Sensational snacks and canapé calamities

Sensational snacks and canapé calamities

Finger food that leaves you feeling palmed off is sure to kill the festive mood, but which canapés live up to their labels?

Finger food has long been a big part of the British party spirit. Alison Steadman's enthusiastic brandishing of "cheesy pineapples" as Beverley in Abigail's Party was funny precisely because it was so familiar. Christmas is a veritable canapé binge, and each year retailers have "developers" scratching their heads for new and exciting ideas. Sometimes that's good, but too often it's a case of innovation for innovation's sake (hoisin duck Christmas trees, anyone?) - lots of these treats look beautiful arranged by a stylist for some glossy packaging, but once cooked they bear little resemblance to that ideal.

I assembled a panel of keen foodists to taste some of this year's offerings and weed out the duds. Generally speaking, it's the simple things done well that shone through - the most successful snack on test was a basic sausage roll – albeit a high quality Donald Russell product - while the elaborate snacks were rendered poorly. The testers were Jackson Boxer (restaurateur); Helen Graves (food blogger and cook) and William Leigh (taste assistant at Green & Blacks, chef and food writer).

Price: £5.99 for 8

Mark: 2/5

"A sausage roll with a difference!" M&S proudly proclaim of these pastry puffs filled with smoked salmon mousse and asparagus; our panel thought they were more like "a sausage roll gone wrong". There was general bemusement at the unwieldy design and lack of seasonality, although the flavourful salmon element attracted praise. The judges approved of the pastry but found these an odd concept for a Christmas snack (asparagus in winter?), and, with their awkward prongs of asparagus, rather difficult to eat.

2011: The good, the bad and the breathtaking

From the economic downturn in the UK and Europe that has hit women particularly hard, to the treatment of female protesters in the Arab spring, to the success of International Women's Day, 2011 has been a year of winners and losers

It's the perfect time of year to review the good and bad of the past 12 months. Given that Dickens is having such a moment this festive season, think of me as a sort of Ghost of Christmas past but not in the androgynous form recommended by the old Victorian.

Scrooge's past reflected an unhealthy interest in wealth and money, but it is hard this year to ignore the economic gloom shrouding both the UK and the rest of Europe. The coalition government's first budget in 2010 hit women hard by cutting public sector jobs (the majority of which are held by women) and services (the majority of which are used by women). The downturn in the economy, which shows no sign of abating, has also had a direct impact on household spending and been cited as the chief cause of declining support for David Cameron and his male-dominated cabinet among working women.

Any discussion of the relative wealth of British women should pause to reflect the status of 50% of the world's population. The statistic may not have changed for some time, but it still came as something of a shock in September to read the latest report by the World Bank which found that although more women are working (making up 40% of the world's workforce), they still own just 1% of its wealth. And people tell us we have achieved equality.

Cuts to legal aid, to childcare tax benefits and changes to abortion laws have all been mooted this year, and we face 2012 still unsure whether radical changes will be adopted. Cuts and public anger about them has led to a resurgence in protest, however, which, fuelled by social media outlets such as Twitter and Facebook, has seen a growth in activism from women's rights groups both in the UK and abroad. In the UK, more than 1,000 women attended FEM11 while the inaugural Women of the World event on London's South Bank to celebrate the centenary of International Women's Day was such a success that it is to be repeated and expanded to America and beyond.

Internationally, the movement for change has been breathtaking. Women took a central part in the protests around the Arab spring, particularly in Egypt and Yemen. Yet the strong showing of Islamists parties in the first round of Egypt's parliamentary elections and behaviour of the police towards female protestors showed how hard it is for these female revolutionaries to bring about change.

In Afghanistan, allied forces are withdrawing without succeeding in one of the declared aims of their deployment – the improvement of the lives of women.

For every gain internationally – four women began the year as the head of G20 countries and a woman was appointed the head of the International Monetary Fund – there were losses. Let us not forget that Christine Lagarde, the aforementioned head of the IMF, came second to Anne Sinclair, the uber-supportive wife of disgraced former IMF head Dominique Strauss-Kahn, in a poll to select the most admired woman in France. Yes, they do things differently there, but it is still salutary to think that more women than men in the 1,000 polled admired the former TV presenter, who had used part of her considerable inheritance to bail her husband from sexual assault charges, than they did one of the most important financial heads. Although the charges were later dropped, Sinclair consistently said she was proud of her husband whose past antics as "an aggressive and incessant groper of women" became public knowledge.

Terrafemina spokeswoman Veronique Morali said: "Anne Sinclair is both a heroine and a kind of anti-heroine for women in France. Women look at the problems they face in their own lives and seem to identify with her."

