LONDON LEG: Supper #47 - E1

Dinner in a high-rise - my idea of heaven. As a child, driving into London with my family, I would gaze yearningly at every tower block we'd pass. They looked so exotic to my country girl eyes. I loved the thought of living in such close proximity to so many others. My cosy sense of urban life had my imagination running wild with thoughts of intensive, relentless domesticity; of wall to wall carpet, 24 hour central heating and fish fingers and chips. My family all thought I was nuts and yet, decades later, a part of me still feels like this. So when I got an invite from Andrew to bring choc pud to him and his friends in his retro pad in Spitalfields I was there with big jangling bells on.

I was told to leave the van at home as parking was an issue so I wrapped up the night's offering and jumped on the 35 bus. Eventually, after some mind-numbingly confusing 'short cut' I should never have even attempted, I emerged at the foot of the big, ugly, but still kinda glamourous Denning Point on Commercial Street and got buzzed up to the 9th floor. I tried to share a lift with a Bangladeshi family but they weren't up for it at all, in fact I suspect that they hung back just to avoid joining me. I tried not to take it personally.

The door swung open to a glorious cacophony of swirling green, yellow and brown carpet. Could it have been more perfect?! I don't think so. I chased it from room to room, transfixed by its gaudy tone and flouncy ways. I could barely lift my gaze to shake hands with the people in the flat - it was just so much to take in. I was taken into the kitchen for a drink. All the windows were steamed up with the fug of cooking. All over the table were strewn packets of Tesco Finest sausages and bottles of red plonk. I clutched my half pint glass of wine and made off with the host to explore the place a little more thoroughly.

THE SET UP: Andrew rents this flat from the family of an old lady who died. All her stuff is still there - the tables, chairs, retro kitchen and, my personal fave, the fully kitted out open-up bar. I think this is what sold it to him; yes, the vistas are marvellous, but what's really dazzling is the glasswear in that cabinet. For a moment I even forgot about the carpet.

WHO CAME: Me, Andrew, his girlfriend, his brother, his brother's girlfriend, Eleanor, Eleanor's flatmate, Gen and Lucas.

WHAT WE ATE: Bangers and mustard mash with buttery cabbage & bacon and onion gravy. It was just what I felt like on such an horrific, wet night. The whole flat was moist with warm, cooking smells and I felt as if in a big, bright protected bubble held aloft in the sky.

DINNER TABLE TOPICS: A lot of the guests are in TV production so we had tales of who was doing who and where, Charlie Brooker, new ideas for shows with Martin Clunes, a dog and a gimp mask. My host opened up to me about his 'bulimic urges' for chocolate which found him purging at the gym rather than down the loo. We got the real reason behind the Schweppes and Tango commercials and someone suggested playing the biscuit game (which biccy would you be and why?)...I went for a Penguin, though the game never really got off the ground as Lucas was busy discussing some woman at work's rack and how he stares at it - not because he wants to dive in, more out of fear of suffocation.

THE PUD: On such a cold and hostile night I pulled out one of the classics - hot chocolate fudge pudding, a dessert that I was raised on and which still gets the most squeals whenever I make it. This time though I decided to spike it with some Aztec flavour - chilli, cinnamon and vanilla. It was great - all that molten richness lifted completely by the spices. Andrew's brother said it was the most drug-like food he's ever had and, I have to admit, the place did turn from manic, Oxbridge raconteuring to hazy, glazy submission in one fell spoonful.

LONDON LEG: Supper #46 - Cheam

I met Jake a few weeks ago as I trawled round Tower Hill with a camera crew filming me. They wanted to gage strangers reactions to the Choc Star Tour proposition. In full waitress mode I charged around with a tray of freshly baked - still warm in fact - ultra fudge brownies; wafting them before people, hoping to stop them in their tracks. Jake was one of the many who stoppped, one of the several who agreed to have me round for supper and, so far, the only one who actually came up with the goods and invited me. "I'll have to clear it with my other half first" he warned, "she might be suspicious".

I returned home and Googled him - as promised - and discovered that he had run for Mayor this year and was mad about motorbikes. Great combo, I thought and we made a date. Monday found me horrified by the weather. I read about Miami in the paper and felt a deep, anguished pang for my old life over there - how every morning you wake up in that city, in that state, being reached for by the most glorious and enticing light. Here I must make do with alternatives - chocolate is the obvious choice and on a day like that there was only one thought on my mind: chocolate bread & butter pudding.

