Christmas baking

Merry Christmas all.... it's 10pm and I'd LIKE not to be the sad case that blogs, but check the awesomeness of this - I managed to book my holiday tix to Japan today on sale!! £100 cheaper than when I previously looked so uber happy, ESPECIALLY as I got it done before the VAT increase. Anyhow, see pics attached. Above is a maderia cake covered in marzipan and ready roll fondant. The cake I made in a pan smaller than it should have been because I wanted it to be taller - epic fail because when I tested it, it came out clean, but I knew it felt uncooked, so I prodded a few more holes until I found the damp bit... and naturally the middle collapsed. Never fear!! I halved, then patched the hole with left overs from the crusty top. YUM.

FYI DO NOT BUY SILVERSPOON PRE-ROLL. Comment for myself maybe, but as I unrolled it (it came on a very good plastic roll and sheet which I am reusing) it cracked in several places. Not good for ready roll, plus it didn't patch together too well either. Ouch. Anyway, the crackled cake is above. Decorated with a mini Santa Einstein, wife and oddly a pig too xx

Please see my now almost annual gingerbread. This year I managed to get little men and angel cutters. The angels naturally look more like ghosts. I also found myself taken to humming the StarWars Storm trooper theme when I was lining them up for the shot. Scary. Anyway, MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

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Rachel Allen's Chicken Pie

Some things should be noted. I'm not a major fan of Rachel Allen. She always seemed such a poor man's version of Nigella. Some trophy wife of a producer somewhere making a lady of leisure's living of cookery shows playing up the Irish accent in a cavernous show kitchen. Perhaps it was because all her helpful "tricks" had already been touted by others a long time ago - like getting the garlic smell out of your hands... But over the years she's kind of grown on me. The format is a little twee, the pink accessories want to make me barf, but she isn't the spawn of all things faux goddess anymore. (FYI I have no idea with regards to her personal life etc, but like my distaste for Ashley Judd, one wonders how she gets good films with little acting skill.) So here I was, tapping away on the internet last week whilst she was on tv, and there it was. A beast of a pie. It was so beautiful. Her job was done. Out I trotted to buy a huge pie dish (we don't own cera...

Low carb diet plan

It's January. I've allowed my weight to grow UP with the Covid curve and somehow it still has not come down. Thanks to a large part to me using up a number of hot chocolate bomb "fails" just before Christmas I think. Wall of text alert - I don't plan on ever writing about this ever again. To be clear, I've never been a fan of carb-cutting. Cutting an entire food group seems wrong. Carbs, as we were taught at school, are cornerstones for growth. I felt like decking a "doctor" at an annual work health check when he told me to cut carbs as a way to get my weight down. The fact he then pushed a blog which was at its infancy at the time felt like a distinct conflict of interest. Anyway, I do absolutely agree I need to cut sugar, and I will never disagree that whole grains are better for you. It is also very, very effective dieting wise on me. We don't know why, I do know I have a lot of water weight which fluctuates a lot in the month and also it does...

Ginger fluff sponge with Apple Sauce filling

This is from the Crabapple Bakery cupcake cookbook. I've loved this cake for ages, looking at the picture for some time, but finally I made it. Decoration wise I don't have any flowers to put on top so I put the little chocolate mushrooms I bought from the Japan centre on top. This cake I'd definitely remake, but without the sponge fingers which are decoration only and don't add anything. They stay stiff and unyielding against the cream which is almost a disappointment when you're eating it. Ingredients: 1/3 self raising flour 1/3 cup cornflour 3 tsp ground ginger 1 tsp ground cinnamon 2 tsp cocoa 5 eggs, separated 3/4 cup caster sugar 1 tbsp golden syrup - Apple sauce - Whipped cream - Sponge fingers (250g pack works fine) Method: 1. Mix all the dry ingredients (bar sugar) together 2. Beat egg whites to peaks, add sugar and keep whisking, then add yolks and golden syrup 3. Fold dry into the egg mix 4. Bake in two greased pans (18-20cm round sandwich tins) for 15 mi...

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