More Cake!

It's my Godson's first birthday today and he's having a party tomorrow (or at least, his mum's inviting family and friends over for the afternoon).  I offered to make the cake as the birthday present.  My back and pelvis are killing me now from the time it took me hunched over the kitchen units.  I have a bit of pelvic girdle pain/posterior pelvic pain because of the pregnancy, right at the bottom of my back, deep inside on the left hand side behind that little dimple - standing for too long tends to make it worse though walking around is fine. Prepping the Christmas meal I did for the 12 of us had me barely able to move and I was limping like Long John Silver!  I got stuck on R's bed once when she wanted a cuddle at bedtime, it really wasn't funny - took me nearly 15minutes to manoeuvre myself off and as I was desperate for the loo it really didn't help (only just made it in time, how embarrassing that could have been! ).

Anyway, I digress - this should be about cake!  An Iggle Piggle birthday cake to be exact.....

I'm pretty pleased with it although admittedly I think it could be better - but you don't get better without practice, right?  I was rushing it a bit at the end because of the aching - and I cocked up one of his arms while shaping it and had to cobble another together with the bits of cake that was left (which wasn't much).  Overall though, I'm happy with it and as my Godson is only one I'm sure he won't be too critical! :-D

Cake!

I really need to motivate myself to shower and get ready for the day, but after a very enjoyable Chinese meal out last night with friends for a 50th birthday I'm suffering an incredible MSG hangover which does nothing to inspire me to get moving! I knew there was a reason I rarely ate Chinese food.

On the plus side - the birthday cake was enjoyed by all. A Big Bang Theory inspired chocolate sponge. I rushed it a little so I felt it was a bit scrappy but still. Mmmmm......cake!

Christmas is Coming....

....or Yule, or Midwinter, or whatever you fancy calling it.  OK, it's still a few weeks away but I ought to consider getting into gear.  So far I've made the Christmas Cake (about 4 weeks back) and it's sitting, tightly wrapped, in the bread bin waiting to be marzipanned (sometime at the start of December) and iced (a week before Christmas) and I'm pondering making a Christmas Pudding this year.  I haven't tried before - mainly because I find the thought of hanging around waiting for a pudding to steam for 8 hours is a bit off putting - always a first time.

Normally by this time of year I'll also have my sloes soaking in gin in time for Christmas gift giving ( *hic* ), but the sloe harvest has been shockingly bad.  No exaggeration here, we went out last month and found a grand total of five! Five sloes?! That's not even enough for a thimble full of sloe gin.  It's not just the sloes that have been lacking....the horse chestnut out the front of the house has no conkers (every year previously there's been large quantities scattered across the ground ready to be gathered for conker fights), the blackberries were either rotten before they were ripe or, if they did survive, were bitter and watery and I've not seen any elderberries either.  The birds are going to be hungry this winter - which reminds me, I need to stock up on seed and mealworms.   Birds deserve a happy Christmas too, in the same way we really deserve our Christmas sloe gin ;)  Seeing as we're lacking in that particular department I thought I'd have a go at making a sort-of spiced mead as an alternative.  Although I doubt it'll be ready for Christmas it's another one of those things I've fancied making for a while (although I won't be able to enjoy it myself for at least another 7 months but shhhhhh, the reason for that is still a bit hush hush - at least until we have the first scan next month!).  I used a recipe for a mead in a book I own called "The Real Witches Kitchen", which I bought years ago as it had various interesting recipes in (for cosmetics, incense, food, all sorts).  I didn't have all the ingredients needed but I adapted it a little and this is what I came up with.  I used:

• 1 and a half large oranges, chopped up, pith removed.
• 2 large eating apples, chopped up
• Large handful of currants (or raisins)
• 12 cloves
• 2 large cinnamon sticks
• Roughly 1inch piece of dried ginger
• 8 pints of water
• 4 jars of honey (weighing 454g each, which is roughly a pound - so 4lb of honey)

The orange, apple, currants, cloves, ginger and cinnamon sticks went into a large stock pan with half the water.  I brought that to the boil and left it to simmer - supposedly for half an hour but I got distracted by other things so it was probably a lot longer (if I'm honest I got distracted by guinea pigs - we have two; R's 4th birthday present and a lesson in responsibility. Both boys - she's named them Holly and Dave).  After the appropriate simmering time the mix came off the heat (all the spices and fruit simmering away produced a beautiful Christmassy smell, reminiscent of mulled wine) and the rest of the water was added as well as the honey which was stirred in until it dissolved.  I then mixed in a sachet of wine yeast (a 5g packet which is what? About 0.2oz? Probably around a teaspoon give or take I imagine) and then strained the whole lot via sieve and funnel into a 2 gallon demijohn.  Added a bung and airlock and voila!.......