It's best to make it at least 24 hours before eating so by Tuesday evening when it was time to steer Jimmy out into the suburbs those slices of bread were fully engorged with the rich, chocolatey custard surrounding them. I might well have broken into it en route and enjoyed the thing uncooked - I was that craven of its velvetty layers. Jesus, this girl needs some sunshine real bad!

THE SET UP: I have been asked to come at 7.30 for 8. I feel I've done pretty well to arrive at 8. Jake comes out into the street and guides me into a space opposite the house and tells me that they've all started without me. Wow, that's a first - but as I follow Jake into their house to be confronted by a table full of strangers that old magic descends. I can't really explain it other than to say it's a bit like acting; it's kind of other worldly, exciting, addictive. I can tell immediately that this is a table of laughs and that feeling at home would be easy.

WHO CAME: The really jolly neighbours, Ray and his wife, Jake, his girlfriend Ruth, her 30 year old son who's living with them, a friend of Ruth's from work and me.

WHAT WE ATE: Jake is cook tonight, he and Ruth take it in turns but I can tell that he gets a real macho pleasure from putting food on the table. This is adorned with a gold shiny strip of paper that stretches right the way along it and is peppered with bottles of wine, most of which I have to decline on account of having to get Jimmy back to SW9. Halloumi awaits me as I take my place at the end of the table. I love Halloumi in an extra special way. As I attempt to stuff the grilled cheese into the warm pitta pouches and then into my gob I hold back in order to converse with this table full of new people I suddenly find myself sitting with. "So what's this all about then? I'm intrigued", they ask me. "What do you actually do?". I gulp a slither of the tasty rubber cheese down and explain myself: London suppers, different backgrounds, chocolate as common ground, etc. They seem satisfied with my response and the eating and drinking continues.

Out comes the main course - a spicy beef stew with mashed carrot and butternut squash and a potato and roast carrot melange. The vegetarians down the end got stuffed oyster mushrooms; only Ruth's work mate is allergic. Jake laughs it off and pours more wine. I feel right at home: nice hearty cooking, the wonderfully maternal Ruth to my left, Jake the patriarch playing the raconteur and the neighbourly couple just oozing reassurance.

DINNER TABLE TOPICS: Pretty varied. From Ruth's son's drum n bass dj-ing exploits to Ray's prize winning sunflowers. Turns out most of them hail from Wandsworth/Battersea and I listen with delight as they talk about being Rockers "cos it was cheaper' and swapping boyfriends down at the Monday Club. "We didn't go out to get drunk in those days" says Ruth, "We went out and had a drink."

Jake and Ruth first went out when they were 15 and now years, marriages and many mod/rocker antics later they're back on. And Ruth has come to be accepted by Jake's other family - the bikers. I wet my pants a bit. "What do you mean!" I demand to know, "Can you hook me up with a dinner invite?!". "Could be tricky, they're very closed - especially after what happened last year". I vaguely recall a motorway murder. I remember Hunter S. Thompson's 'Hell's Angels'. My imagination starts running wild. Jake reveals his biker name to be 'Pyro' and what he does to car drivers if they mess with him on the road. I shimmy inwardly and increase the pressure. "I'm not promising anything - I'll see what I can do". And then, a ray of light - " I do have a friend who's a pole dancer. A bloke."

Oh well hell, that'll do! Bring him on! Can he cook, and then we eat and then have pud and then can he put his outfit on and dance for us?! I almost forget about the damn bread & butter pudding in my reverie and curse having to drive because I need some of that Rioja.

THE PUD: It's all bubbling at the sides; a great moist, dense bed of chocolate hotness. It smells like heaven. I mean, all these cold choc puds are great in the summer but what the hell's the winter for if not for eye-closing aromas like these? Ruth serves us all. Ray tells me he used to be a 3 Kingsize Mars Bar in a sitting man before he became diabetic. I feel bad. He doesn't and launches at the thing with vehemence. The cool double cream rivulets through the folds and we all enter our happy place. Apart from the work mate who's not really into chocolate, but hey, all the more for Ray!

