Cup Cakes

I have spoken before about the need for simplicity in cooking. Why cream butter and sugar when there is an easier way? Here is how you make easy cup cakes ....

1. Get a bowl.

2. Into the bowl put: one packet cake mix (Green's); 1 packet of instant pudding (Cottee's); 1/3 cup vegetable oil; 2 eggs; lemonade.

How much lemonade? Add about 1/4 can and beat the mixture, then keep adding until it looks like cake batter. Don't worry, you'll know.

3. Put the mix into paper cases and bake at 180 for 25 minutes. (Which I know to be accurate in my oven. You will have to play with yours)

Very, very important things .... preheat the oven!!!!! The cake mix flavour and pudding flavour should be the same.

When they are cold, you ice. My favourite icing is whipped ganache (which is what the picture is iced with). The brown ones are just milk chocolate ganache and the grey looking ones are white chocolate with Oreos whipped through. That nearly killed my industrial beater!

One canal, two days.

The photo on the right is April 2010 and on the left is January 2012. Same canal, slightly different spot.

It would be an interesting life on one of those boats. They are lived in and on both days there were signs of life - the smell of a wood burning fire, muffled arguments as we walked past.

Slowly sailing the canals, stopping when and where you pleased. Except in winter when the canals can freeze over.

I'm not sure it's a lifestyle for me though.

Some Time

It's been some time since I posted. The end of 2011 got swallowed up in term 4 stuff and then the start of 2012 was a secret trip to Manchester. I will try to be more vigilant with my postings.

The above image is Hollingworth Lake which is near Oldham. I remember going there when I was little. It was a big day out, a long way to travel. We didn't know then just how far we would travel...

White Coppice

White Coppice is a small village near my cousin's place in Lancashire. It was a beautiful Spring day and in the video, you can hear the babbling brook and chirping birds. And not much else.
The drive had been harrowing - narrow laneways and roads but it was peaceful and quite lovely when we finally found it.

The Flying Orchestra

There is a lovely book in this year's nominations called "The Flying Orchestra." I think that it won a Crichton Award, not Book of the Year.

It begins "Some days are so windy that even the angels lose their balance from the top of City Hall." That's when the Flying Orchestra blows into town.

They play symphonies for travellers coming home, concertos for people awake all night thinking, sonatas for sad moments at birthday parties. The Flying Orchestra always play when a baby is born, at dusk and at dawn.

For me, I hear the Flying Orchestra when I gaze at the stars, in the roar of the ocean or the laughter of a friend. The music is there in the warn rays of the sun and in a gentle breeze.

Music is all around.

St Paul de Vence

We had been travelling for a month. We boarded the ship on the wettest, coldest, windiest day of the journey. We went to sleep...and woke up in paradise. The sun was shining, breakfast was a buffet, there was a bus waiting for us to take us somewhere. And that somewhere was St Paul de Vence, a medieval hill top town just out of Cannes.

The sun was shining as we walked along the cobbles, through the narrow streets, up and down stone stairways, past quaint houses and quirky shops. Views of valleys, vineyards, hills and the snow capped French Alps in the distance.

This is where you end up when you take a risk. Our original tour choice had been taken off the list and we had to find an alternative. What a choice!

I Believe...

I believe that Friday nights should begin with "Wild Wild West" and at some point must involve Jeff Buckley and candlelight.

I believe that the most important people you have in your life are your family.

I believe that true friends are family too.

I believe that everybody has the right to 'lose the plot' every once in a while. As long as the most dangerous thing involved is chocolate.

I don't believe you can ever over cater.

I believe that everyone has a reason for being here and that everyone has their time. I believe that when your time is up, it's up.

And, of course, I believe that love survives death into eternity.