Pizza Flavour Popcorn

We have got into a tradition of letting the boys stay up late on a Saturday night to watch Strictly Come Dancing and when they do they are allowed some popcorn. We usually use the microwave popcorn bags in either butter or sweet flavours, but this week we had run out and so I found a quite ancient (though still usable) bag of popping corn and we did it ourselves.
The boys were amazed and in awe when they watched the corn pinging and transforming in the hot oil, it was much more fun than putting it in the microwave and we will be doing it this way every week from now on. It is also about 10% of the price and just as clean and easy really.
The other major benefit is we can use our imagination and try all sorts of different flavourings. Some of us don't like sweet popcorn (another benefit is having control over how much sugar goes on the sweet bowl) and I didn't have any butter. I didn't want to use salt so instead I sprinkled over some dried oregano and it smelt so pizza-ry that I rolled with the idea and added some grated parmesan and then some tomato puree diluted in a small amount of olive oil, and some black pepper.
And it was great! A revolution in popcorn flavourings has begun! I would say stay tuned for more ideas next week but we all liked this flavour so much it may be a bit longer before we can stray from it to try something new.

More Hand & Foot Paintings - with a Xmas/Autumn theme

Unfortunately another good friend of ours has become poorly, so, remembering how much happiness our summer hand/foot paintings brought to another poorly friend we were inspired to have another session on the dust sheet creating some more seasonally appropriate hand and foot creatures. We sent them off this morning, we hope they bring a smile to our friend's face at a difficult time. We hope very much she gets better soon. We are thinking of her.

Foot reindeer

Foot penguin

Hand  fir wreath

Hand reindeer

Hand Santa

Foot snowman

Hand monkey - not the most successful!

Hand elephant

Hand hedgehog

Hand turkeys/chickens

Blueberry Baked Cheesecake

Recipe

8 crushed digestive biscuits and 50g melted butter combined, pressed into base of 20cm tin and baked at 180*c for 5 mins. Remove and cool in tin for a bit while you get...

600g light Philadelphia, 142ml half fat creme fraiche, 2 large eggs plus 1 yolk, 175g caster sugar, seeds from 1 vanilla pod, 2 tbsp flour; beat together in a mixer until combined. Then add fruit - we added  about 250g frozen blueberries (I didn't bother to defrost them), pour on base and put back in oven for 40 mins, or slightly browned but centre still wobbly. Remove and cool in tin. Ideally refridgerate before serving.

Model Dinosaur

Part of Ollie's homework this we ek was to make a model dinosaur. I saved a load of boxes out of the recycling and he used them all along with some bubble wrap to make this T-Rex model. Even though we used PVA in the paint it still didn't stick very well to the bubble wrap but it stayed well enough to get it to school. I have to admit I am very pleased this is staying at school rather than at home. It's huge!

Our prize winning Dad

We love you Daddy and we are very proud of you and your award.....

Bonfire Bread

Oh my God - THIS is GOOOOD

We made this for our first ever Skype dinner party with my sister and brother in-law at the weekend. The dinner party was a raging success and this was the most delicious thing ever!

It is a recipe I found on the internet - Good food - I think, but adapted to the ingredients I had available

200g wholemeal flour

200g plain white bread flour

1 tsp bicarb

2 tsp cream of tartar

1 tsp salt

1 tsp sugar

25g butter melted

300ml milk

175g cheddar cheese

2/3 of a small packet of pumpkin seeds, toasted in a dry pan

2 peppers burnt on the gas flame and peeled

1 small tub olives

Sift dry ingredients and pour the liquid into a well in the middle and combine to a soft dough. Add all the extras (but put some cheese and seeds to one side to top the rolls before baking). It was quite a wet dough which I was worried about but went for it anyway.

I formed into 6 rounds about 2 fingers thick on a silicon sheet.

I baked for 30mins in a 170*c preheated oven. Cooled on a wired rack, but ate while still warm with a delicious sausage, lentil, pumpkin & porcini casserole.

I will definitely make this bread again. It's lovely and easy with no proving or waiting and so scrummy with all those delicious things in it.

Halloween stuff

A carved pumpkin

A 'vomiting' carved pumpkin

These are the efforts we have gone to for Halloween this year;

Black paper bats in hall

Black paper bats in living room

Trick or treating (in Scotland - guising) costumes

Pumpkin satsumas for snack!

