Lazy hazy strawberry days

One of the benefits of country life is the pure volume of farms, growing stuff, nice stuff and at the moment lots and lots of strawberries. I have some bushes of course planted when I was going through my "Good life" phase. They grew well this year and I'm sure that the birds enjoyed them. The birds it seems have some spooky sixth sense and know not only the precise moment of ripeness but also the precise moment to steal them before I manage to pick them. I've always been deeply suspicious of birds and it seems that I was copletely right to be.

In the absence of any produce from my own bushes it was off to a local strawberry fair to buy some, lots really and some very tasty Strawberry & Lavender Jam too. The strawberries were from Doddington Hall, where they have their own organic garden and grow very lovely if not completely perfectly shaped strawberries. Proper strawberries. That shine and are juicy. The best strawberries really.

Sunday was a lovely sunny day so time for strawberries with clotted cream and a chocolate dip (made from dark chocolate and double cream). There's something deliciously naughty about dunking strawberry's.

Of course I had to try some sort of baking involving strawberries and opted for strawberry & raspberry muffins. An experiment in strawberriness really. I made a couple with strawberry lavender jam hearts (a gorgeously gooey explosion when you bite in) and planted some dark chocolate chunks in a couple of others. Overall, very nice indeed, with clotted cream and ice cream. Especially good if still slightly warm.

Also looking at recipes for strawberry and balsamic ice cream, strawberry and pistacchio shortbread and strawberry shortcakes.

Here's to lazy, hazy strawberry days.

Elemania

Elemania hit London recently and I got the bug bigtime. Basically a herd of over 200 elephants have been sprinkled around the rather grey streets of the City, herded into park corners and shoehorned into shopfronts. There's a serious point of course, to highlight the plight of the Asian elephant which is now seriously endangered. It'd be sad if there were no more Nellie's to pack up their trunks or go trumpety trump so hopefully these guys will make a difference. I think they will because seems like it's a bunch of very nice people behind this little plan. Nice guys get to win sometimes right?

I've probably driven people mad with my ele of the day selections, hopefully though it made them smile when Dandyphant popped up on their screen, marauding through St Pancras or made them feel a little bit like, "ooh pass the chip cone with extra vinegar" as Fish and Chip Ele floated by.


Not to mention feeling a little bit mushy when Mr Stole My Heart or Tree of Love or Kisses on the Trunk rolled across their wall.




Oran (You Stole My Heart)by Adam Bridgland

Anway I had to go, to rush about and get over excited and take lots of pictures of lots of very bright and very silly ele's just because it made me smile. So a lightening tour of the City was undertaken with regular rest breaks of course generally involving Pimms or a nice glass of wine , oh and a quick lunch at the Pieminister - pie, mash , minty mushy peas and gravy - very tasty indeed. There were rosey eles', rainbow ele's, taxi's and policeman ele's. A James Bond ele and some flashy gold and shiny ele's.

Here's a little glimpse into my elemania tour:

My favourite? Well that's tricky, but I do have a soft spot for Cubeelephant by Andre Ritins whose hanging out near Tower Bridge, you can see me dancing with him in the collage pic, yep that's me the mad girl in red, who'd had a Pimm's and a glass of chardonnay and really didn't care if people thought I was silly because I'm not full of myself like some. Anyway I don't think people thought I was silly, I think they thought I was nice and sweet and maybe a bit mad, pretty accurate really.

Cubeelephant is sort of glittery, a party elephant, he needs some blue fairy lights and some colour change love hearts. He's a colourful curly wurly straws and cheese and pineapple on sticks, a cupcake happy garden party sort of elephant. I think he'd look rather nice in my garden, but I expect lots of girlies think that too, much richer girlies who probably have rich oligarchs in tow. Maybe they'd let me visit him though when they move him to their achingly gorgeous mansion in Kensington. I'd make the cupcakes and even bring some Pimms.

I also love Soju Tanaka's elephants The Illustrated Elephant and Whisper, covered in cuddly doodle characters who seem to giggle and dance. Here's his ele's below:





See, cute little guys.

Anyway I could go on and on about ele's as I said it's a real case of elemania for me. There's a link to their website here if you'd like more information and a map in case you also feel the need to pack up some cheese and pickle butties and have a day exploring . http://www.elephantparadelondon.org/

The whole herd will be on display together soon though at the Royal Chelsea Hospital at the end of June. I might go, let me know if you'd like to join me. We can have a Pimms and a Pie perhaps or even Afternoon Tea (now that's a whole entry in itself)

TTFN xx

Raspberry chocolate cupcakes

I've always loved raspberries and chocolate ever since my first Raspberry Ruffle which I think was bought at Woolworths in a pick and mix. Later of course came Raspberry Ruffle bars, which I still sometimes buy basically a raspberry flavoured coconut fondant cream, encased in chocolate. Very pink and girly really for a girl who liked wearing her dungarees and climbing trees and fixing cars with her dad. They cheer me up still, because it's like a Dr Who like Tardis moment when I get one, speeding back through time to Woolworth's to pick out some sweeties and always, always making sure there were ruffles.