LONDON LEG: Supper #45 - SW16 (Mystery Meat)

Well last Wednesday was a bit of an eye opener. I was invited to join a group of twenty-something Trowbridge transplants on their regular 'Mystery Meat' meet. Gwen, Anna, Ella, Annabel and Jemima started up this weekly supper club when Anna returned from her family's farm one weekend with three braces of pigeon. Being the game bunch that they are they decided that from then on they would take it in turns to surprise one another with a different beast or cut, with the winner having to head for the corner shop with £1 to buy the pudding. So far they've had snout, heart, tongue, cheek, testicles, rabbit, turkey and that old favourite, chicken. How quirky and retro I thought and leapt at the chance to join them.

THE SET UP: I turned up with Gwen, sans Jimmy (bad parking round there). We picked our way along the dingy streets of Streatham and filtered up a hill to a house. It was like entering studentdom again - just wall to wall momentos of good, cheap times. Anna was prone on the sofa underneath layers of duvet. In fact most of the floor space in the TV room was occupied by some kind of bedding; it was like it was set up for a permanent slumber party. We went through to the kitchen so Gwen could prep her mystery meat whilst Anabel's dad wandered about applying liberal amounts of Deep Heat to some shoulder ailment. More stuff - a cacophony of it, occupying every work surface, every wall, every shelf. I found it reassuring and cosy and happily headed off to the utility room to wedge the night's pudding into a packed fridge.

WHO CAME: As well as Gwen, me, Anna and Annabel's dad, Dave, one by one fresh faced girls would enter the scenario: Ella, just back from the Embankment cafe she worked at, Jemima, returning from a day of textiles, the sweet French girl and Annabel who hadn't been home since the previous morning and who'd still managed to squeeze in a date with someone else before arriving home.

WHAT WE ATE: Gwen thought it would be amusing to recreate one of the dishes from Jemima's mum's WHSmith exercise book, circa 1982 - Tasty McBrides. She carefully pottered away in the background while everyone else ploughed merrily through the two bottles of red wine on the table. The plate arrived to a fanfare and was accompanied by a special 'Mystery Meat lamp' in order to show it off properly. We all sank our teeth in to these odd little bites. Yum! said everyone reaching for more. I gagged a bit and barely finished one piece. The truth was that the mystery meat in this scenario was Spam. Ever since Spam fritters at school I've never been able to cope with it. It flooded my gag reflexes still further as Gwen explained the recipe; of fried Smash, onion powder, grilled Spam and other horror stories. These girls were insatiable for the stuff though and soon the plate was empty.

Then came the main attraction - a great, hearty robustness of a stew, it was lousy with bone marrow streaming through the sauce. Soon the guessing began and in moments the real meat revealed itself - Oxtail, bought from William Rose on Lordship Lane. I asked why she didn't get it from Brixon market but Gwen thought it best to keep it super legit in matters of tail.

DINNER TABLE TOPICS: The talking was non-stop, from Dave's move to Thailand to the Trowbridge Pump festival that happens on Anna and Ella's farm in Wiltshire. Annabel kept on coming out with whacked-out stuff like how she feels like she morphs into Angel Delight when she's having sex. Dave would turn a blind eye and concentrate on his electrode machine which he decided to hook me up to. I sat there clutching onto Ella as he delivered mini-electric shocks into my arm. I'm not sure why. I learnt about the only male lap-dancing club in Europe which just happens to be there on Streatham High Street (they've all been). Then Jemima taught us Cumbrian - who knew? There's a whole damn dialect of it and I want in on the action (she said she'd hook me up with some Lake District folk). Games began - starting with everyone having to describe someone with just one word. From a table full of people I'd never met I got calm, still, serene, curious and alert - I think I might just have been a bit stunned post-electro probing.

THE PUD: I pulled the pud out of the fridge, turned it out and showered it with glass-like shards of amber caramel - a chilled pralined truffle terrine. It was slight hell to cut up but once apportioned was nyammed up quickly. They all seemed to like it a lot, but to be honest I think the £1 option from the corner shop might have been just as warmly received - they're just those kind of girls and as I left that night I felt a small pang for living a life of cosy chaos, surrounded by your best friends, up to the eyeballs in clutter and debauchery.

