Wedding cake - fruit cake

The first real wedding cake, not a tester, has been made :) This is the one the guests will eat - eeek! 

The fruit cake needs to sit for a few months to develop its flavour and so we can feed it with brandy so ive made it 2 months ahead of the wedding. This is the one im not decorating myself so the caterer also wanted ti made sooner rather than later.

I made a 30cm cake mix but baked it in a 23cm tin as i wanted it tall rather than wide. Just make sure you 23cm tin has tall side or add extra lining paper above the tin height to contain the mixture while its cooking.

I used this recipe but swapped the raisins for dates and apricots as that's what my mum likes :) I also left out the treacle as i prefer a blonder fruit cake. I doesn't look like it from the picture but the middle will be fairly pale in colour for a fruit cake. Its all feeling very real now...

Homemade bread rolls

Just the pictures of these makes me salivate! Delicious homemade bread rolls - nom!

 

I just use a basic bread recipe, its pretty much infallible, i might even teach it to lovely BM!

White bread rolls

Ingredients

450g strong white flour

7g (1 sachet) dried yeast

350ml warm water

pinch of salt

Olive oil for kneading

Method

Mix the flour and salt together and then add the dried yeast. Gradually add in the water to form a slightly sticky dough, you might need more or less water depending on your flour. Put some olive oil on your kneading surface and work the dough until it becomes soft and smooth (approx 10 mins for me). If your dough is too wet add a bit more flour as you knead, or add water if its too stiff. It should be slightly sticky to begin with but loose that stickiness as you knead. 

Place the dough back in the bowl and cover with greased clingfilm. Leave for an hour or until doubled in size. Oil your surface again and knock back your dough i.e. lightly knead for another few minutes until all the air has been removed. Shape into 9 rolls and place on a greased baking tray. Cover with greased clingfilm and leave for an hour or until doubled in size. 

Preheat the oven to 200C and place another baking tray with a couple of ice cubes or a splash of water in the bottom. Put the rolls in the oven, the steam from the ice cubes/water stops a crust from forming immediately, allowing the rolls to rise better and bake for 15-20 mins or until a golden brown colour. You know theyre done when they sound hollow when you knock on the base. Let the rolls cool before eating - if you have any will power.

Homemade pizza

Lovely BM and i made pizza (again!) last night and I think this was one of the best we've had so far!

Its Jamie Oliver's recipe for the base and the sauce then i topped mine with mozzarella, parma ham, peppers, sundried toms and pesto. (Lovely BM put so many toppings on his i lost count!). It was delicious, cooked on a pizza stone so it was crispy and light and just fab. I made it a bit big though (greedy!) so it was difficult to move it onto the pizza stone, which is why its a bit wonk looking!

Spotted Dick for Lovely BM

 

Now i hate dried fruit, its one of my least favourite things, but lovely BM loves spotted dick so, like a good girlfriend, i put my issues aside to make him one! Its a proper traditional one, covered in a muslin and steamed in boiling water, i used this recipe by James Martin, i just halved the ingredients to make a mini version. According to lovely BM it was delicious :)

Profiterole yumminess

 

The 3 stages of profiterole yumminess! Choux pastry dough to puffy baked balls to full deliciousness filled with whipped cream and topped with melted chocolate. They lasted all of 5 minutes when i presented then to my parents!

Homemade apple pie

My aunt has an entire fruit orchard in her back garden (lucky!) including a brilliant bramley apple tree which has had a bumper year. So she kindly provided the apples and i made the apple pie. I always use this recipe for apple pie, it never fails :)

Frying pan pizzas

Lovely BM and i made these yummy yummy frying pan pizzas at the weekend. I followed this recipe and they were fab! Just make sure that your dough is really thin before you start frying it, we had one that was too thick so it was pretty doughy still when we ate it.

