MARMALADE

Marmalade: an exciting challenge and a wonderful result.  Never attempted it before as it seemed all too complicated but first time at making Marmalade was an absolute success, I am not sure as to the reason for my success as I didn’t even cook it with the little bag of pips. (Those were tossed into the bin unintentionally by my husband)   I sliced the oranges, lemons and grapefruit and set it aside in the water to stand overnight.  It stood for more than just overnight in the water as I had to get to the shop to buy the Methylated spirits for the pectin check of the marmalade.  So I’m thinking that maybe it’s because the sliced citrus stood for so long in the water that it drew a good amount of pectin out or that I just had a healthy bunch of oranges and lemons!

Needless to say the Marmalade turned out beautiful not only in taste but consistency and colour.

I am planning on making some more Marmalade this winter before all the citrus fruit is finished and then throwing a “Spring Fair” where I will sell tea cosies, marmalade, crochet cushion covers and more. 

Tried any new things lately?

When it comes to baking and cooking, I am always keen to try out a new recipe.  One of the things I have always considered baking but never tried was croissants.  They just looked too complicated and yeast was involved.  I think the thing with yeast is that you must be patient and need to wait for the dough to rise adequately.  I made the croissants and must say, I am impressed, and success it was!  Don’t think you can whip them up in a jiffy like scones, oh no, they need lots of resting and rolling time.

                            

I have started another tea cosy; I might just enter this one into a competition being run in the “Ideas” magazine.  Twenty Five finalists win entries into the magazine, hampers valued at "whatever" and the overall winner wins a trip away to a resort in Mozambique.  I would far rather have the money so that I could choose my destination but then I am not banking on winning.  As I have mentioned before, I am making the tea cosies for fun and if I can sell a few, great.  I do not want to crush the joy of it by it becoming another job!

For the competition, I am required to take photos of the craft I am doing.  They also want to see a photo of me busy doing it.  That one is still coming.

Cheesecake

 I quite love baked Cheesecake!  The thought of Cheesecake used to sound awful to me as did cream cheese icing for carrot cakes.  I have over the years come to enjoy the sweet tangy taste of Cheesecake and the lovely kiss, cream cheese icing gives to a carrot cake.  I do not make carrot cake often as it is not a favourite with everyone.  I guess it has to do with the fact that there are vegetables in the cake and a "cheesy" icing.

I found this Cheesecake recipe in one of my Ideas Magazines, it jumped out at me and thus the decision to bake it today. Strawberries are not in season at the moment and as I asked my husband to pop into the shop, I got a punnet of Blackberries instead.  The label reads "deliciously tasty and sweet"... they are anything but sweet even with icing sugar sprinkled on them.

I am very please with the result of the Cheesecake however there are just two things I need to change.
Firstly I need a deeper pie dish and secondly, I have to find strawberries or a can of sweetened apricots as a substitute.

Life's Simple Pleasures

Some of my favourites are crumpets, french toast and scones.  In fact, we have scones for breakfast every Saturday morning, it's a tradition I just cannot break. My children don't even need to ask what is for breakfast on a Saturday morning, they know what they can look forward to already.  Sometimes I vary the scone recipe, I have even made lavender scones.  We set the table all pretty, lay out the place mats, put the jams on the table and most importantly, the cream.  We enjoy the scones either with filter coffee or tea(that's for when we are out of filter coffee).  French toast is also a family favourite, it is so versatile as it can be enjoyed with tomato sauce on, syrup, sprinkled cinnamon and sugar, honey, grated cheese or strips of bacon... everyone eats it the way they like it.  I enjoy a savoury one first with tomato sauce on, if I can manage to fit in another, I will put syrup on my second slice. Now that you are feeling all hungry, why not go beat up some eggs and whip up a slice or two of delicious french toast.                                                                                                                                                                      

Why it is called "french toast", I have read, has nothing to do with the French but it most certainly does sound better than saying "egg bread for lunch" though doesn't it.

Creatively Cooking

Cooking on a budget has led to some interesting and creative meals that ordinarily we'd not even attempt, as thinking out of the box would not have even be required like this evening.  I threw some chicken portions (these frozen packets of chicken portions are the cheapest to buy) into the oven, when cooked removed the meat from the bones - the result a juicy and tasty chicken.  Now when the budget is not so tight, one would resort to those beautiful deboned chicken portions, chop them up raw and add them to the fried onions, green peppers and mushrooms, (that’s if you are making chicken ala king)and possibly throw in a special 'chicken ala king packet mix'. The result in this case is generally a dry, non juicy chicken!!  This evening, to make the meal go further, (possibly to put half away in the freezer for a chicken pie another night) I added frozen peas, scratched around in my fridge and found the leftover coleslaw mix, (no mayonnaise in yet) added that and wow, what an amazing chicken ala king.  Now let me add that when you use the wonderful deboned, skinned portions, there is no left over brine from cooking the chicken as with the chicken portions.  This brine is the crème de la crème of this meal, the finger licking good end result!  Now please don't take me wrong, if you prefer to use the deboned, skinned portions, don't feel guilty, I too used these nifty, quick to throw together meal deals! So go ahead use whatever you like, it's just when the budget is limited, creativity need not be!

I have another interesting story I would like to share with you too, it’s my ‘end of the month pilchard special’!

As I have previously mentioned, creativity need not be lacking (well at least with me where cooking is concerned as this has always been a passion for me anyway, so relax if you can’t conjure up the same excitement as me on this) when the budget is tight or let me rather say limited.  Last week, the day before pay day, my freezer was bare, but in my cupboard I had one last tin of pilchards staring at me.  Now one would think ok, fish cakes, uh no – No potatoes to add, no eggs to bind!  So creativity out of the hat I really had to pull to feed my family.  So what else did I have, I had pasta – no rice, I had half a cabbage in the fridge and some carrots.  So I stir fried the cabbage and carrots and finally added the pilchards, (the ones in a tomato sauce) a couple of herbs and spices and served this on the pasta. 

It was so enjoyable that this ‘end of the month pilchard special’ will definitely be on our menu during the month as well!