Pudding time

Yesterday my friend Liz hosted a BBQ at her house.  We met Liz and her husband at our ante-natal classes, and we've been hanging out with the rest of our group on Tuesdays since our babies were born.  Well actually thats not quite true, Liz was hanging out with us before her baby was born, her boy was the last of our group so Liz was our tea and coffee girl while we veged on the couch with very little babies.  Anyway, once again I am off track.  Liz's kitchen flooded before their baby was born and so they spent a long time getting the whole bottom floor of their house dried out and fixed, and to celebrate the 'new' house they held a BBQ.  I asked Liz what pudding aka dessert I could bring and she said I could choose, oh the options!

For those of you who know me, you know I love to bake, actually I love cooking in general, but I love love love to bake.  So I spent this week pouring through my cookbooks, canvasing opinions on FaceBook and generally getting my knickers in a twist because I couldn't decide what to make!  In the end I went with three desserts, two of which I've made before and one that Andrew had.  I would have loved to experiment, but a BBQ with people I don't know is not the time to take risks.

The first pudding I made was Chocolate Guinness cake from Cake Days from the Hummingbird Bakery.  I have both their cookbooks and they are well thumbed, the recipes are very very tasty.  This cake is rich, dark and moist, and most of all ridiculously easy.  I may even post the recipe later on in the week!  The most amazing thing to me about this cake is that it only contains cocoa powder, no chocolate!

 This is the outside, it has a cream cheese icing which is is really yum!  I made this cake for my friend Patrick's 30th a couple of weeks ago and it was also a huge hit then!

I'm sorry but after trying a bajillion times to post this photo the right way up, I give up!

The second dessert was for my friend Jo, who can't eat wheat, so no flour.  I'm really enjoying experimenting with cooking gluten free food for her (well cakes and cookies anyway) so I knew she'd love this Pavlova.  Pav as it is more commonly known in NZ (where it was first created!) is our national pudding and everyone has their version.  Most New Zealander's would put kiwi fruit on top or crumble a flake chocolate bar or slice strawberries.  Not me, I love my pav with raspberries, which is what we had.  Essentially a pavlova is whipped egg whites with sugar added, a meringue cake(ish).

The final dessert was profiteroles, and I have to say, I think they may become my dinner party staple.  So so easy!  Andrew made these for me on Mother's Day, and well if he can make them, I certainly can!  On Friday night I made the choux pastry and piped and baked the 'balls'.  On Saturday I filled them with cream and iced them with a classic chocolate icing.  Mmmmm!

PS  My friends bought me the cake stand as a party of my baby shower presents, not your typical present but very loved!  

 

And now post of mine would be complete without some baby photos, this is Chicken in her party frock.  Unfortunately she wasn't as lady-like as a wearer of such a frock should be.  From stealing her boyfriend's toys to scratching the host of the party on the face she did it all and had a great time, coming home with grass stains all over the feet of her frilly bottom tights.

Food glorious food!

About eight weeks ago we started weaning Chicken, that is introducing solid foods.  The NHS here suggests introducing foods at six months but as I've found out, not many people stick to that and will begin between four to six months.  This has changed since I was a baby (1980) because my mum found my baby records and the nurse suggested mashed banana at three months - which might explain why at 6 months I was two pounds heavier than Chicken!!  Anyway, I'm getting side tracked, people say I do that easily, ooohh shiny things!

We (well I, Andrew lets me make these decisions so far) decided to go down the puréed food route and I bought Annabel Karmel's book to give me some ideas and promptly set off to the supermarket to buy half of the fruit and vegetable aisle (not quite but you know...)  First up was apple.  Lets just say that apple wasn't a huge hit, she'll eat it now but its definitely not her favourite.  I think one of the reasons for the screwed up faces was that Chicken didn't quite know what we were doing, but once she did, well things have taken off!

Firstly we tried pears, sweet potatoes and apples mixed with baby porridge.  The porridge was great because it made the food more palatable, sweeter and creamier if you get my drift.  She also occasionally had the baby porridge by itself.  At this stage we were only have one or two meals a day.

