It's been a little while since I did a foodie blog and as today I've been somewhat of a domestic goddess I thought I'd put that right.
Today I made a cake. Not just any old cake but a cake from the new book by "The Great British Bake Off" winner Jo Wheatley "A Passion for Baking". I'd treated myself to the book last week but hadn't got round to looking at it properly yet. As I had three over ripe bananas in my fruit bowl goading me into doing something with them, other than throwing them away, I went in search of a recipe for Banana loaf.
And here it is
Me being me I mucked about with the recipe a bit as my cupboards dictated. I used golden caster sugar instead of demerara and dark soft brown sugar instead of light. I didn't have any pecans so I just left them out and I put the cinnamon in the mixture rather than sprinkle it on top.
But the results were great. The boy devoured a whole piece at tea time and has been hyper on the slow release energy of bananas and a tonne of sugar ever since. He's been bouncing off the walls like Tigger and is currently in bed and, from what I can gather, is narrating to bear, bunny and monkey entire episodes of Thomas the Tank Engine.
Ahh at least he's happy!
I tweeted about my success and the lovely Jo re-tweeted it and then sent me a message back.
I got a bit star struck as I do in these matters. Well she's off the telly from a programme I really like and her book is great.
I know I'm lame! What can you do?
Jo Wheatley tweeting me back also meant I was only one degree of separation away from one of the hosts of "The Great British Bake Off", Mr Paul Hollywood.
Lemon Cake Lady and I have complete and utter teenage style crushes on "the Silver Fox"!
All you have to do is mention whipping up icing with your hand to LCL and she melts into a puddle on the floor.
Clementine has suggested I apply for The Great British Bake Off as a contestant. I'd be hopeless. Yes I can bake. A bit. But not to the standard they require and also I'd be a gibbering wreck. All it would take would be for Paul Hollywood to announce that the technical bake was iced fingers and I'd be a goner!
Although it might be worth it to go on and say my signature bake was chocolate rice crispy cakes and just see how Paul and Mary Berry coped without laughing or chucking me out the tent?
Instead I am taking Lemon Cake Lady to the Good Food show in November for her birthday present. I have booked the tickets with Gold seats for the food theatre on Friday to see Mary Berry and the afore mentioned Silver Fox Mr Paul Hollywood doing The Great British Bake Off LIVE!
Yes LIVE!
We'll be within touching distance!
Well row D, which is certainly within icing flicking distance should his hands get too over enthusiastic whilst whipping up a batch.
To say we're excited is an understatement. We are grown women. With husbands. And children! Yet we are giggling wrecks. Like teenagers with a crush on the teacher.
Lets just hope we don't muck about so much we get detention.....
I'm a bit in love with my bunting!
I think bunting everywhere has been the best bit of this Jubilee weekend. It's just so... cheery.
We've had rain, wind, sun, more rain, choirs and orchestras in the rain, people floating down the Thames in the rain and the Duke of Edinburgh giving himself a bladder infection by not going for a wee in the rain!
Amazingly we've had a massive open air concert in the glow of the evening sunlight so no singing in the rain (or the sound of someone scratching their nails down a blackboard in the case of Cheryl - I used to be Cole but now I'm not) but pretty much everything else was in the rain.
We're very good at it in Britain. We've got used to it. Picnics in the rain, BBQ's in the rain, street parties in the rain - you name it and we've done it... in the rain.
So for your outdoor activities you need a study water proof bunting. Plastic and tied on tight to withstand the gale force winds so associated with June and the height of our British Summer.
Flaming June! Yeah flaming rain in June.
But the bunting I bought was cardboard that I'd picked up in Sainsburys which I thought was pretty. Which indeed it is.
So because I'm British and we are not to be defeated in such matters as mere inclement weather, I've hung it up inside!
And do you know what?
I'm keeping it up all summer long. For the Euro championships and the Olympics. So I can keep this feeling of national pride and cheery optimism going whatever the weather.
So keep your bunting up good people of Britain and lets keep this lovely atmosphere of national pride going for a bit longer.
We don't care that the country is broke we're British and we've got our bunting up!
