Tempting you back with a Muffin . . .

When my little ones were babies, "Do you know the Muffin Man?" was one of the songs from my repertoire that I liked to sing to them.  There were others and some I made up, as you do as a mum, like the one about a giggly ganoe paddling a canoe, that one involved a lot of tickles!!!  So the Muffin Man song was a favourite of ours and guess what Muffins are too!!!

So when the planets seemed to align yesterday with Waitrose sending through a recipe for Blackberry Muffins at exactly the same time as I was about to tackle the rather large patch (es) of brambles we have in our rather neglected garden, it seemed like the only thing to do!  The kids were dispatched to find as many ripe blackberries they could find in the garden, without hurting themselves too much on the brambles and then we set about making the Muffins.  Flopsy Bunny had a friend over so there were four of us baking.  The thing about cooking with children is that you have to make sure everyone gets a go and it is fair so that nobody gets to do all the exciting parts - who would know sieving flour would be so contentious!!!  So they all chose an ingredient that they would do, the sugar had to be sieved as well, and we set to work, with me hovering trying to make sure the right ingredients in the right amounts went into the bowl.  I think we did a pretty good job!

Unfortunately I can't tell you what they taste like as Flopsy Bunny and Little Roo have divided the remaining muffins up, and they know EXACTLY how many they each have AND what colour the cases are - so there is no way I can have a crafty muffin while they are at school!!!  Which is probably just as well as they would definitely head straight for the 'muffin top' I seem to be developing after a summer of eating well and not doing very much  . . .!

I guess this is a round about way of saying I've been a bit absent from here this year.  I will do a post about why shortly and another one about our crazy summer holiday and another one on the ever growing pile of yarn I am stockpiling for the list of projects I am wanting to make!  But I just wanted to say I am back!  Please have a Muffin and I hope you'll drop by again as I promise there will be more posts coming!!!!

Strawberry and Rhubarb Jam - second attempt

I was a bit worried that our rhubarb plant wouldn't survive after having been dug up from its old position when we had the new vegetable bed made and then replanted back into the new vegetable bed a year later.  It did take a while to recover and I followed my sister's advice, who has two flourishing plants, to keep piling compost on.  Well I did and I now I have a very healthy (and large) plant.  I love rhubarb so there have been lots of crumbles and stewed rhubarb.  I have also made some really gorgeous rhubarb ice-cream which didn't last longer than the day we made it, it was so tasty and so very easy to make!  In fact we've made two batches.

 

Feeling in the need for more things to make with rhubarb I was really excited to come across this recipe in the Guardian for Strawberry and Rhubarb Jam (you need to scroll down on the link as it is recipe number 5).  I lost no time, buying some Strawberries, yes I probably should have picked my own but Waitrose where selling a kilo off cheaply so I snapped them up!  The jam is easy to make but you have to work out when you are going to make it as you need to prepare the fruit and then leave it overnight before making the jam the next day.  Anyway, I duly followed all the instructions but the one thing I didn't do was check for a set.  So having added the jam to the jars, labelled them, I started to worry that actually this was going to be a very runny jam - more like a syrup if I was being completely honest!  It wouldn't do I decided so the labels came off, the jars were sterilised again and the jam was boiled up again - this is what I love about jam - its so forgiving!  Anyway, this time I did check that the jam had set before filling up (less) jars!  My official jam taster, Little Roo, gave it the thumbs up, which is just as well as all my jam supplies had been used up after giving out jam for the teachers presents!  Now I just need my official label maker to swing into action - unfortunately she's not keen - a lot of negotiation and persuasion is going to be needed - or as I fear, I might actually have to do it myself!

It's Chutney and Jam time again!

It has been very busy in my kitchen this week.  First, after the quick picking of all the green tomatoes I whipped up some chutney using my current favourite chutney receipe - well the one I used last year!  People may laugh at my receipe book but I did buy the Jams, Pickles and Chutneys: Best Kept Secrets of the Women's Institute book.  Ok, I'm not quite ready for the W.I. yet but I figured that if anyone knows about making Jams and Chutneys then the W.I. will do; and I have to say I really like this book and have made a number of their recipes.  The chutney was made using Aunt Mary's Green Tomato Chutney and it is really easy to make and tasty too.  The only downside for me is that the glut meant I had to double the recipe so I ended up chopping 6lb of tomatoes, 3lb of apples and the killer for me was chopping 3lb of onions - tears were rolling down my face in rivers that night.  Also I didn't really give it much thought when I set out to double the receipe that a) I would have a big enough bowl to put the ingredients in overnight (I didn't and so had to carefully mound it all up into a big pile and cover with clingfilm!) and b) whether it would all fit in my perserving pan once I'd added all the other ingredients.  Well it was touch and go - I always like to add a bit of excitement into my cooking and now the smell of vinegar has finally left my house and I've got 14 jars of chutney to keep me going . . .!

