Sunday 30 November 2014

Manchester Tart



William has been trying out some new recipes and at the weekend made a Manchester tart. I remember having this for pudding at school and the custard being bright yellow! The recipe he used was a much posher recipe as it had whole raspberries in it. I suspect the school dinner version was made with a very thin layer of raspberry jam and there certainly wasn't a raspberry in sight.

He first made a pastry case, baked it blind and then covered it with jam, raspberries and coconut.


He then made custard from scratch, this can be very difficult to do but his custard turned out really well. The lumps were soon beaten out and it tasted delicious.


The custard was put on the top and decorated with raspberries.

The Manchester Tart was really tasty and is definitely a recipe we will make again.

Cubs



I haven't posted much about Cubs recently so I thought I would give a quick update about what we have been doing recently. Earlier in the month Luke carried the flag at our Rememberance Sunday parade. Unfortunately as I was walking as well and Mark was at their parade this was the only photo I managed to get.


We did a night on knot tying and Luke has learnt a few new knots. This is a reef knot which he has now got the hang of tying.


We also did a night of bridge building with spagetti and mini marshmallows! The marshmallows held the spagetti together. The Cubs worked really well together building their creations.


Coming up we have the Cub carol service and a couple of Christmas activities. We will also be making our traditional mini Christmas cakes which the Cubs always enjoy.

The Garden

We have had a very mild November and consequently a lot of the flowers are still looking good. The begonias and fuschias in the planter by the front door are still flowering and the lily has plenty of leaves on. Underneath all the green I can see the cyclamen coming through again and the first bulbs poking through the soil.




I have a couple of pots of cyclamen by the front door that were looking a liitle tired when I bought them in the sale at Homebase. I removed the dead flowers and now they are looking lovely and healthy and colourful.





I always have lots of fuschias in the garden and whilst they aren't full of flowers any more they are still looking good.




I am really pleased that we still have some colour in the garden and hopefully the mild weather will last a bit longer.

What is your garden looking like at the minute?


Sunday 23 November 2014

Review - The First Hippo on the Moon by David Walliams



The First Hippo on the Moon is written by David Walliams and illustrated by Tony Ross. It is a story about two hippos who both want to be the first hippo on the moon. The hippos, Hercules Waldorf-Franklin III and Sheila, both have the same dream but very different ways of achieving it. 




David Walliam's books are always well written and the humour really appeals to children (and adults too). The page with the bottom burp raised lots of giggles in our house.


Tony Ross's illustrations are bright and colourful and there is plenty to look at on every page. I like how the writing changes size and on some pages even becomes part of the illustrations. The speech bubbles add additional comic humour to the story.


We loved reading this book and think it will appeal to both boys and girls. It is available from Amazon here
 






Disclaimer - We received the book for the purpose of the review but all words, opinions and photos are our own.


Luke's new bike



We have been really busy recently and haven't managed to get out on our bikes as much as we would have liked but as Luke now has a new bike we needed a good ride to test it out. We planned to ride to Grandma's which is 12 miles away so that gave us plenty of opportunity to see how his new bike performed. We rode both on the road and cycle paths and Luke also managed to find lots of puddles and patches of mud to ride through!


Considering it is November the weather is very mild at the minute so this meant we only needed a t-shirt and jumper. I thought my fingers would be cold but I needn't have worried as once I got going I was plenty warm enough.


We really enjoyed the ride and when we got to Grandma's there was a nice lunch waiting for us. On the way home we went a slightly different way so the total miles that we cycled was 28 miles. Luke is really pleased with his new bike and has said that it is much better than his old one!



Friday 7 November 2014

#AngelDelightMoments


Angel Delight was launched in 1967 by Birds and was really popular in the 1970's when I was at school. I remember having Angel Delight at school and pestering my Mum to buy it as I really liked it, my favourite was the chocolate flavoured pudding. After leaving school I didn't really eat it agin until I joined Venture Scouts and Angel Delight was an easy pudding to take when we were camping. It was also great to take when backpacking as it was lightweight and all you need to do is add milk and whisk, leave for 5 minutes and your pudding is ready to eat.

Tesco launced the new bubblegum flavour in September and we recently received a couple of packs to try along with a fancy glass dish and spotty straw.

William & Luke decided to have a go at making it first they added the Angel Delight to 300ml of cold milk.



Then they whisked it.



Finally they put it into the glass dish, ready to eat.


What are your memories of Angel Delight?


This post is an entry for #AngelDelightMoments Linky Challenge

Saturday 1 November 2014

Saturday Evening



We went out this evening for a lovely tea at a pub. Luke had a huge sundae which matched his shirt! He is now busy reading Tractor & Machinery magazine which has been keeping him quiet for the last half hour!


William chose a huge burger for his tea, it was the biggest burger I have seen. As well as two beef burgers there was a chicken breast, pulled pork and cheese between the bread. To go with the burger there was also chips and onion rings. Whist he almost managed the burger he admitted defeat with the chips!