The Pineapple

Yay weekends, Yay giant pineapples! And a hearty Whoopie for another list item ticked off.
 Today we visited the Dunmore Pineapple.  A lovely, crazy building in a gorgeous walled garden.  It's been a very longstanding ambition of mine to go see it, so today was extremely satisfying.

Why a pineapple? good question, clearly the bloke in charge at the time was a little cuckoo! lol, no, seriously it's an old symbol of hospitality and welcome.  Also the gardens were heated with furnaces at one time allowing exotic fruits like pineapples to be grown right here in Scotland.  The gardens are still beautiful if a little less balmy now.  We picked a bag full of glorious crab apples as an edible reminder of our trip (guess I can tick off another b2/m2 item to boot) to the wacky and wonderful pineapple.

 The list is doing pretty well, I really need to scratch my head a little though for some more items.  Tuesday is looking good for #29 (take one) as I'm thinking of having an industrial added to my left ear, we'll see!

Tales from weight loss camp... #1

God, grant us the...

Serenity to accept things we cannot change,

Courage to change the things we can, and the

Wisdom to know the difference

Patience for the things that take time

Appreciation for all that we have, and

Tolerance for those with different struggles

Freedom to live beyond the limitations of our past ways, the

Ability to feel your love for us and our love for each other and the

Strength to get up and try again even when we feel it is hopeless.

 

 

I'm not religious, not very anyway (but that's a whole 'nother bowl of kittens).  But, if you ever see me chopping chocolate chips for cookies or stirring frangipane and my lips are moving (but not coated in chocolate, in which case I've failed in my resolve!), that's what I'm reciting.  Despite my limited retention I have managed to memorise this prayer/extra long mantra and find it incredibly useful. Of course more conventional diet aids (cattle prods and the like) help too. 

 

  lol, edited at 22:37... I've made it through today, no deviation from the Lighterlife Way of Life. I feel good, I feel hungry.  Only three weeks to go on the full meal pack thing though, which is very exciting and a bit terrifying really.  I'm 11stone 13lbs as of my last weigh in, which is less that I've weighed in, forever!? can I lose 13lbs in three weeks? no idea, maybe? it's possible? maybe if I slice off some nonessential stuff (what the heck does the spleen do anyway?) and breathe helium.

 Never mind, one day at a time.  Today good. 

 

Peter's Yard

Yep, another list item ticked off and done! uh, except that I have to go back sometime for the gorgeous sounding breakfast and a cardamom hot chocolate...

 With my trusty taste testers (see list item 6, I'm still dieting here) in tow I headed to Peter's Yard bakery and cafe yesterday, it's gorgeous! It's light and airy and smells of bread, cake, coffee and cardamom.  I felt a bit geeky but got some pictures of the amazing bread display.  Wish I'd had the nerve to take some of the cakes and buns too, another time I guess.

   I always love and respect any cafe that provides books to read, and this one has all the rest beat! it has cookbooks, lots of gorgeous cookbooks.  The bread builders, Artisan bread, lots on chocolates, I could have settled down for hours (and possibly stayed overnight) to read in a completely contented fashion.  Oh, and once you've read the theory of baking these gorgeous breads you can peek through the window to see the bakery in action!

  I sampled the coffee (lovely, and for £1 you can have a refill) while my tasters had a lovely chocolate, marble cake heart, a toffee, coffee, chocolate slice (with crunchy espresso beans on top) and a marzipan tartlet.  It was all declared pretty delicious (and in the case of the latte deliciously pretty) and worthy of a revisit.  They do do savouries too, but we skipped right to dessert for breakfast, you only live once right?

We also bought a few things to sample at home, three types of cookie, a loaf of sourdough, crispbreads and a cardamom bun.  The cookies are insanely good, the pink sugared one is a light, crumbly shortbread type, the chocolate one is sprinkled with pearl sugar and has some cardamom in it and the last (totally my favourite) is a strangely chewy spelt cookie sprinkled with coffee beans, I do mean chewy in a good way here, it has a lovely texture.

 Everything was so good that I had a hard time persuading the smallest (squiddy) taste tester to let me finish taking pictures...

Librarything (and how my books got out of control)

I thought perhaps a link to my Library thing might be helpful, to illustrate the scale of the book collection... I enjoy making lists (as you will later see I also enjoy calculators and rulers in the kitchen, it's part of my nature) so Library thing really appealed to that part of me.  My catalogue, unfinished as it is.

