Pretty Buttons

We don't just write about cakes. We're interested in everything "for her indoors". So when girls aren't in the kitchen, they're sewing or doing their nails, right?


Bought from a craft fair last year and apart from taking them out to 'colour categorise' them, they have remained in tact in their original packaging next to my unopened French Manicure set.

Best carrot cake

Unlike Josceline Dimbleby, Nigel Slater really knows how to make one of these. Hence 'Best' being in the header instead of 'weirdest'. Recipe has been oh-so-slightly adjusted mostly due to not having all the original ingredients at the time and making do with what I had made the results turn out practically similar yet almost half the price to make.

Ingredients

For the cake
200ml sunflower, corn or vegetable oil
3 eggs (separated)
250g light muscovado sugar
250g self raising flour
2 tsps cinnamon
1 tsp baking powder
Juice of half an orange (zest it first - you'll need it for the icing)
200g grated carrots
150g chopped walnuts (save a handful to go on top)

For the icing
150g full-fat cream cheese
450g icing sugar
Zest of one orange (the one you juiced for the cake)

Pre-heat oven to gas mark 4 and line two loose bottomed sandwich tins (either 7 or 8 inch). Cream together the oil and sugar. Add the egg yolks one at a time and beat well after each addition. Stir in the orange juice, walnuts and grated carrots. Add the flour, cinnamon and baking powder and fold in with a large metal spoon. Now whisk the egg whites until stiff and fold them into the mixture. Divide between the tins and place into the pre-heated oven for 40-45 minutes. Your kitchen will now smell wonderful. Cool on a wire rack until needed.

To make the icing, simply beat together the cream cheese, icing sugar and zest. This might take anything up to 10 minutes if you're doing it by hand. Remember, you don't want it too runny as it will simply slide off the cake. On the other hand, if it's too stiff then it will be a nightmare to spread. Refer to the photo for desired consistency.

Take approximately a third of the icing and spread over the bottom half of the cake. Place the other half on top and spread the rest of the icing over the top and sides. Sprinkle over the walnuts just so people know that it's got nuts in it. Hopefully it will put some people off enough and leave more for us.

The recipe can be adapted to suit people on a dairy-free diet by substituting soya cream cheese in the icing.

Tardis Cake

"Anything Doctor Who themed - he just loves Doctor Who."




Yes that's right, someone actually paid for this and unbelievably, didn't complain. They even phoned afterwards to tell me how wonderful it tasted.

The profits made from the sale of the cake are still sitting in a trust fund set up especially for the day I am admitted into hospital for the long-term damage caused to my nervous system every time I look at this photo and cringe.

Method
Build cake using madeira sponge and glue together with buttercream and jam. Cover in marzipan and carefully place the rolled out icing over the tardis. Now carefully let it sink in that it doesn't look as you had hoped and peel off all the icing you just put on. Make up some more icing using egg white, food colouring and icing sugar that you don't have. Run to Sainbury's to buy more icing sugar. On arriving home, apply some deodorant and pretend not to see the clock on the wall telling you that she will be arriving in 20 minutes to pick up cake. Start to panic - this will ensure adrenaline kicking in soon. Bring icing together with said ingredients and gently smooth over cake. Put the windows and sign you made earlier on to the side and hope that no-one notices how AMAZINGLY AND UTTERLY SHIT it looks. Stifle any tears - save them for after she has picked up cake.

My breadmaker <3

Just in case you feel inspired by the french crusty update but haven't yet invested in one of these, I thought I might show you my breadmaker - the Morphy Richards Fast bake 48268.


Brushed stainless steel, 12 settings including a fastbake setting, 1.5lb AND 2lb loaf capacity and I have even started on the crust control yet.

But for me the most appealing feature isn't that it can bake you a loaf of bread in as fast as an hour and ten minutes or indeed it's unique retracting blade. No, for me it's most redeeming feature has to be the little window on it's lid so that you can see what's going on inside.