Wake and bake

I'm having such a lovely lazy day off. The last week has been mental, culminating in a four day Slow Food festival on the Southbank. Someone arranged for the weather to be consistently brilliant for the entire thing and the place was a throng of hungry grazers. I loved it. Sometimes you do gigs and they're just so gratifying - customer after customer seemingly thrilled and excited to be occupying the space in front of Jimmy's counter. Loads of 'ooohing' and 'aahhhing'. Lots of great feedback. People who seem genuinely interested in the Choc Star cause. It was hectic and hot and I couldn't seem to slice those brownies up fast enough or roll them truffles quick enough or make enough of the Venezuelan hot chocolate shots but I had several moments of thinking - and as Dolly would muse - "wow, what a way to to make a living!".

I was asked to give a couple of cooking demos at the stage. I'd observed a few others and decided that I definitely wouldn't be taking the serious route. I mounted that podium with all my kit on the first day and was astonished to find that my compere was a TV presenter from my childhood on Anglia Television. Patrick Anthony would read out the birthday cards accompanied by this fluffy puppet called BC. I would long for him to open up one of those huge cards and read out my name but it never happened. I mentioned this on stage and like to think that Patrick may have made a mental note to fix it for my next birthday....The terrine I prepared wouldn't play ball as I tried to turn it out. There was a collective holding in of breath from the audience and then huge, relieved applause when the slab of darkness slunk free from the tin.


Then I was rescued by the graffiti removal squad. Some little shit had tagged Jimmy while he was parked up overnight on the Southbank the week before. I spotted these dudes in their truck and pounced on them. They chuckled gamely and, without any fuss, bowled over to the van with a bucket and some special sollution and wiped that stain clean away. They even gave me some of the stuff in case it happened again while I reciprocated with a couple of chocolate ice creams.

Willie's Chocolate Factory

It was a miserable day. I'd started it in Exeter where I sidled up to a guest house and caught their wi-fi. I felt a bit dodgy but there was nowhere to park in town and it was pissing with rain. I got on the M5 up to Tiverton and ran over roundabouts and through puddles to get to oor Willie's chocolate factory. It was great to finally be there after hearing about the place for over a year. There was Willie, doing hundreds of things at once but looking fighting fit - even if he did complain of exhaustion.

The place is a warren of rooms; little units of high activity all lorded over by the heavy mechanical clunk of moving paddles and vibrating metal. In one area workers with blue hairnets wrapped freshly molded chocolate cylinders in gold foil. They were wordless in their concentration. I didn't hang around with them for long. Willie finally got off the blower and gave me a proper tour of the place.

There was a room heaving with jute sacks, full of single estate beans just arrived from the Venezuelan Cloud forest. He slit open a sack and emptied it into a waiting container. From there buckets full were thrown in the top of the enormous Bilbao roasting machine. After 20 minutes they'd come out the bottom all toasty and smelling great. Into the winnower where the shells got sucked away ready for the beans to begin the grinding and conching process.

The concher had been going on one batch for a few days, slopping the dark liquid back and forth, refining the particles for the smoothest end result. Willie lifted the lid and we both got a scoop of warm, melted Rio Caribe prime for tempering and barring up. It feels like a meal; like the ultimate in nutrition - complex and deep with notes that sing of a far flung land.

It would have been good to stay and talk all day - so many questions! But the road to Cornwall called. I loaded up with fresh supplies and thanked Willie for the bags of beans and nibs he threw in for good measure and hit the highway.

Look out for more of Willie back on the box soon....

Onto Dartmoor...

It was almost as if I'd entered some kind of full-size, 3D computer game, with me and the van as the perpetrators - twisting through all the obstacles in order to reach the other side and victory. I departed Totnes and Dartington and went in the direction of Exeter. Sort of. I'd read so much about Dartmoor - about the ancient tors, the murky swamps, the mist coming down and enshrouding the place with unspeakable disquiet. And about the bleakness that can bore right through you. I wanted to get right in there and traverse the entire moor.

From Buckfastleigh I cut up through a 1960s housing estate, already pushing Jimmy into second gear just to rev past the kid outside fixing his scrambler. As I turned the corner I was soon ensconced by high, dense hedgerows that seemed only just able to frame us as we wended through. The road was absolutely tiny and Jimmy collected all kinds of fern and bracken round his wheel arches. There was nowhere to pull in anywhere and I have no idea what might have happened if another vehicle had come along - it was all I could do to squeeze past a disapproving woman and her dog.

