The Cucumber Queen

Does anybody else have a baby who eats around two cucumbers a day?

Or a baby whom you can't possibly take to the supermarket because she will sniff out the cucumber section a mile off, proceed to 'acquire' a cucumber, and then promptly devour the entire thing (packaging included)?

...Just me then? Thought so!

Christine Nöstlinger's 1972 novel The Cucumber King is one of those odd childhood novels which has been sitting on our bookshelves for a long time; I hadn't given it a second thought until having Izzy: my little Cucumber Queen.

We happened upon some bizarre cucumber specimens in the supermarket the other day; teeny tiny (around 2-3 inches long); grown in Cambridge (and therefore eco-friendly in terms of importation costs and issues surrounding globalization and the consumption of local produce); and also, um, super-cute basically!

Today, Mama popped out for an hour to return a few books to the library and do a spot of PhD work, and returned home to find little Izzy Doll demanding 'Coo-Comber! Coo-Comber!'

Here is Izzy gobbling up her third teeny tiny Cambridge cucumber in as many minutes (and Mama having a cuddle having missed my baby).