The obsessive book collecting started when I left home and started to learn to cook, it was a self defense thing, one more frozen ready meal and I would have gone crazy. One day I was in a charity shop and whoa, so many cookbooks!  Finding out about cookbooks was second only to the discovery that I adore cooking, when the going gets tough I go to the kitchen.

 Once they were aware of my growing stack of books family members started passing theirs on too. Fast forward to now and, Christmas, birthday, yup, it's a book (which is great for me, I love books) or a book token... not to mention the random eBay/tk maxx/charity shop/Abe books etc hauls that sometimes follow me home.

 Now with the b2/m2 project on the go I'd like to say I was being more selective, but I cant.  D'oh!

photo dump/list catch up

a delightful conglomeration of pictures and list items achieved... starting with

Go Ape

We visited the Go Ape course at Aberfoyle, probably the best one (in my completely unbiased opinion, lol) because of the giant zip wires! (the longest one, return crossing is 426m and one of the biggest in the UK).

I've been more than a bit nervous about going ape as I'm pretty scared of heights, seriously, climbing a ladder to change a light bulb makes me come over all weak and kittenish (uh, please feel free to read incredibly confident and macho).  The first zip wire was a challenge, as I sat down I gave a loud and most unladylike yell of Oh Shit... which echoed across the valley leaving safety instructors and gogglers alike in stitches.  No matter.  That was the worst bit, except the Tarzan swing which we will not speak of, ok? yeah, good.  The rest of the course was superb! I took both chicken routes, but next time (yep, I want to go back) I'm determined to do the entire thing.  The weather was glorious which undoubtedly helped the atmosphere, but I reckon even on a cloudy day it would have been great.

and moving on to, The Earthship.

 I've been really interested in visiting the earthship since I read an article ages ago about building using cob, earth sheltered houses, straw bale construction and so on.  Once it was on the list I finally had a good reason to go! oh, and it was on the way to somewhere else too, you cant beat us for fuel economy, lol.

 It's a fascinating place, the earthship itself is great, but the grounds and polytunnels are even better, if you are someone whos heart beats faster at the sight of pumpkins, grapes and sweetcorn growing in plastic tunnels (yeah, so, I am) this is the spot for you.  We saw greenhouses made of plastic juice bottles (great idea but I'm sure my neighbourhood aint ready for it)  and fantastic vegetable and herb gardens.  I'd like to revisit to explore the grounds a bit more.

101 things list... a work in progress

 This is my sisters fault, no, my fault, too, we share a certain amount of blame. I bought a book from a charity shop, 101 places to see before you die, which got her interested in 101 things type lists, which led her into making a list of 101 things to do in 1001 days. Well, monkey see monkey do, so here I am... the b2/m2 project is part of the list, as you'll see, and probably one of the more challenging items.

My list as it stands reads....

1, Cook two items from each of my cookbooks

2, Learn to make macarons

3, Bake a bread from one country for each letter of the alphabet (what, oh what was I thinking?)

4, Host an Amnestea

5, Visit Peters yard bakery Done 11/09/10

6, Get to between 10.5 to 11 stone

7, Have plastic surgery

8, Go to Paris, tour famous/infamous bakeries

9, Do an extreme driving experience (right now tank is my favourite idea)

10, Go to baby loves disco with the squid

11, Take a midnight swim at Stonehaven outdoor pool

12, Cook a mad, themed meal, Heston style! lol

13, Make it my solemn duty to road test lemon tarts
 27/12/2010 lemon tart at Eteaket

14, Take a motorbike taster lesson Done! July '10

15, Take my cbt

16, Take my das

17, Go to Pride Amsterdam

18, Go to the Eurovision song contest

19, Visit another cow parade

20, Come out to family  Done! lol, July 13th in Glasgow now I can check out anyone I please, rofl!

21, Go to Moominworld

22, Visit the Pineapple Done, 25/09/10

23, Go Ape Done! I swung through the trees with the greatest of ease... 

24, Visit the Earth Ship Done!

25, Go to the Menton citrus festival

26, Visit Cafe Gandolfi

27, Walk across the Forth road bridge

28, Have a tattoo done

29, And some more piercings... Ooh! got part of this done today, a shiny, new industrial on my left ear.