And keeping your bunting up doesn't cost anything does it!
Until the bastards decide to tax it that is.....
On Saturday I went on a course. It was called "How to Feel Good from the Inside Out" and Hippy Chick was running it.
I had done the course before as a half day, but after feedback Hippy Chick decided to extend it to a full day so it wasn't so rushed and people had more time to share and soak in all the information.
I always knew this was powerful stuff and I agreed it takes a whole day, at least, to really grasp the whole concept of increased self confidence and self esteem.
What I hadn't realised, until the day got going, was how far I'd come with it all.
I've had some one to one sessions with Hippy Chick. Some of them really intense. The ones after my redundancy were particularly painful. I sobbed and sobbed and let it all out then collected it all up in a big ball of frustration, resentment and anger and chucked the whole lot into the past. Where it belongs.
So on Saturday, I watched the the brave and incredible ladies who had the courage to come on the course, some of them crying, some so broken and bewildered with life they felt on the verge of a breakdown. When I saw them and recognised myself from this time last year I knew I had come such a long way.
One particular visualisation we did really brought it home to me. Without going into the whole thing it's about facets of your personality that you may have closed down over the years after negative comments. You visualise these as doors to rooms. My doors were open. Not all of them yet, but many more than ever before. I felt free to roam from room to room. I felt open. I felt honest. I didn't cry this time.
I smiled.
I told the others on the course. I was where you are a year ago. You've made the first step. This stuff works. Keep going. It's an on going process.
But then so is life.
We should never stop growing. Learning. Challenging ourselves.
I'm not "fixed"! But then who is? I'm not sure anyone ever is and I've learnt that maybe that's ok.
A little while ago Ken's Mum asked in astonishment why I was having confidence coaching.
"You are one of the most confident people I know" she laughed.
I couldn't answer her. I didn't know. I just knew I wasn't right. I was still on the "happy pills". I had dark days. Days when I just couldn't cope. When I didn't want to get out of bed.
"But you get on stage." she said.
True. I lark about. I make everyone laugh. Except some days myself.
That was the key. It's not confidence I lacked but "Self Confidence".
The ability to be comfortable in my own skin. To open my doors and not hide behind a players mask.
So now I like that's there's still a long way to go because when you feel you are on the right path the journey can only be fun, can't it!
We've had the build up.
We've had the hen do! (apologies for having only written part 1 of that - other parts to follow I promise)
So last Friday week we had the wedding.
The wedding being that of Ken and Mr Ken.
Ken is my dear friend who sat next to me for nearly the entire time I worked with her and put up with my old jokes, larking about and general lack of enthusiasm for doing any actual work for the best part of 13 years!
The woman deserves a medal.
On more than one occasion she has remarked that her now husband is like a male version of me!
A medal? She needs her head reading!
So along came the big day and Ken was very calm and collected bless her.
I on the other hand was a nervous wreck.
First of all I had convinced myself that the boy was going to scream all the way through the ceremony, meal, speeches, first dance and any other major moment of a person's wedding day.
Secondly I had also convinced myself the boy would poo just as we reached the registrar and a horrible aroma would pervade the entire proceedings. .
Thirdly I had visions of sticky little hands all over the brides beautiful white dress.
Fourthly I assumed he would do all of the above plus just as the bride and groom were about to exchange vows in a moment of tender devotion to each other, a little voice would pipe up from the back and say
"Spencer and Gordon next. DD please Mama" in his usual Thomas the Tank engine obsessed way. DD being boy speak for a DVD and Spencer and Gordon being his favourite story.
In fact he did none of these things. What he did do was got over excited after I'd left home to go to the wedding venue, launched himself off the sofa and banged his head and nose resulting in bloody red marks on his face.
All week I had been carefully applying calendula cream to his cheeks to calm the redness of his teething rash so he looked lovely for the pictures and he goes and does that!
I heard the news of this calamity via Nanny P when I phoned her to ask Hubby to bring a needle and cotton with him so we could sew the brooch back onto Earthquakes's bridesmaid dress. Nanny P made it sound like his face was that of a boy who'd done 10 rounds with Mike Tyson and then added helpfully
"He's ever so grumpy too"
Great! An arsey two year old page boy with a cut on his nose!
