Clare Teal: Beans mean the answer to a baking-day puzzle

For this game, you will need two volunteers and a couple of laptop computers. It’s always advisable to have a 12-year-old present wherever possible as they know more about computers than anyone I know. The aim of the game is to order an unusual household object of the question-master’s choice, without knowing its actual name. The fastest on the draw wins. A few weeks ago, we went to dinner with friends. Holly is a very, very good cook. The things she can do with a chicken would frankly surprise a chicken. We were on pudding duty. Muddy decided to make a deep-filled lemon tart as we’d enjoyed one just the other week at a different dinner party. In my role as sous-chef, I juiced and grated the rind off six lemons and a finger, while Muddy made the pastry. After resting in the fridge for 30 mins (the pastry, not Muddy) she rolled it out and put it in the loose-based flan dish. It was at this point that I had a flashback to mum’s kitchen, circa 1979. “It’s a shame we haven’t got any of those things you put on the greaseproof paper that weigh down the pastry, isn’t it?” “Oh, you mean those…thingies. Oh, they’re called… what are they called?” Minutes later, it came to me clear as day – pastry pot peas! Muddy looked blank – apparently, they weren’t called that in her house. Apparently, they aren’t called that in any household – other than mum’s. I tried describing them to Google but Google couldn’t grasp what I wanted. Still, I kept trying. I worked out the rough dimensions of each ball, I used words like ball, porcelain and china. Eventually, I looked on “how to make a tart” websites. Finally, on “pastry for beginners” the bloggist mentioned the words we’d all been waiting to hear – ceramic baking beans. Put ceramic baking beans into Google and it can’t help you enough – 116,000 useful results detailing every aspect of the ceramic baking bean. “Order Me A Thingy” – hours of fun guaranteed.