Kibibi and more

Vintage china

2012-02-18T13:39:00.001Z

I've been to the auction this week as I needed to stock up my etsy shop. My usual competition for china wasn't there so I came home with quite a lot.

Sometimes it's sad to see peoples belongings, collected over a lifetime, relegated to a tray at an auction sale. On the other hand I imagine elegant dining and tea parties using beautiful china ..... Ayr is much more glamorous than it appears to be on the surface!

And it comes in all different shapes and sizes - Some pieces have obviously been lovingly used , others are so pristine I imagine they have only been admired through the doors of some equally fancy display cabinet. It's a good job I don't have one of those as this would be my tendancy! ...... I could see myself getting seriously obsessed with collecting some of these beautiful things.

So here's a sample of some of the vintage china that is temporarily staying at my house.

This one is so perfect, I can't imagine it's ever been let out of the display cupboard.

Lovingly used shabby chic look!

Doesn't get more elegant than this .....

Or this!

And these teeny tiny coffee cups are so cute.

Chocolate chip and vanilla marble cake

2011-11-10T14:09:00.000Z

Did I say already, I really love doing the weekly bake challenge, it's nice to be told what to do for a change and not have to make ALL the decisions. Thank you Weekly Bake-off.

Tray-bakes are not new to me I make them a lot, they are really handy for feeding lots of kids or kids over a few days. I don't generally buy biscuits or cakes .... only in emergencies! or the 25p pack of reduced chocolate digestives I bought last week! so the kids need something to put in their packed lunch and something for after school. sometimes they even have some after diner. Now you may raise your eyebrows at 3 pieces of cake a day, but if you are aware of the phenomenal amount of sugar in the average child's diet - 3 pieces of cake is a drop in the ocean - I don't buy cereal so my kids don't start the day with cardboard covered in sugar. Any way - I digress!

Back to tray-bakes, heres the recipe. In my Mary berry baking bible it's page 251.

225g butter
225g caster sugar
275g self raising flour
2 level tsp baking powder
4 large eggs
2 tablespoons milk
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 level Tblsp cocoa powder
2 Tblsp hot water
50g plain chocolate chips

Pre heat the oven to 180C, grease and line a 30x23cm baking tin.

Measure all the ingredients except the cocoa, hot water and choco chips into a bowl and beat until combined.

Spoon half the mixture into the prepared tin, dotting the spoonfuls apart.

In a small bowl blend the cocoa powder and hot water to a smooth paste and add to the remaining mixture along with the chocolate chips. Spread in between the plain cake to fill the gaps.

Bake in a preheated oven until the cake has risen and is firm. leave to cool in the tin.

To decorate, separately melt 50g of white and 50g dark chocolate (39%) drizzle over the top once the cake is cool

and here it is nicely cut up on a plate

Now you may or may not be saying ...thats a nicely risen cake ... and I was thinking that myself :) Many of Mary berry's cakes are made using the method described above ie, everything in a bowl and whisk. I was taught the long version, beat butter, sugar .... gradually add eggs to prevent curdling. I have noticed that many of the cakes in the weekly challenge have been well risen ... not mine! and so this time I did it the traditional way and my cake is much lighter and fluffy. It's obviously the way that works for me. Having said all that, the kids didn't notice and i'm sure no one else will.

It was a very tasty cake!

Royal icing

2011-11-09T21:08:00.000Z

last week we made our fruit cake this week we made the royal icing for it. The teacher doesn't believe in electric whisks, he reckons not enough air is incorporated and that the clash of metal (bowl to electric whisk) will give the icing a metalic flavour .... blah blah .... at home, i'll be doing it with a whisk! ..... an electric one

This is the recipe we used.

100g icing sugar,
3 egg whites
10ml glycerine
1tsp lemon juice

Beat the egg whites and sugar until smooth. Add the glyerine and lemon juice and continue beating until thickened. You'll know when it's thick enough when you pipe a line between two open fingers and the unsupported line doesn't break.

An hour's hand whisking is not a pleasant experience ....It was painful, one poor girl still hadn't got hers to thicken by the end of the lesson.

We stored the icing in a plastic container, covering it with 2 layers of cling film and a lid. Once you've excluded all the air and the icing will keep for a couple of weeks.

We kept some back for experimenting with colouring. It's best to use the pastes as water based colours will water it down and it'll loose some of that hard earned stiffness. Christmas Red didn't seem to work very well. Some in the group had tried to colour larger amounts of icing and got hot pink! which just got hotter the more colour they put in....

My fruit cake has been resting at home becoming nice and moist in it's wrapping. To add to the flavour and moistness we have generously brushed the outside with brandy. Next week I'll need to take it to the lesson as we'll be covering it with marzipan. Until then ..... happy baking.x

Weekly bake off - Apple and cinnamon cake.

