Forget-me-not!

I have forget me nots growing in both my front and back gardens and also down the wood, they are such pretty little flowers how could they not inspire me to make some cakes in honour of them.

These are just fairy cake size, made with vanilla pods scraped into the batter with fresh eggs collected from the chickens and a splash of butter milk to keep the batter moist.

I made the topping using icing sugar, butter and lemon extract.

Crazy baking day!

Yesterday, I spent the afternoon baking with my youngest daughter, she is quite creative now and so decided to add lots of my food colouring to a sponge cake we had just made, so she splashed it in and whirled it around and this was the finished result, to me it looks like abstract art.







After we made vanilla sponge with chocolate sponge swirled into spots to make a spotty sponge cake, it was lots of fun.

Get Stuffed!

This is what I did to four local free range chicken breasts, I stuffed them with local asparagus and leeks.

Feeds 4

4 free range chicken breasts
2 large leeks (washed and sliced)
asparagus ( chop the tips off and save to steam or cook with the finished chicken)
1 small onion (thinly sliced)
1 clove garlic (choppped)
Salt and pepper
olive oil
butter

In a lidded pan add the garlic, leeks, onion and the bottom half of the asparagus thinly slicing until the stalks feel tuff under the knife, add about a tablespoon olive oil and a little salt and cook over a low heat, so they sweat but don't colour, once tender put to one side to cool a little.

Lay the chicken breasts out on a chopping board and bash and flatten out either with a meat mallet (thank goodness for Ikea) or with a trusty rolling pin. until they look even.

In a baking dish smear a little olive oil over the bottom, just to stop the chicken sticking then add one chicken breast at a time, place some of the leek mixture in the middle of the chicken and then roll up making sure the join sits at the bottom of the dish, repeat until all the chicken has been stuffed, add about a level teaspoon of butter to the top of each chicken portion then sprinkle with a little salt and a good grind of pepper.

Bake on the middle shelf of the oven at 180°/ 350F or gas mark 4, for about 20 mins or until cooked through and slightly golden on top.

I served this with the rest of the asparagus and Jersey royals, which I love as the smell reminds me of my childhood, I could easily polish off a whole pan of them all by myself, just boiled with a little butter, Mmm.

Thank you Rosie!

Rosie at Rosie bakes a piece of cake, had given me an award for my blog.

Thank you very much Rosie, its much appreciated.




Now I have to pass this award on so, I'm going to give it to:



Anna at Anna's kitchen table

Lemon Droppy Cheesecakes!

These are so easy to make nothing can go wrong, no cooking is involved unless you count the melted butter.

I have found a great way to make individual cheesecakes, certain members of this household are addicted to Nutella and the standard size ones comes in little glasses with a lid on, once they are empty I bung then through the dishwasher and use them to makes all sorts of desserts in, cheesecakes and mousse being my favourite.




Makes 6

330g digestive biscuits (bashed or blitzed into crumbs)
160g butter (melted)
300g cream cheese (philly is fine)
Juice and grated rind of 1 large lemon or two smaller ones
15og icing sugar

6 teaspoons lemon curd


Mix the melted butter into the biscuits and stir well, using a dessert spoon add the biscuit to the bottom of each glass making sure the biscuit is evened out in each glass.

Put them in the firm to firm up for 10-15 mins, while this is happening you can get on with the cheese.

Add the cream cheese to a bowl along with the lemon rind and juice add the icing sugar and mix until you have a smooth looking mixture.

Take your glasses from the fridge and simply drop the mixture on to the biscuit base, closely followed by a teaspoon of lemon curd, no smoothing or flattening out required, I have found this is the best way as you don't need to wipe around the glasses to clean them up as you would if you had smoothed it out, its looks great too.

If you feel like being artistic add a flower for decoration.

Chocolate Brazil Nut Cake!

When I was little I always got a box of chocolate brazil nuts for Christmas and birthdays, the box to which I'm talking about are sadly no longer made, it was a large blue box that had a red velvet bow around them and they had the most delicious chocolate coating, I can still picture the flavour even now.

