Year 6 Christmas Cake Crumbly

It's the last cake crumbly before Christmas today and it's Year 6's turn. I wonder how many cakes they'll get to sell?
Anyway after a relaxing birthday yesterday, the cakes were demolished in the staff room, it was time to get baking again. The classic brownies and mars bar cakes were whipped up in a flash. Then to make it a bit more Christmassy I thought I would make white chocolate crispy cakes (think snowballs - well sort of!) and snowmen biscuits. Baking them was the quick part decorating 50 snowmen took slightly longer but I'm sure they will sell fast!

My Birthday!

OK! So it's my birthday tomorrow and I'm the one who has to bring cakes into work for everyone else - bizarre! I must have had the best boss ever in my previous job, he bought cakes for everyone in the office whenever it was someone's birthday. Now that makes much more sense.

Anyway to take into the staff room tomorrow I have made a chocolate gateau and a mixed fruit pavlova.  There should be plenty to go round and I hope everyone enjoys them.  Happy Birthday to me!

Ian's Birthday!

Ian's birthday and as we had friends coming over I thought I should make the effort and make him a birthday cake. While he was out at golf yesterday with his mates I made a red velvet cake, then sent him out later in the day shopping with Freya and managed to get it iced and decorated. The girls made daddy out of lego and the rest of the accessories.

As well as the birthday cake I spent the rest of the day yesterday making soup and baking sausage rolls, pasties, cheese muffins and brownies so we had some home comforts to eat after a cold morning at Blenheim Palace today with friends. It was lovely to catch up with them all and the next time we will see them there will be a new addition! I hope it all goes well, good luck!

Happy Birthday Ian, hope you had a lovely day! xx

Break Time!

After break time yesterday, when everyone was coming in to the staff room hoping for a biscuit to go with their tea or coffee and there were none, I thought I would bake some treats to take in for today. What with the rain and the weather getting colder a sweet treat is definitely needed sometimes.

Yesterday I made Stem Ginger Crunch, Date and Walnut Flapjack and Chocolate Refrigerator Cake. To make sure no one feels guilty about having more than one piece I have cut them all into bite size chunks. I'm sure this will put a smile on people's faces come 10.55am!

Baking Blip Over!

After a good few weeks off from home baking both my girls and I are glad that I am back on the case. I had an extra day off yesterday and after a lovely morning of shopping (new dress and shoes!) I thought I would hit the kitchen.
Megan had been asking me to make some cookies, however, was more than pleased to come home from school to discover that I had made chocolate caramel shortbread (one of the girls' favourites). We also have a Year 4 meeting at school on a Thursday morning so I thought I would make some individual carrot cakes to take in for that. Well I actually ended up making 30 and there are only 5 of us in the meeting so I'm sure the rest of the staff will appreciate them too!

Time to load up the car (it's raining again!!) and off we go.

Year 6 Cake Crumbly

So it was the last cake crumbly before half term today and I think we are all in need of a week off! A time to relax, catch up with family and friends, I'm really looking forward to it.

Anyway back to cake crumbly, Megan's last year at the school and Year 6 are trying to raise lots of money so I thought I would rise to the challenge and bake plenty of cakes to take in. 

Think I was in a bit of a chocolate mood when I started and I ended up making Chocolate and Marshmallow Crispy cakes, Chocolate Brownies, Blondies (white chocolate brownies to most people) and Chocolate Butterfly cakes with Lemon Icing. Then to redress the chocolate balance I thought I would make Iced Butterfly Biscuits only to discover once I had made the biscuits I didn't have enough icing sugar to make the icing with. So my lovely husband, Ian, was in the supermarket at 7 o'clock this morning buying some so I could decorate the biscuits before school. What a star!

Iced Butterfly Biscuits

Blondies & Chocolate and Marshmallow Crispy Cakes

Chocolate Butterfly Cakes with Lemon Icing
and Brownies

The cake crumbly was huge with most of the year bringing in cakes to sell, so much so that they need to have another one tomorrow to sell the rest. Fantastic! I hope they do well and raise lots of money.

What with baking for the cake crumbly and finding the time to bake three Christmas cakes I think I've had a very productive week in the kitchen. I think I might even make my own Christmas pudding being as we are at home for Christmas this year.