2011-10-30T20:50:00.000Z

Sunday is a good day for baking and that was my plan, that was my first mistake .... making a plan. I forgot about the clock thing and was up at 5.30! Once daylight arrived and and everyone else emerged, it was looking like a lovely day so I spent the morning gardening. I came in at lunchtime to drop hubby at the station and get going with my cake. hubby dropped and cooking apples purchased i headed home to do the cake. son was waiting on the doorstep to turn me back round ... there was a problem with the train and back I went to drive hubby to glasgow airport - 2 hours later I was able to finally get going on the cake, at this stage I was quite tired but there was no turning back, my brood had been promised Mary Berry's apple and cinnamon cake. You can get the recipe on Amy's blog (and while you're there take a look at what the weekly bake off is all about).

Heres the first layer with the grated apple,

All in the tin!

And in the oven .... I put it in the oven and then remembered I was supposed to sprinkle nuts and sugar.....oopsy

The finished cake, partially cooled because middle daughter couldn't wait

and sliced

It does taste very yummy, but then you can't really go wrong with apple and cinnamon, it's such a perfect combination.

Strathaven Ethical fair.

2011-10-30T20:09:00.000Z

On saturday I took my fair trade goodies to a fair at Strathaven Academy. It was very poorly attended so I didn't sell much ..... which is always a bit disappointing! . But, I love going to their events as they are very supportive of fair trade and don't charge a stall fee .... so even if you don't sell anything it's essentially a great opportunity to sit and chat with other fair traders and the lovely ladies who run the event.

As usual I spent nearly as much as I earned and came away with some wrapping paper from Neema fair trade and ethical gifts. This paper is gorgeous and i'm not sure if I'll be able to cut it up for wrapping. I may have to save it for crafting.

A beautiful handmade basket from Rwanda

and a tea towel from India. I love this pattern. We have a picture in a similar style, clay painting from Gujerat.

These traders will be at the Kyle Academy Fair trade christmas fair, so if you also like what you see, I'll be putting out some more information soon.

Weekly bake off callenge

2011-10-18T16:32:00.001+01:00

I recently came accross Amy's weekly bake off challenge and decided to give it ago, I like the idea of baking with people sharing disasters, triumphs and tips.

The challenge aims to bake its way through all the recipes in mary berrys 100 bakes and cakes. I don't have that book, but do have her Baking Bible hopefully that will suffice! I've arrived on the scene a bit late, they are already on bake 9 luckily, still 91 to go!

So the bake this week is Raspberry meringue roulade, page 360 in my book. I had similar problems to Amy, the roulade seemed to be buring with the temperatures and times given. I turned to oven to bottom heat only and that seemed to help. It would be useful if cookery books said something about the different oven option!

Here it is out of the oven

and turned on it's back

and the finished roulade

As it was all puffing up in the oven, I did wonder how I was going to roll it, but with a little poking and prodding, it came out ok in the end.

Like amy, I used frozen raspberry's and combined with the whipping cream, the inside is a bit sloppy. Next time I think I'll try whipped double cream and fresh raspberry's.

As an update to a previous blog on the GBBO technical challenges .... the pork pies were not a huge success, the pastry was really difficult and did't come out of the tin easily. So ...... full of holes I didn't get to do the jelly thing. Next time! However, it's not all bad, they did taste absolutely delicious.

Great British bake off and the technical challenges

2011-10-15T22:12:00.000+01:00

Love it or not bothered about it the Great british bake off has a lot of people talking, baking and blogging! I personally have found it fab and really enjoy trying out some of the technical challenges. It's not always possible to fit some of these tricky bakes into a busy family life. They can be quite time consuming and things I wouldn't normally bother with, but the programme has the effect of encouraging you to indulge yourself and find the time to take on the challenges.

I've successfully made lemon tart before and also the odd Focaccia ..... but I can see from GBBO that the Foccaia in particular could be so much nicer and so will try that again. So thats another reason I like the programme, us amateurs love to try something new, but we also like to try and do it better. We don't mind if it doesn't turn out exactly as the professionals say it should, but we've tried, are always appreciated for our effort and highly praised on the occasion it all goes to plan.

Here are a few of my technical challenges

The first one I tried was battenburg. I didn't use the recipe from the show but from Mary Berry's book

Next I tried macaroons - This effort, I am sad to say was a complete disaster. My daughter was very taken by the very pretty ones made by all the contestants and so had been particuarly keen for me to try this. We scrapped them off the baking parchment, filled them with cream and they tasted delicious,

I'm not sure what I did wrong but that recipe is on the back burner for another day.

I then tried Iced buns .....OMG, they were so delicious and are definately on the family favourites list.

Next I tried Sachertorte

The cake and it's shape were the business but the icing didn't quite come right. Since watching Mary's masterclass ... perhaps it was overheated. I also made the mistake of using cooking 70% dark chocolate, which made the icing a wee bit bitter .... thats important because otherwise my chief cake eaters leave it all to me and thats not good!