 

Well the annual brambling and jam making took place last weekend.  DH had to make a quick trip to the hardware store to buy some more jars, after all that chutney my reserves of jars that I save over the year were running low.  I have to say that this year I have made some lovely Blackberry and Apple Jam - my best so far I think.  I'm not sure what I did differently, if anything but you can really taste the fruit this year.  The jam making has been a total family affair, DH and the little ones picked the blackberries, I made the jam and Flopsy Bunny came up trumps with the labels - I just love the decorations don't you?!

 

A quick catch up

It feels like I've not been here for ages and looking at the date of the last post - it's true!!  So I thought a little catch up was needed.

First there was the end of term and lots of gifts to make for all Flopsy Bunny's teachers - phew there were a lot!!  When I first saw a post for peppermint bark on Soule Mama's blog I decided it would be just the thing to make one day and stored it away in the back of my mind.  This end of year, was the year and boy was it wonderful.  Really easy to make and sooo effective and soooooooo yummy!!  It is definately something I will be making again  (maybe just for me though . . . .!).  I used Little Cotton Rabbits version and the delicious Green and Blacks chocolate.  I really should have put more peppermint candy sticks on and will be looking out for those between now and Christmas!

Then we had a glorious week of just me and the kids, no plans, no meeting up with anyone, just getting into the holiday groove and their first request was to make a den in the woods! 

It was at this point, right at the beginning of the holiday that Flopsy Bunny had a little accident with a cup of tea and my laptop - needless to say all was NOT that calm that day in our house . . . thankfully a little spill and only a new keyboard was needed, but it did really put me out of action . . .

Then we were off to the lovely Italy - to fall in love with all it's beauty once again.

 

Our lovely holiday house

 Scrumptious food

Now I'm back, re-charged and fully rested!!!  Now where did I put my knitting needles . . .

Goat Girl

Flopsy Bunny has always been a lover of goats and the other day she spent ages feeding this little cutie.  Of course that is not to say that she is not partial to feeding . . .

 ponies or in fact . . .

deer - we did have a lovely time at this Farm Park.

The holidays were full of highs and lows.  Unfortuanately the low came with a nasty bug which laid Little Roo low for the second week, so we were rather confined to the house.  But despite this there were plenty of highs.  I think the major highlight came when we made THIS cake - oh how yummy it was.  It is now my all time favourite cake - not least because Little Roo insisted it was called Lemon Fizzle cake - well that is what it will be known as from now on in our house!!

On the fourth day of Christmas . . .

. . . I baked my boy a cake

Yes, you might have guessed from yesterday's post, it's that time of year again, Little Roo's birthday.  I can't quite believe he will be three on Tuesday - I look at him trying to see the baby he once was and just see this grown up boy - still quite little though!  Anyway, despite trying to convince him otherwise he requested a dinosaur cake again this year.  I was gutted as I had big plans for a space rocket cake made with Swiss Rolls! 

Baking and Storing

Sarah Raven's lovely apple cake, and even though it didn't all go according to the receipe (my fine breadcrumb consistancy was rather more like large doughy balls!) this didn't seem to make much difference.  Very yummy and a hit with all.



I also had a bit of an epiphany over our fennel plant the other day.  When I planted the fennel about four years ago I didn't intend to eat it, I just liked it's fluffly leaves and thought it would go well in the herb bed.  Each year the plant gets bigger and bigger - this year it must have been about 6-7ft tall!  So it wasn't until I looked out of the window one day while washing up that it suddenly dawned on me - those are seed heads I was looking at - Oooo I could dry those and use the seeds!  I can't really believe I haven't done it before - lots of lovely fennel seeds. 

