Daim chocolate chip cookies and TV stardom

Thank God for Easter. It comes at the perfect time every year. Just when you're completely fed up with the spring / summer not arriving ever and having not seen the sun for 6 months, you get this one glorious weekend of colourful flowers, shiny chocolates and two extra days off work. Weather's still as shit as ever or often even worse, but you just unwrap another chocolate egg and laugh at the face of the rain and the wind.

For me this year it couldn't have come at a better time. The product that has consumed my life for the last couple of months is launched and it all went well apart from a couple of misses which were fixed last minute and which no one ever needs to find out about.

Thursday was an exciting day at work. The local BBC crew came to do a piece about the launch. Getting ready for work in the morning I asked husband if I looked nice. He slapped me on the bum (he's quite excited that I have put on some weight during the last couple of months not having enough time to exercise, so he might not have seen the wife a lot but when he has, there has been more of her to see) and said that I did look nice and maybe they'd give me my own show and I would become famous. I told him that it was somewhat unlikely and that he shouldn't hold his breath.

So the BBC guy turned up and did a little interview. Then one of our finance colleagues (bribed with chocolate) went to bed using the new product. She doesn't actually need a lot of persuading, she's our go-to person in these situations, an unfulfilled actress stuck in accounts receivable. Last time we did some filming we also had one of our warehouse lads in bed with her. We manufacture medical devices for sleep disordered breathing not sex toys. Just to clarify.

They then wanted to shoot some footage in the warehouse and all of a sudden it all went a bit off the rails. The BBC dude saw all the local football club paraphernalia in the warehouse. You can't not see it. It's everywhere, stickers on the trolleys and tape guns, newspaper clippings on the walls, one of the guys has a motorcycle helmet in the team design, there are tea mugs, scarfs, tattoos, you name it. Apparently the BBC guy had been asked to do a feature on crazy local football fans. Why, I do not know, but I'm glad our licence money goes to such good use. So anyway in no time the warehouse guys were all queuing to be interviewed in front of the wall covered with newspaper cuts about this 2nd league team which I'd never even heard about.

Soon they were telephoning around the building to find a fan of an other team to bring more "depth" to the piece and found a volunteer Swindon fan in customer services who came down to help out. He offered to put on his mankini, you know, Borat style. He had a choice of a pink or a leopard print one, as you do. We said no, please don't. Ever. He was then interviewed and also entered a bit of a staged banter session with the other guys over who's team was better. Because that's what men do. Apparently preferably in mankinis.

Me and my media trained colleague watched in awe as these guys completely stole our show and owned the camera as if that was all they'd ever done. We then tried to gently steer the budding Spielberg back to his original mission to film us and our amazing new innovation.

A fun and intense week, so now I'm happy in my kitchen for the rest of the week with lots of lovely Easter cooking planned. I started Easter prep with a batch of biscuits. Husband's kids are spending the weekend with us, so I can't be an evil step-mum and not bake biscuits for them. After all I promised that on my speech on our Wedding day. Dad remembers this and sent me some of mum's trusted biscuit recipes with a note saying "Bake biscuits for boys. Dad" He's a man on few words, but usually they are wise.

So I made these Daim biscuits. You know Daim, the fantastic Swedish crunchy butter and almond caramel covered with milk chocolate. You can buy it in most bigger supermarkets and definitely in IKEA, Scandinavian Kitchen and Ocado.

My biscuits look different from what mum used to make, I think I might have been a bit tight-fisted with my flour and oats. Anyway these are delish and I know it won't take long for the kids to eat through the batch.

Daim chocolate chip cookies (makes about 30 large ones)

200 g butter (room temperature)
200 ml sugar
1 egg
2 tbsp golden syrup
1 tl vanilla paste or extract
400 ml flour
150 ml rolled oats (or 100 ml oat bran)
2 tsp baking powder
200-250 g Daim pieces (you can use the pieces and in the picture or chop a couple of bars)

Preheat your oven to 180C.

Mix the butter and sugar well until light. Add the egg, golden syrup and vanilla and mix well. Mix all the rest of the ingredients together and add to the dough. Blend until everything is incorporated. Take a generous tablespoon of the mix and form into a ball, then flatten it and place on a baking tray covered with non-stick grease-proof paper. Repeat with the rest of the dough. Bake for 10-12 minutes.