ENGLISH MUM

The July Roundup. This month I have been mostly…

Scoffing…

…fabulous bags of Warburton’s ChippidyDooDaas – yummy scrummy bags of baked pitta chips, and SnackaDoodles – little crunchy doofers which are 70% wholegrain, making them healthier and with 60% LESS fat than regular crisps, meaning, naturally, that you can have two bags with your glass of wine *cough*

Fiddling…

…with my new mad gadgets from Oxo.  My faves:  the fabulously named ‘mango splitter’ (it really works!)

and the little strawberry huller too. No, I really can’t live without them…

Loving…

Apples for Jam:Recipes for Life by Tessa Kiros.  It’s so much more than a cookery book – it’s been by my side ever since it arrived (recommended by my friend Rachael who writes gorgeous website Tales from the Village).

There are childhood memories, lovely little stories and gorgeous recipes too.

and finally…

Squealing…

…at news of a very exciting trip coming up.  I’m going to keep you in suspenders for now though.  Have a fabulous August xx

English Mum’s Big Bakeoff: only 4 days left!

So the entries have been coming in thick and fast, and if you want to take part in the Big Bakeoff, and have a chance of winning that fantastic Green and Black’s cook’s hamper, you must get your entry to me by midnight on 31st July!

Want to have a little sneak peak at the competition (chosen totally at random)?  Well it’s tough, I’ll tell you that.  First up (above) is Working Mum on the Verge‘s delicious jammy dodgers, then just take a look at The Glutton’s Mr Whippy Raspberry and White Chocolate Cupcakes:

Or maybe you’d prefer Paula from Battling On’s scrummy Lemon Lapiz Pudding?:

Or my friend Tums’ beautiful birthday cupcakes?:

Or how about something savoury? Here are Helen from Icklebabe’s delectable bacon and corn muffins:

So if you haven’t entered yet, get baking!  Oh and remember that the lovely Green and Black’s would like to know a little about your sneaky chocolate habits.  They’d especially love to hear from parents with kids aged 4-12, so if you’d be so kind as to fill in their little survey here:

Green and Black’s Survey

… they’d be very grateful.

And if you want to see all the entries in one place, check back here on 1st August.  Happy baking!   xx

On love, sisterhood, and friendship

I love, adore and worship my friends and family.  They are the kindest, funniest, most diverse bunch of lunatics ever.  They’re splodged across the country, across the world, even, but it doesn’t matter.  From Canada and Slovakia, from America, Ireland, Edinburgh, the Midlands, London, Devon and just down the road, whether I saw them last Friday or last year, I cherish the fact that they care about me, that they’ve ‘got my back’, that they’d do anything for me, that I could say anything and they’d understand.  They’re the best.

Recently, amongst the funny, happy, silly madness that is my inbox, there was nestled a really shitty email.  When I read it, it took my breath away.  Not only because of the content, but it was from somebody that I know.  They criticised me (and something I had written) in a really hurtful way.

Not feeling as though I should have to explain myself, and also not wishing to engage in some ridiculous, protracted argument, I just replied that I was sad that the person felt they could speak to me like that, and that it was all I had to say on the matter.

Here’s the rub: why do people – in particular, women – feel that they have the right to criticise others?  I see it time and time again.  What makes them so fabulous that they’re worthy of telling other people what they perceive that they have done wrong?  The internet seems to have made things worse – people will type things about and to other people that they just wouldn’t say to their faces.  I think this is cowardly. What example are we setting our children?  If we accept this behaviour, how will they treat their own friends? What happened to ‘live and let live’?  What happened to sisterhood?

I’m just me.  I’m not particularly thin, not particularly fabulous looking, not fantastically clever or talented, in fact not really that remarkable at all.  But I don’t think I’m unkind, unpleasant or spiteful either.  I don’t write nasty things.  I don’t snipe, or bitch, and I should not have to – and will not – defend myself or explain myself to people who feel they are somehow qualified to criticise me.  What I say, and what I think (and what I write on here – be it recipe, travel tip, review, comment or opinion) is me.  If you don’t like me, don’t hang out with me.  Don’t read what I have to say.