A pickling weekend

DH has been a busy little bee this weekend and there's been a nose tickling aroma in the air in our house.  Our home grown chilli's have been harvested and pickled and then DH moved on to some pears that we had been given by his parents and they got pickled too!  I was slightly worried that if anyone stood still too long this weekend they might end up being pickled!!  Both receipes came from the lovely Sarah Raven's Garden Cookbook.  I just love that book and there are so many lovely receipes in it.  I think I am going to make her apple cake this afternoon for the little one's pudding.  It is good to have our annual favourites, like blackberry and apple jam but then it's also good to try something new.  I'm looking forward to some lovely cheese at Christmas with a pickled pear sliced up - delicious!

Brambling on Sunday . . .

. . . Jam on Monday!  We've gone early this year.  But it seems the blackberries have too!  So in between showers on Sunday, we hot footed it up the hill to our favourite bramble patch and within 30 minutes had collected about 5lb of blackberries.  A fortuitous visit from my parents brought with them cooking apples, so my favourite jam was made.  We've got enough for the year this time - 14 jars, last year was a disaster and we ran out in May!!

A bit of making this weekend

It was Flopsy Bunny's school fete today so there were cakes to be made . . .  Poor Little Roo couldn't understand that they weren't for eating straight away - although he made up for it at the fete and made sure he got a good helping there!
   

Then I started making my borage ice cubes.  I'd seen this idea a while back and thought I must grow some borage!!  Only three flowers so far - but I'm soooo excited.  You need to half fill an ice cube tray with water and then pop the flower on top.  Freeze the cube and then top up the tray with water so that the flower is trapped in the middle, refreeze the cubes and you get gorgeous ice cubes to go with your summer pimms!!

Ah yes, there is only one to harvest at the moment, and it is rather small but perfectly formed don't you think?!

I have moments of being really organised - I think it's my Capricorn side, being born on the cusp it doesn't always show itself!!  Anyway, a while back I decided to index my receipe books by ingredients.  It was really useful when we had a vegetable box delivered as I could easily look up receipes for the various vegetables I found in my box.  So I thought I would share with you my courgette receipe index card along with the various receipe books we own!  In the hope that it might be useful to any courgette growers out there that are in need of some inspiration!

The River Cafe Cookbook: Bk. 2

Penne with ricotta and courgette

Tagliatelle with deep-fried courgette

Wood-roasted courgette

Courgette carpaccio

Courgette Frittata

Courgette, prosciutto and menta

Real Cooking - by Nigel Slater

Slow-cooked courgettes with lemon and basil

The River Cottage Year

Baby courgette salad

Courgette and goat's cheese soup with basil

The River Cottage Cookbook

Deep-fried stuffed courgette flowers

Courgette and milk soup

courgette sauce for pasta

Courgette souffle

Risotto! Risotto! 80 Recipes and All the Know-how You Need to Make Italy's Famous Rice Dish

Fried zucchini blossoms

Lamb risotto with zucchini

Risotto with zucchini and their blossoms

Soup Kitchen

Courgette soup

Plenty

Stuffed courgettes

Courgette and cobnut salad

Sarah Raven's Garden Cookbook - I just love this book!!

Courgette risotto

Courgette and dill farfalle

Courgette souffle

Courgette souffle tart

Courgette and lemon salad

Greek courgette pie

Crisp courgette wedges with anchovy mayonaise

Matthew's stuffed courgette flowers

Tam's stuffed courgette flowers

Courgette chutney!!!!!!  A must if you have a massive glut and are tired of all the above!!

River Cottage Every Day

Courgette Kisir

Lemony courgettes on toast

Courgette and potato cakes with mint and feta cheese - this one might see a lot of action this year with all the potato plants I have!!

Phew that's a lot of courgette receipes!!  But a favorite in our house is Courgette Dollops!

Courgette Dollops

225g grated courgette

50g grated onion

50g self raising flour

75g grated cheddar cheese

2 eggs, beaten

dash of milk

salt and pepper

oil for frying

Place all the ingredients in a bowl and mix well together.  Heat a large frying pan with a little oil or butter.  Place heated table-spoons of the mixture in the pan and cook for 2 1/2 minutes until brown.  Turn over and cook the other side for a further 2 1/2 minutes.  Eat at once!!

I'm off now to check on the greenhouse to see if it's going to be a courgette dollop night tonight!!

Crown and Heart biscuits

. . . for a Royal Wedding street party - well it had to be done!!

Spring, spring, spring - must be nearly here?

 

The sun is shining today - horray.  How wonderful everything feels on a bright sunny day.  Spring is definitely on it's way.  Potatoes are chitting everywhere inside!  I've got garlic bulbs to plant out asap and signs of life are coming back in the garden.  The hellebores are flowering and my peonies are starting to show their little maroon tips, lots of fun to be had in the garden soon.