Every person I saw, in the occasional village I'd enter - in Buckfast, Coombe, Scorriton - would look at me with eyes of pure, local distaste. She's got to be out of her mind, they seemed to say, bringing that monstrosity through here, and then, she'll get hers...and as if I'd read their minds I would then be confronted by some new challenge - either a terrifyingly steep hill (shades of Yorkshire) or a bridge so tiny and so narrow that I wondered whether I might have to abandon Jimmy there in order to save myself.

But we triumphed and finally found ourselves with somewhat of an opening and engaged with the company of this merry party.

They shook their heads in horror as I showed them the route I fancied for reaching Exeter - none of them had ever done it, but I had to cross the moor properly or I wouldn't have been able to rest easy at night. And oh my! What a wild, beautiful thing it is! Hosted entirely by languishing sheep and the odd self-sufficient pony, it engulfs you with its sweet, chilled, marshy air. And time could fall away.

Not for me though; not for long. I had a dinner date on the fringes of Exeter and didn't want to throw the paella into jeopardy...

Supper #31 - Upton Noble, Somerset

We plough on down the A303 until an emergency toilet break forces us to pull into our old mucker Vicki's house in Chicklade to use the facilities. There we stay, lolling around on the lawn, dozing in the baking afternoon sun. We catch up then distribute the rest of the cake amongst them and get on the back road to Upton Noble - apparently one of the most beautiful routes in the area.

Terraced knolls, high hedgerows, Douglas firs all staggering down to luscious ravines and swooping hills - and with the sun cutting languidly through. Purty. We stop off at an egg stall where old ice cream containers hold individually wrapped homemade cakes: coffee cake, lemon cake, chocolate cake. Beyond the large farm gate lives Kate and her husband and their four kids of 1,2,3 and 4 years old. It's a smallholding with Jersey cows, chickens, dogs, a pig, cats, goats, a bull - all spread out over a field, a yard, a couple of statics and a caravan.

I was instantly hooked by this lot. They're proper. 'Free range' as Ferdie said, wild little kids messing around with any old piece of junk they can get their hands on. I understand them; I get it. Sometimes, with certain kids now, there's this slightly horrific sense of self-awareness, born out of an excess of attention and autonomy. That constant thing of being asked for their opinion on everything - as if they're the single most precious thing to ever arrive on Earth. Kate's lot are very refreshing; roaming little creatures with their imagination as the number one toy and self-importance nowhere in sight.

We gave them some ice creams then continued on to Upton Noble where a lane full of kids were hooting and hollering for us as we arrived. These I liked a lot too. Just sort of wide eyed and curious about life. Their folks were off to a party and we were left in charge. We hung round the van, chatting about this and that, then inside to watch a bit of football and have our supper.

THE SET UP: Andy and Vicki moved to Somerset from Woodstock five years ago. They like living in an area that's not too polished - which is what they say has happened to Oxfordshire. The house is a winding, thick stone-walled affair, heavy on Cath Kidston and organic food. Outside chickens mother ducklings and their dogs doze on the tiny road.

WHO CAME: Just me and Ferds - but the kids hung around to chat.

WHAT WE ATE: Spag bol made with lamb's mince and a wonderful peppery rocket salad from the garden washed down with a bottle of organic red wine.

DINNER TABLE TOPICS: The sleepover the two older girls had been to the night before and how badly one girl behaved, the family trip to Kerala in February, how mad their mums are on organics and composting and recycling...and bread baking. Then this great strapping man strode in, looking for his daughter. He went wild for the van and then started telling us all about his job as the only servant of the British government on the West Bank. We later discover that he's ex-S.A.S. and I decide that I want to live on such a fruity lane as this.

THE PUD: Ice cream from the van: Turkish Delight, Cookies & Cream, Raspberry sorbet and white chocolate & chilli. Plus a plate of brownie bites.

MY BED FOR THE NIGHT: Ferdie and I have a spat about who sleeps where. It's a bit of a nightmare when your brother tries to encroach upon your rightful bed. As we walk up to the local for a quick pint I list all the reasons why I should have the best bed and he finally concedes over a game of dominoes. With 'Bedgate' taken care of I slide into cool, crisp sheets and sleep long like a teenager.

Bingo with Vera, Hilda and Rose

I've always wanted to go to Dudley. It's unfortunate that it had to rain so hard but then I wasn't going for the weather. No, Dudley doesn't conjure great images of magisterial beauty for me, but that's rarely the reason I choose to go to the places I do. "Why the hell d'you want to visit that dump?" people will cry when I mention some town high on my hit list. Most people assume that the only reason you'd ever want to go anywhere is because it's gorgeous/foodie/middle class/twee and, whilst that's all great, it doesn't paint a very varied picture in one's mind.

So there I was, chugging through Lenny Henry's home town, not quite sure what I might do in Dudley when the Gala Bingo hall appeared to my left. Outside stood a banana backed, ravaged old girl with a huge cigarette jammed between her lips. She gaped at me, the lights went red and I reached across the passenger seat to unwind the window -
"What time's bingo on til?" I yelled.
"Three O' clock bab" she croaked back.

Right, only 30 mins to get involved. I pulled into a particularly grotty hotel carpark, cut through the hotel (far out - howlingly empty, electricity appeared to have come and gone) and hot-footed it over the causeway. There was a pearly haired lady with apricot nails and smokers' lips, trying to prevent me from going in. In the end I became a member. Imagine that. I fairly glid into the huge theatre, down past all the old girls and their fat pens, onto the main stage where I was furnished with booklets and then...what the heck happens next?! I didn't have a clue what to do - I approached a group of women and whispered for help: Vera, Hilda and Rose took me under their wing and showed me the ropes and I became one of scores of silently punching players.

Oh, how we laughed...but when it came to the end I couldn't get anyone to invite me for dinner. They all fled into the rain for their buses with looks of steely determination while I was left in the yellow glare of the bingo hall, counting my losses.

Under fire in the milking pit

Through the outer reaches of Blackpool - a town that goes on and on, belching out more and more Tudor-bethan semis and endless roundabouts until, finally, you reach the M6 and all its outlying towns. Burnley, Preston, Chorley, Blackburn, Wigan. Wigan Pier! I went and got stuck into a bit of Orwell nostalgia - and the rain came down to assist in the scene setting.

Onto Manchester and through to Wilmslow, Knutsford, Alderley Edge: prime WAG territory and not disappointing on the bottle blonde/CD shades/jeans and Jimmy Choos count.

And then I went to Staffordshire. It was supposed to be an innocent stop-off in a B&B while I gathered my thoughts. I was met by a very jolly, rosy cheeked lady. All I did was mention my growing interest in the thought process of bovine life when she pushed me into the cloakroom, put me into some overalls, got me some wellies, wrapped a great, vinyl apron round me and drove me over the field to her husband.

There he was milking the cows, down in this deep, dark, clanging pit. Overhead a loud, ominous clunk sounded, signalling the twice daily routine of milk pumping from resigned cows. I guess it's just like work to them: fairly dull and not hugely stimulating but quite a relief I'm sure once they've been relieved of those great swollen udders.

I was put in charge of disinfecting the teets. I had to get right down there at the back of their hind legs and sort of swish this jar around their nips. some had mastitis and needed to be lubed up with Vaseline. It made me wince with female empathy. Every now and again a tail would lift up and out would gush a loud load of something smelly. "It's only grass" said the farmer as if this made it pleasant and then went about his business, oblivious to the large moist patch of brown on his shoulder.

I learnt a lot about cows down there and have had some of my questions answered but he was kind of full-on, this guy. He loved to talk! Dios mio - eventually I managed to steer him towards the great bucket of bright yellow milk, colostrium, which I drank from with a mix of repulsion and glee - you could make some pretty interesting milkshakes with that stuff.

Chasing the gypsies...

I ducked back into the moors - went round the other side this time - rootled out my old flatmate in Barcelona, Arlo. We lived high up a flight of stone steps in San Pere, right above the most gruesome, twisted family you could ever imagine. They would snarl and belch and shout in their bestial dialect and we would conjure up all sorts of scenarios we imagined they might be engaged in.

We had a fun night in the local boozer - conveniently situated right next door to their house. It's proper Last of the Summer Wine land where the pub feels like this great communal arena, made a home of by everyone in all the surrounding lanes. We drank Thwaites and gin & tonics then went back to the house for Arlo's mum's famed sausage plait - a great tome of juicy sausage meat closely swathed in crumbly, buttery shortcrust pastry and eaten with shredded spring greens and mashed potato. It went right well wit' Thwaites.

