Oh dear, I’m not sure out of which magazine I snipped this recipe…but I have changed it considerably, so…
50g bread/cake crumbs (ideally not the shop-bought kind)
100g caster sugar (at most)
100-150g crushed almonds (ideally crush whole ones in a blender, for extra almondy flavour)
2tsp baking powder
200ml olive oil (or sunflower)
4 large eggs
Zest of orange
Zest of lemon
The original recipe had an order of events to follow, but really, just tip everything into a bowl and stir briskly. Use a silicon baking dish ( no need to grease, and cakes never stick). Bake at 190 degrees C for 35 minutes or so (clean skewer test).
Cool for a bit, then prick the cake surface all over with a skewer. Make a syrup by mixing the juice of a lemon and an orange with a few spoonfuls of marmalade, warm it up (as it might be, in the microwave), and pour it over the cake.
It’s a moist cake that you could also serve warm as a pudding.
Wednesday, 22 July 2009
Wednesday, 15 July 2009
Vignette at the swings
Muslin Mummy gently swings and sings to her little daughter, who chortles cheerily, waving at the six-year-old hogging a baby swing next-door.
Badly-behaved Six-Year-Old: Dad, Da-a-a-d, Dad, come push me on these baby swings! Now!
Grumpy Dad: Who you talking to? Youse too big for them baby swings. I’m not fackin swingin you, you can do it your ownself.
Badly-behaved Six-Year-Old: I’m kicking off my shoes. They’re off now. Look! Swing me. Da-a-a-d.
Grumpy Dad (now grumpily pushing): Say please. Say thank you, cantya.
Muslin Mummy (to pointing Hungry Mouth): Yes, those are pretty pink shoes. Soon you’ll be walking and then you can have some shoes too.
Hungry Mouth: Hah! (chortle)
Grumpy Dad (to Muslin Mummy): Yes, and as soon as she turns sixteen she can put em on and walk out the house and never come back. (to Badly-behaved Six-Year-Old): Gerroff! Put em back on. Come back ere!
Badly-behaved Six-Year-Old: Dad, Da-a-a-d, Dad, come push me on these baby swings! Now!
Grumpy Dad: Who you talking to? Youse too big for them baby swings. I’m not fackin swingin you, you can do it your ownself.
Badly-behaved Six-Year-Old: I’m kicking off my shoes. They’re off now. Look! Swing me. Da-a-a-d.
Grumpy Dad (now grumpily pushing): Say please. Say thank you, cantya.
Muslin Mummy (to pointing Hungry Mouth): Yes, those are pretty pink shoes. Soon you’ll be walking and then you can have some shoes too.
Hungry Mouth: Hah! (chortle)
Grumpy Dad (to Muslin Mummy): Yes, and as soon as she turns sixteen she can put em on and walk out the house and never come back. (to Badly-behaved Six-Year-Old): Gerroff! Put em back on. Come back ere!
Muslin Mummy’s Easy Custard Shortcake
Shortbread, shortcake, who knows the difference? Actually my Grannie’s recipe. Though it was mainly my mum who made it for us, until we could make it ourselves. Takes about ten minutes mixing and measuring, then stick it in the oven for 30 minutes, then wait for it to cool…probably an hour from thinking of shortcake to eating said shortcake, provided you have:
6 oz self-raising flour (you could use plain)
1 tsp baking powder
6 oz margarine or butter (not the spreadable sort)
2 or 3 oz icing sugar (no other kind of sugar)
2 oz custard powder (nothing else will do, and this is what makes this shortcake different from the Scottish sort)
Whizz butter all by itself till it turns white (who knows why?), then add all dry ingredients. Now use a fork to hand mix till it looks like breadcrumbs. Press firmly into greased tin with your fingers. Bake at 175 degrees C (gas mark 4) for 25 to 30 minutes. Remove and carefully mark out portions with sharp knife, but do not remove from tin until cool.
You could dip portions into melted chocolate and then chill, if desired.
Eat!
6 oz self-raising flour (you could use plain)
1 tsp baking powder
6 oz margarine or butter (not the spreadable sort)
2 or 3 oz icing sugar (no other kind of sugar)
2 oz custard powder (nothing else will do, and this is what makes this shortcake different from the Scottish sort)
Whizz butter all by itself till it turns white (who knows why?), then add all dry ingredients. Now use a fork to hand mix till it looks like breadcrumbs. Press firmly into greased tin with your fingers. Bake at 175 degrees C (gas mark 4) for 25 to 30 minutes. Remove and carefully mark out portions with sharp knife, but do not remove from tin until cool.
You could dip portions into melted chocolate and then chill, if desired.
Eat!
Pretty pink shoes
The Hungry Mouth has developed a shoe fetish earlier than expected. It started innocently enough with socks and toes. She likes the cheery patterns on the grippy-soled socks her Grannie sent her, patting her feet with her socks and then pleasedly ‘helping’ Mummy put them on. Possibly with the help of ‘this little piggy…’, she learned ‘toes’, and can point at any family member’s toes, whether encased in shoes or socks or bare. Then she found some carelessly un-put-away parental flipflops, and had to learn not to chew them…instead she would awkwardly carry a flipflop, half-crawling, half-shuffling, and place them on top of our feet. Now that she’s walking, she routinely gets them out of the cupboard and brings them helpfully to one of us in the morning.
