Apple, Blueberry & Ginger Crumble

Crumble Time!

One of my favourite warm puddings is crumble, especially apple varieties. I usually like apple and raspberry but my grandma bought me a punnet of blueberries so i thought id give them a go this time instead, and they were very tasty, and give the crumble this beautiful berry pink colour.

 Ingredients:

For the crumble:
70g flour
40g caster sugar
70g margarine or butter

 35g Muesli

For the filling:
700g cooking apples, peeled, cored and quartered 

1 punnet Blueberries
50g sugar, to sweeten

 1 tablespoon ginger & lemon-grass cordial

1 teaspoon grated ginger

Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F/gas 5.

Peel and core the apples, quarter and cut in to chunks.
Put the apples into a pan with the sugar, cordial and grated giner. Cook over a low heat for 5 minutes and place in a small ovenproof dish. I like to use Pyrex glass dishes, as you get the see the gorgeous colours of the fruit on the sides of the bowl. Now add the blueberries to the apples (or whatever other berries you fancy).
Place the flour and oats in a bowl and mix well. Cut the margarine or butter into small cubes and add this to the oats and flour. Mix with your fingertips until it resembles an even crumb texture. Add the sugar and mix through.
Cover the fruit with the crumble mixture. Bake for approximately 30 minutes until the crumble is golden and the apple hot.

 I used mainly cooking apples, but I added two pink ladies as well as I love the taste of them.

 My favourite part of the crumble (minus the taste of course) is the beautiful colours of the fruit when you use berries. I also like scraping off and eating the sticky berries on the side of the dish once everyone has had their portion.

Finally serve with Vanilla ice cream, custard or cream :) This was the picture before I attacked mine with whipped cream (Because we didn't have ice cream).

Winter Walking

Scotty and I took the ladies a walk in the woods in Manchester.

Not the best idea to wear Doc Martins for muddy dog walking, but they were very waterproof and only needed a little bit of a clean aftwerwards.

The air was pretty chilly, but it added this lovely crisp fresh feeling to the scenery.

This is Ella tryi ng to chase a duck.... need I say more .

And seabear slowly trotting behind, as usual.

We are trying hard to stick to the new year's resolution of walking, and as it gets warmer i'm sure we'll be doing it a lot more.

Minestrone Soup

For my lunch today I made Minestrone soup, which is one of my favourite varieties. I love the tomatoey (yes that is a word) juice with the chunky vegetables and the hint of the smoked bacon.

Minestrone Soup

Ingredients:

3 sticks celery

1 large onion

2 carrots

4 cloves garlic

2-3 tablespoons tomato puree

2-3 tins chopped tomatoes (depends how runny/thick you want your soup)

1 can cannellini beans

1/2 bag spinach

4 large cabbage leaves

2L stock cube (vegetable or chicken)

5-6 rashers smoked bacon

2-3 handfuls of pasta

Fennel Seeds, Chili flakes, smoked paprika (or whatever you like really)

 Fresh basil & coriander.

Cut bacon into strips, and saute in a frying pan with the onions until browned. Chop the celery and carrots into small chunks and add to the pan along with the minced garlic. You can now add your desired herbs and spices etc. Cook until slightly softened. Then add the chopped tomatoes, tomato puree and stock. Bring to boil for ten Min's. Now add the pasta, cabbage and cannellini beans and simmer for 20 minutes. Before serving add the spinach and season to taste.

Serve with warm crusty bread, chopped basil and coriander, and a shaving of Parmesan.

 Perfect for a cold night in, and made better if worn in a one-sie, or is that just me?!

Valentines 'Sweetheart'

 For Valentine's day, I created these two candy 'Sweet hearts' for the shop window display for my parents. We wanted something a bit different from the usual pink and red heart shapes, and came up with this quirky idea.

 These pictues arn't very clear as I took them once they were already in the window!

 This is a very simple DIY as I wasn't planning on making it a DIY, but once you have the supplies and idea, it's easy enough to make.

You will need :

Wreath or wooden/ plastic frame

LOTS OF GLUE STICKS for your glue gun, or super glue.