Then amongst the chicken pox and half term a special little girl turned 5. Five! I can't believe it but there we have it and here is her cake - a little bit wobbly and not as smooth as I had hoped but a feat of engineering non the less!  Flopsy Bunny had her party at the weekend and had a fantastic time - I am exhausted having entertained 24 little ones for 2 hours but it was lovely seeing her with all her friends and she was very pleased with her cake - I don't think she even noticed the bumpy icing!

Happy Birthday my gorgeous girl!

Dinosaur Cake . . .

. . . every little boy should have one on their birthday!  Wow hasn't time flown.  I can't quite believe I have a two year old now.  Poor little boy we had to cancel his birthday last week as we were all so ill.  But he got his party and he got his cake - which is all he really wanted!  OK so the cake wasn't the masterpiece I had envisioned - but then I only make a cake once a year so what do I expect really?!

Then I thought - hold on a minute if Little Roo is two then this blog is two too!  So I've completely missed my blog anniversary which should have been in October as it turns out!  So just wanted to say thank YOU for reading!  Have a bit of cake on me.

PS I used this template for the cake - so very easy and if your icing abilities are better than mine then very effective too!  The cake was baked by my brother and is yummy- thanks Bro!

Squirreling: part two!

The squirreling continues . . . this time grapes.  When we moved into our little cottage 8 years ago this was a very small vine which didn't really produce any fruit and as the years have gone by, the vine has got bigger and more grapes have been produced.  Last year we had quite a few but I didn't really know what to do with them.  Anyway, this year help came in the form of a newspaper magazine which told you how to make Mosto Cotto, which is really cooked grape must.  I was so excited, finally I had something I could make with the grapes.  So last Friday I picked all that I could reach then squashed the grapes - alas not using the method suggested - squelching them with bare feet! - I used a potato masher instead - I know the other method would have been much better (and more fun) but time was not on my side and I had two small people running around, so it was the potato masher!  Anyway, the squashed grapes and juice were put into a jelly bag and hung overnight.  The next day I just simmered the juice down so that it had reduced by about 2/3rds and bottled (OK a small bottle) the juice.  It has the most amazing intense taste.  I'm not sure what I can use it for, salad dressings were suggested, but I'm going to enjoy finding out!

A Wet Wednesday

It's been raining ALL day. We haven't had a day like this for months. After scurrying home at lunch time, and despite the weather, we had a really lovely afternoon. Little Roo slept, Flopsy Bunny was crafty (sorry about the photo but I took it with my phone - am still really bereft about my camera :( ) and I sewed. Two hours of sewing - what bliss! Especially as I had worked out how to sort out my mitered corners on the project I'm working on - which is coming together nicely and hopefully will be finished by the time I get my camera back. Then Little Roo woke up and we made Chocolate Raisin Jumbles. Then suddenly the rain didn't matter, with a hot cup of tea and a chocolate raisin jumble what could be better? Then DH phoned and asked if I had lit the fire yet - a roaring log fire - now that would make a perfect end to a perfectly miserable day!!!

Mother's Day and Birthday Cake

I haven't got the best reputation in our house for baking great birthday cakes. In fact they are always a disaster! For Flopsy Bunny's first birthday, the sugar free carrot cake I made her had to be thrown away as it tasted awful, hadn't cooked properly and sunk in the middle - I had to make a last minute dash to our local butchers (yes they sell cakes too!) to pick up a victoria sponge! The second year, still reeling from the disaster the year before I played it safe and bought a smarties cake - which went down very well. The third year my sponges didn't rise (although they tasted fine) so I ended up making 4 cakes and finally settled on a 3 layer cake. The butter icing didn't go on too well either so I gave the cake to Flopsy Bunny to decorate and everyone was happy - Flopsy Bunny loved decorating her cake and I managed to save myself any cake decorating embarrassment by saying Flopsy Bunny did it!! So this year, I hoped that I might be able to produce something that was both edible and looked good too! Well it's not perfect by any standards but I must say I'm proud of myself! Obviously the princess decoration was not my own work but I think I managed to stay on brief - Flopsy Bunny had wanted a chocolate heart shaped cake. Unfortunately the heart shaped tin I bought on the internet was too small to feed all her little friends so I had to think outside the tin so to speak and settled on a round tin as I had a board and cake box to fit it!