You too can have your wedding ruined by my son. I'm thinking of hiring him out!
I fessed up to the bride. Many a bride would've freaked out that their cherub of a page boy had smacked his face on the morning of the wedding but not Ken.
Ken is a star.
"He's two mate. And a boy. What do you expect? Little boys look like that. He's gorgeous"
After that I felt much calmer.
In reality, when hubby arrived with the boy (and the needle and thread - which we never got round to using) his face wasn't that bad and due to a sleep in the car on the way over his mood had vastly improved. His suit went on swiftly and with only a little wobble before we went down the aisle and one Hubs had to deal with at the end of the ceremony all was good.
I needn't have worried about the official photos as we never got one of the boy. He was too busy bombing about on the grass with the other children and running his poor father ragged to stand still long enough but at least he was happy. And thanks to bubbles and colouring books on the table at dinner he was as good as gold during the meal.
He also waited until the end of the meal to have a poo so he missed a good deal of the speeches by being back in our room with his dad having his bum changed so all in all it went off fine.
So relaxed was I at this point and so happy was the boy running about on the stage area with the other children that he stayed up long after his bedtime. He even started to do the Peter Kay thing where little boys pretend to be aeroplanes at wedding receptions - he came just short of skidding about on his knees.
My parents were invited to the evening and the plan was for them to stay until the boy could take no more then they would bundle him in the car and take him back for a sleep over at their house for the night.
The disco started. All was good. The boy was dancing, running about and generally being a two year old on reserve energy and excitement at being up an a hour and half later than his usual bedtime.
The guy doing the disco set off the smoke machine. Clouds of white mist flooded the dance floor.
"Fire. Fire" the boy screamed.
"No baby, it's just the smoke machine. Not a fire"
In hindsight how a 2 year old who's never seen a disco before is supposed to know what a smoke machine is I have no idea so of course it was a fire! Where there's smoke there's a fire. Usually started by Naughty Norman or that idiot Mike Flood and expertly put out by Fireman Sam.
"Fire. Fire!" he was really screaming now. And not only screaming but due to the many, many episodes of Fireman Sam we have watched in his short life so far, screaming "Fire" in a Welsh accent.
Come in Nanny and Granddad your time is up!
The boy was unceremoniously scooped up and taken to our room for milk and pyjamas all the time screaming "Fire" as if he hailed from the valley's themselves buyo.
Once safely and sleepily handed over to his doting grandparents, we waved him good bye as the car drove away, him still mustering up the energy to shout "Fire" at regular intervals.
"I thought your husband was half Irish not Welsh" someone said to me later.
"He is" I replied. I didn't bother to explain. I was too busy strutting my stuff on the dance floor with a gin and tonic in my hand to go into it.
I was just relived for everyone that the day had gone so well.
Like a house on fire in fact!
So last Tuesday was my 42nd birthday and Hubby and I went on a brewery tour of Adnams in Southwold.
Nanny P had the boy for the afternoon and we ate fish and chips out of the paper, then went along for a look at how they brew our favourite beer.
As far as I am concerned Adnams is one of Suffolk's great treasures and finest success stories, exporting their real ales, stouts and now spirits all over the world and importing unusual wines into the country to sell in their Cellar and Kitchen stores.
Me and Hubby do love a brewery tour! On several trips to Derbyshire we've been to the Bass museum and tour and then again since it has changed hands to Coors.
I do however tend to get the giggles in these places. Once, on the Bass tour, I'd had a lot of coffee at breakfast in the B&B. Never a good move as me and caffeine don't mix well. I'm like a hyper kid after a bucket full of Smarties and a vat of orange squash. I was bouncing off the walls and completely losing it. There was a working model in a glass cabinet showing how, back in the day, the canals and trains brought the ingredients for the beer into Burton on Trent and took the finished beer away again. There were buttons to press to make the miniature vehicles move, blow steam, whistle and generally do stuff. So I, like a demented 4 year old, ran round and round the glass case pressing them all, giggling and laughing as the little trains and barges zoomed up and down their pretend rails and canals.