Recently, my lovely friend Lucy carried the following quote on her blog:

I’m a passionate believer that women are women’s greatest allies; women need other women – in good times and in bad. A strong girlfriend or group of girlfriends can get you through things you’d never quite manage alone, and if you mess up along the way, they’ll still be there for you afterwards. What’s more – you’ll get to laugh about it, and those laughs help keep everything in perspective.

I’ve written about sisterhood before.  And here, for the record, is my own personal pledge:

If I do one thing today, it will be to tell my friends and family how fabulous they are, what I love about them and the qualities that I most admire. I will cherish the people I love, strive to make new friends, never be guilty of excluding anyone from my social circle, no matter how complete I think it is. I will be brave and strike up a conversation, I will compliment a total stranger, I will smile across a crowded room.  I will take no notice of those intent on spreading cynicism and ill-feeling.  I will live for today, love unconditionally and celebrate the fact that we are all, obviously, in this together.

Spread the word, sisters.

The Sun’s fantastic 2 for 1 days out challenge

Soooo the Super Soaraway Sun (is it still called that?) are doing another of their 2 for 1 days out offers for this summer.  Basically you just pick up a copy of The Sun (from this Saturday until Friday 30th), and you’ll find 2-4-1 vouchers for 800 of the UK’s best attractions to keep you busy over that long, long slog that is the school holidays.

There’s more information (and bonus vouchers) in a special 4-page pullout on Wednesday 28th’s Sun too.

As a bonus for you lovely lot, here’s a little competition for you.  Get it right and you’ll be entered into a draw to win a Merlin Annual Pass giving you basically a whole year of messing about at theme parks, attractions like Tussauds and SeaLife centres, completely free!

Have a shufty at this picture and then tell me in the comments section where you think it is out of one of these attractions:

• Thorpe Park
• Chessington World of Adventures
• Alton Towers
• Legoland
• Warwick Castle
• Madame Tussuads
• Lego Discovery Centre

Good luck! Oh, and if you win, remember your friends eh?

The Friday Photo: Busch’s new baby

I thought you’d like this.  My lovely mates at Busch Gardens are celebrating a new arrival:

The as yet unnamed little girly was born at Busch Gardens Tampa Bay on Tuesday 13 July, weighing an estimated 10 stone (ouch!).   Isn’t she cute?

Rapeseed oil and a lemon and almond cake with lemon drizzle

The fields around this area are, at various times of the year, the most beautiful, glowing yellow with all the oilseed rape.  Driving anywhere in the car, it will only be a matter of minutes before someone shouts ‘rape!’ from the back seat (yes, yes, it’s not politically correct, but try explaining being PC to any 15 year old and then you’ll really understand the meaning of a lost cause).

Anyhoo, I’ve been hearing more and more about rapeseed oil.  You’ll be impressed here because I’ve actually done my homework.  It has:

• the lowest saturated fat content of any oil (6.6g/100g, compared to 14.3g for olive oil and 54.8g for butter)
• very high levels of Essential Fatty Acids (ten times the Omega 3 of olive oil)
• a natural source of vitamin E*.

Then I noticed someone tweeting about substituting rapeseed oil for butter in baking recipes.  I contacted her, but she bloody ignored me, so I had to have my own little experiment with a recipe very kindly sent to me last week by Borderfields who, as well as being flippin’ psychic, make cold-pressed rapeseed oil.  And wow, it was a great success:

Lemon and Almond Cake

100ml rapeseed oil

225g caster sugar

3 large eggs

1 lemon, zested and juiced

250g self-raising flour

50g ground almonds

1 lemon and about 3 tbsp icing sugar for the drizzle

So first, preheat your oven to 180°C/Gas 4 and dribble a little rapeseed oil into a medium cake tin, rubbing it about with your fingers.

Put the rapeseed oil, sugar, lemon zest (JUST the zest! I got this bit wrong and put the lemon juice in as well, although it didn’t seem to make a difference) and the eggs into a bowl and mix until light and foamy.

Then add the flour, almonds and lemon juice and stir in gently.

