Back at the start of November I woke up one morning with a sudden urge for a winter flavoured coffee. No one else was up and it was cold outside, so as I waited for the coffee to brew I thought about how I could get that taste I wanted.
The taste I wanted was the taste to wake up to on a cold snowy morning, when the Christmas tree is up, something warm and spicy.
I have put off making cheesecake for years, reading so many recipes but worrying about cracks or soggy bases or that I wouldn’t be able to get it from the tin. But when it came down to it, it was actually super simple.
Over the weekend I have been over indulging on scones, scones, more scones and the occasional pumpkin cookie. Despite all this I have not disgusted myself quite enough to stop from it altogether. An emergency plan is needed, I need to trick my own brain!
I need something that tastes scrumptious, autumnal, indulgent and cosy, but doesn’t do so by piling on the calories. With this goal and left over pumpkin puree from yesterday tonight I made and tasted my first Pumpkin Spiced Latte.
A week last Tuesday I got Nigella’s latest recipe book Kitchen: Recipes from the heart of the home.
You can win a copy of this recipe book by filling in the How do you use food blogs questionnaire. More details on the questionnaire and giveaway here.
It’s been ages since I got a new recipe book so I was really excited. I eagerly flipped through the pages, until I got to this recipe, then I stopped.
The September 2010 Daring Cooks’ challenge was hosted by John of Eat4Fun. John chose to challenge The Daring Cooks to learn about food preservation, mainly in the form of canning and freezing. He challenged everyone to make a recipe and preserve it. John’s source for food preservation information was from The National Center for Home Food Preservation.
The summer months are just long enough to forget how difficult it can be to get decent lighting for photos. I do most of my baking in the evening, by the time its finished it’s too dark to take good shots. I ended up taking these photos in the morning sunshine, but somehow it’s not the same.
Or I could have called this Tuna once-microwaved-once-baked potato, but it doesn’t have quite the same ring to it!
When I was a child I used to hate sweet and sour sauces with a passion, I never even told my parents (I am not sure why – if I had I’m sure they wouldn’t have made me eat it!) I don’t even really remember what it was, but I think it was the taste of pineapple.
There is an inherent difference between men and women, or at least between Matt and I. I want fuss and time and effort, Matt wants anything for the easy life – the less stress version.
This is most obvious by looking at what I made each of us for a birthday cake. I wanted a stunning three layer brightly coloured cake, lots of time, lots of effort, lots of stress and essentially (in this case) disappointment.
Matt however wanted… nothing, he wouldn’t be drawn on what he wanted at all as his birthday cake this year. For a while I thought about making a lemon torte, but I have tried umpteen different recipes and none of them worked, none of them were really even tasty. In the end I gave in to what he wanted which was the least stress option.
One of the problems when you are first trying a new slow cooker recipe is the anticipation. You have picked from hundreds of recipes online or in cook books, you have hunted out all the ingredients, entrusted them to the large pot and placed the lid on top. Yet at this point you have to wait, often for 8 hours.
If I am in the unfortunate position to be home while I am slow cooking, I’ll spend too much time peering through the condensation.
An ongoing internal dialogue as to whether I should lift up the lid, only for a moment, just to check.
They say lifting the lid on a slow cooker adds 30 minutes to the cooking time, I say lifting the lid on a slow-cooker is tantamount to opening Christmas presents and resealing before putting them back under the tree.
It ruins the surprise.
When you do eventually lift the lid off it can all to easily be a disappointment after being built up for so long. This recipe, however, will be no disappointment.
Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén
