Lovely dawn sky

Lovely dawn sky this morning, though by the time I’d run inside for my camera the most intense colours had faded. Almost makes it worth getting up before first light. (Almost.)

Yesterday evening I realized that the duck’s beak seemed to be pasted closed by gunk and dried blood, and I wondered if she was even able to drink, let alone eat. So we dipped it in warm salt water and cleaned it up, and that did seem to make a difference. When I gave her back the fresh water she took some sips, and then I put some food in front of her and she truffled into that in quite a starving manner. So that’s a good sign. Her head is still bowed right down though, in a really unnatural and disconcerting way. The male ate and drank yesterday and stretched his wings and tried to flap them, so you can see that although he’s still stiff and achey, he’s on the mend.

I went to the cinema last night (Revolutionary Road: a disappointment), and driving home late, I turned the radio on and caught a just-so-Italian discussion on how to make the perfect pesto.

You assemble your ingredients. Fresh basil. Two cheeses: Parmesan and seasoned pecorino, adjusting the relative quantities depending on how piccante you want your pesto to be. Garlic, which you mash slightly with the back of a spoon. Pine nuts. Oil (extra-virgin olive). Coarse sea salt. And a spoonful or two of the pasta cooking water, for starch.

Your mortar is of course made of marble, and your pestle of olive wood. And you simply mix everything together, crushing and mashing and pounding as required, until you have your pesto.

The two presenters spent a good ten minutes on this, talking with not only real enthusiasm but also deep-seated knowledge (where the best pine nuts come from, what kind of salt), even though I don’t think they were professional foodies. I couldn’t imagine such a discussion taking place on the radio in England, not without some degree of pretension.

Made me want to go and sow my basil seeds.