Monthly Archives: March 2012

A Moment in Time…

March 29, 2012 By in Homing Instinct, Making Tags: , , , , , , 8 Comments

At 2 and a quarter, Harry finds it utterly incomprehensible that he was once a baby. ‘You soooooo funny, Mummy!’ he chortles, with patronising affection,when I venture to suggest that he was once small enough to fit in a Moses basket and slept for 20hrs a day.  The notion that he once came from inside my tummy is met with stunned incredulity.  I pretend that this is because my stomach is so flat it seems impossible, but this hypothesis in turn causes my husband to giggle with incredulity so I swiftly move on.

Anyway, I digress; the thing is that at some point between about 6 and 9, (esteemed studies show), children are at their most intensely interested in stories about how they used to be and what they did, said and liked to do. I anticipate this phase with mild trepidation because my memory is very unreliable and I know I will fall short when it comes to detail, despite the vividness with which I feel I’m storing the memories away now.  So today, Harry and I built a Time Capsule to be hidden in the loft and ‘discovered’ again some wet Sunday when he is about 8yrs old.  Packed with photos and information about exactly who Harry is today, it should prove interesting, especially as it contains some challenges and a few pieces of treasure as well.  It does, of course, depend on his father and I remembering that it’s up there, but hey, we can at least hope…

Here’s a selection of the stuff that Harry and I put inside….the possibilities are endless.

1. A list of all the things he loves the most right now; foods, friends, toys and games

2.  A load of shredded tissue (gotta have something to throw around..)

3. His favourite toy character, at Harry’s insistence (don’t worry, we have another one….)

4. The current brochure and newsletter from the school he’ll eventually go to at 5yrs old, so he can see what all the teachers looked like back in 2012
5. A picture of us – though with some hesitation as I know this will provoke a later critique along the lines of ‘Dad, where did all your hair go? Mummy, what were you wearing??’
6. Footprints and handprints to compare and contrast with then and now
7. A note of his current height, and a challenge to find the marker of this that is shown in the photo (a small carving on a tree in our garden), and to make a new one…

8. And best of all, treasure: a small, corked glass bottle with clues as to where to find £20 of his 2011 Christmas money, which I’ve hidden somewhere in the house… I’m just hoping he works out the clues because I’m sure I’ll have forgotten…

Champagne on Ice, Dinner at 8…

March 25, 2012 By in Homing Instinct, Making, Paper Paper! Tags: , , , , , , , , , , 10 Comments

Some friends you just know are going to be in your lives for the long run, and our former neighbours fall firmly into that category. In the space of just a couple of years we’ve camped out in each others’ kitchens, set the world to rights more times than I care to remember,  celebrated some of life’s great milestones and donned a myriad of fancy dress costumes whilst sinking an inordinate number of bottles of wine – all the usual stuff that bonds you and transcends the superficial differences in age and life stage.  So it was a no brainer that they’d be the first people invited to dinner the moment the new cooker was connected, and last weekend we celebrated in style.

Of course, anyone who has ever had a new kitchen fitted will immediately recognise my amateur error above, namely to throw a dinner party without having even idly flicked through the 368 page cooker manual beforehand, and indeed such a laissez-faire attitude was foolhardy to say the least. The food was certainly eye-watering, but not alas because of its grandeur and finesse but because of the smoke which billowed from the oven and created an atmospheric if throat-constricting backdrop to the evening.

Still, the champagne helped, and the table decor distracted – I made these personalised placemats earlier in the day using a basic graphics programme and some vintage cutlery clipart, before adding a touch of silver leaf to the knife and fork to catch the light from the candles on the table.  Stencilling the initials of our friends on these slate tags below with a chalk pen made for unique (and wipe-clean) napkin rings, into which I tucked a sprig of rosemary for a flash of colour and a hint of barely discernible scent. Tips and techniques below…

 

For the placemats (I used Powerpoint, but adapt these guidelines for your chosen programme)….