Cards & Cake!

Thank you to all of you who came to my card party last night, I enjoyed myself and I hope you did too. I bought my first Christmas cards as did a lot of others, just need to get my Christmas cake made now and I will be making that move towards Christmas preparations!

Back to last night I thought that I would make all mini morsels, easy to eat and far less washing up! Scones with strawberry jam and Devonshire clotted cream, of course. Mini chocolate and raspberry pavlovas, just big enough to fit one raspberry on the top. Chocolate refrigerator cake made to my own yummy recipe. Mini velvet blush cupcakes, these taste like no other, delicious! Finally, homemade shortbread for those with a less sweet tooth! The cakes were devoured with pleasure and many returned for seconds, thirds, fourths,fifths and more - the advantage of them being bitesize is you don't even have to feel too guilty!! Luckily there's not too many left for me to work my way through on my day off!

Sunday Lunch

Today we had family over for Sunday lunch and unsure of the weather we had decided on Roast Pork with all the trimmings, stuffing, roast potatoes, parsnips and sweet potatoes, carrots, broccoli, Brussel sprouts and gravy! 

To follow that I thought I would do something quite light and refreshing and had settled on a Key Lime Pie which  I made yesterday and just needed to finish this morning. A baked biscuit shell filled with a smooth, creamy, lime middle and topped with lightly whipped double cream. However, Megan had an urge for my triple chocolate cheesecake so I decided to make that too. Although on checking my cupboards for the ingredients I discovered we were out of white chocolate so opted for a Double Chocolate Cheesecake instead! Just as yummy! 

They were much appreciated the only problem being there were only 8 of us to eat dessert and I have enough left to last for breakfast, lunch and tea until next Sunday lunch! Think I may have to share some of it with my friends at work tomorrow, not that they'll complain.


Our guests also had a chance to look through the first pages of my book and they said it was looking good, and said they would be more than happy to buy it once it was published!

Year 4 Cake Crumbly

So it's my first Cake Crumbly of the school year tomorrow. At lunch today in the staff room I was kindly advised that it had been announced in the staff meeting this morning that I would be baking for this weeks cake crumbly - no pressure then!!

Hmm! What to bake? I wanted to kill two birds with one stone so to speak and bake for the cake crumbly while still assisting myself in the book writing process. At Freya's request brownies were once again at the forefront and whipped up this morning while getting ready for school. Nothing like the smell of fresh brownies first thing in the morning. Mmm!

Then after tea we multitasked, testing Megan and Freya ready for their weekly spelling tests. Freya reading the recipes for me and for her reading diary and both girls doing a bit of baking along with me ready for cake crumbly, and as I was reminded by them for their lunch boxes.

I decided that I would go for Apricot and White Chocolate Chewy Bars and Lemon Drizzle Cake initially as they are both easy and quick to do. Followed by Gingerbread People which all (well nearly all!) children love! As you may have guessed this is the one the girls wanted to assist with, so I cut out the people for the cake crumbly and they were let loose with the left over dough. We have ended up with lots of tiny flowers, leaves and butterflies which Megan thinks are the perfect size for her lunch box tomorrow.

With bedtime approaching it was time for milk and for Megan to have a taster of the Gingerbread leaves. Then once peace had descended on the kitchen it was time for me to decorate my people, very relaxing. Now I hope that the children will enjoy eating them tomorrow as much as I enjoyed making them.

Rhubarb! Rhubarb!

After a bit of a break from doing any baking I decided that the awful British weather this morning warranted a delicious rhubarb crumble to follow our favourite Sunday Roast! Home grown rhubarb and a lovely, buttery, oaty crumble what more could you ask for? Served hot with vanilla ice cream -yummy!


Then after cooking some extra rhubarb I thought I would trial a recipe for rhubarb and almond cupcakes and I have to say it  turned out very well, even if it did only make 9 cupcakes instead of 12! Smaller cupcakes or an increase in quantities - which one will I choose?