A few weeks into this I added mashed banana, peas, carrots, blueberries, and baby fromage frais. all of which she's loved!  The only thing that hasn't gone down well  has been this fancy yoghurt I got from the farmers market as a treat, turns out my kid doesn't like posh food!!!

Now all this home made mush is all well and good at home but when we are out  and about I use pouches like  these and to start with only vegetable dishes.  A pouch will last for two meals, and while it isn't cheap, its not super expensive either, and there are lots of great flavours! (in the scale of things)

A couple of weeks ago I decided that it was time to move to three meals a day, and I have to say, my world seems to revolve around feeding my baby, possibly even more so than when she was a new born.  Back then, all I had to do was whip out a boob, but now I have to cook, serve, clean up (way, way too much cleaning up!) and also breast feed in-between, busy busy!

I have to say though, Chicken loves her food!  She gobbles it all up (bar the fancy schmancy yoghurt) and often squawks for more.  This week we've branched out and I made rice pudding and cauliflower cheese, and tomorrow I'm making cheesy fish pie and fish and sweet potato mash.  The opportunities are endless!  There is only one downside, and I think its the first time I've been sad that my baby is growing up.  I'm sad that I'm not the one feeding her any more, perfectly natural I'm sure but sad nonetheless.  Anyway, talk to me in six months when she's walking, four years when she's going off to school, eighteen years when she's going off to university etc etc, and then I'll be sad that she's growing up!

These photos are from Chicken's first feed, sooo much has changed, she now gobbles up all food!  PS Check out Andrew's facials!

Friday Five - Things I've been doing instead of blogging

Well its been two weeks now since I last blogged, I just seem to be so busy lately, the older she gets (seven months now) the busier I get!  So I've decided to share some of the more exciting things I've been doing.




1.  Pick your own.  We've been to our local Pick Your Own farm twice to pick raspberries.  Raspberries are my favourite berry and these ones were huge!  Its so much more rewarding (and so much cheaper) to pick them yourself too.  Two good things about picking raspberries are that the canes are mostly at standing height and therefore the berries are easy to pick.  The other thing is that they don't (well these ones anyway) have thorns so no scratches or pricks!

2.  Scrapbooking.  I'm going to try and get my A into G (as my dad would say) and post some of my latest layouts because I'm quite proud of them.  I've scrapped my baby shower, Eilidh's birth story, a picture of our god-daughter Emma at our wedding, us at Andrew's work Christmas party two years ago, and us at the Eiffel Tower in Paris.  At the end of each year I go through all our photos and make a list of the layouts I want to do and then cross them off when done.  I try and make sure I scrap older photos and newer ones, otherwise I'll get behind on the old ones.

3.  Cooking.  I've been cooking meals for Chicken.  I've got a post coming tomorrow or Sunday about her food so I won't go into too much detail, but let it be said, that girl likes to eat!!  This weekend I'm going to make spaghetti bolognese, some sort of chicken dish, more rice pudding and a custard for her.

4.  Hanging out with my baby friends.  Usually the girls from my ante-natal group and I meet every Tuesday, but this week we went back to our tutors house for a pool party (the babies paddled and we held them)  and today we tried to go swimming.  I say tried because we got to the pool and it was shut so we went to an overcrowded playground and sat at an overpriced cafe (and didn't buy anything) and fed the kiddies.  My lovely friend Jo and her adorable son George have been driving us around.  Indecently George is Eilidh's boyfriend, she likes her younger men you see (G is three weeks younger than her).

5.  Saying goodbye to a good friend.  My lovely friend Michelle has left London after living her for nine years.  Michelle and I met at high school 15 years ago when we went on a school trip to Barcelona Spain.  We hung out there and then when we got home to NZ.  Michelle and our other friend Jonelle are some of my oldest friends, and I'm really going to miss her.  Eilidh and I went to Heathrow to wave goodbye as she left to start her new adventure in Hong Kong where she is going to teach in an international school.

So there you go, that's been my last couple of weeks, Eilidh is now in a more reliable sleep pattern in the day so I'm going to try and blog then, fingers crossed it works!

Friday Five - Favourites

I'm sorry I've not blogged this week, again I have been crazy busy, Harry Potter at the cinema, highlights in my hair, pedicure, going to my school's end of term party, watching the Year 6 production, and today I'm packing for a long weekend away at a friends wedding. Who said this stay at home mum business would be at home?? Anyway this weeks Friday five is in response to Kat's questions. Here goes!