 

Homemade Party Rings

 

Party rings were my absolute favourite when i was a kid and when i saw these beauties on pinterest i knew i wanted to make grown up one. I used this recipe for the biscuits and then topped them with 4 different toppings. Dulce leche icing (dulce leche, water and icing sugar), lemon curd, white glace icing with coconut and pink glace icing with hundreds and thousands. All were fab, my favourite was the dulce leche but the lemon curd ones went the quickest!

Caramel Cupcakes

I made these delicious salted caramel cupcakes for the folks at work and they went down a storm! I used this recipe by Created by Diane but i added dulce leche to the icing and drizzled it on top rather than caramel - nom nom nom...

Chocolate Swirl buns

Ive been dying to make these for ages and had a great excuse the other week as i returned to my 'proper' job after a year on secondment to a different department. These were my 'im back!' cakes :) They were easier than i thought they would be to make and by goodness were they yummy. I liked them because they were chocolatey but not too sweet and when theyre warm out of the oven they are fabulous! The recipe is from the always delicious Smitten Kitchen

Chicken Enchilada Soup

Lovely BM is partial to some Mexican food so i made him this Chicken Enchilada Soup by Skinny Tastes the other week, he loved it so i highly recommend it. I had some too but ate it more like a dip with corn tortillas - just as delicious :)

Banana Bread

My sister is vising from Australia at the moment and, as theyre massively into Banana Bread out there, i decided to make her some, so she felt more at home! Its really not a bread its a cake but you can eat it toasted with butter which is probably where the bread name comes from, i prefer it on its own though.

I used this recipe by A Beach Cottage and it was lovely, i didnt manage to get the dark but still soft outer layer like they do in Australia (any tips?) but it still tasted pretty good!

Sticky Toffee Pudding

Do you every see a recipe on your blog feed or on Pinterest and you're buying the ingredients before you know what your doing! That's what happened with this post by Bakerella. Lovely BM and I were eating sticky toffee pudding before the day was out! It was exceptional :)

Oat Biscuits/Cookies

We had a family lunchtime party recently and i made some biscuits for everyone to nibble on in the afternoon. I used this recipe by Created by Diane but reduced the amount of icing to just a drizzle and made some chocolate drizzled ones too. They were lovely, a bit like flapjacks but in biscuit form, definitely a winner :)

Chive and Garlic Rolls

I saw this delicious recipe from Will Cook for Smiles on Pinterest and knew i had to make it. We dont have Pilsbury pizza dough in the UK so i used ready made pizza dough from the supermarket and rolled it really thin, i worked just as well i think

These bad boys were fabulous!

Cinnamon Sugar Pretzels

Delicious cinnamon sugar preztels were my snack of choice this week. Thanks to Life's to Short to Skip Dessert for the recipe!

Watermelon Juice

I managed to juice and then drink an entire watermelon the other day!! I was insired by dyi home sweet home's post to make it and then it was just so delicious i couldnt help drinking it all. One tip though, you really really need to make sure all the seeds are out before blending it though, hard little black bits in your juice are not so delicious...

Blueberry Lemon Smoothie

De-licious blueberry lemon smoothie from Young and Crafty. I wasnt that keen on the almond milk so i didnt add much and my smoothie was uber thick! You really couldnt taste the almond milk so i should have just added more, still yummy though!

Homemde Sausage and Egg Mcmuffin

 

Lovely BM and I are partial to a McDonalds breakfast so i wondered if i could make my own, turns out theyre simple!

I squeezed the filling out of a good quality pork sausage and formed it into a burger shape. Which i then fried it along with an egg. I used an egg ring to help me get a nice round shaped egg. Pop both the sausage burger and the egg onto a toasted english muffin, top with a slice of (poor quality) cheese and its done!

They were delicious, and so much more filling that the bought ones too!

Thai Chicken Stir Fry

Delicious Thai Chicken Stir Fry from the ever excellent Annie's Eats! Her recipe is for Thai Chicken and Cashew nuts but neither Lovely BM nor i like cashews so we left them out - still tasted amazing though!