30, Visit Eteaket Done 27/12/2010

31, Have a Wallander themed meal, no crayfish though!

32, Go to an outdoors Indigo Girls concert

33, Eat breakfast at Peter's yard

34, Have a tea party each month on a seasonal theme

35, Drive the A1 from Edinburgh to London

36, Go to Books for Cooks

37, Look in a full length mirror and say I look good

38, Cycle across Edinburgh

39, visit Rosslyn chapel

40, walk (lurch?) in the 2011 Zombie Walk

41, Participate in project 365

42, Buy a Lame to make my bread look nicer!

43, Go to pride in Edinburgh

44, Join the library in Glasgow



  yes... currently it is a list of 44 items, must try harder! I did think of something today but promptly forgot what it was (which  is what I get for going out without a notebook).  On the bright side I ticked off an item today too! more in the next post.

Sage, brown butter & pumpkin cupcakes

So, the first (recipe!) post...

The b2/m2 project has been unofficially running a little while, but I'm all about rules, so I'm starting fresh, each recipe documented /geek moment.

For American books, cups kind of bother me, I'm quite unhelpfully ocd about being exact with measuring. For the sake of my sanity I use the conversion charts from Waitrose which are very good and also printable! excellent...

Now, on with the baking. This recipe is from Martha Stewart's Cupcakes, a book I really hesitated to buy as I've had mixed successes with her magazine recipes. However, the pictures were gorgeous and the layout nice, so yeah, it joined the herd.

I made these cakes for no good reason, except that the sunny weather we've been enjoying had rather clouded and it was a chilly'ish afternoon. They are gorgeous, I love anything with brown butter, it's like nuts, vanilla and love rolled into one. I was really unsure about the sage, but next time I'd use more than I did, it's a really great flavour.

Pumpkin brown butter cupcakes

From Martha Stewart's Cupcakes, Makes 15

3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature.
1 2/3 cup all-purpose flour, plus more for tins
1/4 cup fresh sage leaves, cut into chiffonade (optional) not optional! use plenty!!
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1 cup canned pumpkin puree (not pie filling)
1 cup packed light-brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
Brown Butter Icing (Recipe follows)

1. Preheat oven to 325 F. Brush standard muffin tins with butter; dust with flour, tapping out excess. For all recipes that involve turning out a cake I use cake release, Lakeland plastics stock it... it ensures cake happiness

In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add the sage, if desired, and continue to cook, swirling occasionally, until butter turns golden brown. Skim foam from top, and remove from heat. Pour into a bowl to stop the cooking, leaving any burned sediment behind; let cool.

Actually, browning the butter is not at all tricky, so don't be put off. I neither skim or strain my brown butter, as long as you watch it and take it off the heat before the solids burn then they add great flavour to baked goods.

2. Whisk together flour, baking powder, salt cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. In another bowl, whisk together the pumpkin puree, both sugars, eggs, and brown-butter mixture. Add flour mixture and whisk until just combined.

3. Divide batter evenly among lined cups, filling each three-quarters full. Again the ocd comes to the fore, I weigh my mix and the sit my cupcake tin on the scales, each cupcake is equal in size and bake more evenly.

Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until cake tester inserted in center comes out clean, about 20 minutes. Transfer tins to wire racks to cool completely before removing cupcakes. Cupcakes can be stored overnight at room temperature, or frozen up to 2 months, in airtight containers.

4. To finish, dip top of each cupcake in icing, then turn over quickly and let set. Cupcakes are best eaten the day they are glazed, keep at room temperature until ready to serve.

Brown Butter Icing Makes 1 cup

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
2 cups sifted confectioners' sugar
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
2 tablespoons milk, plus more if needed

1. Melt butter in a small saucepan over medium heat, swirling pan occasionally, until nut-brown in color, about 10 minutes. Remove from heat, and pour butter into bowl, leaving behind any burned sediment. Again, I didnt strain it, looking at the picture in the book I'm thinking they didn't either! the little brown flecks are butter solids.

2. Add confectioners' sugar, vanilla, and 2 tablespoons milk to brown butter, stir until smooth. If necessary, add more milk (up to 2 tablespoons) a little at a time, just until icing is spreadable. Use immediately.

To ice these cupcakes I poured the icing into a pudding bowl and just gently dipped each cake into the glaze. Leave to set on a rack.