Neither Lagarde nor Nafissatou Diallo, the hotel housekeeper at the centre of the allegations, made the Guardian's own list of its women of 2011 despite some of you suggesting they should. Yet the list itself gives reason to cheer. Three Nobel prize- winners, protesters and political leaders – all showing that female role models come in all shapes and sizes. They also give reason to cheer 2011 despite the setbacks.

This has, of course, been a partial list – it has not even included the launch of the Guardian's women's blog! – and there are many more national and international events that had made this year an important one for women. Do you agree? Let us know. And in the meantime, have a happy New Year. …

Pottermore and more: 2011 in children's books

2011 was another busy year for JK Rowling with the launch of Pottermore. But what else happened in children's books this year? Michelle Pauli rounds up the news highlights of the year

What have been the children's books and stories of the year for you? Email us your highlights at [e-mail]

January

2011 got off to a sad start with the news that Dick King-Smith, the author of animal books – whose The Sheep-Pig was made into the film Babe – had died at the age of 86.

There was happier news for Jason Wallace whose harrowing debut teen novel, Out of Shadows, which is set in a boarding school in Zimbabwe in 1983, won the Costa children's prize.

February

More debut celebrations in February, when Sita Brahmachari's Artichoke Hearts, inspired by her "60s babe of a mother-in-law", won the Waterstone's children's book prize.

Martin Amis caused a little kerfuffle with his remarks that "only a serious brain injury" would cause him to write for children but the headache may have been all his with the news that seven of the UK's top 10 most borrowed authors write books for children.

March

Of course, the big news this month was the launch, on World Book Day, of the Guardian children's books site! It launched with support from previous children's laureates, including Michael Morpurgo and Jacqueline Wilson and features reviews, interviews, podcasts and much more by children for children.

Enough blowing our own trumpet – March was a busy month on children's books. A new story by Enid Blyton was discovered, Mr Tumpy and His Caravan, while an author who writes modern Blyton-esque stories, Lauren St John, won the Blue Peter book of the year award with her Laura Marlin mystery, Dead Man's Cove.

Eoin Colfer announced that the next Artemis Fowl book, the eighth in the teen mastermind series, will be the last but that he is working on a new series, described as "Oliver Twist meets The Matrix" and the first book is due to be published in the summer of 2012.

Australian writer and illustrator Shaun Tan wins the prestigious (and very rich, at 5m kroner (£490,000)) Astrid Lindgren award for being "a masterly visual storyteller". We went to Stockholm to record him getting the prize.

Back home, Gruffalo author Julia Donaldson reveals that she vetoed an ebook of her and Axel Scheffler's rhyming classic because she thinks interactive book apps for children are a bad idea.

April

First appearance for JK Rowling in what will be a busy year for the Harry Potter author. She reveals her favourite character. No prizes for guessing who it is.

Seven lost Dr Seuss stories from the 1950s were discovered (one of these, The Bippolo Seed, was published in September) and the last in Anthony Horowitz's Alex Rider series, Scorpia Rising, was published.

May

May saw the annual celebration of Towel Day. As every good Douglas Adams reader knows, a towel is "about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have", and fans all over the world celebrated the author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by conspicuously carrying a towel.

June

The first teasing signs of Pottermore appeared this month with the launch of a website, Pottermore.com, showing only the word "Pottermore" on a pink background, with the promise of more "coming soon" and Rowling's famous signature emblazoned below. A week later Rowling revealed that the new site would feature new and previously unpublished material about Harry Potter's world, along with ebooks and digital audiobooks.

Julia Donaldson became the seventh children's laureate and pledged to support libraries and bring some music and drama to the job.

Libraries were also the focus of Patrick Ness's Carnegie Medal acceptance speech which he used to launch a scorching attack on the coalition government's policy. He won with Monsters of Men, the third instalment in his Chaos Walking series, which was shortlisted for the Arthur C Clarke award earlier in the year, only the second young adult work to have been considered for the celebrated science fiction prize.

The silly season got underway with a ruckus over a claim by Wall Street Journal, columnist Meghan Cox Gurdon that teen fiction is "rife with depravity". Teen fiction writers and readers rushed to its defence.

July

Another month, another rush of JK Rowling stories. Fans were very excited indeed to learn that the author was "writing hard" on a new work. She also left the agent she had been with since 1996 and who had helped her to launch her first book about the boy wizard, and discovered that her childhood home was up for sale.

Also this month, a biographer identified the spider who inspired Charlotte's Web and it was announced that the Willard Price adventures, about intrepid animal collectors Hal and Roger Hunt, are set to be continued by Anthony McGowan.

August

First peek into Pottermore! The first million users chosen to enjoy early access to the site discover a richly-imagined, elaborately realised behind-the-scenes wizarding world.

Meanwhile, Snape is voted the public's favourite Harry Potter character.

September

The Guardian children's fiction prize shortlist was announced and Roddy Doyle published his new children's book Greyhound of a Girl.