Blob the mixture into your oiled cake tin and bake it for about 40 – 50 minutes (check whether it’s done by poking a knife into the centre – it should come out clean).

Leave the cake to cool slightly, then tip into a rack.  Squeeze the second lemon and mix the juice with the icing sugar.  Drizzle all over the cake.

We served it with big dollops of double cream and it was actually really delicious.  As my Mum pointed out, it’s not a really light cake – it’s more like a madeira cake, but it’s moist and the drizzle top is zingy, sweet and crisp, making it yummy served warm as a dessert.  Although I can also attest that it keeps quite well and is lovely just cold with a cup of tea.  It would also be fabulous topped with a lemony cream cheese icing.

Oh, and I’ve also cooked with the oil quite successfully too – roasties come out well as I think it’s quite pure so it heats to high temperatures quite well, and I’ve used it to fry eggs and drizzle over salmon when grilling too.  I think I might actually be a convert.

You can also make it in various different tins – take this, my new favourite –   a Nordicware heart bundt tin (reduce cooking time by about ten minutes):

*a big huge thank you to Borderfields Cold-pressed Rapeseed Oil for the health facts, recipe and freebie bottle of oil!  Oh and apologies for fiddling with your recipe too.

Indian spiced courgette fritters (pakoras)

One of my favourite recipe books is a very old and slightly crusty ‘Curry Club’ book called 250 Favourite Curries and Accompaniments that my Mum bought me years ago.  I was searching high and low for it earlier as I’m currently suffering from a glut of courgettes, and knew that I’d seen a recipe for spicy fritters in there.  But no, it was nowhere to be seen (it’s since turned up, obviously the ‘where the f*ck has that gone?’ gremlin has finished with it now).

Anyhoo, I had a rough idea what do so, along with the help of the BBC Good Food website, which had a similar recipe for courgette fritters (not quite right, the courgettes were sliced), pretty much worked out how to do them.  And here they are (with apologies to the people of Northern India, who will no doubt be shaking their heads at my terrible and not very authentic version of one of their best-loved spicy snacks.

You will need:

Several courgettes (of varying sizes and comically rude shapes, if they’re anything like mine)

1 red onion, halved and finely sliced

1 chilli, deseeded and finely chopped

Large pinch salt

2 tsp curry powder (or you can make your own mix of the usual suspects: cumin, coriander, turmeric, chilli, etc)

Chopped fresh coriander (big handful should do it)

150g self raising flour (or, to be more authentic, use half gram flour)*

Grate all the courgettes and place them in a sieve over a bowl.  Sprinkle with salt and leave for an hour or two.

You’ll be amazed at how much excess water they give up.  Discard the water and place the grated courgette into a bowl.

Add in the onion, chilli, salt, curry powder and coriander, break in the egg, then sprinkle over the flour.  Stir it all together as much as you can.

Now slowly add cold water, about a tablespoon at a time, until you’ve got a really thick paste (you’ll probably need around 100ml or so, but judge it by eye).

Leave this to one side while you heat up a wok or large saucepan with a good couple of inches of oil (groundnut is fine).  Once the oil is hot (for god’s sake be careful here) – you can test this by popping in a little bit of the batter and seeing if it sizzles – just drop in tablespoons of the batter and fry:

When the first side is a deep golden brown, flip them over in the oil and cook the other side:

Drain on kitchen paper and serve with a nice yoghurt and mint dip, or maybe some mango chutney.  Noms.

*Gram flour is made from ground chickpeas and also happens to be gluten free.  I didn’t have any, but I’m going to use it next time as I suspect it may give an even crisper result.

The Cosmo Blog Awards

Oh go on, go on, go on, go on, go on….

(In the Lifestyle section please – I know I’m a fashion guru as well, but y’know, I don’t want to spread myself too thin.)

The International Travel Photographer of the Year awards 2010

Poras Chaudhary, India

Daisy Gillardini, Switzerland

Courtney Krawec, Australia

So here’s one for my lovely photography-mad friend, Tara Cain, and her absolutely fantastic ‘Gallery‘ contributors: The 2010 International Travel Photographer of the Year awards (TPOTY) are now open for business!