  • Draw a simple coloured square for your background colour, and choose font colour
  • I googled an online dictionary and copied the phonetic layout and invented appropriate descriptors for each guest
  • Either paste your clip-art directly onto the backdrop or carefully print, clip and paste on to each
  • I printed these onto UK A3 sized paper – using recycled paper gave a great matte finish, but normal copy paper would work fine
  • Rub the clip-art image lightly with low-tack glue (I used Pritt-Stick) and brush on a little silver leaf, using a dry brush to remove any excess.
  • Save the template – you can use it infinitely and just change names and descriptors each time – ta da!

 

Channeling Martha with a spot of dip ‘n dye

March 23, 2012 By in Homing Instinct, Making, Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , , 11 Comments

I was lying on the sofa the other day, idly trying to choose which of the few remaining chocolate Mini Eggs to eat first; should it be the pastel pink one, or the soft purpley-blue one? (Note the deliberate use of ‘first’ here; it was clearly never going to be a trade-off).  It reminded me that Easter is just around the corner and that Martha Stewart is no doubt at this very moment engaged in vigorous preparations for her extensive annual Easter home-makeover.  I prefer a rather more minimalist approach myself, saving the creative double-barrels for Christmas, but the one thing I do love doing is dip-dyeing eggs to make a simple centrepiece, or even a colourful addition to picnics when the weather allows.

The one big drawback here in the UK is the distinct lack of white eggs, unlike in the US where white eggs are the norm.  Apparently sometime back in the 60s, the UK government announced that brown eggs are better for you, and farmers and the general public immediately switched allegiance and the white hen egg was quite literally bred out of circulation.  The health-benefits story turned out to be entirely untrue, but brown eggs are now the norm and so for this I used white duck eggs, from Prince Charles’s very own Royal farms, and thus retailing at about £10 an egg.  Alright then, £2 a box.  Even so…

1. Hard-boil your eggs, boiling rapidly for 5mins then cooling gently in the pan for 15 mins to ensure a gradual reduction of heat, preventing the shells from cracking.  In the meantime….

2. Prepare several small bowls with 1 tbsp vinegar, food colouring of your choice and enough warm water to cover the egg completely. I used plain blue and green (above), then also mixed pink and blue food colouring to create a lavender colour, and experimented with different shades and depths of colour as I went along.

3. Add the eggs in turn and check colour regularly – leave for anything from 30 seconds to 5 minutes for deep colour, before extracting with gloves or tongs. Don’t wipe the eggs but instead rest of a piece of kitchen roll or place in egg cups.  Martha’s minimum wage elves apparently build her custom-made draining boards with a grid of nails specifically calibrated for optimal egg drying, but for us mere mortals an egg cup is more than sufficient.

4. The eggs look beautiful just grouped on a tonal plate as below (this one is from Wedgwood’s Vera Wang ‘Chalk’ range and I use it constantly…), or you can experiment with speckle effects using either undiluted food colour (if you’re intending to eat the eggs) or artist’s ink or paint if not.  Be warned that using anything pink/red based could leave your kitchen looking like a scene from CSI, with extensive blood spatter pattern effects across every surface.

The good thing is, once you’ve finished displaying them (no longer than a week after cooking, and keep in the fridge in the meantime), they taste really lovely too, despite H’s obvious suspicion…

Spiders, leaky roofs and that cheese obsession again…

March 21, 2012 By in Green Fingers, Making, Reinvention & Renovation Tags: , 1 Comment

This week’s project: a slate cheese board made from one of the ancient roof tiles which I found tucked away in the shed at the bottom of the garden.  This shed, which looks as if it would fall down if someone so much as coughed loudly in its presence, contains a myriad of dusty and (to me) beautiful abandoned garden bits and bobs left by previous owners.  A mountain of tiny, hand-formed terracotta plant pots are ready to be transformed into summer candles (on my long list of things to do…), but it was the slate tiles that caught my eye this time.

Taking the filthy and unpromising specimens below, the first step was to give each a long, hard scrub before coating with a durable matt varnish to bring out the original depth of colour.  Actually, I’ve abbreviated the process somewhat; the first step was to pick up a slate tile, carry it halfway in doors before dropping it, shrieking, onto the lawn as a generation of arachnids large and small leapt off the tile and scurried hastily back to the security of the shed. Having recovered from the mild hysteria this provoked, I carefully checked that no-one had observed me before casually retrieving the tile and continuing with the stages described above.

