Strawberry, Cherry, Cream and Custard flan.

I keep coming to Erlangen with the intention of moving out of my old room, but as soon as I arrive I get drunk and am then too hungover to go and get some packing cases and move my stuff out. This time the drunkenness was predictable: my housemates had organized a big garden party with 40 crates of beer, three large punch bowls and a chili-con-carne so large that it could only be stirred by a length of 2" by 1" wood.

After several hours of partying, I decided it would be a good idea to bake a cake, so I went to the market to buy the ingredients at 5am, thinking that this would allow me a nice lie in. When I woke up I found that I had acquired a punnet of strawberries, a bag of cherries and half a watermelon. This evening I finally got round to baking a cake with the ingredients.

Strawberry, Cherry, Cream and Custard flan

(There is no real need to buy the ingredients while drunk, but it won't hurt).

Base: Shortcrust Pastry, about 5mm thick. Find a suitable recipe and make enough to fill the base of your container. Bake at 200 deg. Celsius until done.

First Layer: Custard, I used Bird's custard powder, which thickens nicely when cooled. Pour the custard on the base, and place in the fridge.

Second Layer: Strawberries and cherries. It is OK if they sink into the custard, but they don't have to.

Top Layer: Whipped cream. I used just enough to cover the top of the fruit.

This recipe is rather vague, but is based on the hope that anything involving strawberries, cherries, cream and custard is going to taste good, even if it ends up as a collapsed mush in your fridge. By some miracle, my flan had a good shape at the end, and was swiftly devoured by my flatmates, who were admittedly quite hungry.

It is impossible to stand on one leg.

I'm in Erlangen again, and drunk again. The most telling signs of irresponsible use of alcohol and other intoxicating substances so far:

1/ The two bottles of exploded beer in our freezer. Someone put them in to chill, but now the beer can only be consumed as an ice slush. Maybe someone will drink it soon, as we have even run out of Oettinger and are getting desperate.

2/ My flatmate Timo playing the theme from the A team whilst drinking a beer and smoking something or other for breakfast.

3/ My housemate Katja using the scaffolding on the building site next door as the most convenient path between first and second floor balconies.

4/ Me walking straight into a set of traffic lights at 4am without a shirt on.

The beer festival in Erlangen has another week to go, but I only have to stick it out for 2 days.