I'm in a magazine...

...This Months issue of Making Magazine to be precise...they have a reader's makes section every issue and I'm in there with the Pillow Mat I made!! It's quite hard to see, but I'm there at the very bottom of the right hand corner...!!

Beef, Red Wine and Black Olive Stew...

I found this recipe the other day as I was searching for a completely different one...and decided it looked pretty great for a Thursday night dinner...why Thursday? Well I don't work on Thursdays, so have time to make a lovely slow cooked evening meal...which is what this looked like to me...

A bit of light reading...?

I love the start of each new month, it means new editions of the magazines I buy or subscribe to...which means a whole load of new recipes and crafty ideas to try out...Look at the lovely April Issues...lots of Easter/Spring goodies to make and bake...

Mondays...with a bit of baking thrown in for good luck...

Mondays in our house tend to take a similar path each week...School run (always), supermarket (most Mondays), washing (does it ever end!), tidying (again...does it ever end??!!), catch up with emails, blog etc (if I have time)..dinner prep (definitely), a bit of baking (maybe), some sewing (if I'm lucky!)...school run (essential), dinner (goes without saying), cubs and guides (most Mondays), bedtime routines, grown-up time...and then we hit Tuesday...for the next 5 weeks or so, I am gong to be working Tuesdays and Wednesdays, so blogging will have to come either side...


But right now, let's concentrate on today...

Cheeky Tweaky Chicken Pie...

I went to bed last night thinking about dinner tonight...(yes sad I know!!) I had planned on doing a fish pie for us, but woke up not fancying fish at all today, so took a peek in the fridge and found chicken, leeks, bacon and mushrooms...so what else could I do? Fate was pointing me in the direction of chicken and bacon in some kind of sauce/pie...I also really fancied having a go at making some pastry...so pie was settled upon

Pancakes for dinner...

...Retro Revival Creamy Chicken and Mushroom Crispy Pancakes...


When my sister and I were growing up, Mum cooked for us every day...no convenience foods, just good home-made meals. I remember looking at the frozen foods in the supermarket when we went shopping, and being told that things like the ready-made frozen crispy pancakes were full of additives etc and not good...but look what was in the March edition of Delicious Magazine...



...A Retro Revival section full of those 80s foods that your Mum always said were no good...that have been re-visited and made with fresh ingredients that are good for you!! Yay!! Well as it is Shrove Tuesday, I thought I'd give them a go...Mind you, there is already a 'tweak' in the making, I don't have any breadcrumbs, and the only loaf I have is a fresh one that I made yesterday, so I shall be coating mine in fine matzo meal instead.

Sunday Dinners...(Winter Warmers pt5)

Hi guys, well, me and the smallish people are in South Wales right now, visiting Grandma...we've left hubby at home to some peace and quiet...

Before I left home, I remembered to upload some photos from the weekend, so that I can still post a few bits and pieces whilst away...So without further ado...Sunday Dinner...in our house, the two nights on the weekend are the only time we get to sit down and eat together, during the working week it is more often a case of two smallish people eating together, followed much later by two larger people...Sometimes I will sit with the smaller ones, and hubby will eat when he gets in from work...Not ideal I know, but these are the times we live and work in...So...Saturday and Sunday are meals we all like to eat...plus the odd 'newbie' once a month or so. It's because of this that we don't very often subscribe to the 'Sunday Roast' theory...We just plump for good home-cooked meals that we can share as a family. This Sunday it was Lamb cooked in Red Wine...

Warming Spice...and Chicken so Nice...(Winter Warmers pt3)

Another day at work, and the need for another speedy supper...and I have the perfect thing...(it's even another Winter Warmer-ish!!). It is a recipe I found in a Good Food Magazine supplement about 5 or 6 years ago, but the supplement was lost at least 2 years ago...however as it is a popular meal in our house, it's etched in my mind, at least my version is...I didn't even get to copy it down before losing it, so this may or may not be like the original now...as my 'tweaks' may well have changed it into a completely new dish...anyway, it is now known in our house as...

My Moroccan-ish Chicken Dish

Spreading The Christmas Cheer...a retrospective post...

This will be the last retrospective post...for now...I don't think there are any more to come, but stranger things...


Now I know it is almost Valentines Day, which means for us here in Enfield, a school (half-term) holiday...but I want to look back to the last holiday that we had, Christmas...


...Christmas is a magical time, a time for giving, loving, seeing friends and family, sharing and in our house birthdays...I've always loved Christmas, as a child for the presents, as an adult for the time off work! But as a parent for the smallish people's reactions to it all...and more recently, for the food...

THE 10th Birthday Cake...!

Well here is another of the retrospective posts I mentioned back when I started out...This is the tale of how I made my daughter Emily's 10th birthday cake...it is the most complicated cake I have made to date..I got the idea from here... but instead of using the suggested bought cakes, I made my own!

Step 1 - Bake a cake!! I used a 2x20cm cake pans for this one, and I used a basic 4 egg Victoria Sandwich recipe...Em had requested a marble cake, so I halved the batter and added some cocoa powder to one half. I then sandwiched the 2 cakes together using my Basic Vanilla Buttercream (that was tweaked to make it a chocolate one by adding some cocoa).

 


Step 2 - I then trimmed the cakes, so that the sides were even and the top and bottom (when stood on it's side!) were flat.

Birthday Cakes...

I have always been keen to make my own Birthday Cakes, whether they are for the 2 smallish people in my life or one of the larger ones!!! I found some pictures of some of my earlier attempts and thought I would share them with you... 

A trial run...

The beautiful butterfly design is taken from here... which is an amazing website for busy people that want quick yet stunning cake design ideas...It was so simple to make, using just 1 large 25cm round cake...and some rather cunning cutting!!!

The real thing...

...and the sponge cake recipe from BBC Good Food Magazine's website, which is one of my most used recipe sources...