So yesterday was a lovely day - a lie in, a wonderful breakfast, a hand picked posy of snowdrops and presents and a card from my two gorgeous children (with a little help from the wonderful DH), a glorious walk along the river and then Flopsy Bunny's party - full of bouncy castle fun, face painting and of course THE CAKE!

Spooky goings on ...

It's all been a bit spooky around our neck of the woods. We've been to a Halloween disco, which was excellent fun for Flopsy Bunny and even Little Roo enjoyed himself and it gave us all a chance to dress up. I've realised that I have LOTS of halloween dressing up clothes, not sure why, but I have devils horn's, witches hats and my favourite fluffy spider deely boppers!

So the halloween disco was in aid of our local pre-school and I was roped into making some halloween biscuits.
Ok so the photo doesn't really do them justice but I was actually quite pleased that they even got to this state! I used this receipe for the biscuits and rather wished I had read the comment that had been left before I started making them - I've only just seen it!! Like the commentator I also found that I got a gooey mess at the end despite following the receipe exactly! In fact I only put in half the quantity of buttermilk as I could see which direction the mixture was heading! So it did not make a dough and therefore it was impossible to cut cookies from it. Luckily I put the whole bowl in the fridge for a couple of hours and using masses of flour to flour the surface, my hands and the rolling pin I managed to cut out some decent-enough looking biscuits. The decorating bit went a bit better, although I discovered that Flopsy Bunny had been round eating all the chocolate drops which were the bats eyes! Luckily I still had a bit of black icing left to stick some more back on!

Blackberry and Apple Jam

Blackberry and Apple Jam has to be my all time favourite jam. I'm not sure whether it is because of the taste or whether it is because it was the first jam I ever made. I first made the jam at school and in fact still use the recipe today. Although reading through my book I don't think I was paying much attention that day (I was a bit of a dolly daydreamer at school) as it was rather brief, I had left out the amount of sugar needed and the instructions were simply, wash and then cook the fruit, add the sugar and boil until setting point is reached. OK so that is basically how you make jam but there was no ideas of timings etc. So this year I decided to actually work out some timings so here is my recipe for Blackberry and Apple Jam:

3/4lb Blackberries
1/4lb Cooking Apples
1lb Sugar
A little water
********
Wash the blackberries and peel, core and chop the apples. This time I cooked the fruit separately, but in the past I have cooked them together. I'm not sure if it actually makes much difference and might actually cook them together in future. Anyway place the fruit into a saucepan and add a little water to just cover the bottom of the pan. Bring to the boil and then simmer for about 10 minutes until the fruit is soft. If you are cooking them separately then add the cooked Blackberries and Apples together into a large saucepan and then add the sugar. Heat the mixture gently and stir while the sugar dissolves and once it has dissolved bring to the boil and boil for about 8-10 minutes until setting point has been reached. I now use a jam thermometer as I can never work out if it's reached setting point using other methods such as the cold saucer method. Then it's just a case of filling up your sterilized jam jars and adding labels!

I made twice the quantities and made about 4 jars worth with a little left over for tasting, although I might have made more but I think I over boiled it at the end - got a bit distracted with two little ones and having to change a nappy! If you are not a fan of the pippiness from the blackberries, The Cottage Smallholder has a non pippy version. I might have to pick some more blackberries to make a second batch, the rate we get through jam these four jars won't even last until Christmas!

Chocolate Raisin Jumbles

It may be tipping down with rain outside, but inside we have chocolate raisin jumbles! Flopsy Bunny and I spent an afternoon baking while the rain poured and Little Roo slept. The thing about having a three year old helping is that it involves a bit of pouring, a bit of stirring and a LOT of licking - spoons, fingers, cookie mixture when mummy isn't looking! I don't blame her though! The cookies are lovely and just as I remembered them - a favourite of mine from my childhood, thanks for the recipe mum!

Lovely Lolly

An unexpected sunny afternoon had Flopsy Bunny and I running for the ice lolly's to eat in the garden. We had been very excited when our rocket lolly moulds arrived in a package from Lakeland and I quickly whipped up some lovely raspberry lolly mixture (recipe courtesy of my sister). I wasn't sure how much the recipe would make but in the end we had lots of mixture left over (after filling all the moulds) so I filled up some little pots with lids and froze those too and DH and I have been having little raspberry sorbets for pudding - what a treat!