Going to try Pork pies tomorrow, so watch this space.

Cake decoration week 5

2011-10-12T19:35:00.002+01:00

After all that moaning, what a fun evening I had this week

We started with a basic sponge recipe (given in a previous post) adding 30g of cocoa powder to make chocolate cake. Whilst that was in the oven we made Ganache to ice it with.

This is the recipe

250g chocolate, chopped into small pieces
100 ml cream
50g butter.

Heat the cream and butter until boiling, pour over the chopped chocolate and leave for 10 minutes until melted. Maybe i stirred too soon, but I found my chocolate hadn't quite melted so I needed to heat it slightly to melt the remainder. The problem with this is that as you stir, air bubbles get trapped . more about that later.

While we were waiting for all this to cool, we had a quick tutorial in making piping bags from greaseprrof paper.

Make a square of greaseproof paper by folding the bottom corner over to the opposite edge discarding the excess

Tear diagonally to make two triangles

With the straight edge along the top, draw one of the top corners down to the bottom point turning as you bring it down so that the underside is facing up - thats a difficult action to describe, but I hope you can see what I mean from the picture

now bring the other corner down to the bottom point by wrapping it around the back

I've turned it upside down here to get a better view. lastly you'll need to secure the edges by folding them over towards the inside of the bag. The tutor suggests stappling!.

These are useful for small amounts of icing or drizzling.

So ...... cake out of the oven and cooled, we poured over the chocolate lettting it drip down and over the sides. At this stage it's best to leave the cake on it's cooling rack so that the excess ganache can drip down onto the tray or greaseproof paper. Using our piping bags and melted chocolate we decorated our cakes. I went for the cobweb look! Is there a name for that technique? using white chocolate and starting in the centre, I made a spiral and using a toothpick dragged the point from the middle to the outside.

It's not clear from the photo, but those bubbles were still there ..... easily removed by popping with toothpick!

Here are some of the others.

Next week, tempering chocolate and chocolate modelling.

Cake decoration 3 and 4!

2011-10-04T17:57:00.003+01:00

Oh dear, having decided to blog about my classes I'm not being very consistant about keeping it up. To tell the truth I'm a bit disapointed! It's not been motivating me to blog! We are doing a lot of cake making and not an awful lot of cake decorating.

So week 3 we made buttercream icing ... again, the purpose being to practice piping. We'd been advised to buy a nozzle and set I'd got one from Amazon, paying what I though was a very reasonable £28 for 56 pieces. Bindu, who you may remember was standing next to me. had the very same set, purchased for her by her sister the las time she visited Inida .... for £4!...... made mental note to self that next time I'm there I should remember cake decorating supplies amounsgt all the other lovely things I could fill my suticase with!

Week 4 we made a a victoria sponge so we could water ice it! We also practiced suger coating fruit. This involved bushing fruit with egg white and then dusting with caster sugar. Very tricky trying to get the right amount of egg wash on and stop it going all gloopy. It didn't help that we each had about 10 pieces of fruit to cover and one station to do it at, so with a queue of 10 people behind you, looking over your shoulder waiting for their turn is not good for concentration or achieving perfection!

It was a bit of an all round disaster, Sponge, separeted by jam, covered in icing, and then sugared fruit ... not even my kids would eat it, I'm afraid that it ended up in the bin. We love sugar in our house but this was just overkill! It did look quite pretty though.

Now that doesn't look to bad does it, nice and colourful. take a look at the close up!

See what I mean about all that sugary gloopiness! Now, I'm sure if I practiced lots, I could get the right consistency and make it look very attractive ....... but fruit covered in sugar doesn't do it for me.... I like my fruit and my sugar straight! I liken it to putting sultanas in a curry!

Off now to class no.5 ...... feeling a wee bit unhappy that i'll be missing the great british bake off final.

Action plan for Ayr - A fair trade town

2011-09-29T13:10:00.001+01:00

What an amazing morning I had on tuesday. Ayr fairtrade partnership are putting together an action plan in support of the renewal of their fairtrade town status. As part of that Process we are consulting with as many people as possible in our community.

Our first meeting was hosted by the Kyle Academy fair trade co-op and was attended by 8 pupils from S2 and S3 as well as representatives from local primaries school and church groups.

I help the teacher organise the Kyle FT group. It's run as an extra curricular activity on Mondays and fridays so I know that children are great when it comes to brainstorming. They have an amazing capacity to think outside the box, the ideas just flow, they are not restrained by what others may think ...... They'll explore the impossible, impractical outrageous even the ridiculous. Us adults are left to do the boring bit .... thinking about resources and praccticalities!

So, between brainstorming, summing up, tea, juice, biscuits - all fairtrade of course and more brainstorming, these are the ideas we came up with.