1. Favourite cuisine: Italian. Hands down, I loves me some Italian food! Spaghetti alla vongole, risotto, tiramisu, pannacotta, you name it I love it! Oh and don't get me started on a really good thin based pizza with artichokes, olives, pancetta and mozzarella!

Our group, left to right: Me, Andrew, Amy, Delia, Fran, Kay, Dr Mel, Dennis, Paul and in front Graham.


2. Favourite vacation: In NZ and the UK we call a vacation a holiday, but I digress. I think (and this is quite a hard choice because I've been on a lot of holidays, both in Europe and further away!) I've chosen Egypt. We spent two weeks in Egypt with 9 friends over Christmas 2007. It was brilliant, I've seen all the sights, pyramids, tombs, the Nile etc etc, but do you know what the best part was? Two or three days in a town called Siwa which is very remote, only 50km from the Lybian border. We rode bikes, ate great food, relaxed in hot pools in the dessert!! and went sand-boarding down the dunes. Sometimes its nice to get off the beaten track.

Sand-boarding.
3. Favourite hobby: I've got lots of hobbies but my favourite is definitely scrapbooking! I love recording our memories, cutting and pasting and choosing the lovely papers. Some people (Andrew maybe) might say that I've got too much stash, but you can never have too much stash surely?

Andrew and I on a sand dune enjoying the sunset.

4. Favourite Holiday tradition: I've not done this in a while because we've been in the UK for Christmases but I love the $5 present. On Christmas night we have anything from fifteen to thirty plus people at our family camp-site (it is summer in NZ remember) and that is far too many presents to buy! Each person buys one present worth $5 that fits the theme set by my mum (she's the youngest of seven and the unofficial boss) last year it was bottles. All the presents get put in the middle and the first person in the circle chooses one and opens it in front of everybody. The second person looks at that first present (still following me??) and has to decide, do I want that present or a new one? If they take the first present, the first person goes back and takes another present and opens that, and then its the third person's turn, and so on. It gets quite hilarious because some presents (one year it was some naughty dice) get hotly fought over and someone always ends up with the duds!

Waiting to go on our bike ride.

5. Favourite “the-baby’s-asleep-the-chores-are-done-now-what-shall-I-do” pastime: Drinking wine. Lounging on the couch, watching some TV and (not often enough) blogging. It’s my way to unwind. Confession, I mostly read blogs, and need to write more, but thanks to Kat for the answer to number five.

Fran on the main street of Siwa
PS the photos are from our visit to Siwa!

Friday Five - On a Saturday. Foods Chicken has tried

Sorry for not posting yesterday, we are having a Harry Potter marathon in our house because next Tuesday Chicken and I are going to the cinema/movies (depending on what country you live in) to see the final film.  I'm quite excited it has to be said!!  Anyway back to the Friday Five - Foods Chicken has eaten.  I'm going to do a post about how we started weaning and how its going in the coming week.  But for now, I know everyone wants to see pictures of a baby with mush all over their face!




1.  Apple.  This was Chicken's first meal and well, she wasn't keen!

2.  Toast.  Chicken has toast for breakfast most mornings.  She only really sucks on it and I spend a good half an hour picking up the pieces from the floor, good times.  She likes butter and vegemite, french toast, houmous (sp?) and cream cheese.

3.  Pea.  This is mixed with sweet potato which she really loves.  Because of the skin on the peas they don't mush up completely which is good, we're moving on to more solid food.

4.  Yoghurt.  Chicken has yoghurt after her toast in the morning.  I give her the yoghurt because its a good way to get calcium in her diet and I'm not sure how much she actually eats when she has toast.

 5.  My personal favourite - Blueberry!  The blueberries are mixed with pears (another favourite of Chicken's) and a bit of baby porridge to thicken it up.  I love this just because how cute she looks at then end!

Stealing my stuff, already!

Last week I went to Topshop to buy a fascintator for my friend Alice's wedding and I found this funky cream flower on a headband.  I liked that fact that it was cream and wouldn't be too obvious.  By the way, why is it called a fascinator?  Is it fascinating?

