouldn’t put together, let alone eat.

But these little red meaty beauties were made from happily farmed animals. I was instantly transported back to the children’s birthday parties of my early days, when fairy bread, chippies and cheerios dunked in tomato sauce were basically as good as it got (plus cake, obviously).

I didn’t buy the cheerios, by the way. When I was a kid, the butcher would give them away for free if you were nice to your mother while she was buying the Sunday roast. But multiple decades later in a swanky food market, they came at a cost I wasn’t prepared to pay.

I did find myself hankering after a spoonful of golden syrup from the tin, though. I remember being caught dipping my paw into that particular pot as a wee girl, although that disgrace faded into obscurity after my younger brother went missing one day, prompting a neighbourhood search and rescue mission, only to be found under a bed, asleep, cuddled up with the sugar bowl. What simple tastes we junior Lynches had in those days! The very mention of a Gregg’s instant pudding could send us into a lather of anticipation. Whisk up a treat, alright! And open a can of peaches while you’re at it.

My sister remembers going to stay with friends and being astonished that they were allowed to mix their Ribena with lemonade. Could anything be more sophisticated? We thought pouring the lime Quench concentrate into a kilo of sugar and eating it before you added water was the last thing in catering cleverness.

It’s a miracle any of us have teeth. But those were the days!