Everyone recognised the need to strengthen links between secondary andprimary schools. klye pupils offered to go to other schools to talk about how to set up a fair trade group and run tuck shops and stalls

All schools need to encourage parents to get involved and include fair trade in all areas of the curriculum. kyle pupils felt that attendance has to be voluntary and the lessons made more interesting. One of their ideas is to do an interactive FT quiz, a bit like who wants to be a millionaire where the audience votes - apparently most schools have the facilities to do this sort of thing now.

The children like the Youtube videos and think it's much better to use these resources than be lectured at ..... Unless it's a real producer or someone who has visited a producer and can speak from personal experience.

It was also felt that schools need to do more to investigate FT uniforms and sports equipment as most kids think fairtrade is just about chocolate.

Businesses

Golf club houses – should be visited to persuade them to use and sell FT. Local courses first, then further afield. Research needed – costs?
Produce laminated copy of Fairtrade town certificate for display by local shops and businesses (Troon do this)
Find out which local businesses use FT
Encourage local businesses to expand their range of FT products
Talk to local nursing and care homes about using FT
Talk to supermarkets about FT – more products
Encourage all businesses to swap to FT, including sports retailers

Fairtrade Fortnight focus

Invite producer to come to Ayr

Social Media

Use Ayr FT Partnership website; Glow website; Wordpress to promote FT
Use Twitter, Hotmail, Slide Shure, Facebook
Create Ayr FT Facebook group
Use Wikispaces
Use local press – make links with local papers

Campaigning

Contact local MPs & MSPsabout their involvement and commitment

Olympics 2012 – write topoliticians, sports teams etc about using FT equipment; ensuring FT in venuesetc

Community

Mini FT Olympics – as many events as possible for children and adults. People pay to enter and receive FT t-shirt
Trip to Ghana, for example, to see how FT has helped people there. School pupils, business people could go and then tell others from first hand experience.
School twinning with school in developing country could expand to include community twinning
Promoting FT in youth groups, Scouts etc (are there badges for FT, citizenship?)
Competitions to find out what people know about FT
Asking people what FT means to them
Encouraging swapping normal purchases for FT

So thats it, We now need to follow this up and see how we can carry forward some of these great ideas. If you want to get involved in this process send me a message or contact us via the Ayr Fairtrade partnership website.

Class 2 update

2011-09-28T10:39:00.000+01:00

Found some time yesterday and used it to practice making flowers.

We'd been given the following recipe

2 tsp gelatine
1-1/2 tblsp water
2 tsp glucose syrup
250 g icing sugar

I initially found that this amount of liquid didn't incorporate all the icing sugar, I added a little more water and then found it too sticky, more icing sugar and lots of kneading and it came right in the end. I asked about this at last nights lesson and am told to just keep kneading even if all the icing sugar isn't incorporated. It dries out really quickly, so if you are trying this, make sure you wrap the fondant in cling film until you are ready to use it.

I rolled the fondant out and made these using the daisy and rose cutters.

They looked ok and the kids say they look as good as the shop bought ones .... praise indeed!

I think I should probably be rolling them out thinner. Any experts out there, would appreciate your advice.

Cake decoration class 2

2011-09-25T08:33:00.000+01:00

I'm a bit behind with the class posts. We are already approaching week 4!

On the agenda this week were cupcakes and fondant icing. We were given a standard recipe, as follows

150g butter
150g caster sugar
150g self raising flour
2 eggs
1tsp vanilla essence
2 tblsp milk

This is my preferred recipe, I've tried many from the new cupcake bakery books that have appeared in recent years. Not sure why there is a need to continually reinvent a recipe that has worked for decades! and I don't know about you but I find them very wet! They rise up and then flatten, running over the top of the case. I'm maybe doing something wrong but have reverted to the traditional recipe which always works for me.. If you have any tips, I'd love to know what I'm doing wrong with these new recipes.

Whilst our cakes were in the oven we made buttercream. I made 2 batches, 1 chocolate and 1 coloured pink, so I could practice piping the 2 colours together. This is no great british bake off! there are no kitchen aids, not even and electric whisk ... we are having to beat everything by hand. I've pondered on the idea of taking my own one in, but there don't appear to be any sockets anywhere!

Piping done and we moved on to decoration. I was hoping we would be making fondant icing and then using it to make flowers. Unfortunately the teacher had made it himself and gave a short demonstration before we were sent off to practice. The icing all got snapped up as did the cutters leaving nothing to play with. I should learn to complain! Towards the end of the session, I managed to get hold of some leftovers and cut out a few, which you'll see sitting on the finished product ......

Nothing to be impressed with, but there's a lesson learned, I need to take my own equipment.

Making fondant flowers looks fairly simple, (yes I know ....heading for a fall!) when there is time to practice this week, I'll update with a few pictures ....again, any tips gratefully received!