I used two cupboard handles shaped like chillies to attach to either end for carrying – I’d found these a year ago in a sale bin at the local DIY store and finally they’ve found a natural home.  I used epoxy resin to attach them securely, though those more savvy with drill-bits might want to have a go at doing this properly and making holes in the slate itself; mine looked a bit fragile to take it.  Now for the fun bit of accessorising the new cheeseboard; these decorative parchment leaves look great against the black, and a simple white pastel pencil works well on the slate, and is erased with one wipe of a wet cloth.  I’ll also be using it for tapas, with perhaps a trio of white bowls for contrast.

This project would be even easier with new slate tiles if you happen to come across them or have neighbours who are in the process of repairing their roof; a word of caution however – it was only when I whipped this out at dinner with much fanfare and self-congratulation that I noticed my husband peering at it a bit too closely. ‘Would that be one of the handful of original tiles I’d set aside to repair the annexe roof?’ he queried, in the kind of voice that tells you we both know the answer already.  Oops. So check that the roof slate is spare before coming over all artistic, would be my advice.  Still, it looks great…

The life-shortening joy of Churros Y Chocolate

March 19, 2012 By in Baking, Uncategorized Tags: , 2 Comments

Whilst the rest of the world was celebrating St Paddy’s day this weekend we – contrary as usual – were having a bit of a Spanish moment and cooking churros for the very first time.  I’d often looked longingly at churros recipes (doughnut mix ? rolled in cinnamon sugar? That you are then actually required to dunk in hot, melty chocolate? Can it even be legal..?), but never before attempted to conquer them at home.

To the loud accompaniment of Catalan songsters The Gypsy Kings, we sashayed around the kitchen brandishing piping bags filled with an ever-expanding dough, whilst simultaneously heating a vat of oil and melting a tonne of chocolate.  It’s amazing in retrospect that nothing caught fire and no-one was sent to call for an ambulance.

My understated photo belies what a truly explosive and messy process this is, at least the first time – no kitchen surface or implement was spared, and none of the pans involved in this enterprise (there were many) looks quite the same afterwards… but oh my god it was worth it.  Eating churros dipped in molten chocolate may be the only time in life that you can actually hear your arteries furring up if you listen closely enough, but in the moment it is impossible to care.  As Harry demonstrates below, you can add fruit into the mix too if you like, but really it isn’t going to make it any healthier.  Still, life is short…

Ingredients:

For the chocolate dipping sauce:

  • 200g dark chocolate, 50g milk chocolate
  • 2 tbsp of golden syrup
  • 300ml double cream.
For the churros:
  • 90g caster sugar (for dusting after cooking, when mixed with the cinnamon)
  • 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
  • 125g plain flour
  • 125g self-raising flour
  • a good pinch of sea salt
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 litre sunflower oil for frying
  1. Mix the chocolate sauce ingredients in a pan over a low/medium heat until melted, then set aside until ready to use; gently reheat once the churros are cooking.
  2. Sift the flours and salt together into a heatproof bowl; make a well in the centre.
  3. Mix the olive oil with 450ml of boiling water. Stir well then add to the flour and mix to make a smooth paste (you can do this in a mixer if you prefer). The dough will be sticky and puffy and will adhere to every part of you it touches; be warned.
  4. Spoon the dough into a piping bag fitted with a star nozzle and place in the fridge to chill until ready to use.
  5. Heat a saucepan of oil to 170c / until a piece of bread sizzles on contact.
  6. Pipe your churros, snipping each one off at whatever length you’re happy with.
  7. Toss each one in the sugar mix and set on a plate with the chocolate dipping sauce.  Wait whilst each of your friends declares undying love for you before grudgingly passing around the table.
recipe adapted from Thomasina Miers’ book Mexican Food Made Simple

Ahoy there M’hearties!

