Plums???

Pretty colours outside our flat. Possibly plums?

Baskerville's Tea Room - Palmers Green

I used to live in Palmers Green and it's always nice to go visit - especially when I find plenty of books I want in the very excellent and plentiful charity shops there AND discover a large tea room has opened and it is very pretty and has a garden and a huge tea selection (I had a refreshing green tea with ginger and lemongrass) and banana cake with peanut butter frosting. Banana cake is my favourite and I love peanut butter. Yesssss.

Macaron 2014.2

Ughhhh. FAILURE. Which I don't deal well with. I'd like to pretend this didn't happen but I won't.

Flat. Footless. Some underbaked. Some overbaked. The important thing is they taste good!!!!

It's the first time I've failed to get feet on my macarons though, I feel like I'm going backwards.

Possible reasons - overwhipped eggwhites? over mixed mix? did not bother to dry out properly as had same issue as in Jan where it was taking FOREVER and I wondered if I could get away without doing it. I guess not.

I've been using a different recipe to usual and I wonder if this has anything to do with my not drying problem. I'm going to revert to my old recipe for the next batch and see if it makes a difference!

Macaron 2014.1

First macaron attempt this year and not too bad. They looked like macarons and tasted delicious but as usual I struggled with my oven temp and timing.

First tray that went in the oven was over browned and a bit too crisp so I dropped the temp and covered with foil. I think just the foil would have sufficed as the other trays were all too soft. I ended up pulling soft shells off the tray and leaving the middles behind.

I also had a first time problem....after 2 hours my piped mix still hadn't become touch dry! This has never happened to me before, it's always been fine after about 40 mins. Not yet sure if I did something wrong with my mix or because my new flat is extremely damp.

I feel much more confident with my mixture and piping though! Yay! Next time I hope I get my oven temp/timing correct!

Picture is of the slightly browned overly crispy ones. I forgot to photograph the slightly anaemic squishy ones. They were all plain almond vanilla macaroons with different coloured butter icing as filling.

Retap: lovely reusable glass bottle

I like glass bottles because plastic ones get a smell, however much you wash them. And there's the chemicals leeching into your drink thing. And the recycling thing. But mainly.....it just feels nicer to drink from glass. Anyway, I used to reuse glass drinks bottles like Snapple or fancy water, but the metal lids always started rusting! Here is my solution! A retap glass bottle with a silicone lid. It's just the right size, my water tastes delicious and it even looks quite nice.

Bourbon biscuits are the best ordinary biscuits

Although digestives and pink wafers are strong contenders. I'm torn. Also, does shortbread count as ordinary biscuit or is it fancy biscuit?

Kallo rice cakes with tabasco

A delicious mid morning snack. Also, I think not bad for me. And the packets look so pretty together!

I miss Calpis water.

So readily available at every vending machine that dotted every street. So refreshing and delicious. I got this treat at Little Orient, which I discovered today in the Elephant and Castle mall.

Quarters Cafe near Highgate Station

So nice! I loved the cosy homey mismatched antique-y decor and on top of that the food is delicious. Stu had the mos amazing dumplings and we shared a super rich moist brownie. Mm. Plus the delicious hot spiced apple drink. Must return soon.

Bake Off

One of my new years resolutions was to regularly update this blog, at which I have failed miserably. I did have some updates while we were travelling South East Asia but they were so wordy I felt weird about it and have taken them down. Much prefer pictures. Since returning to London I have become obsessed with baking! I got very inspired by the Great British Bake Off and have put on a little weight as a result...several midwives (at work) have asked if I'm pregnant so I'm now jogging and taking Pilates classes. And continuing to bake.

Kate Jenkins

Oh dear.....a 3 month blogging blank. I suck...I guess I have been quite preoccupied with wedding planning! But I haven't failed to fall in love with Kate Jenkin's oh so cute food crochet-ing of joy! Pork Pie! And 4 and 20 blackbirds! And marmite! Catch the exhibition quickly, at Rebecca Hossack Gallery on Charlotte Street till the 24th.

