I live abroad.
My boss wanted to do a Christmassy thing in the office this afternoon and he asked me to bring some mince pies because I'm the only British person and most of colleagues won't have tried them before.
So, stupid me, I thought, "I'll make some!"
You can find them in British/expat shops here, but no, I thought home made ones would be so much nicer.
To say it was a fiasco would be an understatement. When my OH came home at midnight I was chiselling pastry and what looked like dried lava off a muffin tin and I hadn't done any packing. (We are leaving for the Christmas holidays after work tonight.)
So this morning I got up at 6, washed my hair, packed my suitcase, cleaned the worst of the mince-pie related crap off the kitchen worktop and left the flat early.
I decided to take a detour via one of the major stations which has a shopping centre with an M&S food in it. When I arrived I saw a train for where I work leaving in two minutes and thought, "Fuck it, shall I just forget the mince pies and go to work? I've got so much to do today."
But no, I said I would bring them, so I went to M&S and bought a couple of packets. By the time I came back 10 minutes later there was a signal failure affecting the whole station.
So I had to dash halfway across the city to get to another station to get a train to work, and now I am going to arrive late for my meetings.
Help me out, Mumsnet.
Do you make your own mince pies or is it a fucking crazy thing to do in the run up to Christmas? (I don't have kids but it still seems like an insane amount of effort.)
If you do, do you have any idiot proof recipes?