For this weeks lesson I stood next to Bindu, she had wanted to do the advanced decorating class but it didn't run so she's doing this one instead. She makes cakes for family and friends and is lovely. She also does cooking lessons from home, I'm assuming Indian but need to clarify!

Next week we'll be piping and have been asked to bring our own nozzles, I've bought a set of wilton nozzles on amazon and will be taking them along.

I'm done winging about the school bus!

2011-09-22T10:04:00.000+01:00

You may have heard me over the last few days winging on about the cost of sending children to School.

My three children go to the secondary school in our catchment area, but because it is under 3 miles from our house I need to pay for their bus fares. This has always felt unfair to me. The zoning arrangements in South Ayrshire council mean that they can't go to the more local school, less than a walkable mile way!.

You may say, make them walk .... 4 miles a day carrying a 5 -6KG rucksack! ...... There must be a health and safety regulation covering that! There are not many adults would do it. Cycle ... no way, it's a busy road. I would be a nervous wreck. So they go on the bus and we find the money.

I needed to get my son a new photo card this week and was alerted to the fact that, now he is 16 he is no longer entitled to a reduced fare and that he would need to pay the full adult fair. Once I'd worked my way round all the different discount and ticketing minefields ....mega riders, discount cards, weekly, monthly, daily variations, young scot cards bla bla, with and without various discount card, I'll be paying 30% more to get him to school. An extra £10 a month doesn't seem such a lot, but on top of the £60, it sent me into a frenzy.

I've calmed down a tad now and know that there is nothing I can do, everyone is suffering nationally, If South Ayrshire subsidises buses for schools they would have to cut somewhere else.

In talking to various people I realised that my problems pale into insignificance compared to someone on benefit. I had wrongly assumed that if you are on benefit your child's fares are paid. but no .... how on earth is someone on benefit with 3 children supposed to find £60 a month! a scenario definitely designed to demotivate poorer children from going to school at all! especially when they get there, they see other children booking up for the ski trip, the london trip, the Arran activity trip etc etc,

Frankly, it breaks my heart, so no more winging from me.

Bunting, Tanzanian style

2011-09-21T21:52:00.000+01:00

I sold some bunting this week. Its been a while, I'm not sure why as it really is very lovely.

Besides the fact that bunting is both beautiful and useful, Moyo developed their version as a way of using up scraps of fabric.

They still do that to a certain extent but in reality they wanted every triangle back and front to be special so now both scraps and new kanga are cut. Each triangle has to be cut out separately. Because the weave on Kanga is very loose it's difficult to get a perfect triangle. As a final touch they added some small masai type beads and sparkly sequins to give them extra pazazz.

The bunting is sold in a netting bag, originally conceived as a gift bag, I've found with the sets that I own, that they are really useful for keeping the bunting folded and flat so that they don't get all creased.

London, vintage, markets and food

2011-09-16T17:18:00.001+01:00

During the summer we went to London for a few weeks house swapping with a lovely family in East dulwich. While we were enjoying the delights of city life with our 3 children, they were by the seaside with their 3 small children.

The kids enjoyed visiting friends and family .... especially the lovely food we were dished up! There was also the sightseeing and shopping, but for different reasons we've all enjoyed the markets.

We went to Greenwich market

Food, crafts and clever people making lovely and unusual things. If I lived close I would try to sell Moyo things ....I'm sure they would go down a storm.

East dulwich has lots of lovely shops to linger in and a market on saturday morning. Lovely cake, bread, savoury bakes and even a hog roast ... a big hit with our son.

Having moved only a few year ago back from Tanzania to a small corner of Scotland, I hadn't quite realised, just how popular vintage is at the moment. I'm looking at things with a new light on my weekly visits to our local auction! and have slowly been building up an assortment of goodies ....can't keep them all myself, so I'm hoping Etsy will come to my rescue.

Last week I bought a tray of things which included a lovely carving/wall hanging of an indian goddess - that will be for my husbands birthday. It also included a vintage glass salt and pepper set, immediately commandeered by my mum and these these lovely cups and Saucers.

Columbia road and Brick lane markets were the highlight of my trip, we enjoyed

The world food

The cake and biscuits

smoothies ..... on a production line!

and more vintage

We also enjoyed this wall of greenery in trafalgar square!

We'll be looking for another house swap in London again next year. We don't have tickets, but still, during the olympics would be nice.

My lovely children

2011-09-15T22:31:00.000+01:00

Inspired by and with the technical help from Karen over at all about the boys I've found these lovely pictures of my children and decorated them accordingly!

Sensitive, musical, funny, friendly, theatrical, confident

Rader, foodie, harry potter fanatic, Starkid, Empathetic, Curious, Kind

Determined, Cook, writer, whit, loving, gamer, scientist

Kibibi bag

2011-09-08T13:01:00.001+01:00

I asked Moyo to send me a photo of one of their employees making a Kibibi bag. It arrived today so thought I would do a quick blog about it. In case you were wondering, the bag wasn't inspired by me! the common name is just a co-incidence.