March 16, 2012 By in Homing Instinct, Making Tags: , , , , , , , , 5 Comments

They say that marriage brings many surprises, and this is certainly true. When my boyfriend – now husband – and I first moved in together, he arrived with a pile of classic bloke stuff (flat screen TV, huge bag of sports kit, very little else), but also a large, scuffed box marked ‘fancy dress’.  This he explained, quickly, was full of kit worn for various ‘work dos’ at which he had been required to play the role of Spice Girl, Madonna etc – always female, for some baffling reason which we won’t dwell on.  I mentally assigned this discovery to the category ‘things to reflect on but not be unduly concerned about’, and forgot about it.  He remains the only grown-man I know of who has his own dressing-up box.  It pains him slightly that, as a sign of his growing maturity, this now contains a Santa Suit, the role he is most often called on to play at festive nursery events.

Watching 2yr old Harry waft round the kitchen recently in a carefully curated outfit of jeans, dressing gown, sunglasses and bike helmet, brandishing a play sword, I realised that genetics has once again leapt to the fore, and that perhaps each man in the household now needs his own dressing-up box.

I customised this old blanket box (ebay, £30) to produce a pirate chest befitting a mini-adventurer; I wanted to avoid paying a fortune for the the standard high street primary-coloured options, and also to make something more personal.  I have visions of this being consigned to the loft for Harry’s teenage/early-adulthood before being whipped out dramatically to impress his own children ‘You were a pirate, Daddy???’ ….but I am of course getting way ahead of myself here.  Tips and techniques below…

Once you’ve found a chest or box to customise, you’ll need some or all of the materials below:

1. Decide on what text you want to add to the front of the chest and print to your decal paper, following the manufacturers instructions; I used Lazertran, which requires a shallow water bath to release the paper from its backing.

2. Mark lightly in pencil where you want the lathering to appear and then apply; with Lazertran I brushed the surface area lightly with turpentine before applying each letter and coating again; this ‘melts’ away all the Lazertran without ink, so the great thing is you don’t need to worry about cutting out accurately and can leave some border to your letters before you apply

3. I then added giant upholstery tacks to all the metalwork to look like ancient studs, by snipping off the pins and then glueing the tack head to the chest.

4. Papering the inside was a case of trial and error, and errors were a-plenty; I used watered down PVA to coat liberally my maps and then pasted to the sides and lid of the box.  Where possible, I tried the align the map parts together to recreate the whole, but I didn’t slave over this.

5. I’m still on the look out for a suitable buckle or clasp for the front to finish it off – as with all my projects, it will probably continue to evolve for a little while…

p.s. I’ve just been asked how to make the scroll in the second photo, so here goes…

  • Print your text onto a standard sheet of paper, wait 10 mins for the ink to completely dry out
  • Take it outside and hold a lighter against the paper to brown the edges, blowing out as soon as it catches light
  • For this bit, have a pail of water to hand, tie hair back, check wind direction; really, just the obvious stuff…
  • Rub a squeezed-out tea bag all along the edges to create an aged effect.  Dab it across the rest of the paper for tonal colour.
  • If you want your scroll to lie flat, cover the damp paper with a tea towel and a heavy book until dry
  • When dry, curl the top and bottom round a paintbrush or pencil to create a scroll effect.
  • Admire your efforts.

Unnatural Passions…

March 15, 2012 By in Homing Instinct, Uncategorized Tags: , 17 Comments

So there I was in the new kitchen, sniggering at a story in the news about a lady in the US who was experiencing a distinctly unrequited passion for the Statue of Liberty, whom she intended to marry at the earliest opportunity.  ’A rare disorder’, mused the gravely serious experts, which meant that she was ‘irrevocably attracted to inanimate objects’, causing the same pulse-racing, obsessional behaviour that might occur in a normal woman were George Clooney to move in next door.  The Eiffel Tower too, it seems, has a flurry of admirers who become a little skittish and flirtatious when in its presence.