Now it's just a case of waiting for fermentation and maturation and I'll unfortunately have to use my husband as taste tester.  Exciting! (Note - I remembered to sterilise everything I used.  Had some sterilsing tablets left from when R was a baby....well, I had a full unused packet as we never bothered with bottle-feeding.  Far too much hassle!).

Now to plan the family Midwinter Feast (I have parents, in-laws, grandparents and siblings around for a three course monstrosity on or around the 21st December) and ponder whether I've got the time to make some new Christmas decorations with R.  Pass me the glitter! :-D

'Sneaky' Breakfast Smoothie

Second blog post, more food.  There is more to my life than that and I'm sure I'll get around to it sooner or later but in the interim I have a typically fussy 3 year old and there's only so much pasta and sauce (with blended in carrots, onion, mushrooms, peppers and celery) you can feed a child as a means of getting some veg into them.  I'm veggie and my husband's veggie so it grates a little bit that our daughter would probably live off fish fingers and bread if given half a chance!  No point in getting too concerned about it though as I remember clearly enough disliking a lot of veg when I was little (celery, broad beans, brussels sprouts.....) while my husband pretty much refused anything but raw carrots for a while (according to my mother-in-law).

However, a lack of overall concern doesn't mean I'm not going to attempt to get some vegetable goodness into her, I'm sure every mum has their sneaky way of doing this (I've been told using pizza is a favourite - blend up some extra veg in the tomato sauce and hide a bit more under the cheese.  Sadly my daughter doesn't like pizza either!).  This here is mine:

'Sneaky' Breakfast Smoothie - looking worryingly like the tofu custard pudding ;)

It does look a bit speckled which is down to the berries I used and the fact I currently only have a cheap little stick/hand blender.  It would be a lovely chocolate brown minus speckles if I had a super duper jug blender that costs two weeks pay but this'll do for now.  And yet again, easy as pie....well smoothie.

• 1 large ripe banana
• 4-5 dates (stones removed)
• A small mug full of berries (e.g. strawberries, blueberries, blackberries - I use frozen mixed summer berries or forest fruits that I've defrosted.  Cheaper than buying fresh)
• Milk (we use soya milk at home)
• Large handful of fresh baby spinach or 3 blocks of frozen spinach that's been defrosted (3 blocks of the frozen spinach we buy is about 80g or 2.5oz give or take - this morning I used fresh baby spinach as that's what we had in the fridge).
• Around about a teaspoon of cocoa powder

I haven't given exact measurements because I don't tend to use them - I'm a bung-it-all-in-and-see-what-happens sort of cook.

First off I blend the spinach with a good splash of milk (not too much) until I have a bright green liquid - I do the spinach first as it can be a bit stringy and I want to make sure it's properly pureed.  Then I add the banana, dates and cocoa and blend some more until I have a dark green unappetising-looking sludge (sounds good doesn't it?!).  I finally add the berries, give it a good whizz and the purple/red with the sludgy green turns a nice chocolate colour.  I then add a drop more milk just to get it to a consistency we like, which is normally around that of a thick milkshake.  I don't need to add any sugar as the banana and dates tend to make it sweet enough (even for my daughter!) although if I've put in a lot of blackcurrants in with the berries I'll add an extra date or two to balance the tartness.

Nice and tasty start to the day, and my daughter loves it  - and heres the proof.......

The proof is in the pudding smoothie
(Although I'll be in trouble if she ever actually sees me adding the spinach!)

Chocolate Tofu 'Custard' Pudding.

It's coming around to the new moon, as it happens that also tends to coincide with the hormonal shifts that cause me to alternate between weeping into my keyboard and eating cake; lots and lots of cake.

Today, I have no cake.  In the past that wouldn't have been a problem as I would have made a microwave mug cake - 3minutes to cake-y perfection.  Unfortunately, we recently freecycled the microwave as it took up a lot of room in the kitchen and was very rarely used (bar occasional heating of baked beans and the monthly mug cakes).  I never considered the long term consequences of my decision!

A rummage around in the kitchen came up with few options but the packet of firm silken tofu in the fridge gave me a brainwave as I remembered making a tofu-based pumpkin pie last year.

Ta da....Chocolate Tofu 'Custard' Pudding....

Ok, so it's not cake, but it's sweet and it hit the spot.  And it was about as easy as easy gets.

• 1 packet of firm silken tofu
• 3tbsp honey (that's all I had in the cupboard and I've no doubt agave nectar, maple syrup or old fashioned granualted sugar will do the job)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 3 tsps cocoa powder

Put all ingredients in a blender, whizz together, done.  It had the consistency of thickish custard so I poured mine into a glass and topped it with a dollop of coconut milk/cream (I'd had the remains of a can sitting in the fridge) and some blueberries and strawberries so I could fool myself it was healthy.

I imagine it might firm up a bit if placed in the fridge but I'm neither that patient or that concerned with the consistency. 

Yum.