Esther McCarthy: Here is my recipe for a perfect Saturday night

Esther McCarthy has declared Saturday as stay-at-home nights

Saturday night. My favourite night of the week.

In yonder times, it meant the heady potential of a night out where anything could happen: Drinks, pub, nightclub, after-party. WHOOO! But these days, I have a different vision of the perfect Saturday night.

Self-improvement is all about little steps, the experts say. Small changes that can lead to big differences in your life. So I say boooo to going out. Thumbs down to dressing up. A firm no thank you to taxis and crowds and pants with buttons.

The week is full to the brim with must-dos and start times; we are slaves to the calendar, and that’s fine, you won’t hear me complaining. I’ve started going to a circuits class and rejoined a pickleball group; I’m trying to fit in a swim twice a week, and shur, the kids have stuff on every evening: drop, collect, drop, collect, repeat. Delighted. Thanks a million.

But since October has settled in, like a mother bird closing her wings over us, I am declaring Saturday nights stay-at-home nights. For me. I don’t care what the rest of the family does. Off ye go to your prinks, your dismantling a bike in the hall, or screaming at your friends online: “Bro! Respawn, respawn!”

If you’d like to join me on this lazy journey, here are three things I’ve been introducing in pursuit of the perfect Saturday night.

1. Hide in the hygge

It might just be my internal little spirit animal (a cute but potentially lethal bear) clawing at my soul for a bit of hibernation since the temperature dropped, but I, for one, am ready to embrace the hygge concept. As usual, I’m woefully behind the times, as this was trendy about five years ago. But I make sure the sofa and surrounding area are at peak comfort. I have the fluffy blankets and the cushions plumped, with a Miss Piggy Hiiiiya! chop to the top of them to make them look foncy.

The firewood is stocked and the candles are on standby. We recently installed dimmers on the light switches, ooh yeah, baby, and I have an LED lamp I can move around for ultimate ambience.

2. One thing at a time

It struck me recently when I was out walking the dog while trying to answer a poll for a basketball training session on an app on my phone: When was the last time I did just one thing at a time?

Just walk the dog, without trying to do a bit of admin on the side?

Just watch a movie without simultaneously scrolling on my phone?

Just drive, on my own, without listening to an audiobook?

I know us women are supposed to be better at multitasking, but honestly: going through emails while I’m having a cup of coffee, or looking at Vinted while brushing my teeth, doesn’t feel it’s getting me anywhere, really.

I need to put down the phone and focus properly on what I’m actually doing, even when it is just relaxing on the couch.

3. Actually using my Thermomix

I never thought I’d see the day. I really didn’t. When others would produce baked goods, gooey brownies, golden flapjacks, plump protein balls, I would gasp in wonder and seething jealousy. “Witchcraft!” I’d cry, before reporting them to the Ministry of Magic.

This week, I was given a bag of cooking apples, unironically, and went ahead and produced a cake within the hour. A few months ago, it would have been more likely for me to fart glitter, honestly, and my first few offerings were met with similar surprise and oohs and ahhs from my doubting family.

To be fair, they’ve been burnt in the past, much like every cake I’d attempted before I got the Thermomix. There was the now-infamous apple tart where I used salt instead of sugar. That coincided with the end of the short-lived phase in my housekeeping annals when I decanted everything into Kilner jars.

The Thermomix app is called Cookidoo, and I’ve been paying a rolling subscription because I always felt I had the potential to use it. Hope is a thing with feathers, you see. And dates. Lots and lots of pitted dates.

Anyway, a feature was added recently: An AI assistant. I strongly suspect it will rise up and murder me someday, but for now, I clapped with glee when I typed in: “I have a shitload of wormy apples, what’ll I do?” and it presented me with options, including an apple crumble that the husband said was the best he had ever tasted.

Take THAT, Mr Kipling, you hack.

I am now one of those people who walk around hardware stores getting turned on by a deep pie dish. What a wonderful world.

As the great bard Elton John once surmised, Saturday Night’s Alright for Fighting. Fighting for the remote, I presume he meant.

Because tonight you’ll find me PJs on, watching a movie in front of a flickering fire, phone-free, scoffing a hot hunk of apple sponge cake.