Variety of Sweets

White paint

Fishing Wire.

 1). I used this wooden wreath as the base for my heart. But you could use any other hollow shaped wreath or wooden frame to make one. With hindsight I would have chosen white as the undercoat, as the red darkened it a little too much, and I think white would look fresher and brighter. So if you are trying this out, spray or paint your base white and leave to dry.

 2) You need a heck of a lot of brightly coloured sweets. We used Lollipops, candy hearts, marshmellows, liquoirce and Quality Street as out main ones, but you can use whatever you like.

 3) Basically use your glue gun to attach the sweets to the wreath! I liked adding lots of greens, blues, red and yellows, as I felt primary colours worked well, and green brightens up the wreath better.

4) Keep checking what your wreath looks like from a distance and make sure that you dont leave any gaps, or have too many of the same colour by each other.

5) Lastly leave to dry and attach clear fishing wire to the top of the wreath, which will enable you to suspend it.

And Voila, one candy sweetheart for your valentine, or to hang on your wall.

Alice in Wonderland exhibition, Liverpool.

 Yesterday I went to Liverpool with some friends to see the 'Alice in wonderland' exhibition in the Tate.

I stopped by at the shopping centre to get my favourite treat - Frozen yoghurt. I had plain yoghurt with Reece's cups, buttons and raspberry's.

 This was a picture form the docs. The weather was awful and I forgot my coat... but I still had a lovely day.

 We stopped for a few sweets from this lovely retro feeling sweet shop.

This is what i chose in the end : Reece's peanut butter cups, Wonka's nerds, and two cherry lollipops.

Nobody wanted their picture taken whilst eating... but I managed to wangle this sneaky one. I love Rachel's newly dyed turquoise hair, it's so cool.

These suspended cakes are adorable! This was in the gallery shop, but it was my favourite part of the exhibition!

It's just so magical and exaggerated, just like the novel itself. The cakes were quite realistic, and looked really yummy. It was hard to take a picture as so many people were standing around, but you can get an idea of it how it looked.

We weren't allowed to take pictures in the exhibition... but I took this one quickly (hence the poor quality) I love the composition. and the way the photographer manages to make the girl appear larger than in reality, just like in the books.

The most impressive display of the day had to be the neon signs on the ground floor. The ceiling was covered in suspended neon signs depicting various words, all in different colours, with the wires hanging loosly beside them. It was so pretty and interesting, and made me inspired to use more light in my own artwork!

Debonding Day

 De-bonding day!!! ( Braces removed)  Thursday I had my braces removed, and boy it feels good.
I had them just over a year and a half, but it feels like forever!

I do have to wear a retainer for three months, and then only at night, but at least I have to freedom to take it out as and when I please which feels sooooo good. Sorry about the cringy pictures, I just was extremely happy! :)
Bring on the lipstick, apples, toffee and sweetcorn.......
(everything I couldnt eat or wear before).

Thumb Print Cookies

Thumb print cookies

I love this variety of biscuit. I really like how the sticky jam centre looks like a jewel, and lets face it, anything with jam in is always a winner.

Gregg's do a really awesome version of this biscuit called 'Jammy Star Biscuits' or as I like to call them 'Jammies!' But they haven't been selling them over the winter months, but hopefully they will re appear this summer. In the meantime this recipe is satisfying my needs.

3/4 pound (3 sticks) butter, at room temperature, 1 cup sugar, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, 3 1/2 cups flour,
1/4 teaspoon salt, Raspberry and/or apricot jam.

Cream together the butter and sugar until they are just combined and then add the vanilla. Sift together the flour and salt. Add the flour mixture to the creamed butter and sugar. Mix until the dough starts to come together. On a floured board, roll together ingredients into a flat disk. Wrap in plastic and chill for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 350 F. (Gas mark 4)
Roll the dough into roughly 1 tablespoon sized balls. Place the balls on grease proof paper and gently (using your thumb) create a well in the centre. Drop 1/4 teaspoon of jam into each well.
Bake for 20 to minutes. Cool and serve.

I always end up adding too many ingredients to my recipes, e.g here, Jam!!