Little things....
But on this tour, I was very well behaved. I'd had no alcohol or caffeine prior, only fish and chips , which sometimes aggravate my IBS, but other than that we were good to go.
The tour was excellent, with a really knowledgeable guide to talk us through the history and the process of how Adnams came to Southwold and how they brewed the beers before and right up to the present day.
After about an hour we went for a tutored tasting!
God love them, they were not stingy on the measures. We tasted four beers and I must have had a good half pint of each. Then the guide asked if anyone would like a wine tasting session too?
By this time two of the ladies on the tour I'd been chatting to knew it was my birthday
"Yes, we all do. It's her birthday. We've got to celebrate!"
So another very lovely lady who was extremely well versed in wine knowledge, took us through a white, red, limoncello and a dessert wine called Rubis, which tastes like chocolate but has the texture of port. Amazing stuff. We bought a bottle!
I was feeling mellow at this point and, as a friend of mine describes it, "lightly refreshed"!
Hubby and I walked along the front, towards the pier for an ice cream.
"I just need the loo" I said
"It's that door there" said Hubby "You'll need 20p for the barrier"
By the time I'd fudged about for 20p I was a bit desperate. the fish and chips mixed with all that beer and wine had kicked in!
The door was open so you couldn't see the sign on it and the barrier was up which immediately confused me, and in my "refreshed" and desperate state I didn't notice what I should've noticed!
I sat down quickly and did what I needed to do.
I coughed.
Then I heard a voice.
"Is that you?"
It was Hubby!
"What are you doing in the ladies?" I said "Get out!"
"What are you doing in the men's?" came the reply
"Oh Christ you told me the wrong door!" I complained back at hubby
"Well hurry up" he said urgently
"I can't!" I moaned frantically "I'm having a poo!"
Hubby kept guard and luckily no one else came in but it was touch and go in there I can tell you.
In Hubby's defence the men's and the ladies used to be the other way round and there did used to be barriers that charged you to go in so you can see why we got confused.
"Why didn't you notice the urinals?" asked Hubby as we walked back to the car with our ice creams.
"They looked like the sinks" I said "They have those all in one soap dispensers, sink and hand dryer things and they looked the same" I explained.
"No they don't" Hubby exclaimed.
"Well they did to me"
Must have been the beer.
Beware beer goggles! They don't just make unattractive people look attractive, they can make the Gents look like the Ladies!
Keep Easter special I say.
And by that I don't just mean, the shops should shut on Easter Sunday.
By special I mean keep it simple.
What I love about Easter time, apart from the beginning of spring and it is often my birthday, is that it doesn't hold any of the pressures and work of Christmas. You get four days off to spend with friends and family but without having to send cards, buy presents or decorate your house up within an inch of it's life.
And so it should remain.
Adverts on TV may be telling you that the Easter bunny is chain-sawing a hole in all his baskets to cram a board game in and shops may be trying desperately to get us to send each other cards and trim up with chicks, lambs and bunnies, but I prefer a much more traditional Easter.
And that means chocolate!
So on a rainy Easter Sunday with Nanny P and on an even rainier Easter Monday with me, the boy has been helping us make a craft challenge from Tesco Online Magazine.
And it's due to the very simplicity of Easter that we have lots of lovely time to do things like this.
So with card, glue, glitter, bunny and chick sprinkles, crayons and coloured paper, not to mention chocolate eggs, buttons and a Thomas the Tank Engine cupcake we set to work.
Here's our efforts to cheer a couple of grey but not so miserable days.
Long may Easter be simple and special.
Happy Easter everyone!
Last Saturday I went shopping with Lemon Cake Lady in what turned out to be a "tits and arse" day!
We had escaped for a whole day and got to be us again instead of Mum.
Don't get me wrong, we love being Mum's but sometimes you just need a damn good day out.
