Krapfen!

I know to English-speakers that sounds like a rude word ("Stop honking your horn at me, you Krapfen!") and, goodness knows, dozens of Irish visitors have had a hearty snicker at this unfortunate name ... but their snickers are soon silenced when a bag of Krapfen are produced and their senses are allowed to feast on the sight and smell of its jammy, sugary goodness.

Yes, a Krapfen is what we in Ireland would call a jammy doughnut. And as I write, the pictured doughnut is sitting on a plate beside the laptop. I can smell it. I can actually smell the fat it was fried in, I can smell the sugar and if I tried really hard, I could probably smell the jam. These doughnuts are traditionally eaten in the time before Lent, the Carnival (Fasching) period and traditionally should be given up on Ash Wednesday. However, the Gingerbread Husband practically runs on sugar, so there's no chance that he'd give up his near-daily doughnut for, say, the Almighty. He can devour a doughnut in three bites and, given the opportunity, he will. In fact, so prodigious is his propensity for baked goods, that the baker near our old house used to throw in an extra doughnut for him when we shopped there - a kind of frequent-flyer doughnut, if you will. And I've often come home from work to find sugar powder in his beard: "Oh no," he'll say, "I'm not really all that hungry. I had a big lunch." A big lunch my foot.

Anyway, I see no other option but to put the kettle on and make a cup of coffee. Say goodbye to the Krapfen, gentle readers, it's about to be devoured.