Yule 2015

Last Tuesday was Yule (22nd December this year) and I had a chocolate Yule log again. In previous years I've bought one from Sainsbury's. Last year I decided to make my own. It was fun but this year I decided to buy one again, lol. Since some years the Sainsbury's log has been nicer than others, I tried Tesco's Belgian chocolate log this time. I liked it but the cake was a bit dry. Here's a picture:

                              

Hallowe'en/Samhain 2015

For Hallowe'en/Samhain last weekend (Saturday 31st October) I made my usual fave drink Demon's Blood. I also made some potato salad using a recipe from the book The Kitchen Witch by Soraya. The recipe was for rosemary and garlic but rosemary has a strong taste, so I decided to make chives and garlic instead. It came out nice. I had it with some buffet type food, crisps and dip, onion rings and chicken satays etc.

In my Madron post I wrote that I wasn't sure whether to make gingerbread or not. In the end I made gingerbread skeletons using a recipe from Closer magazine. You just make gingerbread men and then use icing to draw on them. I didn't have writing icing so mine weren't as neat, lol. I made 3 gingerbread skeletons and 4 round gingerbread biscuits. They were quite nice as well. I usually use the recipe from the Tesco Light Brown Soft Sugar packet when I make gingerbread for Madron or Lammas  but it made a change to use a different recipe.

Here are a couple of pictures of the food:

Potato salad

Madron 2015

Sorry I'm late posting this; I had computer problems and had to get a new computer. :)

For Madron/the Autumn Equinox on 23rd September I made a gingerbread cake. It was similar to the one I made last year which you can see here: https://livingseasonal.blogspot.com/2014/09/madron.html

I got the recipe from the website Will Cook For Smiles: https://www.willcookforsmiles.com/2014/11/gingerbread-cake.html

The topping was cream cheese, whipped topping like Cool Whip, mild molasses (treacle) and brown sugar but I don't think we have Cool Whip here and I couldn't seem to find a good equivalent, so I used Betty Crocker's cream cheese icing again, like I did for last year's cake. It's easier as well! lol. I have made a cream cheese frosting before when I made James Martin's Frosted white chocolate cake for Easter 2013. The frosting was made with Philadelphia cream cheese, butter and icing sugar. It was quite nice once you got used to it, I think it was quite a strong taste. Here's the recipe if you want to check it out: https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/frosted-white-chocolate-easter-cake *


Anyway here are a couple of pictures of my gingerbread cake:

As the icing was being spread on.

Beach Photos

Last Friday I went to Worthing Beach. We've had a lot of rain here lately but it was sunny for a bit that day and since I've hardly been to the beach this summer and summer is almost over, I decided to go. I took some pictures and thought it would be nice to share a few here. :)

Hope you like the pics and that you had a good summer. :)

Lammas 2015

Last weekend it was Lammas (Saturday 1st August). Last year I made a Cornish pasty for lunch and gingerbread later. This year I just decided to go with the gingerbread. Maybe I'll make a Cornish pasty  again next year or a loaf (a traditional way of celebrating). To see last year's Cornish pasty (or Cornish style pasty technically!) and gingerbread click on the Lammas link. :)

Here is a picture of the gingerbread. I put icing and sprinkles on the top and the icing got a bit messy around the edges! lol. I made traditional gingerbread men and also two round circles with what was left of the dough. It was too dry and kept crumbling, so I lost some of it but never mind!

 Hope that everyone had a good Lammas and that you're enjoying the rest of summer. :)

Litha 2015

Last weekend I celebrated Litha/the Summer Solstice (Sunday 21st June) by making lemonade and having it with some ice cream with crushed Digestive biscuits on top.

The lemonade is what I refer to as "Hello Kitty lemonade" since the recipe is from a Hello Kitty book! lol. I also had ice cream with crumbled biscuits last year (click the Litha link above for details). This year I had Mackie's and Cornish ice cream and also some chocolate sauce. It was nice. :)

Here's a pic:

Wishing everyone a happy summer! :)

Cake Batter Fudge

The other week I made some cake batter fudge. I first made it over a year ago and I wasn't too impressed with it at the time, lol. But I decided to have a go at it again and I liked it better this time. I didn't have any sprinkles last time but I did this time, so that helped! I used a recipe I found on Pintrest that is from this site: http://bakedfromabox.blogspot.ca/2012/07/cake-batter-fudge-10-minute-recipe.html

It's very simple, you just mix it together and microwave it. The recipe uses yellow cake mix. I'm not sure if we have that in the UK. The nearest I can find is vanilla, so I used a basic vanilla cake mix. I liked the fudge, it's good once you get used to the slightly odd texture of the cake mix. Here's a picture:

I'd probably make this again since it came out better than the first time. It's good if you want something sweet that's quick to make. It does have to chill in the fridge for a while though and in my opinion it tastes better when it's been out of the fridge for a couple of hours or so because it's had time to properly set. If you'd prefer to eat it straight away (once you take it out of the fridge) you can though! lol. I think I'll try more microwave recipes in the future.