soul cheering sunshine and sprouts

You’d think having nothing to do and nowhere to be would be bliss but waiting for a baby to come, when your body is preserving its energy and sends out ‘can’t be bothered’ vibes to anything more strenuous than getting out of bed, is actually quite dull.  And if I mention nights of hardly any sleep … well you can imagine how dull can grow into ‘a bit fed up’.
On Saturday when I begged George to take me to the allotment for some cheering sunshine and fresh air he could hardly say no.  With the promise that I wouldn’t do anything more than look as soon as we arrived at the plot my spirits lifted.Our kale was looking finer than ever thanks to the winter chill wiping out all trace of white fly.  Our single sprout stalk was looking majestic with lovely cherry sized pickings.  And the smaller stalks of sprouting were easily pinched off in favour of the larger, slightly woodier ones.  A delightfully unexpected harvest which we enjoyed lightly steamed this evening.My first visit to the allotment in 2012, and my last for now.
The timer is ticking but the bun is still in the oven. Not for much longer I hope …..

making an easy peasy bread and butter pudding

What’s not to love about edible gifts? This Christmas we received a Pannetone loaf from our friends Dan and Ruth and very successfully scoffed most of it between the two of us (lovely thick wedges slathered with butter for breakfast or a cheeky afternoon snack) and then forgot about the last quarter once it found it’s way into the cake tin for safe keeping.  So when I did happen across it and found it looking a bit dry and forlorn refashioning it as  a bread and butter pudding seemed obvious.

It must be a good 15 years or so since I last ate bread and butter pudding and I’ve certainly never made it so I did a little googling to see what other ingredients were needed and compared that with I had available.   Alas no double cream, so I simply layered slices of buttered pannetone in a dish, sprinkled with extra raisins and cinnamon, and poured over a mugful of milk with 2 eggs and a table spoon of sugar whisked into it and baked it for half and hour at 180°c.
Simple.  Delicious.  Lovely cold the next day too.

You’ve probably guessed that with all this baking and time to blog there’s little to report in the bump-to-baby department.  At least I’ve been able to replenish stocks of Chocolate dipped Flapjacks and if we can ration ourselves to one a day I’d hope baby appears before the empty bottom of the cake tin does!

making Nigel Slater’s Festive Chocolate Flapjacks

Much as I like to cook I don’t really watch many food programmes.  I do like Nigel Slater’s Simple Cooking though and I think it’s because he’s so down to earth and says recipes are just a starting point and changing it to suit your own taste or what’s in your cupboard is just fine.  Just as well really as that’s exactly what happened last week when I made Nigel’s Festive Chocolate Flapjacks and had to replace his cranberries, sour cherries, figs, walnuts and ground almonds with what was in the cupboard – dried apricots, dates,goji berries, almonds and dessicated cocounut.  See the link above for Nigel’s original recipe  - quantities below are my adapted recipe doubled up to make 16 chunky squares.

What you’ll need

• 100g each brazil nuts and almonds
• 60g each of dates, dried apricots and goji berries, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds
• 2 tbsp dessicated cocounut
• 100g butter
• 200g caster sugar (I didn’t have any so used granulated)
• 4 tbsp golden syrup
• 200g porridge oats
• 150g rolled oats
• 200g dark chocolate (I only had a 100g bar, hence dipped ends rather than halves! – delicious using Divine’s Dark Chocolate with ginger and orange)
  .
  making Chocolate dipped fruit and nut flapjacks
• Turn the oven on to 180C/350F/Gas 4.
• Roughly chop the nuts and dried fruit then add to a food processor along with the other ingredients and half the pumpkin seeds. Add a spoonful of dessicated coconut and blitz together – but not for long – leaving nice sizable chunks of the nuts and fruit. Tip into a large mixing bowl along with the rest of the whole pumpkin seeds.
• In a pan melt the butter with the sugar and golden syrup, trying not to stir it too much and allowing it to melt together gradually.
• Once melted mix in the oats and the fruit and nuts and spread the mixture out evenly in an oven tray lined with greaseproof paper then bake for 25 minutes (having doubled up the recipe my chunkier flapjacks took about 10 minutes longer)
• When the flapjacks are baked, cut them into rectangles.  When cooled and hardened dip them as far as you dare into melted chocolate.
• Allow to chill for 20 minutes in the fridge and then serve.
  It wasn’t just Nigel’s drool inducing Simple Christmas programme that prompted the flapjack making.  My friend Jenny gave me a really thoughtful ‘mum-to-be’ bag of goodies which recommended a flask of hot chocolate and flapjack as fine night feed companions.
  Time to make some more then since all 16  have now gone ….

wordless wednesday

2011 in pictures

I’ve long been a fan of Julie’s Little Cotton Rabbits blog and this post is inspired by her annual New Year’s reflection on the happiest moments of the last year.
As Julie says ”it’s good to remember the good bits and gloss over the bad”. 
So here are my month-by-month smile making memories from 2011.

Jan-Dec 2011:
Weston Super Mare with dear friends, survival and new life, helping hands at the plot, holiday in Fuerteventura, Sufjan Stevens gig in London, our cornflower bed inspired by a visit to Durham, Laura and Tim’s wedding, 20 week scan, finally being able to eat home grown cherry tomatoes, falling in love with our new nephew Zac,   the last of a fab harvest, our niece Kim and her love for her yet-to-be-born cousin.

goodbye 2011, hello 2012

Happy New Year everyone and a very warm welcome to 2012
I was quite chuffed that I managed to stay awake until midnight yesterday and see in the year in which our little one will be born (due on Friday but no signs of an early escape yet!).  2011 was quite a year by all accounts:  forever remembered for times of great sadness and unbelievable joy.  Who knows what 2012 has in store… apart from the obvious lack of sleep, pooey nappies and hours spent marvelling at the little miracle we’ve created!

My blogging year for 2011 faltered somewhat when I was deep in the throes of morning/noon/night sickness.  So it was interesting to receive an email today from the stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com who’d prepared a personalised report for 2011 for how my blog fared.  It seems I’m not the only one addicted to making preserves judging by the most popular searches that lead people to my little corner of the blogosphere.  Here’s a sneak preview or you can click here to see the complete report.  
It seems timely to say a big thank you to all of you who continue to look out for posts when my blog goes a bit quiet, leave lovely comments and have links to my site from yours. You know who you are (and if you don’t it’s in the report now!)
Happy blogging all in 2012.

(not) making Christmas Pudding Truffles

Christmas is here and we’re very much ready for it.  Our ‘hosting’ will be limited to cups of tea this year so we haven’t really had to do much by way of preparing (just as well really since the last week or so has seen a very busy George grappling with a broken boiler and rain thwarted DIY tasks).  With only 12 days until the baby is due nesting and afternoon naps have rather taken over for me and plans to make mini-Christmas cakes have been shelved for next year.  I really wanted to make Christmas truffles too but alas ….  I have the Christmas pudding sitting in the cupboard and there’s sure to be plenty of chocolate flying around over the festive period so maybe I can still aspire to New Year truffles?

I made Cherrapeno’s Christmas Truffles for Christmas 2009 but never did get round to posting about them.  Check out her blog for details as it’s a brilliant way to use up left-over Christmas pudding.  It’s also great fun rolling cooled chocolate between your fingers and trust me when I say licking your fingers afterwards is the easiest way to clean up!
G decorated our truffles by making holly petals and berries out of icing sugar.
For the snow on top of the truffles you’d do well to follow Cherrapeno’s lead and use icing sugar as the melted white chocolate I used has a less attractive yellow hue.

So all that remains is to wish you all a very happy Christmas and a merry New Year.