Onion Seed Pitta Breads

This week Sunday was bread making day and instead of making my usual standard white loaf I fancied making something slightly more technical. A couple of years ago I bought a bread book (here on Amazon) which appears to be out of print now and is actually quite expensive so I'm quite glad I managed to get it for £5 in WHSmith's. Anyway rambling aside I was flicking through last night for inspiration and the pitta bread recipe (p195) looked fairly easy.

Banana, Plum & Pecan Muffins

What to do with bananas and plums that are getting a bit too ripe? Make muffins of course. I found a banana muffin recipe on Nigella Lawson's site and decided to double the quantities and then add plums and pecans. Here is the recipe which will make 18 muffins.

Birthday Cake

Normally for my birthday I would make a really rich, indulgent, disgustingly decadent chocolate cake, however after scoffing rather a lot of chocolate over Christmas and indulging in the Hotel Chocolat January sale, I thought it might be a good idea to do something slightly different this year.  I bought the Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days book a few months ago and was looking through it for inspiration and decided to make the maple and pecan layer cake (p144). I'd previously always thought of maple syrup as an expensive ingredient (the real stuff not 'maple flavoured' syrup) until I realised that it probably costs about the same as all the chocolate needed to make a rich chocolate cake and you only need to use a fairly small amount. I think there will be quite a few maple syrup inspired bakes appearing over the next few weeks, not because the syrup desperately needs using up but because I absolutely love the taste!

Lemon Marmalade

On Thursday I decided to try my hand at making some lemon marmalade. I've made jams with my mum in the past and after seeing this recipe in Good Food magazine last month I thought I'd give it a go. All you need is 1kg of unwaxed lemons, 2kg granulated sugar, some water and a really big saucepan (a stock pot is ideal for this). The smell of lemons boiling away kept me awake whilst working analysing some data, it took around 2 and half hours to boil the lemons. They then had to be chopped up and then boiled with the sugar.

I was a bit worried that my marmalade wouldn't set as it seemed to be taking ages to reach the setting point and I didn't have anyone to ask for advice. It's definitely a judgement call deciding when your marmalade looks 'wrinkly' on a cold saucer. But luckily when I came to have some on my porridge the next day it had set beautifully .

Must make sure that if I make more jams in the future that I buy a proper ladle and a funnel and perhaps a shallower pan. My stockpot holds around 5 litres and is very deep so I had to pour the marmalade into a bowl and then spoon it into jars from there. As you can imagine my worktop got very sticky during this process but it was worth it.  I now have supply of marmalade that can be used as the basis for creating some yummy lemony bakes and also a jar for my mum because she showed me how to make jam in the first place.

And for a picture of some of my jars of marmalade, I made 8 in total in varying sizes after raiding the cupboards for empty jars.

Hello

Hello and welcome to my blog. My aim for this year is to try and bake as many different things as possible. I've got quite an extensive collection of recipes in various books and magazines and I think it's time to start working my way through them instead of just baking basic cakes. I will post pictures of my baking creations and some of my own recipes so you can have a go if you want. I also want to try and improve my decorating skills and will keep you updated on my progress. I bought this cake decorating set  recently and haven't gotten around to using it yet so I will let you know how I get on with it.

Not strictly baking related but I bought some daffodils a couple of days ago and put them in a jug my mum gave me for Christmas to coordinate with my kitchen and they look so lovely that I decided to take a picture. And they look nice and cheerful on a cold winter's day.