The competition is open to anyone, anywhere – whether you’re a professional photographer, or just an enthusiastic amateur, and whether you’re 4 or seventy four!

There are some utterly amazing prizes to be won, from worldwide travel to software and for new and emerging photographers there’s even the chance of bursaries and representation by professional photographic agencies.

All the previous winners of the TPOTY awards can be seen in the Winners’ Galleries on www.tpoty.com, and in the ‘Journey’ series of books from Travel Photographer of the Year.

Full details of the awards categories, entry fees, bursaries and all the information about how to enter can be found on www.tpoty.com.  Entries close on October 9th 2010 and the results will be announced in December. Images can be uploaded online or entrants can submit prints.

And to whet your appetite, I’ve got the latest in the Journey series of books, containing entries and winners from 2007, 2008 and 2009, worth £25.00 to give away!  It’s a really beautiful, 29cm x 29cm heavyweight hardback book filled with gorgeous, glossy images.  Just leave a comment to be entered into the draw.

So what are you waiting for?  Grab that camera!

Summery strawberry and white chocolate cupcakes

As I sit here, simmering in my sun-baked conservatory and squinting at the dusty screen, I’m really beginning to believe that summer’s in full swing. Here and there at farmers’ markets and farm shops, the glossy punnets of British strawberries are stacked up high, making it the perfect time to treat your loved ones to some pretty strawberry cupcakes.

I like this recipe as it perfectly demonstrates how easy it is to fling together your own recipes. Don’t listen to those people who say that baking is a science and everything needs to be exact. Fancy adding something to a recipe? Whop it in. If it turns out wrong, well, as my good friend Coastal Aussie said after her recent Kiwi Meringue Pie disaster, ‘it wouldn’t be fun if I didn’t experiment’.

Here, then, is the result of my own experimentation: a strawberry sponge as light and fluffy as a cloud, topped with a swirl of creamy white chocolate ganache. Pandering both to my sweet tooth and my eye for the pink and pretty.

For the cupcakes:

170g butter

170g caster sugar

6 or 7 fresh strawberries, washed and hulled (about 100g)

Squeeze of lemon

3 free range eggs

170g self raising flour

For the ganache:

200g white chocolate

Small tub double cream

First then, beat the butter and sugar together until it’s really pale and fluffy. Next you need to purée the strawberries with a squeeze of lemon. If you’re using a large blender (my stick blender with the handy little cup attachment blew up quite recently), it’s easier to blend the strawberries together with the three eggs as the volume is larger and you’ll get a smoother finish, but if you don’t mind the odd lump, you can just as easily mash them with a fork.

Add the strawberry/egg mixture to the butter and sugar fluff little by little, beating all the time. Don’t worry if it curdles – you can usually get it back by adding a tablespoon of the flour and beating it again. Keep adding until all the strawberry mixture is combined into the batter. Now just gently fold in the flour. The result is so deliciously light and fluffy, and smells so scrumptious, that you might have to give yourself a stern talking to in order to avoid eating it all right now. However, if you’re one of those strange people who are repulsed by raw cake mixture you should be fine. Weirdo.

And now, by some mystical baking magic, (and if you haven’t eaten it all) it will transpire that there is exactly enough mixture to fill 12 cupcake papers with exactly a tablespoon of mixture. Pop them in your preheated oven (oh I forgot that bit – gas 4/180 degrees. Sorry) and bake for a scant 20 minutes until the tops just spring up when pushed. Better to be slightly underdone than over, though, you want these sponges light and airy.

While the cupcakes are baking, make your white chocolate ganache. Melt a 200g bar of white chocolate in a bowl over some barely simmering water (turn the heat off when it’s bubbling).  When it’s melted, allow to cool a little then whisk in a few tablespoons of double cream (every time I do this I curse the fact that I never remember to measure it).  It will thicken up, then loosen again.  You just want it the consistency of softened butter, I guess.  Whisk it up to incorporate loads of air, then either pipe into thick swirls, or just speak generously over the cupcakes

and top with a strawberry.

Pink perfection in a paper case. Try saying that after you’ve been at the cooking sherry.