While Matt and I don’t normally do Burns’ night, I saw Vegetarian Haggis on special in the supermarket and thought – why not?!
Author: lauren (Page 2 of 25)
It’s been a while, hasn’t it?
I have been making pancakes for breakfast now for months, initially just on weekend mornings after a long run, but now I make them for weekday mornings too.
This week I needed to mix up my weekday lunches. Instead of relying on Tuna or Chicken to bulk out my salad, I tried adding more veggies and a little feta cheese.
This Courgette (or Zucchini, if you prefer) and Mushroom quinoa salad is quick to make, and is great as both a cold or warm salad – which is useful when the weather jumps between snow and warm spring days regularly. Although I loved both, it was particularly great when warm as the feta cheese melts.
It’s January and a new year, and we all must be getting pretty bored of the “we should be healthier than we were last year” articles. However for the first time ever, I feel like I was pretty healthy last year and it wasn’t that hard. This year is all about continuation and balance.
Last year for the first time I made my own Christmas cake flavoured with chocolate and cherries. It was meant to be a little different, but to be honest it wasn’t that different from a traditional Christmas Fruit Cake.
This year I am trying again to go a little on to the unusual side. In this case by using Indian spice blend Garam Masala instead of just the usual Christmas spice collection: cinnamon, ginger, cloves and all spice.
I am following this recipe for Garam Masala Christmas Cake.
Today I have a bit of a treat for you – CoffeeMuffin’s first guest post! This guest post is from Simone Gribble author of Grrr. Cupcake. (cupcakes for men). As you may know I hate the craze for cupcakes with huge amounts of frosting. Thankfully now Simone has people like me covered with her latest ebook.
The cupcake craze has been raging since the 1990s and hit Edinburgh a few years ago with the opening of a few specialist cupcake bakeries in the city centre. I’ve been baking my own cakes ever since I was a little girl and resisted additive and preservative rich store bought cakes. My icing skills weren’t as good though so when these speciality shops opened, professing to sell handmade cupcakes, I thought I should give them a try, for research purposes, you know.
I bought two. One was a banana caramel cupcake with two inches of icing and a dried banana chip on top. It sure looked pretty. Imagine my disgust when I bit into the cake only to find that the banana and caramel flavour existed only in the icing – the cupcake itself was pretty bland. The second cupcake, whose flavours I don’t even remember, fared no better.
I’ve just started a sewing class, you know to learn how to use a sewing machine and make a skirt. It’s a Sunday night class, because I can’t make the ones during the week, and it turns out these things take concentration.
Sewing in a straight line takes focus and sewing a curve is worse. By the time I leave with a skirt full of unpicking to do… it’s blowing a gale outside, it’s dark and raining. I want something to eat but I know we have nothing in the cupboards.
Then I get into the house, it’s bright and warm, my husband asks me as I enter the front door if I want a hot drink, and suddenly I relax. I know what I am going to make.
Although I am not immune to a little Christmas excitement in late October – I am already thinking about how to ice my Christmas Cake this year and if I can hand make Christmas Decorations to give out as gifts. I feel it is still to early for those heavy Christmas spices, ginger, allspice, cloves etc and you need to ease yourself in gently with some autumnal cinnamon first!
I had to admit I was pretty surprised to see that I have never blogged a Cauliflower Curry before.
I have taken pictures before, I have folders and folders of them on my Mac, but I guess it just seems too simple to post. Let’s face it, Cauliflower is never going to be the sexiest vegetable.
However if you have a huge cauliflower and a husband that dislikes Cauliflower cheese, then maybe this recipe will also be helpful for you too!