We went out to explore the moors the next day where wild ponies run and relics from the Ice Age abound...and then I bolted and discovered this pair trudging off to Appleby for the big horse fair.

The day I fell in love with Morecambe Bay

I always had a feeling about Morecambe. Something just sang inside at the thought of it and then bust into a full-blown aria as I joined the stream of traffic that wended its way along the promenade. I had been in touch with Kate at Sunset Ices and was keen to track her down. It's so interesting encountering other post-Mr Whippy mobilers and the website also sang to me a bit too.

There she was parked outside the resurrected art deco Midland hotel. I went round and round the roundabout before making a dash for it and traversing the cyclists lane and onto the promenade, actual. Kate had said she was happy for me to trade on her pitch with her but I was too enraptured by everything to even think of opening up the hatch. I roamed around like a ravaged old coyote, licking my chops with glee at the pure, uninhibited kitsch of the place.

Kate gave me an Angostura Ice which flicked my switches still further and I hung out in her van with her while she worked. Fascinating to be in the passenger seat of someones elses operation. She does all these retro treats like Oysters and Snowball Toppers and has jars and jars of sprinkles which the kids receive with total glee. The Midland was winking at me through the window so I set off to try and persuade one of the builders to show me around. This was achieved by impressing upon this one hot guy that I wasn't in town for long and would miss the big opening ceremony on Sunday.

"Ok, but if the boss comes then just keep yer 'ead down" he warned.
"Don't worry - let's just walk about like we own the joint and if that fails I've got a whole van full of chocolate outside" I assured him.

He then gave me the most comprehensive tour of this grand old dame I could have wished for - round the kitchens, the spa, the bar, the ballroom - up the curling stairs to the penthouse suite and onto the rooftop. I beamed happily away at all the hard-hats who looked like they had shed loads to do before the place could be opened and then dodged off when they started yelling for me to give my guide my phone number. I might have handed it over but I had to get back onto my and Jimmy's beloved moors.

Doon in Troon

While the rest of the country gets soaked we roll out of Glasgow with our arms scorching - down to Troon and its clear, languid light. Andy and Susie and their two wee ger'ls, Katie and Emma come running out to meet us and I furnish the kids with some ice creams then we pile inside. A big BBQ is under way and lots of their friends there, girls beautifully turned out in heels, CD shades, French manicures, blonde tresses. The guys are all in the local rugby team. All the guys are hooked up with all the girls - it's like an Ayreshire soap opera with extra bawdiness.

Everyone gets stuck into the booze - it's Bank Holiday Sunday and most of them are feeling pretty ordinary after staying up all night, raging: cider, wine, shots, hot choc with Morgan's Spiced and strawberries at 7am...but they're still standing and looking sprightly. I decide it's time to open Dave's Elderberry Wine ('alcohol content: lots'). Great big glasses are filled in a gung-ho fashion, which soon turns to quiet horror as the full reality of this dark liquid hits...back to the shiraz we go!

Andy tends the barbie outside, the kids run around in the big girls' heels, more booze flows. Conversation gets quite lewd - something about a dog and a couple of the girls and...lipstick(?!), and about Andy's controversial speech at his wedding, and Maryhill and what a rough place it is and how if you're from Troon you always have to rough up your accent when you go to Glasgow or you'll get jumped. And then we're introduced to the 'Wedge-otard'. One of the rugby players likes dressing up in this hot pink, high-cut leotard and launching himself on the local boozer in it, super-hero style and we get to see him in action.

The BBQ is really hearty - burgers, steak, sausages, lamb, kebabs, baps, salad and everyone swarms the table as soon as it's out. Eventually, after hours more of laughing and joking everyone leaves and me and Alanna fall into our makeshift beds with glee.

The next day Andy's up and at 'em with the most enormous cooked breakfast ever. "You ger'ls need to get a good Scottish breakfast insahd ye" he declares and then rolls out a platter that requires two people to carry it.

I load up my plate with sausage, black pudding, square sausage, tattie scones, haggis, beans, tomatoes, mushrooms, eggs, toast...but draw the line at the Aberdeen Angus steak.

Fully fortified we waddle off to the beach to do a bit of fly-pitching.