Imagine my surprise when my husband looked me in the eye and asked me, gently yet firmly, whether I recognised any of these symptoms.  He drew my attention to the way I stroke our Italian granite worktops, sigh contentedly at the soft-close doors and am happy as a clam just gazing at our new range cooker for the entire 45 minutes it takes to cook a Findus Ready Meal.  My denials faded rapidly…. in my defence, at least a new kitchen is – generally speaking –  a lower maintenance and less threatening lover than the usual alternatives.

So here it is; the object of my affections….

The room used to be a shag-pile carpeted living room, before we reconfigured the space to create a kitchen/diner. We had a mould made of the original coving and will continue it along the new back wall (above). The flooring is engineered artisan oak with a linen whitewash; it’s probably my favourite thing, and is great for tricycles…

A pair of dressers hold a collection of white and neutral china, including this cow creamer which holds a place in my heart as the quirkiest yet most utterly useless milk jug ever.

It would be untrue to say that the whole kitchen was designed around this beautiful and organic light from BTC, but we certainly had it in mind from the outset; six porcelain bell-cups cast a soft glow over the dining table.  Assembling it and wiring in without dropping a clanger (literally) is a feat of engineering and would make  a good game show challenge.

An off-white sofa may seem a ludicrous choice for a family kitchen, but this one is treated with industrial-grade stain guard and has so far resisted wine, chocolate, mud and just about everything else a 2yr old can throw at it.

The range cooker from French company Lacanche looks the bees-knees but its opaque doors and my resultant inability to peer inside without opening the door means that my baking skills are going to have to improve…

We kept the original fireplace and added a stone surround from London company Chesneys. After a frenzy of chimney sweeping we held our breath and built a fire; now evenings are spent pottering around the kitchen whilst logs spit and crackle in the hearth.

We’re taking our time with accents (not least because we need to earn some more money first…), and will add counter stools, in due course.  For now a clock and blackboard lean against the wall and can be moved around as we decide on their ultimate position.

And finally, the fireside log basket doubles as a stool and portable play table when fitted with our barrel-top breadboard

Spring Fever

March 11, 2012 By in Green Fingers, Homing Instinct, Making, Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , , , 11 Comments

After a couple of stuttering false starts, it’s clear that Spring is just around the corner and Harry and I are alternating between indoors and outdoors at the drop of a hat.  Thank heaven for wipe-clean wood flooring. When the sap is rising and the buds are bursting into colour, it makes me come over all green-fingered, so this week we’ve been experimenting with growing cress, the ultimate in instant-gratification gardening.  There’s something so bafflingly magical about being able to toss a generous and unfettered handful of seeds onto some damp cotton wool and see them sprout forth overnight. For those with patchy childhood memories, each stage is demonstrated with gusto by Harry, below. Our admittedly rather camp collection of Cressmen are now 5 days old and ready for a first trim…



Step 1: moisten some cotton wool in lukewarm water

Step 2: Insert carefully into your egg cup.  Pause to wipe hands on your jumper.

Step 3: Scatter a small handful of seeds carefully into the cup, covering the cotton wool

Step 4: Abandon this plan; instead, scatter seeds flamboyantly over all surfaces

Step 5: Your work is complete. Retire for a nap whilst Mummy clears up and entertains herself attaching eyes and moustaches to your efforts, in homage to The Village People.

And then… For something a little more grown-up, and to give the impression that great culinary endeavours occur in my kitchen, I also planted up a few wilting supermarket herbs into a variety of different decorative containers (including a copper coffee tin, right), and am diligently watering, trimming and tossing into any dish which may warrant additional greenery… aesthetics may outweigh flavour here, but at least they look pretty. Maybe a little understated compared to the Cressmen, but then there’s only so many things you can attach fake eyes to…

Audrey Hepburn Cookies

March 9, 2012 By in Baking Tags: , 2 Comments

Harry is an ardent admirer of the older woman. At the tender age of two, he is having his own Mrs Robinson moment and is far more enthralled by my often chic and stylish, rather more mature girlfriends than those of a similar height to him.

This weekend we will be seeing a number of them, so have embarked on a spot of decorative baking in an attempt to turn their heads.  Even projects like this one offer a number of opportunities for small, clean hands; the cutting of cookies, glueing of surfaces and rolling of icing all needed the services of my knee-high sous chef. Much of the original icing vanished during the project; the crumb-covered blackened mouth being a dead giveaway.