I've been wanting to make a brazil nut cake for a couple of weeks now and tonight I made this:





I will type the recipe out shortly, as its scribbled over five bits of paper scattered around the kitchen.

I've been tagged again!!!!!!!!

By my Friend Anna at Anna's Kitchen Table, (check out Anna's blog for more details) she is not only my cyber friend but we are friends in real life too. Anna has been going through the most amazing transformation by going on the Lighter Life diet plan, not only this but she is sporting a fab new hair do too and is now a fully enrolled member at the gym.

Anna you are a complete inspiration.




Here are my ten favourite photo's



This is a red roast quince from Nigella's Forever Summer
These are muffins covered in icing, the children thought they were really cute.
This kinda goes without saying, a classic victoria sponge
Violet and Lemon fondant fancies


Rose topped cupcakes



Here is my Raspberry ruffle cake, I love this photo because I'm not very good at getting the image at the right time and this worked out just right, as the chocolate was oozing down the side.



As you know by now, I love making cakes and this was a flowerpot cake made for my daughters school teacher.



These were vanilla sponge cakes with swirly vanilla icing stained different colours
This is my rainbow cake another of my wacky ideas, which first came to my mind a few years ago, this is the second edition of it.
These were Christmas cupcakes, made for the school Fair

Next I tag:

Farida at Farida's Azerbaijani Cookbook

Julia at A Slice of Cherry Pie

Claire at Clares Cake Bake

loulou at Kitchen moments in time

Gayle at The oven is on

Slow roast shoulder of Lamb!

I got this from the butcher yesterday afternoon as I am still craving winter food. Today has been bleak and miserable more like a December day than an April one, its been barely light all day and the lights in the kitchen have been on for most of it other wise, I'd have been rooting around in the dark.

I cooked this in my top oven as I've now turned the aga off (stupid, I know) I placed it on the bottom rack and cooked it for 8 hours on a low heat. When it was ready to serve up, it literally dropped off the bone this really pleased the dogs as knew something good was coming there way.

I served the lamb with all the usual suspects except the gravy which was made with red current jelly and marsala.

The one thing I cannot stand is over cooked vegetables, so the local asparagus was cooked and then thrown in a bowl of iced water, this is one vegetable that doesn't hang around long enough to spoil by boiling the life out of it.

Chocolate Concrete!

This seems to be a fairly regional recipe and was once served with school dinners, with a jug of mint custard, not that I'm telling any of you to make mint custard as its perfectly lovely all by itself with a cup of tea or coffee.

This recipe comes courtesy of my Cadburys Cookbook and its so simple to make.

75g/3oz butter/margarine
50g/2 oz Trex or similar
50g/2 oz caster sugar
175g/6oz plain flour
25g/1oz cocoa
1 tsp vanilla extract (this isn't in the original recipe but it works well for me)
25g/1 oz biscuit crumbs


For the Icing

350g/12 oz icing sugar
30g/1 oz cocoa

Beat the fats together really well then add the sugar, sieve the flour with the cocoa and work into the mixture with the biscuit crumbs.

Spread evenly in the tin, using a palette knife.

Bake in a moderate oven (180°/350f/gas mark 4) for 25 mins.

Cut into oblong shapes whilst still in the tin, then leave to cool in the tin.


Sieve the icing sugar and cocoa into a bowl and mix with enough water so that the icing will spread evenly.

Pour over the top of the biscuits and spread using a palette knife, leave to set before removing from the tin and onto a plate.

Chicken cooked in Harissa!

This is by no means authentic fayre, not even close, Hubs wanted something with a kick and Francesca had sent me a lovely jar of harissa paste, so I chopped up and onion and some chicken and cooked it in a big spoon of harissa, no marinading (I didn't have time for that) I just added some olive oil to a pan and threw in the onion, quickly followed by the chicken and paste.

I let it cook over a medium heat while the boiled rice cooked, I also added some peas to it.

This was a quick and very tasty dinner, just the sort of thing after I'd spent about three hours looking through books and not deciding on anything until I looked in the cupboard and found that lovely jar.