Yes, indeed, now that she’s walking… That throwaway phrase was what kickstarted this whole shoe thing. From the moment she scrambled to her tiny feet and zoomed her new pushalong trolley off down the garden path, we knew our days of not buying kiddy shoes were numbered (and that number was zero). Clearly, those grippy-soled socks were not going to cut the mustard when it came to mud, concrete, knobbly paths etc. We didn’t want those little piggies stubbed.
So, off we went forthwith to purchase baby’s first shoes. ‘Cruisers’, they’re termed, according to Clarks, because she still crawls sometimes. But the sinisterly shaped foot-measurer caused unprecedented, unpredicted distress and total lack of cooperation. Yowls and flailing ensued. Loud yowls. Whole-body flails. We scrapped the measuring idea and asked the nice lady simply to offer a shoe to our daughter. This went much better. She instantly chose a brightly coloured shoe, far too large. With cunning distraction we substituted another style and size. Sadly, according to the nice lady, nothing fitted correctly. So off we crept, shoeless, with a soggy-cheeked, limp toddler, banished back to the Land of Socks.
Our next attempt met with success. Measuring still called for many a tear and a comforting breastfeed…the commemorative Polaroid shows a sad and drooping tiny child gazing anywhere but at her new shoes. But once we’d left the shop with sparkling new feet, the Fetish began. Admittedly, it’s focused on only one pair. But she’d like to wear them day and night. First thing in the morning, she excavates them from her footwear bag, and brings them to us, sits down hopefully, and waves her shoes until we put them on to her feet. Then she’s up and off. Pretty pink Manolos next, no doubt.
Yes, indeed, now that she’s walking… That throwaway phrase was what kickstarted this whole shoe thing. From the moment she scrambled to her tiny feet and zoomed her new pushalong trolley off down the garden path, we knew our days of not buying kiddy shoes were numbered (and that number was zero). Clearly, those grippy-soled socks were not going to cut the mustard when it came to mud, concrete, knobbly paths etc. We didn’t want those little piggies stubbed.
So, off we went forthwith to purchase baby’s first shoes. ‘Cruisers’, they’re termed, according to Clarks, because she still crawls sometimes. But the sinisterly shaped foot-measurer caused unprecedented, unpredicted distress and total lack of cooperation. Yowls and flailing ensued. Loud yowls. Whole-body flails. We scrapped the measuring idea and asked the nice lady simply to offer a shoe to our daughter. This went much better. She instantly chose a brightly coloured shoe, far too large. With cunning distraction we substituted another style and size. Sadly, according to the nice lady, nothing fitted correctly. So off we crept, shoeless, with a soggy-cheeked, limp toddler, banished back to the Land of Socks.
Our next attempt met with success. Measuring still called for many a tear and a comforting breastfeed…the commemorative Polaroid shows a sad and drooping tiny child gazing anywhere but at her new shoes. But once we’d left the shop with sparkling new feet, the Fetish began. Admittedly, it’s focused on only one pair. But she’d like to wear them day and night. First thing in the morning, she excavates them from her footwear bag, and brings them to us, sits down hopefully, and waves her shoes until we put them on to her feet. Then she’s up and off. Pretty pink Manolos next, no doubt.
Tuesday, 7 July 2009
Homemade building blocks
OK, they probably can only be built into a tower. But that's tricky enough for a young toddler, and is actually one of those development goals your health visitor will be watching for.
Use any sturdy screw-lid container or pot, so long as it has a flat top and bottom, obviously, otherwise they won't be stackable. If the pot is transparent, fill with something visually interesting. Beads, buttons, ribbons, a Duplo man, a roll of pretty paper, a dried flower…whatever you have. If the contents are potentially fatal to your twisty-fingered child, stick the lid on forever by squirting glue into the threads before screwing it on tight. Another good idea is to part-fill with water, and add a squeeze of Fairy liquid. Shaking it will cause chortle-inducing froth that slowly settles. Or add food colouring and glitter, for a snow-globe effect. For opaque containers, part-fill with objects that rattle, such as dried chickpeas, rice, and so on. (The Body Shop body butter/scrub containers are good for these, and come in unusual colours, and stack well too.) You could put fun stickers on the lids.
Use any sturdy screw-lid container or pot, so long as it has a flat top and bottom, obviously, otherwise they won't be stackable. If the pot is transparent, fill with something visually interesting. Beads, buttons, ribbons, a Duplo man, a roll of pretty paper, a dried flower…whatever you have. If the contents are potentially fatal to your twisty-fingered child, stick the lid on forever by squirting glue into the threads before screwing it on tight. Another good idea is to part-fill with water, and add a squeeze of Fairy liquid. Shaking it will cause chortle-inducing froth that slowly settles. Or add food colouring and glitter, for a snow-globe effect. For opaque containers, part-fill with objects that rattle, such as dried chickpeas, rice, and so on. (The Body Shop body butter/scrub containers are good for these, and come in unusual colours, and stack well too.) You could put fun stickers on the lids.
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