Easter Biscuits

Hope everyone had a great Easter! :) I celebrated on Easter Sunday (20th April) by making some biscuits and I got 3 eggs, Quality Street, Cadbury Buttons and Hello Kitty, lol. In my post  on Oestara I mentioned that I wanted to make something for Easter and was thinking of a cake but then I've had quite a lot of cakes lately, so I thought I might make something else for a change, like biscuits.  In the end I went for the biscuits and they were nice. :)

I based them on a recipe from The Co-Op magazine. I can't find the exact recipe online but it was similar to this one: http://www.co-operativefood.co.uk/food-and-drink/recipes/Easter-biscuits-recipe/

Update 15/4/19: That page is now gone but you can find a similar recipe here: https://www.centralengland.coop/food/recipes/desserts/easter-biscuits

The biscuits were bunny shaped but I just used round cutters, lol. Then I decorated some of them with icing that I made up and the others with left over buttercream frosting from Moshi Monster cakes that my mum used to make a trifle. I also put sugar strands on top of some and more of the red, green and white sprinkles I used for the vanilla roll cake at Christmas on the rest, varying the combinations. I used the recipe on the back of the icing sugar packet for the normal icing (white in the pic).

They were a bit thicker than other biscuits I've had but I liked them. :) I've got a few biscuit/cookie recipes saved on my Pinterest board, so I plan to make more in the future. I pin way too many recipes though and there's not enough time to make them all! lol.

Oestara

It was Oestara recently and I celebrated by making some fairy cakes. Oestara (also spelt Ostara) is one of the sabbats, it's the Spring Equinox and happens around 21st March in the northern hemisphere. (In the southern hemisphere it's reversed, so they have their Autumnal Equinox around this time).

It was a precursor to the Christian festival of Easter, its name comes from the Anglo-Saxon goddess Ostara (also known as Eostar/Eostre/Oestara). She is the goddess of the dawn and fertility and her symbols are the egg and the hare (both of which are associated with the modern Easter). The Spring Equinox is when the days and nights are of equal length, and from then on the days continue to get lighter and the nights shorter until Litha (Midsummer/ the Summer Solstice) which is around 21st June, when the days gradually get shorter again. (If you live in the southern hemisphere, just reverse it). :) The Persephone and Demeter Greek myth is also related to this time of year.

Now spring is coming and the world is waking up again. You can see the signs with the flowers coming out, trees blossoming and lambs being born.


Oestara was on the 20th this year. I made the fairy cakes (like cupcakes) and put Cadbury Mini Eggs on top!

Sorry the pic is sideways! lol

It's just a basic fairy cake recipe that I got from my mum. :) Here's the recipe:

White Hot Chocolate

Last month I made White Hot Chocolate using this recipe: http://whipperberry.com/white-hot-chocolate-recipe/

I liked it but it can taste a bit overpowering, maybe because of the cream, chocolate and vanilla all mixed together. Also I might have put too much vanilla in. It was nice to have for a change but I wouldn't drink it all the time. It will be spring officially this week when we have the Spring Equinox on 20th March* (I'll do a post on Oestara, the sabbat, later) and while the days are warmer it's still quite chilly at night, so I'd recommend trying the White Hot Chocolate if you feel like a hot drink. :)

Here's a picture of mine. I can't remember exactly why it came out a bit yellow but I think I might have heated it for too long. I didn't use a slow cooker because I don't have one, I used a saucepan instead. Maybe it tastes best if you use a slow cooker but it's still worth trying if you don't have one.

*In the northern hemisphere, in the southern hemisphere it's reversed so it will be their autumnal equinox.

Hove Park in Winter

I've been longer posting this because I wasn't able to get to the park over much of the winter, but then I was able to go again last month and take some pictures. So as part of the Hove Park project, here are a couple of photos taken during winter:

Coca-Cola Chocolate Cake

I made a Coca-Cola Chocolate Cake the other day. I'd wanted to make it for ages. I first heard about a 7UP Cake (I think I read that Jada Pinkett Smith makes it) and thought it sounded interesting, then I heard about the Coke one and thought I would probably like it more because I like Coke and chocolate cake best! lol. I haven't made the 7UP one yet but I will later on.

I used this recipe: http://naturegirl7.squidoo.com/coca-cola-chocolate-cake

There are actually a few recipes on there, I made the Original, Official one. I also came across another recipe (I'd originally saved the first recipe but lost it, so I went looking and found the second one but then I found the Squidoo one again); it's similar except it doesn't have any marshmallows or vegetable oil. I might try making that one sometime. Here's a link if you'd like an alternative version: http://myblessedlife.net/2013/06/chocolate-cake.html

This cake was very nice. People said you couldn't really taste the Coke in it but I thought I could taste it a bit and it seemed to be a little bit "fizzy" just after I'd made it, lol.

Has anyone made 7Up cake?  What did you think of it?

Imbolg

It was Imbolg (also known as Imbolc and Candlemas) yesterday. It's a Wiccan/pagan sabbat that is celebrated around 2nd February and is also the feast of Bride (or Brighid, pronounced Breed) the Irish Fire Goddess. Imbolg is about 6 weeks after Yule and 6 weeks before the Spring Equinox (Oestara), and is the time when spring is starting to come again. It's still winter, but moving into spring and a time when the Goddess is changing from Crone to Maiden.

I made some pancakes as suggested in The Real Witches' Kitchen book (last year I made pancakes and jelly) and had some Tesco Cloudy Lemonade. (Sparkling drinks like champagne, lemonade and mineral water are a good choice). You can also make your own lemonade, it's fun to make but this time I bought it, lol.

I used this recipe for the pancakes (found it on Pinterest): https://www.inspiredtaste.net/24593/essential-pancake-recipe/

They're American style pancakes (thicker). I liked them but they were a bit too salty for me. Afterwards I realised that I probably got the amount of salt wrong because the recipe used kosher salt and I used table salt! Never mind, lol.

Pancakes

Here are a couple of links about Imbolg:

http://www.thewhitegoddess.co.uk/the_wheel_of_the_year/imbolc.asp

http://www.earthwitchery.com/imbolg.html

Christmas Vanilla Roll Cake

Hope everyone had a nice Christmas! :)

I made a Christmas vanilla roll log for Christmas, using  this recipe: http://www.roxanashomebaking.com/christmas-vanilla-roll-cake-recipe/

It's basically like a Swiss roll, a rolled up cake with buttercream in and similar to the Yule log.

Mine was nice but it was quite dry, so I ate it with Nestle Carnation topping (evaporated milk). The buttercream was nice. I couldn't use the batter bits that were in the recipe because I don't think we have them over here. There are also red and green sprinkles in the recipe but I used Sainsbury's Festive ones, which are red, white and green. Here's a picture of the cake:

One of my Christmas presents was Sam Stern's latest book Sam Stern's Cookery Course (formerly Virgin To Veteran), so I'll be making some recipes from that next year.

Happy New Year! :)