Recycled plastic bags are threaded through the sacks, shaped, and then stitched into handbags lined and trimmed with brightly coloured African print kitenge. Such a lot of work goes into them, they are totally gorgeous and unique to Moyo. We have a few in stock at the moment - a snip at £30.

My gardening heritage

2011-09-07T14:28:00.000+01:00

Whilst on holiday in London recently I decided to visit the house I was bought up in from the age of 5 ....... post war council housing estate in south east london. I was curious to see if the garden my dad had built was still there. It was and here are a few pictures. It was a mamoth construction so i hadn't really expected that the new owners would be able to dig it up even if they had the inclination to try. The lady who lives there now was really welcoming and so excited to let us round the back for a look around.

Above is a picture of the front garden, it had a pond with a bridge over, wishing well by the side, filled in now, there was once a waterfall. How 70's is that!

Out to the back, a large paved area leading down to more crazy paving with raised beds, another pond with waterfall, wishing well, ending at the back ....... the nerve centre of all operations, the shed.

It looks tiny from this view, covered in Ivy ..... but after 40 ish years it was all still there and sturdy as a rock.... they don't buildem like that these days!

My mum tells me that when they dicided to take on the task, they ordered as much crazy paving as they could afford, it was smaller than they had expected and not being able to afford more, they collected what ever they could from where ever they could. If my mum saw some on the street, she'd pop it in the pram and bring it home!. Granite squares were used to build the raised beds ...... My dad had noticed that contractors were digging up an old cobbled street in east london, a word in their ear and the cobbles were his. Take a look at the garden and be amazed at how many trips he made to get those cobbles home on his moterbike through the balckwall tunnel! As he'd had half the street, the contractors insisted he take the street name, carved into a block of granite and now cemented into one of the raised bed walls. Unfortunately I didn't realise that while I was there and so missed the opportunity to photograph that bit of history .... next time.

Cake decoration, back to basics

2011-09-07T13:30:00.001+01:00

When I started making cake for people, I'd thought I'd be doing cupcakes, tray bakes deserts and the like, but everyone I speak to invariably asks me if I do celebration cakes. Yes I can do celebration cakes is my answer, but nothing fancy. I don't know why I say that as i'm a good cake maker and have made some great cakes resulting in lots praise. But am I a confident cake decorator? - no, so I thought right, go and learn properly and build confidence.

This week I signed up for a 12 week evening class in cake decoration at Ayr college. In Scotland we can apply for an ILA grant of £200 per year and luckily that has paid for the course. Once the 12 weeks is up I may move on to advanced cake decoration- lets see how I get on.

There were 18 of us in the class with ages ranging from 16 to 60 ish, men and women. Over the weeks I hope to get around and find out why people are there. My companion this week was hoping that by the end of the course she'll be able to make and decorate her daughters wedding cake in May..... how lovely is that!

We started with the basics, butter icing which we flavoured, coloured and piped on to sheets of greaseproof paper. We then refilled and repiped to perfect the toppings on our imaginary cupcakes. I've topped a few cupcakes in my time, but wasn't initially that impressed with my offering. My nozzle was too small. Still, by the fourth go I figured out how to work with the smaller nozzle and was happy with the result. Normally at home I wouldn't mess around like that, get the job done and not waste time or buttercream ..... so on the one hand it was great to be practising but then devastating to have to throw it all away at the end of the lesson!. Some who were driving managed to pack their icing away for use at home. I had a cold wet rainy walk home so it wasn't possible.

Next week we'll make cupcakes and fondant icing, It was really nice to spend time with other bakers and get back to basics. Can't wait for next week. I wonder if they'll mind me taking my camera.

Homebake Heaven

2011-07-07T20:00:00.000+01:00

I have always cooked, particuarly cake! but since having children I have been particuarly keen, wanting them to learn and appreciate that the homemade way is not only the healthiest but the yummiest way. I've been lucky enough to be able to stay at home with them. This has been partly due to circumstance - a husband who works in overseas development and frequently travels, but also, the desire to do so.

Now as they get older and become more independent ... the pressure is on to get a job!. The trouble is I've got used to staying at home, doing my own thing - and want to continue to do so. I'm trying, therefore to make a go of selling the thing that I am best at - cake! I don't say this often about myself, but I am good at baking and I hope others will think so to.

I took the Hygiene course and had environmental heath round to check me out. That was the easy bit, now I need to do the marketing ...my weakness! I may be good at making cakes but am hopeless at selling myself. I've used one of the free templates to set up a website www.homebakeheaven.co.uk/
and made a facebook page Homebake Heaven, Ayr Take a look and let me know what you think. Any constructive criticism and help appreciated!

I pretty much like all cake! .... but am rather partial to cheesecake ... of the baked variety! How about you?