So off we ventured to Norwich letting the train take the strain. Unfortunately part of the journey meant letting the coach take the strain but that did give us the following gem from the driver, who said, in a thick Suffolk accent;
"Put your seat belts on to comply with the law"
No please, thank you or kiss my replacement bus service. It takes on it's full effect if you say it making "comply" the longest word in the sentence, if not the whole world, then you get the picture.
Once we arrived in Norwich we headed straight for Bravissimo.
It's like a Mecca to us both. I have, to not put too fine a point on it, enormous boobs. I hate them. I hate them with a passion. They get in the way, they make my back hurt, they are the butt of many a joke and they cost me a fortune to "house".
No picking up a £2.99 bra from Primark cos it's pretty and trendy and I can float around the bedroom in it tantalising the window cleaner. Oh no. I'm talking re-mortgaging the house just to buy something plain and functional to go under a t-shirt.
But still Bravissimo have excellent service and loads of choice in my size so I do have pretty stuff as well as the obligatory "over the shoulder boulder holders"!
And more importantly they always make me feel better about myself. The assistant I saw was very flattering about my shape and how I'd dressed. We were both wearing one of their dresses and she complimented mine and I hers. It was that moment of slight frisson when two woman appreciate each others form. After all as Ken always says, "There's a little bit of lezza in all of us!". Mind you the assistant had just felt up my bangers on a professional basis and she may well have been on commission but frankly I'll take my pleasure where I can find it! I got two bras with matching knickers.
My bank balance may have taken a serious hit but I came away feeling uplifted.
In more ways than one!
Which brings me to our second appointment of the morning.
Lemon Cake Lady had booked us into an event called Jean Genie at the Chapelfield shopping centre. This was a Gok Wan style pod where advisors would fit you for jeans and had various pairs from all over the centre for you to try on. Big, small, tall, short, small waisted, long legged, of child bearing hip or as petite as a pin, it didn't matter. They were there to help and make the best fit make the best of what you've got.
If Bravissimo was the booby lady then this I had affectionately nicknamed the "arse doctor"!
The ladies were funny, charming, helpful and positive. Lemon Cake Lady and I are the polar opposite of each other. LCL has a great figure but whereas she is slim on top with a tiny waist she's conscience of her hips and bottom. I quite like my lower half and indeed Hippy Chick has remarked on more than one occasion that I have "cracking pins, but I carry all my weight on my top and middle, especially after having the boy.
LCL was delighted to find jeans that actually fitted her after all these years. She is, according to Levi's, a supreme curve. I could've told them that years ago. And I'm a slim leg, slight curve. Apart from the obvious help and information this was so much more than that.
With the help of Hippy Chick I'm on self confidence kick about my body image. For years, when shopping, I've done this awful squinty face into the changing room mirror which annoys the hell out of LCL.
"Don't do the face" she'd yell at me as I screwed my face up and narrowed my eyes in an attempt to not really look at myself properly. It's like the hall of mirrors at the fairground. If I distorted the image maybe I would look thinner. Or disappear altogether! In fact all it achieved in doing was giving me the look of someone who had smelt something nasty and couldn't work out where it was coming from.
What Hippy Chick is helping me do is accept what I have and learn to love it. If I want to work on slimming it down or toning it up later on then so be it, but for now I want to love myself, wobbly bits and all and say this is me, without screwing my face up like old man Steptoe every time I pass a mirror.
So what Bravissimo and Jean Genie did was to help me love my best bits and control and compensate for the bits I don't like.
One of the ladies who helped us at Jean Genie had , as far as I was concerned, a perfect figure, yet she declared that she didn't like her thighs and they only looked ok because she was wearing the right jeans. How could she not like her thighs I asked? How could I not like my boobs and my curves she asked? I was womanly and "lush" she told me. I had my second little lezza moment of the day. I was starting to like this!
Then I realised that there is no perfection. We all of us don't like something about ourselves, even those who seem to be perfect. When I told LCL that I found this very comforting she said,
"What, that no one is happy?"
"Yes" I declared. "That no one, however perfect we think they are, is so smug and self satisfied that they don't have flaws and things they don't like about themselves too."
Then of course Samantha Brick wrote "that" article but hey you can't be right all the time can you?
That would just make you perfect.....