The reason for the lull in baking has been that when I've had some time off work I've been catching up on the writing part of my book, so much so that I've now actually printed off some of the first set of pages to edit!
But the lull in baking will now have to cease as I have Freya's Year 4 cake crumbly this week, a card party with lots of cakes to taste for my friends next week and Megan's Year 6 cake crumbly the week after. Hmm what shall I bake this week? As if that wasn't enough I need to get the Christmas cake made too to give it plenty of time to prove with the brandy!! After all it's only 12 weeks until Christmas!

European Day!

Olá


So tomorrow is European Day at school and Year 4 is studying Portugal. Red, green and yellow attire for myself and Freya in the morning, well definitely for Freya and whatever I can find!

I found out this morning we are going to be baking "Pasta del Nata". This is an egg custard tart and something I've never made before so I copied the recipe and gave it a try this evening... and I have to say they didn't turn out too bad. They tasted OK too!

Then as is my want I decided to have a quick look at the internet and see what other Portuguese baking recipes were around. I found quite a few and settled on making some "Lavadores" which are a type of lemon cookie and a Portuguese Sweet Bread. The cookies turned out beautifully and I am still waiting to see if the bread is going to rise before I put it in the oven. 

Freya came downstairs just as I was making the cookies and wanted to help and she did a very good job too!


Hopefully the children will enjoy tasting them tomorrow along with the ones they will be making themselves. Fingers crossed the sweet bread turns out ok too!


Boa noite!

Pizza!! Hardly Cakes !!

Hmm! Hardly cakes is it, but fun never the less.

Today we had friends coming over for lunch so after cycling to the gym and back this morning it was time for some baking. A quick batch of my fail safe brownies to start with followed by Megan and Freya assisting me in making some Rock Cakes. I'd not had them for years! and they were just as I remembered. They smelled delicious while they were baking too - nutmeg and cinnamon! Megan was especially pleased when she tried them only to discover that they didn't feel or taste like rocks at all!!

Then we met up with our friends down the skate park for Freya to show off her moves on her skate board before coming back to make our own pizzas for tea. As you can see our little visitor was a complete natural and has a vocation at Dominos should he require it!!

We followed up the pizzas with a sticky toffee pudding that I had been wanting to try from Nigella for some time, and although it tasted very nice I have to say it wasn't exactly what I was expecting! Definitely some more searching required to find one I really like.

Different!

Well I'm not giving up the day job but have spent most of the day up on the scaffolding helping Pops fit new fascias to our house! I'm not sure how many times I have been up and down the ladder today but I have to say it is nice to sit down! And guess what more of the same for tomorrow and my days off this week.

In between, however, I did manage to bake a carrot cake and get it iced and a mars bar cake for the girls lunch boxes next week.

I'm looking forward to sampling the carrot cake later I've not made it for a while, and I definitely feel like I deserve it today!

Just Desserts!

An afternoon away from work and spent sitting in front of my laptop trying to remember details of my Just Desserts business from over 4 years ago to include in the Just Desserts section of my book! A little bit of the first draft follows:-

In July 2004 after making delicious desserts for dinner parties, families and friends I thought it would be a good idea to sell my desserts to others who might be having a dinner party or gathering. After plenty of research, a course in food hygiene and lots of preparation I was ready to start my own business from home and called it Just Desserts.

I started by inviting all my girls, neighbours and their friends to my house for an introduction to Just Desserts and a tasting evening. My kitchen was quite bijou then so I set up at least 20 desserts on two dining tables in my lounge. It looked fabulous and I felt very proud if a little nervous as everyone began to arrive. How had I managed to pull it all together?

There were at least thirty ladies salivating around the table when I started by giving a very short speech and then proceeded to describe my way through all the desserts, dishing out tasters as I went. The fantastic feedback was more than I could have imagined and hoped for and by the end of the evening I had the first orders confirmed in my diary. Everyone left feeling replete and most took doggy bags home for husbands and partners to sample too.

The business started and continued to do well, with Christmas being a particularly busy time, one Christmas Eve I had to complete and deliver over 20 desserts! It was then that I felt my children were missing out as I had less time to spend with them, weekends being when most of my baking would need to be done. So after over two years and pleasingly in profit I decided to close Just Desserts and to revert to baking just for family and friends.

So there we have it, it still needs work but I'll slowly getting there. I wanted to include a photo of all the desserts for you to see but Ian is away and I have no idea how to retrieve it from an older storage file! Another time!