Summer fair Tanzanian style

2011-06-24T22:17:00.002+01:00

I was recently sorting through my photo stock and came accross these of Moyo in Tanzania.

They were taken whilst we were exhibiting at the bi annual Makutano fair. It's a showcase for tanzanian artists and crafters with NGO's and small businesses attending from all parts of Tanzania and Zanzibar.

It's not so hot in Tanzania, but very humid, If I'm ever complaining about being cold in Scotland I try to check myself and remember that humid heat.

thats me looking very hot!

Ayeasha, the very talented designer at Moyo. They are working on a website of their own, but if you want to see just how talented she is, take a look at her designs on our website Kibibi designs completely original, contemporary African design you won't find anywhere else!

As with most of these events we had a tiny space to fit in all our products it was quite a squash, barely any room for the customers to walk around.

We were able to display it all though. Now when I attend fairs, I only have a table and have to leave most of my home decor, cushions etc at home.

Happy days, I miss them!

pesto

2011-06-22T20:45:00.001+01:00

We love homemade pesto sauce in our house ..... eating it with pasta, on toast, in sandwiches with cheese or chicken, it's truly yummy and nothing like the shop bought variety.

During times we have lived in warmer climes we've been able to grow huge amounts and have experienced plants growing up to a metre high. I've tried cultivating it here in Scotland but even in the greenhouse, have never quite been able to produce enough for even one helping.

I'm reduced to buying it from the supermarket .... besides being expensive, especially in winter, I do worry about the amount of chemicals that may have gone into its production.

I feel bad throwing away the plant once I've picked the leaves so have tried to keep it going by leaving it on the window cill. That's never worked for me. It hasn't grown and usually results in a soggy mess, covered in those little flies you sometimes get on houseplants! Recently though, I have been repoting and growing on in the greenhouse. So far it's working well. I pick off all the taller stems with big leaves so I'm just left with the shorter stems and tiny leaves. I then repot into larger containers using some new compost.

I bought these at Morrisons yesterday where they are selling for 50p ...... if you buy basil regularly you'll know thats a bargain!

I've taken off the big leaves and the taller stems and will repot them to grow on.

I have 6 pots regrowing now

To bulk out the basil I use mint from the garden, I think this is apple mint but I'm sure any type will do.

This is the recipe we use

60g Fresh basil leaves
20g mint leaves
2 garlic cloves
2 tbsp pine nuts
100ml extra virgin olive oil
7 tbsp freshly grated parmesan
Salt to taste

Place all the ingredients in a food processor and liquidise. if you like your pesto crunchy, you could hold back a few pine nuts, chop them roughly and add at the end.

and Hey pesto! .... sorry I couldn't resist!

kids doing fairtrade

2011-06-17T11:14:00.002+01:00

For a few months now I have been volunteering at my childrens school, helping the teacher run a lunch time fairtrade group. We spent the first year working on gaining fairtrade status for our school. You can of course still do fair trade without getting the status, but it was a good process to go through as it gave the group a focus to get us started and warm us up for future activities.

Now that our application has been submitted we are looking forward and making plans for the next school year. At our weekly meetings the ideas flow freely. We have a long list of exciting options and next week we'll have a planning meeting to narrow them down and decide which ones we want to move forward with ....

I'm not sure there are enough days in the school year to cope with it all. One of the best ideas has been to do an interactive assembly around fairtrade, something along the lines of who wants to be a millionaire where the audience votes...... a message i think, to us adults that our usual assembly offerings are boring and old fashioned! Along side this they are working on a fairtrade section for the school website and developing lesson plans for the geography teacher to use with first years.

In writing this blog I've been trying to think about why they are so enthusiastic in their participation. It goes without saying that they are all fully on board with the principles of fair trade... being acutely aware of the unfairness of it all. But it's more than that. Participating in the fairtrade group allows them to put into practice a whole array of things they are learning at school. We have the computer expert who is doing the webpage, the mental maths expert who loves to do the tuck shop, the artist who is making our banner, the ideas person who is listened to. The group allows them all to do what they are good at and be listened to by their piers. They run the group, chair it and take the minutes .... they are in charge, they are awesome and they love it!

One of their favourite activities is to face the public. We run a Fair trade friday tuck shop and sell tea coffee and snacks at parents evenings and other school events. These are always the most popular activities and the kids are queuing up to volunteer. So that I don't have to 'choose' someone, we have a points system (inspired by another FT school, Stonelaw high) whereby points are given for the least popular activities and the students with the most points get to do the things they want. ..... not sure quite how this will work at the moment, the problem being that they all attend every activity and so all have the same number of points!

I'm told that exciting things are being planned for fairtrade, ethics and the curriculum so hopefully there will be updates on this topic.

Exams are over.

