It’s already week 7 of the Great British Bake Off, and the latest challenges were based around desserts. Options were a signature roulade, a technical marjolaine, or a showstopping range of petite mousse desserts. Once again I had to cater to Andrew’s fussiness so couldn’t make a marjolaine which is meringue, nor mousse – Andrew […]
Week 43 – amazing roast beef and Laguiole carving set
Many years ago, Andrew went out shopping to buy me a birthday present in his lunch break, and when he returned to the office his colleagues were eager to know what he had bought me. It was a frying pan. They were horrified, but Andrew explained I would be delighted with it, as it would […]
GBBO week 6 – coconut and raspberry cake
Botanicals … when I think of botanicals I think of gin … I do have a rather one-track mind where my favourite tipple is concerned though. Mmmmm, gin. But for the Great British Bake Off botanicals week I was a bit stumped, as I have already made a G&T cake. Inspired by my weekly visits […]
Week 42 – invasion of the Welsh
As the first grandchild on both sides of our families, Ioan was always going to receive more than his fair share of attention from his grandparents. My mum lives in London so gets to see him regularly, but just for a few hours at a time, and Andrew’s parents live in Wales so see him […]
GBBO week 5 – Danish pastries
I was going to title this blog post ‘Easy Danish pastries’ because the dough I used was a cross between a rough puff and an enriched dough, so it wasn’t as much hard work as it could have been … however, it wasn’t that easy either, so I thought it best not to mislead with […]
Week 41 – Asia to Columbia on a plate
Looking back on my week’s photos, I can see between the thousands of pictures of Ioan that most of our food has been Asian inspired this week, with a little pop across to Colombia for lunch with the girls. First up was a prawn stirfry for meat-free Monday – although I normally like to avoid […]
GBBO week 4 – Chinese style duck filled yorkie puds
For the first time batter has featured in the Great British Bake Off … and probably the last time as the news reaches us that the show is moving over to Channel 4 without Mel, Sue, or Mary Berry. Sad news, as whatever Bake Off becomes, it won’t be the same series we all fell […]
Week 40 – how wonderful life is while you’re in the world
So, with Ioan at 8 weeks old, we had our first night out without him. My brother, who pretends he is not a big softy even though he already dotes on Ioan, babysat for us. We were completely confident that Jason would be fine with Ioan, but would Ioan be fine with Jason? He has […]
GBBO week 3 – plaited loaf: cheese, tomato and pesto couronne
The latest edition of Bake Off involved delicious bread – possibly one of my favourite things ever, but sadly something which makes me fat: because once I start eating the stuff I literally cannot stop. Mmmmmm, lovely bread. Anyway, the options this week were chocolate bread, which sounds utterly amazing but there’s no way Andrew […]
Week 39 – a carb-tastic week
Obviously, as any new mum could have told me, I didn’t manage to meet my meal plan every day this week. However, I didn’t do too badly … and I even managed breakfast on Friday (Ioan started crying the second I took this photo!): Obviously I didn’t manage to make my own spinach and ricotta […]