I've never worn a fascinator before, and I especially don't want to stand out like Princess Beatrice at William and Kate's wedding.

When I got home Chicken was a little whiney so I threw her the headband to play with, and of course she promptly showed it in her mouth.  I then decided to try it on her for a laugh.

And that back fired, she looked cute, super cute.  It even fits properly, we tested it last week and it doesn't fall off.

Looks like I'm going shopping for another fascinator next week!

Friday Five - Things about me

I've had a rather big day today, I mean I had to get up at 6:30am!  Now I know for working people (and my mum and dad, and my brother) that this is quite late, but for us, well it was quite a challenge.  Today I went into my work to see my kid's assembly.  Kids you say?  Yep I have had for the past eight years, thirty kids.  Thirty kids in my class that is!   This week's Friday Five is not about my baby, or my brother, or my husband, what I've baked, or my latest scrapbook layouts, or where we've been on holiday but about me - five things about me.  Not that those aren't great things to blog about, must remember that for the future.




1.  I'm a teacher.  For the past four years I've taught seven and eight year olds in a school in London.  I love my job because I get to make a difference in their lives (well hopefully).  I really love teaching History and Design Technology.  Before I taught in London I taught eleven and twelve year olds in New Zealand, quite a different story to the younger ones!  I have a funny story about one of my students, lets call him Steve.  Steve had a habit of saying what he thought out loud without thinking about he consequences.  One day I came to school looking particularly rough, I'd had a cold and was very tired, and I had no make up on.  Steve asked me (very innocently)   Miss C, why have you got pen marks under your eyes?  I raced next door to the mirror to check, and what did I see, just my dark circles!  I made sure I was wearing make up the next day!

2.  I like old school crime novels.  My favourite series is Agatha Christie's Poirot, and I'm also partial to the Amelia Peabody series by Elizabeth Peters, and the Alphabet series by Sue Grafton.  I like these books because while you have to think about 'whodunit' there isn't too much gore or scary things, I'm not a fan of scary things.  I also looooove Poirot on TV, there is no better way to spend a Sunday afternoon.  Any by Poirot I mean David Suchet, not that Peter Ustinov guy!

3.  I spend far too much time on the internet.  Now this is probably to be expected, I mean I (try to regularly) write a blog, but there's so much more than that!  I read lots of blogs, food blogs, mum blogs, scrapbooking blogs, photography blogs and travel blogs.  I also tweet, check three email accounts, read two New Zealand newspapers, spend far far too much time catching up with friends stalking people on Facebook, and then there's my Cityville game, and people.com.  Sad, sad, sad.

3.  I quite like the idea of gardening but never really get round to doing much.  I'd much rather leave that to Andrew, he used to be a gardener in a former life so is much better qualified, and then I don't have to get dirty!  When I do garden however, it seems to be the destructive type.  I'm quite good and pulling out things, or cutting things back, but I certainly don't like cleaning up the mess, that's a boys job!

4.  I played football/soccer for nine years.  From 1994 to 2004 I played soccer in New Zealand.  I started off as a goal keeper, and then moved up to right defender and finally ended up as right midfield.  During my first two years we lost every single game, talk about character building.  During the five years I played in the field I scored two goals, yep only two goals.  I'm sure I helped set up a lot and save a few even.  When we moved to the UK in 2005 I was sure I'd be able to find a team here, it is the home of football!  But no, it wasn't too be, there was no team in my area.  Never mind, I'm sure I'll get to play when/if we move back to NZ.

5.  I used to live in the Scottish Highlands.  In 2005 when we moved to the UK we stayed with friends in Dundee, Scotland for a while.  It soon became obvious that while we loved staying with our friends, Dundee wasn't the place for us.  Andrew found a job as a gardener on Attadale Estate in Lochcarron and I worked in the best pub in the village, the Strathcarron Hotel.  Lochcarron is a teeny tiny village on the west coast of the Highlands, about an hour and a half west of Inverness.  This was a very remote place, no broadband, no freeview TV, and not many people, about 1000.  We had the best time up there and even used a Highland name for our Chicken, Eilidh.

So there you go, five things about me, happy Friday everyone!

So there you have it