Tina's Birthday Barbeque!

Many thanks for a lovely relaxing barbeque Tina and Graeme, and the rain managed to hold off until after we had finished dessert just!!!

So easy chocolate crispy cakes with marshmallows devoured by 10 children!

Lemon meringue pie, which Keira said was the

best she has ever tasted which is great, thank

you!.

White chocolate and strawberry cupcakes and chocolate and raspberry cupcakes for the grown ups. I think I have finally found a way to keep a chocolate sponge nice and moist, so often they are just a little too dry from the cocoa powder.

So I need to get these typed up in my book and then start thinking about what I'm going to bake next!

The Summer Holidays are over!

Well after a fantastic summer holiday, where Megan & Freya fitted in Summer School, we all went to Devon to see the grandparents, Megan went away on a Chinese Course with some of her year at school and we all finished off with a holiday in France, it was time to return to school today for Freya, Megan and me! And... we all enjoyed it, the girl's were especially pleased to catch up with all their friends and settled in well to their new classes.

In France I managed to type up three more recipes for my book, chocolate caramel shortbread, apricot and white chocolate flapjack and pecan pie, along with the introduction and some other waffle, Ian even had time to begin mocking me up a front cover so its beginning to take shape nicely.

Now I am back in my own kitchen and ready to get on with some more recipes. To get myself in the swing of things I whipped up a batch of brownies for Megan and Freya to have as a snack after school this morning before we set off. Then my good friend, Tina, is having a birthday barbeque on Sunday (yes we have some more sun predicted!) and I have offered to bring a selection of desserts with me so that should keep me busy for a couple of days!! And will hopefully result in some positive feedback for my book!

Back to it!

Well, I've had nearly two weeks off, Ian took Freya into work with him today and Megan is away on a Chinese course all week so I thought it was time I got back to it.

Today I have managed to work on a few more pages of my book. I had already taken the photos before I went to Devon last week to see my parents so I have the evidence if not the cakes left!

Firstly, it was iced fairy cakes, always a favourite

with Megan and Freya. They like to help decorate

them too and lick the icing off the spoons!

Next, Bakewell Tart, which Heather Manthorpe

said was the best she has ever tasted!!

Mars Bar Cake, deliciously moreish!

Finally for today Chocolate Chunk Cookies, you

can't beat these when they are still warm from

the oven, mmm!!

Hopefully I'll have a chance to get on with some more later but Freya is now back from her morning at the office with daddy, apparently she was an absolute superstar!!

WI Reunion!

Well I had a fantastic night last night! No baking involved, but met up with all my girlfriends from the WI! Started at The Hermitage in Kingsbridge, then a curry followed by more reminiscing and playing pool in The Quay. We decided it must have been at least 11 years since all 6 of us have been together.

Many thanks to Sarah Day, Claire Harvey, Sheena Day, Sarah Cleary and Sarah Catchpole for the best night.

Lets hope it's not another 11 years before we all manage to get together again.

xx

A Busy Morning!

We're off to visit mum and pops tomorrow so some baking was in order today.

Pecan pie is my pops' favourite so I had to make one to take with me. I fancied some white chocolate and apricot flapjack, sort of healthy maybe not!! Then Freya came in to the kitchen asking if I was making caramel shortbread and offering to help, how could I possibly refuse!? So one became three and we're in for some nice treats over the next few days. Especially when I spoke to mum earlier and she has made a chocolate cake too! Delicious!!

Masterchef!!

So the cake went down very well at my in-laws 40th anniversary!

It made my day when one of my husband's 11 year old cousins told his mum that "... whoever made this cake should go on Masterchef!"

Now that might just have to be a quote for somewhere in my book!!!

Something Different!

This weekend we have the In-laws 40th wedding anniversary gathering and they asked if I would make them a cake. Not the sort of thing I usually do but I was up for the challenge! Six sponge cakes later, along with an abundance of butter icing (the remains of which were lovingly licked off the whisks by Megan and Freya!) and I have the result sitting in my fridge awaiting demolition tomorrow afternoon!!

