Working so far :-)

I did a huge shop on pay day (25th Jan) over two shops - Asda and Tesco.  MySupermarket had worked out that it was cheaper to split it over the two, so I did  (clever website). Apart from the planned shop at Farmfoods to stock up on meat and fish I've only done a £15 shop so far to top up with milk, bread and eggs.  So - so far so good :-).

I've cooked some lovely meals, and even done a batch of baking.  I used the crown muffin moulds that I got from Silicone Moulds, which make muffins just like the huge ones in Costa and Starbucks only much cheaper!  A batter that makes 12 normal muffins makes six of these but they're gorgeous.  There's just no comparison with the shop bought ones.  I also made twelve apricot, coconut and dark choc ones.  I always like to have something home made to put in hubby's lunchbox.  Today's 'home made' was sandwiches made with foccacia - dough made in the bread machine then shaped on a baking tray, proved and baked in the oven.  It was gorgeous - a lovely texture made even better with the drizzle of oil and sprinkling of sea salt on top.  It's a lovely soft bread and hubby has had chunks of it filled with ham and tomato.

No wonder he gets so many nice comments about his lunchbox! ;-)

A lovely weekend

We had a really nice, but busy weekend :-).

I spent Saturday morning at work, but I got home and prepared lunch, we went to a local park called Forest Park.  Just our luck - as soon as we pulled up, the heavens opened but after ten minutes the rain gave way and we had a breezy and slightly damp walk around the lake.

We spent a happy few hours baking, Snickers Muffins, Double Chocolate Muffins, Peanut Cookies and Millies Cookies, Lucy made a pillow for using a fat quarter I bought ages ago, I got absolutely loads of planting done, had a full roast beef dinner....all in all very busy, very productive....

but very fun :-)

Double Chocolate Muffins

I must have made these Double Chocolate Muffins over 200 times in the past few years! I've tweaked the recipe a little over time and played around with changing flavours, but this is a recipe that I absolutely love. I've made over 200 in the past for a friend's daughter's wedding, and I'm always asked for them by friends and family at any party I attend. I even keep my mechanic sweet by keeping him supplied with them !!

Recipe

10oz plain flour

5oz granulated sugar

1 tbsp baking powder

4 heaped (and I mean heaped) tbsp cocoa - not drinking chocolate

200g chopped dark chocolate (cheaper than chocolate chips and I prefer finding a few large chunks in my muffins!)

8 fl oz milk

2 eggs

4oz butter

Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a large bowl. Melt the butter and combine first with the milk, then with the eggs (to cool the butter a little and prevent scrambling the eggs!). Then carefully mix the wet ingredients with the dry until the batter is only just about ready - never overmix muffin batter as you lose the wonderful texture that you never get with supermarket produced ones.

Fill 12-15 paper muffin cases about two thirds full. If the batter gets a little floury towards the end of the bowl, then add a little milk (a couple of tablespoons) and lightly incorporate it.

Bake at Gas mark 5 for about 20 minutes, checking from 18 minutes onwards to see if they're ready. The tops should be dark and glossy, the bottoms very soft and squidgy - the essence of a good muffin! When they're done, the whole kitchen smells of chocolate :-)

The other muffins in the photo above are Strawberry and White Chocolate. Replace the chopped dark chocolate with chopped white chocolate, and leave out the cocoa powder. Add a punnet of chopped strawberries and sprinkle with demerara sugar before baking as before. The sugar gives a lovely crunch to the cakes.

Happy eating :-)

Clare xx

Just a little thank you.....

We're famous for our muffins here. Our (and apparently everyone else's!!) favourites include Strawberry and White Chocolate, Raspberry and Almond. Double Chocolate and last but not least Banana and White Chocolate.

Our mechanic did a rush job for me on Tuesday when my fan belt needed an urgent replacement. So as a little thank you, I took across a plate of Raspberry and White Chocolate (no almonds in the cupboard, lol) and Banana and White Chocolate muffins.

That was 35 minutes ago. They're already all gone. :-)

Now we just have to decide what to do with the other 30 muffins that are left. After all , you can't bake just a few muffins, can you........??

Cooking today - 18 Raspberry and White Chocolate Muffins, 18 Banana and White Chocolate Muffins, Roast Chicken dinner, Chicken stock.

Clare xx

Spooooky Cooooking...

As well as making cupcakes and muffins, we also have been making some spooky muffins for halloween! The moulds were only about £2 each from Sainsburys, but sadly I didn't get the definition on the character's faces as I'd hoped. But at least they still tasted great!

xx