For these I used the sugar cookie recipe from cult British bakers Biscuiteers, which I’ve added below; the golden syrup makes the cookies crisp and deliciously chewy, although I should warn the uninitiated that toddlers and syrup are a recipe for kitchen chaos..

Boxed cookies in waxed paper tied with ribbon, to mail to a friend we won’t be seeing

Bake your cookies and assemble your decorations; I coloured royal icing with black paste and used ivory dragees, with edible glue to hold everything together

Use the same size cutter for the icing; the cookies expand a little in the oven leaving a nice rim around the iced shape.  The finished cookies will store for 7-10 days if kept in an airtight container (layer with greaseproof paper).  You can also freeze the unbaked dough.

Biscuiteers Sugar Cookie Recipe (from the Biscuiteers Book of Iced Biscuits)

  • 350g plain flour
  • 100g self-raising flour
  • 125g granulated sugar
  • 125g salted butter; cubed
  • 125g golden syrup (corn syrup in the US)
  • 1 large egg, beaten lightly
  1. Sift the flour together, add sugar and mix well
  2. Add the butter and rub together to resemble fine breadcrumbs
  3. Create a well in the centre and add the syrup and egg
  4. Mix well, into a ball; flatten and chill for 30mins or until ready to use
  5. Roll out, cut and bake for 10-15mins; mine took a little less than this so check at intervals to avoid over-baking.
  6. To adhere the icing to the cookies I used edible glue; for the dragees I dipped each in the glue with a pair of (sterilised!) tweezers and before adding to the neckline.  Doing this when the black icing is still soft and malleable helps them to remain in place

Lepidoptery for the Lily-Livered

March 8, 2012 By in Making, Paper Paper! Tags: , 3 Comments

As a child on holiday in Cornwall, I remember scuffing my way along the hedgerows in Summer and finding seemingly hundreds of butterflies which had quietly met their last and were now decoratively, if a little sombrely, adding a flash of colour amidst the green.  We’d gather them up and head home, carefully cupping our deceased quarry as if it might still fly away.  But here the nostalgic reminisces grind to a halt because I cannot for the life of me remember what we did with them next.  Even at the age of 10 when one’s barbaric tendencies are at a peak, the idea of pinning them to a board or glueing them into a macabre holiday craft montage  seemed a little, well, unnecessary. So instead I imagine they  sat on the kitchen table, shedding and gathering dust in equal measure, until swept to their ultimate doom by my mother in a fit of domestic zeal.

This week I discovered a far more humane way to reignite my brief flirtation with the world of lepidoptery; a cheap and cheerful craft punch, which has proven to have a multitude of uses.  I worked my way through some leftover gift wrap, then experimented with watercolours and finally some old walking maps, which my husband had unwittingly left lying around.  I am mildly apprehensive about the day when he confidently whips one open when lost on a Yorkshire moor and finds that there is a butterfly-shaped hole in the place where the footpath was once shown, but I’ll endeavour to not lose any sleep over it.  A word of advice on maps; if using the more mundane modern versions like me, rather than the romantic olde worlde versions, do check what map detail you are stamping out before attaching your butterfly irrevocably to a card; I had to prise a fluttering ‘Public Sewage Works’ butterfly off and start again…

Close-ups, tips and tools below.

A Kaleidoscope of Butterflies on pastel paper. If you had the time or inclination to keep going, these would look beautiful en masse in a box frame. (Fact of the day; a kaleidoscope is indeed the beautiful and apt collective noun for a group of butterflies…)

Map butterflies glued to a square of mount board with a watercolour wash

Fun layering with leftover gift wrap – this would work well on tags or headed notecards too

A wallpaper butterfly on mount board as before, this time with a dash of glitter glue

Materials:

  • Hobbycraft small butterfly punch (£3.99)
  • Decorative paper scraps and maps
  • Gel craft glue or hot glue (glue sticks like Pritt will work fine for flat butterflies but are not quite strong enough if you’re folding and mounting at an angle)

 

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