Here is a sneak preview for all of you that will and won't be getting to taste it! Not professional but definitely not a bad attempt I hope they will be pleased with it.

Just hope we can transport it ok and that it makes it to Abingdon in one piece!

So here's to sunshine and no showers for tomorrow afternoon.

Happy 40th Mike & Viv.

xxx

Getting Published!

As I thought it's going to be difficult to find a publisher for my book, however, after a lovely chat with James today he has enlightened me to the world of self publishing. So this looks like it may well be the way to go, I'm just going to wait for James to send me some more information and will go from there.

At the moment it looks like I'm getting my apron back on, getting baking and taking more photos! So plenty more photos coming and if you're lucky and are friends that live close by then plenty more tasters too!

Photos!

So here we are. Photos of the recipes I have worked on so far.

Number 1 Chocolate Brownies, delicious and a favourite

amongst many of my friends and family, and a sure fire sell

out on Cake Crumbly day but I'll tell you about that another time!

Next, Chocolate marshmallow crispy cakes, Freya's favourite and she always loves to help in the

kitchen when these are being made.

Chocolate and Raspberry Roulade, absolutely

delicious and very moreish! Good for when you

have friends around for dinner.

Finally something without chocolate,

Baked Strawberry Cheesecake, even Megan liked

this one without the strawberries!?!

And that's all I'm showing you so far, although I have now progressed further. I'm even lucky enough, thanks to my friend Keely, to be able to speak to a publisher on Tuesday for some advice!

More news soon!

xx

Chocolate Chunk Cookies

Mmm! Nothing better than trialling the recipes even if you have made them many times before! I made fresh chocolate chunk cookies for the girls to have warm before bed last night, just had to try a couple myself to make sure they were up to standard. Delicious, big chunks of milk and plain chocolate, good job I was off to the gym to work it all off!

Have been busy taking photos of all the cakes I have been making so you'll be able to have a look even if you can't taste them yourselves very soon.

xx

So far so good!

After much help from my hubby on writing up recipes 1, 2 and 3 he has deserted me! Well gone to play golf with his friends anyway! So I have tackled recipe four by myself and actually I have to say its looking good!

Recipes so far are chocolate brownies, chocolate marshmallow crispy cakes, chocolate and raspberry roulade, (Hmm! do I see a pattern forming?)and baked strawberry cheesecake (Maybe not then!) That's 4 down and another 56ish to go, along with things like descriptions, introductions etc!

If anyone who knows me would like to give me some input or a possible quote for any recipe that would be lovely!

Off I go then to write up recipe number 5, what do you think this one will be?

xx

So who am I?

Hmm! Now there’s a question. Basically I am a married full time mum to two gorgeous girls, Megan and Freya and I work part time as a teaching assistant in their primary school. Yippee! I now have 6½ weeks off work with them as it’s the start of the summer holidays.

I live in Oxfordshire and have the luxury of parents who live in Devon where we can holiday by the beach. I enjoy doing exercise classes at the gym which counteracts my love of chocolate and delicious desserts! (Hence the book subject!) Baking is my therapy which I love to do to relax and need no excuse for. I also love to shop given the time as do most of us girls, including Megan my eldest, who keeps badgering me for a girly shopping day which I know will be expensive!

The Time Has Come!

About 4 months ago I rashly decided that I would like to write my own recipe book!

Many of my friends and colleagues are always praising me on my baking and asking me for copies of recipes only to come back saying it doesn't taste like mine. So I thought that I would do something for myself and write my own recipe book to see if I can help others make cakes and desserts like mine.

I have spent the time since then working out a selection of cake recipes that I would like to include in my book. Whether they are ones that I have used for many years or ones that I have since come up with. I have been trialling these recipes and asking family and friends for feedback and now feel it is time to put my plan into action! My husband is enjoying the tasting but not enjoying his expanding waistline!

Now I need to decide what I need to present to publishers, so am going to be spending the up and coming weeks mocking up my book before I start the hard slog of trying to find myself a publisher. If there is anyone out there who is a publisher and fancies giving my book a chance I would love to hear from you! Obviously there are many, many cook books out there but I feel I have something a little bit different to offer.

Time to start my first draft so wish me luck and I'll update you soon.

Lisa x