You can see it go round and round and round. And then up and then round and round again. And then up and then up some more and slowly, you can see it turn brown :)

The 48268 is simply leagues ahead of Morphy Richards cheaper version, the Compact Breadmaker 48245. Morphy Richards have tried to do it justice by listing it's programmable timer as a feature. This obviously comes as standard for the 48268 and unfortunately just makes the 48245 seem even more shit. Oh dear 48245 :(

My only word of caution on the 48268 is to not bother reading the manual - it's only really good when you have greasy hands and need something to wipe them on.

If I were a lesbian, I would really fancy...

...Kathryn Hughes from The Guardian for her article on the knork.


I love to see this amount of enthusiasm on something which people take for granted. I have been a closet fan of the knork's sister, the spork, a hybrid of the spoon and fork for sometime now and had no idea that someone else could spend so much time, not only thinking but writing on this subject.

In a parallel universe somewhere, I would be a successful writer like Kathryn and holding hands, we would go for long walks in Richmond park on Sunday afternoons. We would talk about her article on the knork and my critically acclaimed article on the spork. She would recite her Freudian views on cutlery and I would talk about how Spudulike are the perfect food outlet to showcase the spork.

"But oh..." I would sigh "...wouldn't it be amazing if someone could invent a hybrid of the two. A hybrid of two hybrids. A spork and knork as one..."

It doesn't take more than a heartbeat for her to pull me toward her shouting;

"Why, the sporkife!"

"The sporkife? Why didn't I think of that?!"

Why didn't you think of that Jeanette. Anyone could think to invent the spork but the person with the type of mind to think up the knork, well, anything is possible with that mind. Anything. Including the sporkife. God, she's amazing. I could make love to her right now, I would think to myself.

"Then Spudulike wouldn't need to give knives with their sporks. Hell, they wouldn't even be handing out sporks now there's a sporkife." I exclaim.

I look into Kathryn's eyes now filled with the same tears of joy that run down my face. We both stand motionless, consumed by the mutual love of knorks and sporks that brings us together. Two minds, one sporkife.

Delia's mincemeat

I've already got carried away with Christmas this year. I've already bought the snowman shaped biscuit cutters to make the biscuits that will decorate the tree and have made two massive jars of mincemeat and three Christmas cakes; one for the boyfriend, one for me and one to give away as a present although I'm not sure how long I'll be able to keep up the pretence that I'm going to give it away. I used this recipe last year and was pleased enough with the results to make it again this year!

Using these fancy jars makes for an awesome Christmas present. Nanna will be very impressed.

Ingredients
450g Bramley apples diced into small pieces
225g shredded suet
350g raisins
225g sultanas
225g currants
225g whole mixed candied peel, chopped into small pieces
350g soft dark brown sugar
Grated zest and juice of 2 oranges and 2 lemons
50g almonds cut into slivers
4 tsps ground mixed spice
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
6 tbsps brandy

Method
Combine and thoroughly mix all ingredients except the brandy. Cover and leave overnight. The next day pre-heat oven to gas mark 1/4 (yes, a quarter) and place the mixing bowl, covered with foil into the pre-heated oven for three hours. Remove from oven and stir occasionally until the fat coagulates. Now stir in the brandy and spoon the mixture into sterilised jars.

And to sterilise your jars, wash them in warm soapy water, dry and place them in a medium oven for 5 minutes or until completely dry.

Breadmaker bread recipe

I know it might seem silly giving a recipe for something which you don't actually make but breadmakers can be surprisingly difficult to get right.

In the past, I had been following the recipes from my breadmaker's manual and was quite content to pretend to be pleased with its results. Indeed, I would chew disappointingly on my heartburn-inducing stodge happy to bypass my taste buds in favour of the pleasure of eating something 'homemade'. The novelty was obviously quick to wear off.

I thought I'd give it another chance and use a recipe not featured in the manual. Since then I have been making bread practically every day for the last week. I've even taken it out of permanent hibernation from under the sink and have put it pride of place next to the microwave. That's a good thing - my microwave is amazing.


Gone are the days of bland, indigestible stodge. Say "Bonjour" to French crusty!

Ingredients
350ml water
1 tbsp skimmed milk powder
25g butter
540g strong white flour
1 and 1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp light brown sugar
1 sachet dried fast-action yeast

Method...if you want to call it that
Place ingredients in breadmaker in order listed and use basic small setting. Or if you breadmaker is super fancy like mine, then use French setting.