Book Club Boutique - Sophia Blackwell

Yesterday a friend and I went to the Bookclub Boutique at Blacks in Soho. It was very lovely, charming and intimate with open fires, sofas and writers reading stories, poetry and singing. It was Alice in Wonderland/fairy tale themed - how perfect for me! We did feel a little awkward, being somewhat shy and everyone appeared to know each other, although they seemed nice.

Highlights for me were Salena Godden making up an excellent song, on the spot, about Alice in an artichoke, Rachel Rose Reid telling a story about seals and Sophia Blackwell's poems.

There was gin to be drunk from teacups too, though I stuck to regular tea. We were too hungry to stay to the end though so we had to leave around 8:30 and didn't see everything. It goes on from 3 til 12. I think you can get food there but don't know what it costs! We went to Crepe Affaire, and enjoyed teapigs and crepes. Then found out afterward that they don't use free range eggs. So I won't be returning. Why on earth do they bother using organic flour but not eggs??? It puzzles me.

I think I will be returning to Book Club Boutique though.

Lovely Soreen

About a month ago, a colleague offered me a slice of Soreen. I accepted, curious to try this 'Soreen'. That night I bought 2 loaves and scoffed them within 2 days. It tastes like dense, sticky heaven...and it's full of raisin therefore I consider it healthy. Despite loading each slice with butter. Mmmmmmm.

Next I must try it with cheese!

Oh! Oh! Oh!

Raspberries cost way too much. Especially when you grew up picking them from the garden. But I had to bake these because they looked like heaven. A layer of brownie, a layer of cheesecake and a layer of raspberry cream. They taste SO GOOD. And they're pretty :) They almost look like they do in the book!

Thank you Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook for giving me this pleasure.

I heart cake.

Summerill & Bishop

Delicious assortment of vintage kitchenware and new simple, unusual designs. The shop feels so home-y even though its an expensive boutique-y place :) I like.

http://www.summerillandbishop.com

Daylesford Organic

Lovely simple seductive packaging. Too expensive for me but mmm. I love how thin the heart shaped box of chocolates is.

http://www.daylesfordorganic.com

i found my teapot

I've been searching the charity shops for a teapot i'd love and this morning i found it! Joy :) Apparantly it's a Sadler teapot and apparantly this is good. I didn't know about Sadler teapots. The lady in the shop asked if I collected them and when I said no she said she expected the teapot back in a couple months when I get bored of it. This won't happen..I love my new teapot and shall use it to serve tea and glee.

Teapod

After the design museum we needed tea refreshment and teapod is very very good! I wish I lived nearer it...because mmmm yunnan tea and orange&almond cake.

Epigenetics

A couple weeks ago we did a week group project combining science and design following an intense day of talks about epigenetics and model organisms - Fabrics of life, marrying design to discovery. It was so interesting! My group were focusing on my favourite talk as well which was by Jim Smith ( Molecular basis of mesoderm formation, Gurdon Institute, Cambridge) about frogs and how cells cleave and organise themselves into what they need to be. We made a concept animation thing about self repairing plates much like how newts can regrow lost limbs :)

My favourite part was thinking about mutations and playing with all the crockery. I made a cake stand out of plates and a wineglass. And of course I needed to bake cupcakes to go on it...any excuse to bake cake :D I've always wanted a cake stand and now I can create a makeshift one whenever I may need then take it apart again for easy storage. Eggggs.

You can see our work here and what all the other groups did over here.

Colour Your Eggs :D

In a corner shop in Camberwell I found some wonderful things. This retro looking condensed milk with a creepy milk loving child on it (who kind of resembles my dad as a child a little) but even better........powder you boil with your eggs to make your eggs coloured :D This is clearly, CLEARLY genius :D My friend and I had no idea what it was but decided to buy some for the awesome rabbit with eggs packaging...when we asked the shop guy to tell us what it was we were thrilled with the response.

"It's as if someone had eggs and thought, wow, these are really good....but they'd be even better if they were green!" said my friend with glee :)