October

More JK as she reveals that she nearly (gasp!) killed off Ron Weasley and there's a fuss around teen Cherub author Robert Muchamore getting banned from giving a talk at a London school due to the "unsuitable" content of his books. The school probably wouldn't be too happy with Darren Shan's new series either – the author of gory vampire sagas announced that he is turning his attention to zombies and is to publish a 12-book series, Zom-B, with a new book every three months, starting in autumn 2012. Francesca Simon turned her attention from Horrid Henry to a new adventure featuring Viking Gods, giants, dragons and a magical chess set, The Sleeping Army.

November

It was a busy month for prizes with Andy Mulligan winning the Guardian children's fiction prize with his tale of a riotous boarding school, Return to Ribblestrop, and the Roald Dahl funny prize going to The Brilliant World of Tom Gates by Liz Pichon.

There were also three shortlists – the Costa, the Blue Peter and the Red House.

Christopher Paolini published the last book in his Eragon series, Inheritance, which became the fastest selling book of the year so far, and Lauren Child published the first in her new Ruby Redfort series, about a girl sleuth.

December

December has been a quiet month so far, but there's still two days left to go...

Your 2011 in children's books

What have been the children's books and stories of the year for you? Email us your highlights at [e-mail]

GCSE exam paper withdrawn after examiners 'tipped off' teachers

The exams regulator says an ICT paper set by the WJEC board is compromised after inappropriate information was shared

Examiners shared "inappropriate" information about a GCSE paper due to be taken by pupils in January, the exams regulator has warned.

Ofqual says an information and communications technology (ICT) paper set by the WJEC exam board was compromised, and will be withdrawn to protect the "integrity and security" of the qualification.

The finding was included in a report ordered by ministers into allegations that examiners had been tipping off teachers about the questions their pupils should expect.

The Daily Telegraph sent undercover reporters to 13 seminars run for teachers by exam boards.

The newspaper has handed over 52 hours of audio recording to the regulator, as well as rough transcripts of excerpts from this recording.

Teachers were routinely given information about future questions, relevant areas of the syllabus, and specific words or facts to use in answers, the Daily Telegraph claimed.

However, Ofqual says in its preliminary report, published on Wednesday: "Although there are instances where the evidence reviewed to date backs up some of the allegations, most of the material we have reviewed does not show such unacceptable practice."

At a WJEC seminar about the GCSE in ICT, attendees were told which areas would be assessed, Ofqual said.

The report says: "This is in clear breach of regulatory requirements, and it compromises the planned exam."

Around 450 candidates were due to sit the paper. This will be withdrawn and sat at a later date.

A key part of the newspaper's investigation was the WJEC GCSE in history. No papers for this subject are being sat in January and Ofqual says it will investigate this when it has completed work on January exams.

The exams watchdog said it had considered banning seminars, but feared this would leave the market open to unregulated providers.

Ofqual's report said: "We want to consider again the legitimate purposes of seminars, and the regulated and unregulated market in them. We want to consider whether the legitimate purposes of seminars are best met by seminars, or in some other way."

The exam board Edexcel said in a statement: "We are clear that awarding organisations can and must improve the way that training sessions are conducted and have made a public commitment to do that in very practical ways."

The exam regulator published a separate report on 12 errors in A-level and GCSE exam papers this summer.

It recommended that exam boards should consider using teams of examiners to write papers rather than a single chief examiner.

The report said: "In some instances where errors occurred, the awarding organisation had concerns about the principal examiner's question paper drafting skills, but the examiner was nevertheless asked to see the paper through to print.

"This is clearly risky, but awarding organisations point out there is not always a ready supply of suitably qualified people who will commit the necessary time to serve as an examiner."

The exams watchdog said the "overall view" of schools, colleges and students was that candidates got the right grades.

Ofqual said it could not say whether the errors in 2011 exam papers represented an "unusual change" in the number of mistakes year on year.

"What we can say is that together, the number and nature of errors this year was unacceptable."

Dr Jim Sinclair, director of the Joint Council for Qualifications, which represents exam boards, said: "The examinations system is huge, with awarding bodies setting over 60,000 examination questions and over 50,000 examiners marking over 25m separate examination scripts. Although the number of errors was small, it is clear there were too many and this is regretted by the awarding bodies."

Michael Gove, the education secretary, said that exam boards had "overstepped the mark" in providing advance information to teachers. When overhauling GCSEs and A-levels, ministers will seek to ensure there is sufficient "unpredictability" to maintain public confidence that exams are a true test of ability.

He said he did not rule out "large-scale reform" of exam boards.

In a letter to Ofqual, Gove said: "I am clear, and the public reaction proves, that they have overstepped the mark on what is felt to be an acceptable level of advance information.

"Providing teachers and students with too much certainty over which elements of the curriculum will be tested, or which questions will be asked, only serves to narrow the curriculum, lower standards and promote teaching to the test."

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