Strawberry and Raspberry Ice cream cake

Make a regular sponge and cut in half. Get a tub of vanilla ice cream and spoon through a punnet of raspberries. Cut a punnets worth of strawberries in half.

Compile in a lined cake tin and freeze. 

Take out 10mins before you wish to slice and serve.

Reasons to be cheerful.. 1. 2. 3.

Thank you Ian Drury and the Blockheads (which includes my old drawing tutor Humphrey - though I'm not sure he would be very impressed by my efforts) for this idea!
I have put the frame up on the hall table as a daily reminder of all the reasons to ignore the persistent Scottish rain and greyness and be happy anyway!
The reasons (and happy faces) are written with a white board pen onto the glass, so they can be wiped off and updated in an instant!

Bircher muesli

Lately we have been in to having Bircher muesli for breakfast during the week. It's really quite filling and I don't get hungry during the morning in the same way as porridge.
We make a dry mix which include oats (about 200g) we buy oats that have bran in as well, handful of sunflower seeds, sprinkle of poppy seeds, raisins, dried blueberries or whatever I have - pumpkin seeds, dried cranberries, whatever...and keep it in tuperware in the cupboard.
Then the night before we want it, I put into a small bowl enough for me and my man for one morning. Then I add a grated apple, some milk & apple juice (enough to cover the oats), and putting it in the fridge overnight. Then in the morning add a big spoonful of natural yoghurt and some poached fruit and a drizzle of honey if you fancy.

Space agency

Yesterday Max decided he wanted to make a space helmet, then it all got a bit out of hand! We made control panels, with buttons, knobs to twizzle, dials, levers, star maps, walkie talkies, a keyboard out of cardboard, silver foil, scraps of paper, egg cartons, pipe cleaners, loo rolls and pencils.
Then he used it all to make a rocket out of all the cushions and went to space. Mission accomplished!

Soups of the week - Chorizo & Bean soup, Thai broth

Forgot to take a photo of the Thai broth!

Chorizo & Bean stew soup.

Chorizo, White Beans, Sweetcorn, tinned tomato, fresh tomato, garlic, smoked parika, ground coriander & cumin

Thai broth

Stripped poached chicken, fresh ginger, chilli, lemongrass, lime leaf, fish sauce, palm sugar, coconut milk, pak choi, spring onions, lime juice, chicken stock, baby corn, green beans

Library book recepticle

So many people have seen us with this and said what a good idea it was that I thought I would share it with the ether... It's an old washing powder box (the really big 90 washes size) covered in coloured paper used for carrying and storing the kids library books.
It's a lot stronger than carrier bags, even jute/canvas ones. Plus it stays upright so works better to keep library books together once they are home and being read in the bedroom.

Apples, apples everywhere!

This wasn't my car but I feel like it should have been!
Our neighbour offered us some cooking apples from his friends garden and we happily accepted, excited at the idea of the lovely treats we could make.
But, I have since become afraid to leave the house, as every time I do, there are 2 more huge bags full! I think we have had 12 bags so far.
Over yesterday and today I have made;
6 litres of unsweetened puréed apple which I have frozen for future apple pies and crumbles
an ice cube trays worth of the naturally sweetest ones for Charlie to eat
2 more litres of sweetened and spiced cooked apples for apple pies this weekend
4 pints of apple, lime and ginger juice to which I plan to add some stock syrup and churn in the ice cream maker to make some sorbet
6 jars of indian spiced apple chutney
6 jars of apple, tomato, smoked paprika and chipotle chutney
plus we have send in 2 bags to Tom's friends and had baked apples for pudding today!

Our dream home has an orchard in our mind's eye, but please can we not have too many apple trees!

Chestnut Cake Pops

Today's school holiday activity was making these chestnut/conker inspired cake pops. I was inspired by some truffles I saw in this book but decided to make them as cake pops when I saw that a walnut cake was on sale in Sainsburys.
This is how we made them;
Smush a walnut cake like this into crumbs, then mix in a large tablespoon of nutella (warmed in the microwave for 10secs), plus 2 tablespoons of some chestnut paste (I had some in the cupboard that I had never known how to use!), and a teaspoon of peanut butter.
Refrigerate this mix for a while, then roll into balls. I made 20 about the size of large marbles.
Then I put a few drops of blue food colouring into some ready made golden marzipan to make it green. Use the marzipan to make little blankets to wrap around the chestnut cake balls.
Then put on a stick and cover the outer with melted chocolate which you agitate with the back of a teaspoon to give a spiky look as it dries.