I'd been wondering about raspberry and chocolate cupcake possibilities and decided to try some out and I must say they were very lovely indeed, Very sweet and gooey and yummy and somehow rather naughty cheeky little cakes. They're fantastic to make as only really need one saucepan. the icing here was lovely, but equally you could do a raspberry buttercream one which would be very girly indeed and decorate with icing flowers or chocolate stars. You can also pump some chocolate ganache into the raspberry for a cheeky chocolate surprise when the berry bursts in your mouth.

I love these cakes and would be happy to make the for anyone who'd like some. Just let me know and you can come and talk bobbins with the crazy cake girl and her creatures.

xxx

INGREDIENTS


FOR THE CUPCAKES:
125g soft unsalted butter
100g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
300g raspberry jam
150g caster sugar
pinch of salt
2 large eggs, beaten
150g self-raising flour
12-bun muffin tin and papers

FOR THE ICING:
100g dark chocolate
100ml double cream
Raspberries
Makes 12

METHOD

1.Preheat the oven to 180ºC/gas mark 4.

2.Put the butter in a heavy-bottomed pan on the heat to melt. When nearly completely melted, stir in the chocolate. Leave for a moment to begin softening, then take the pan off the heat and stir with a wooden spoon until the butter and chocolate are smooth and melted. Now add the raspberry jam, sugar, salt and eggs. Stir with a wooden spoon and when all is pretty well amalgamated stir in the flour.

3.Scrape and pour into the muffin papers in their tin and bake for 25 minutes. Cool in the pan on a rack for 10 minutes before turning out.

4.When the cupcakes are cool, break the chocolate for the icing into little pieces and add them to the cream in a saucepan. Bring to the boil, remove from the heat and then whisk – by hand or electrically – till thick and smooth. Ice the cupcakes, smoothing the tops with the back of a spoon, and stand a raspberry in the centre of each.

Cupcakes ready to eat in the garden:

Bring back Geoffrey!

Mr Galaxy I love you, really, seriously, I do. Bringing back Counters had made my year. I am happily munching some right now as I type. Counters you see were the stuff of happy childhood memories. I was you see an only child, which meant well possibly more annoying than one that can be distracted by having brothers or sisters to torture. So there were times when mum would need some downtime, which meant dad had to take me somewhere, anywhere, preferably out of earshot for the poor woman to have some peace. Quite often I'd get taken for a walk. Down through Butt Lane, past the canal and up the hill to a little shop. I loved this little shop, not because it was extraordinary in any way but because that was where Dad would buy me a bag of Counters. Counters made me very, very happy. For those of you who don't know what they are they are basically little discs of chocolatey gorgeousness. Naturist Minstrels essentially. Look, there they are below, yum, gorgeous, you know you want to go out and buy some right now. Go on, forget the diet, you'll burn off the calories with all the smiling anyway.



Have them with a cup of tea, like I'm doing now. All melty and lovely and just plain gorgeous.

I remember one day they disappeared, just stopped being there, that was a very dark day. I pouted a lot. I may even have had a little cry. I found that they were still there in Revels, but there were never enough of them and there were some well dodgy flavours in a Revels back which I wouldn't eat and then I'd get told off. I think i wrote in to you Mr Galaxy as a rather irate (but very polite enraged kiddy) appealing for their return. I didn't get a reply, I felt rather annoyed, but hey lets face it the letter was probably addressed to the boss at the place that makes my favourite sweets, so chances are Royal Mail are still processing it. Unless you received it and that's why you brought them back?

In the end I sought solace with Chocolate Buttons, which many of you will know have previously been hailed as my most favourite of chocolate treats. But Counters are back now and Counters henceforth it will be. I will be stockpiling then ready for next week.

There is just one thing though and this is an appeal really, to you Mr Galaxy. it's the packaging you see. It's very nice of course, very grown up. Which I imagine is what you think we want as we are all grown up now. But we don't, not really. I even canvassed opinion of some of my friends and we'd all quite like the old packets back. Big ones of course as we can eat lots more counters now we got all grown up but like they were, white with the pictures on.


So please,please,please, bring back Geoffrey Giraffe and make me a very happy girl.