Wombat Friday, Jane Morris and extolling the virtues of lemon curd

Here is my offering for this week's Wombat Friday.  Accompanying my wombat today is the painting 'Proserpine' by Dante Gabriel Rossetti - the first painting of his that made an impression back in my teenage years.  He painted several versions of this image of Jane Morris and I was fascinated by the colour of her dress, ranging from teal green, through green/turquoise and purple/blue, depending on which version you see.  I was also fascinated by the model - feminine but with a masculine jaw.  Was she real and if she was, did she really look like that?  Yes and yes was the answer.

Jane Morris was the wife of William Morris (the Victorian version of a 'Renaissance Man') and she really did look like that.  I was particularly envious of her beautiful curls as my hair was (and still is) fine and straight as a poker.
I have also managed to include cake this Friday, which is homemade lemon curd and buttercream sponge.  The lemon curd came about as I had been seeing it on various blogs which I follow and decided I needed to make some.  Having bought lemons, I set to, following Nigel Slater's recipe ( link here):

Nigel Slater's LEMON CURD

Most lemon curd recipes instruct you to stir the mixture with a wooden spoon. I find that stirring lightly with a whisk introduces just a little more lightness into the curd, making it slightly less solid and more wobbly.

Makes 2 small jam jars
zest and juice of 4 unwaxed lemons
200g sugar
100g butter
3 eggs and 1 egg yolk

Put the lemon zest and juice, the sugar and the butter, cut into cubes, into a heatproof bowl set over a pan of simmering water, making sure that the bottom of the basin doesn't touch the water. Stir with a whisk from time to time until the butter has melted.

Mix the eggs and egg yolk lightly with a fork, then stir into the lemon mixture. Let the curd cook, stirring regularly, for about 10 minutes, until it is thick and custard-like. It should feel heavy on the whisk.

Remove from the heat and stir occasionally as it cools. Pour into spotlessly clean jars and seal. It will keep for a couple of weeks in the refrigerator.

 It made two and a half small jars of the most delicious, mouth watering lemon curd.  I didn't have unwaxed lemons, so just omitted the zest (I don't really like 'bits' in the lemon curd anyway).  I am going to make some sponge buns with lemon curd in their middle as I think that would be gorgeous too.  With the weather the way it is at the moment, and winter still very much in charge, we all need some sunshine, whether in the floral form of daffodils, or the edible form of lemon curd.

A Trio of Pre-Raphaelite books

Here are the books I am reading at the moment - one at work (during my lunch hour) and the others at home. The good thing is that they are all on the same subject, so overlap and interweave beautifully. 'Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood' and 'Jane and May Morris' are the library books and 'Circle of Sisters' is my own. I bought it following an exhibition of Pre-Raphaelite art at Nottingham Art Gallery in 2005, and had not got around to reading it.
The books are about the women in the Pre-Raphaelite circle; Jane Morris, Lizzie Siddal, Georgiana Burne-Jones, Annie Miller, Fanny Cornforth and Emma Madox Brown, who were all models and muses to the various artists, as well as wives in some cases. Dr Jan Marsh is an authority on the Pre-Raphaelites and her research is thorough, but is also easy to read. I don't think any of these women had an easy life, there were many social conventions and certainly a stigma attached to being an artist's model. Some of them also were artists in their own right but were not able to continue their own work once they were married or were not given much recognition during their own lifetime.
I am particularly interested in the children in these marriages; what happened to them and how did they cope with their famous parents? (I think I shall have to buy the other two books as they are ones I shall return to. Our house is rapidly turning into a library and it is no surprise that I don't seem to have any money!)