DANGER UXB!

My first lot of wine is now bottled and is maturing. It seems OK though and everything went to plan in the making of it. My next has proven a bit of a problem. I am making a type of mead - it contains honey, spices, apples, oranges and lemons. I had to boil everything for about 20 mins in 4pt of water, add another 4pt of water and then add the yeast.

The recipe said it would start fermenting in about 6 weeks. 6 weeks? More like 6 minutes! After about 2 hours I went to check it and it was frothing up through the airlock, down the side of the demijohn and onto the worktop! I had to separate it into 2 demijohns. But as you can see during the night they must have both frothed up to nearly the top of the jar!

Hopefully after about 10 days I will be able to transfer them back to the one demijohn - so long as there are no further happenings in the meantime!

My New Cupcake!

My hubby and my two daughters have been away for a couple of days. They went to Dolwyddelan in our caravan. I don't mind going but if I stay at home it gives me a chance to get round to doing all those horrible jobs in the house. This time I rearranged the living room and bedroom so I could make room for our computers. They looked unsightly downstairs so mine is now upstairs.

The other advantage to staying at home is that they always bring me back a present! This time they gave me this lovely little ceramic cupcake, which now sits on my kitchen window sill. I think it's lovely!

Banana Coconut Cake

I wanted to make a Chicken Korma last week and the recipe called for coconut milk. I couldn't get it in our local Tesco so I had to buy dried, which worked just as well. However there was a recipe on the back of the box and it was fantastic. If you can find Maggi Dried Coconut Milk this cake is delicious:

185g Butter

1 Cup Caster Sugar

4 Eggs

2 Cups Chopped Walnuts

3 Cups Self Raising Flour

1 Cup Maggi Dried Coconut Milk

1 tsp Cinnamon

1 Cup Orange Juice

CREAMY HONEY FROSTING:

125g Cream Cheese

30g Butter

1 tbsp Honey

2 Cups Icing Sugar, sifted.

Preheat oven to 180'C. Grease & line a 25cm round cake pan (I used 3 sandwich tins). Cream butter & sugar until light & fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time. Stir in banana & walnuts. Fold in flour, Coconut milk and cinnamon with orange juice. Spoon into greased tins & bake for 1 - 1 1/4 hours (I baked mine for approx 35 mins as I used sandwich tins). Cool on wire rack. To make the frosting beat the cream cheese, butter and honey together until smooth. Gradually beat in the icing sugar. Use to cover cake (or also use as a filling & topping if using sandwich tins - there is plenty left for this)

100 Flowers to Knit & Crochet

This delightful book arrived this morning from Amazon. It's absolutely gorgeous. Take a look - the flowers are so life like. There are 128 beautiful pages and it only cost £7.03. A real bargain!

My Dishcloth Pattern

A dishcloth should be large enough for its purpose, absorbent, mildly abrasive and quick to dry. This simple pattern in moss stitch, using double knitting cotton, moss stitch and large needles satisfies all these needs. Prettiness can be added by choosing pastel or vibrant colours to match your kitchen, but remember when bleached the colours will eventually fade.

LARGE CLOTH

Requires 1 x 50g ball 100% Cotton Yarn (Double knit)

Using 5mm needles cast on 65 stitches and knit 2 rows.

Row 1: k2, (k1,p1 to last 2 sts) K2

Row 2: K2, knit all purl sts and purl all knit stitches (single moss stitch) to last 2 stitches, Knit 2.

Repeat last 2 rows until 61 rows have been worked in pattern.

Knit 2 rows. Cast off.

SMALL CLOTH

Cast on 50 stitches and Knit 2 rows.

Work 46 row in moss stitch as given for larger cloth.

Knit 2 rows. Cast off.

My Plum Jam Recipe

I have come across many recipes for plum jam and have had one or two disasters. One recipe called for boiling the recipe with the sugar for 20minutes. As you can imagine you end up with plum toffee! So this recipe is my own and it seems to work for me:



Ingredients:


1kg Plums


1kg Preserving Sugar





Put a saucer in the fridge to test the jam for setting. Have ready at least 4 jam jars washed and sterilised - I put mine in the oven directly after using it, but switched off. Cut plums into quarters and twist to pull out the stone (This is messy so wear an apron and have a cloth on stand by!). Put the flesh in a preserving pan with all the juice and skins, bring to the boil and simmer for approximately 20 minutes (The skins will boil down with the rest of the plums).

Add the sugar and dissolve gently. Do not let it boil at this stage. When sugar has dissolved bring to the boil and boil rapidly for 3 minutes, take off the heat and put a teaspoon on the cold saucer to test for setting. If the jam is not set boil rapidly for a further minute and test again. Take off the heat and bottle immediately. It is advisable to try and get hold of a jam funnel - I was balancing a ladle, the pan and the bottles wrapped in kitchen paper as they were hot - not a good idea as I scalded my fingers twice.

Shell Plant Pots

The shells that we collected on the beach last week came to good use today, and I very cleverly roped my husband into helping my daughter to cover the plant pot. I asked him to strip the old plant pot of a couple of decorations that were one it, and just happened to mention that the new box of Polyfilla was under the sink! We had also bought a small collection of shells from a little kiosk on the prom to bulk ours out a bit, hence the starfish!