Cooking with Uncle Frank.

William liked cooking but the lessons with Uncle Frank were getting a bit weird.

Uncle Frank was a squat, balding little man with a strong Yorkshire accent; nobody knew why as he had lived his entire life in Thornbury. A firm believer in homeopathy he kept a Shetland pony overnight in the spare bathroom and smelled faintly of dung.

Each cooking lesson began with what Uncle Frank described as “the traditional abusing of the eggs” whereby Frank and William opened the fridge door to hurl oaths and abuse at the unsuspecting chicken by-products.

The main part of the lesson then usually consisted of William attempting to master the finer points of French cuisine as Uncle Frank shouted instructions from behind a door of tempered steel for, as he explained, “safety reasons”.

Today, however, was to be different.

“Lad,” said Frank proudly, “today we make pound cakes”.

Pound cakes, queried William.

“Pound cakes”, said Frank “hundreds of ‘em. In that way we can understand t' true nature of t’ pound cake.”

William thought Uncle Frank reminded him of that Asian bloke from the Karate Kid – provided the Asian bloke from the Karate Kid looked like a squat, balding Yorkshire man who smelled faintly of dung.

The following week William took up bass guitar lessons instead.