Ice cream cupcakes

A bit of baking was called for at the weekend - ice cream is in short supply in our house due to the fridge freezer going on strike - so I made the next best thing - ice cream cupcakes! (Ok well, not quite the next best thing given the heat, but still pretty darn good).

I recently got the book "Eat Me" by Cookie Girl (Xanthe Milton) and have wanted to make them ever since. Cleverly you wrap the outside of the cones in foil to keep them from falling over (and to stop them burning I suspect)

The cake mixture is a slight variation on a Victoria Sponge - I scraped every last drop out of the bowl and really thought that I did not have enough mixture. The cakes rose magnificiently however and even overflowed on a few.

Sadly I only had golden icing sugar for the buttercream which does detract from the true Mr Whippy look, but still looks good. (O in true 3 year old style ate the flake, the icing AND the cornet but left the cake.....) Am now wondering about making them with a scoop of ice cream on top at the last minute instead of buttercream........ mmm - wonder if I could bake chocolate brownie (or a blondie!) in them, and serve them warm with the ice cream on top as a pudding?

Holiday!

No pictures - no time despite the glorious sunshine and heat. We're off to Italy - with three excited small(er) people!

Wealden Quilt Show 2010

Hmm - well back to Work and a windy weekend in Rye have meant I haven't got round to blogging at all (I know start blogging and fall at the first hurdle!)

Anyway, I really wanted to show you some pictures of the Wealden Quilt show that I visited a couple of weeks ago. Some amazing pieces - all very different and quite inspirational. What I particularly loved was when there were suprise details on the backs, which had been equally thought out - a bit like a secret for the quilt's owner.

I'm afraid I foolishly didn't take notes of the names of the quilts and who made them, but thought I would share a few of my favourites (and there were more which I also loved, but I have to stop somewhere)

This was stunning - my photograph doesn't do it justice - it looks a little pink in the photo, but trust me it wasn't - it was very red, gorgeously so. Beautifully crafted and freehand machine quilted.

This one was really hard to photograph as it was in a sort of small alcove. Very soft, with some delicious tactile details, and I loved the subtle punch of colour on the ladybirds.

Gorgeous fabric choice on this sampler quilt. 1930's style fabrics are very popular right now and this was a lovely example of it - the other sampler quilts were much in much stronger and bolder colourways and had a very different feel.

And here is a close up of the Dresden Plate block

This one is all about the fabulous quilting - it reminded me so much of Durham Quilting - the plain fabric and then the lovely quilting patterns, The blocks were stitched together with subtle decorative stitching. The detail is really hard to see in the full shot.

And I now have an urge to make a Dinosaur Blanket..........

I could probably persuade the 3 year old he would like one, but unfortunately although I am a very good project starter I am an appalling project finisher! The question would be whether I would finish it before he left home?

Hopefully my next post will show a finished object - but it needs to wait until my sewing machine has been serviced on Monday (I have tried sewing on it, but the timing seems to be off and the resulting stitching makes a plate of spaghetti look orderly)

Sourdough (Pt3)

Well, strictly speaking it could be part 4 as I did feed and nurture it for a third day as instructed.
was looking much better by this morning- frothing nicely and had a pleasant smell - yeasty and slightly sour.

So I turned it into a stiffer batter, let it rise again for a few hours, took out a few tablespoons and then turned it into a nice bread dough - shaped, proved and baked it and here it is!

It is a nicely risen loaf - but (and there had to be one) it isn't sourdough. I did wonder as it rose quite a lot and in a fairly short space of time when I put the shaped loaf to prove. It is soft and tender within - no holes and that particular chewy texture - and most definite of all - not sour (there might be a slight tang but believe me it is slight).

I will keep the remaining starter and see if I can't get it to sour up a bit - after all it is a huge improvement on my first ever attempt where the starter end up foul smelling, a weird colour and in the bin.

The macaroons we made today were much better - however with 3 children on school holidays there aren't any left around to photograph!

Sourdough (Pt 2)

Hmmmm

Not exactly frothing is it?

Sourdough (Pt 1)

This is my second attempt at a sourdough starter - the first we will draw a veil over (it was an umitigated disaster quite some time ago).

I have been inspired to try again by The River Cottage Family Cookbook which we I recently acquired. So with a little time in hand I got my ingredients together. Though I should confess that I forgot the orange until I was mixing....

The recipe intrigued me as it uses orange juice in the first stage - I also love this book as it explains a bit more about the process and the reason for using certain ingredients (such as organic flour and mineral water). 

So I mixed and ended up with this which needs to be left in a warm place for 24 hours.

I'll just have to wait and see if it is more successful than my last attempt. (I should confess though, that to be on the safe side, I followed Hugh's slightly cheaty instructions and added a pinch of dried yeast to the inital mix.....)

Spring

Suddenly it's here!

The buds on the camellia have suddenly burst into flower - we're lucky that they last quite a while as the bush is in a shady spot.

It is finally dry enough for A and his Dad to dig over the allotment and rotovate it. Well, probably not quite, but we really can't leave it any longer. In doing so they discovered this!

A poor lone little leek that actually grew - it will join the many other leeks from the weekly Veg box that I still haven't managed to use up (and I have used a lot!)

And the children? Well it is finally nice enough to go out in the garden and play! The current favourite is scooting - the joys of a new level patio and paths with no more steps; luckily O doesn't mind that he's always lagging behind - provided he gets a turn on his big brother's scooter every now and then.