There is one solitary mince pie left in the box in kitchen cupboards this week. The box was moved from the kitchen counter top to inside the cupboard in early January during a brief kitchen tidy up and resolution to eat less pastry, bread and potatoes which lasted half a day but felt longer.
The mince pie’s packetmates were eaten at the start of the year, often accompanied by the last of the Christmas cream or some brandy butter. Now languishing fruitily and feeling only a mild hope when the cupboard door opens, the pie is very aware that it has a use by date of January twenty-seventh. It is kept company by a packet of dried yeast from a bread making phase.