2011-06-07T11:32:00.000+01:00

My oldest child and favorite son! or so he likes to call himself (my only son, ) went back to school today after over a month of exam leave. The school seems to have prepared them well and he's a bit of a bright spark so we had none of the stressed filled days and late night panics which were common in my teenage years. Now its all over we are getting the inevitable queries about what his reward will be for academic success? Everyone else, I am informed, gets one ...... with amounts ranging from £10 to £100 or an expensive piece of electronic equipment. He had various suggestions for me to consider.

It's a dilemma, I want all my children to take responsibility for their own success and have pride in what they have achieved. I explain they are doing it for themselves not me. I am just so darn proud of him and he is proud of himself ...... yeh yeh yeh, whatever, is the reply i get and it still doesn't stop him from chancing his arm.

I tell him there is no money in my purse and that there is also the question of fairness to consider. They watch each other like hawks with an acute sense of fairness, possessed only by siblings. Everyone needs to be treated the same, given the same rewards, punishments and praise. The perfect mother needs to be a statistical genius with the memory of an elephant! I am neither a statistical genius or an elephant and so need to keep clear of rewards, because you can bet your life someone is taking notes.

Ever the chancer, his next move was to tell me his girlfriend had a reward. Knowing the mother I expressed disbelief and questioned further ... he confessed that it was a Mars bar! Ok, thats fine, we settled on a snickers bar.

I'm my fathers daughter, I wish!

2011-05-31T10:55:00.000+01:00

I really like old furniture especially when it's made from wood. I especially like oak in the form of the simple low key pieces. The type that generally comes covered in a nasty dark varnish. I recently bought a piece at our local auction and have been reworking it - I learnt how to do this at my fathers side. He was a serial furniture restorer /upcycler! and collector of bric a brac .... regularly attending the antique markets and auction rooms in Greenwich. The best treasures though, came from Club Row market in Londons east end. That's what he called it, but some of you may know it as Brick lane. He'd be there at 5am to get his bargains and be back in time for breakfast with a car full of old furniture, fresh beigals (not bagels ...but don't get me started on that!), prawns for us and Jellied eels for himself.

He had the tools to deal with any job and the most amazing shed, a DIY paradise. In his time he restored boats, built pony traps, miniature gypsy caravans, kitchens! and this, one of my most treasured possessions. He used to fire it up when i was a child. Now it's mine, I just polish (occasionally!) and admire.

Bits and pieces collected from all over, recycled, reclaimed and one of every size! apologies for the poor copy, it's an old photo, pre-digital so I had to scan the original.

Anyway, here's what I'm working on. I'm not sure what it's original purpose was, sewing box maybe. Once the dark varnish is off it'll have that lovely honey coloured shine of old oak and the new owner will decide what they want it to be.

I've done quite a good job on it but I've a lot to live up to, so not quite my fathers daughter but I'm working on it!

George Bush waved to me

2011-05-25T18:37:00.002+01:00

Obamas visit and talk of the 'beast' has reminded me of the time George Bush visited Tanzania. During 2007 I had been working with Moyo and we were invited to the rather Grand Kilimanjaro Kempinski hotel to participate in a fair, organised, so that the entourage could buy souveniers. From a selling point of view it was a bit of a dead loss.... the numerous staff being stuck in meetings most of the day. Barbara bush did come by through and bought some Moyo cushions, similar to these. She was very nice and bought one for each of her daughters.

At the end of the day we packed up and set off for home. Walking with Ellie from Wonder Welders, we found ourselves on a street corner, progress blocked by police ....the cavalcade was approaching - not just one but three beasts!. As they approached the corner, caught up in the excitement, we both began to wave excitedly .... being the only two people on the corner Bush looked at us directly in the eye, smiled and waved back. The moment passed, the man and his beast were gone. Leaving Ellie and I hysterical with laughter at the ridiculousness of getting caught up in the moment and waving so enthusiastically to a man who's politics we didn't like or respect at all. Welcome to the UK Mr Obama, it's great to have you here.

muffins

2011-05-25T12:12:00.000+01:00

I'm not a big honey fan but we had a couple of jars in the cupboard that were no longer as runny as they should be and so had been discarded by the kids as no longer easy to deal with. After trying to melt it out and wondering how many dangerous chemicals I was releasing by doing so, I cut the top off and scraped it out. I made cinnamon and honey muffins - I'm telling you this as I wanted to do a first photo upload

getting started

2011-05-25T11:55:00.000+01:00

I hurt my back recently, not seriously, but enough for me to need to take it easy for a few weeks. I had been generally abusing it by heavy digging and awkward positions up a ladder - more about my DIY atempts in a later blog! . But looking on the bright side - the pain has forced me on to the sofa with a hot water bottle and lots of time to play with the computer. I've always wanted to blog as a way of engaging in conversation in a bit more depth than is possible on twitter or facebook, so please please please talk to me. Thats it first one done and dusted, see you later!