Sunday 31 August 2014

Baked Alaska

Baked Alaska has been one of the puddings William has wanted to try making. None of us had made one before and after watching the contestants in this weeks Great British Bake Off make them William decided to make one for tea. His Baked Alaska went much more smoothly than the ones on TV and didn't cause any controversy!
First he made a chocolate chip sponge which was to be the base of the Baked Alaska and then using a cutter cut 4 circles of cake.






Once he had done this he mixed sugar and water and heated it to make a syrup which was then added to the whisked egg whites.



The ice cream had previously been formed into a ball and this was put on top of the cake base. We then had to work quickly so the ice cream didn't melt. The ice cream was then covered with the meringue.



Finally the meringue was blasted with a blow torch to brown the meringue.




We served it with a chocolate sauce that was flavoured with After Eight mints.



The Baked Alaska worked really well and tasted fantastic however the portions were huge and would easily have fed two people. Even I couldn't manage to eat a full one! Fortunately Grandma and Grandad hadn't had their tea yet so we gave them the leftovers.

Friday 29 August 2014

Luke's new bike

Here is Luke with his new bike. It just needs a little work on the brakes and then it is ready to go. We are looking forward to being able to go on some longer bike rides now. Mark will be at the front and Luke is just about big enough to be the stoker! 


Tuesday 26 August 2014

Berry Picking


This year seems to be an exceptional year for berries. The blackthorn bushes in the fields are covered in sloes, I have never seen them so full. As there were so many we decided to go and pick them and make some sloe gin. We picked a carrier bag full and there are still hundreds left on the bushes.


As well as sloe picking we also picked some blackberries, again the hedges were full of them and they were all fat and juicy.


We ended up picking two plastic boxes full and had a lovely blackberry crumble for tea. The rest we will freeze and use over the next couple of months.



The elder bushes were full of berries too so we are going to go back and pick some of them and then make some elderberry cordial and jelly.


I also noticed that the holly bush was full of berries, the berries are still green yet but they will look stunning once they turn red.


Sunday 3 August 2014

Eclairs


William is trying some new recipes whilst he is off school. This week he tried making éclairs and whilst the choux pastry didn't quite work like it should when we sandwiched the pastry together with cream they tasted delicious.