mirrormirror - Part 35

Blueberry Boy Bait

September 13, 2011 By Paola 2 Comments

Speaking as we were about baking with kids, the Minx and I had very fun day for the last day of ‘mummy’ camp before starting school.

We went with friends for some pick your own blueberries (thanks Mercer Slough Blueberry Farm!) and then decided to do a spot of lunchbox baking afterwards.

The recipe for Blueberry Boy Bait from Smitten Kitchen seemed ideal lunchbox fare – easy to bake, easy to pack, not too sweet and packing enough blueberries that it could almost be counted as a healthy option. At least that’s what this mother tries to tell herself. Oh and did I mention that they’re rather delicious?

First pick your blueberries. I love how pretty they are.

Then mix up a plain-ish yellow cake batter (the full recipe is here) made with butter, a little soft brown sugar and half a cup of blueberries. The cake is then topped with more cinnamon-flavoured sugar and another half cup of blueberries so that the fruit is evenly dispersed throughout the cake. This is an ideal job for small fingers.

You should end up with a golden rectangle of purple-flecked yumminess with a slightly crisp crust. Cut it into small lunchbox-sized portions. Ours is now in a big ziploc bag in the freezer. Add a frozen slice to the lunchbox the night before and it will be fresh and ready to eat in time for lunch.

Incidentally the fabulous name was apparently bestowed by the fourteen year old girl who devised the recipe and came second in a baking competition back in the Fifties. She was obviously a marketing as well as a baking genius. Mr T, the only boy in our family aside from Flora the cat, confirms that the name is appropriate even though it doesn’t contain either beer or bacon.

Decorate!

September 7, 2011 By Paola 6 Comments

Holly Becker of Decor8 fame has been an online friend for the longest time. I started blogging a little after she did and she was one of the very first people to comment on this blog nearly six years ago.

I’ve done her Blogging Your Way course and cheered her on from the sidelines as she has gone on to her incredible and very much deserved success.

Holly is one of those people who is always generous with her time, her encouragement and, latterly, with the enormous reach and power of her blog. She’s one of those people who always seems to have time for a friendly word or blog comment, however phenomenally busy she is and has created a huge network of friends, followers and devoted admirers across the globe. And I’m not sure whether she ever sleeps or manages to have any leisure time as her output and the number of projects she’s involved in has always been prodigious.

I find her inspirational on so many levels and have always been sad that she managed to skip to Europe not long after I arrived in the US. We’ve never been on the same side of the Atlantic for very long.

When plans for her book tour were finalised, she invited me to come down and see her in San Francisco. And at first it seemed like a crazy idea to fly down just for a book-signing and a dinner. But a little voice in my head kept saying ‘why not’ and then Virgin America was offering great deals on flights from Seattle and before I knew it I’d booked flights and a hotel and was lined up for my first night away from the family in ages.

Holly and yours truly

And, all you mothers out there, I seriously don’t know why I didn’t do it sooner. I had totally forgotten the joys of plane travel without a fidgety six-year old; of mooching aimlessly round shops without being in a terrible rush or having to march a six year old to the toilet; of eating a most amazing lunch (thanks Boulette’s Larder) without having to worry whether the Minx had brought her DS or a book. For 36 hours I was single again, and goodness it was BLISS.

Holly’s book signing was at Anthropologie (beautifully decorated with these garlands and bunting from Paper Source. Note to self, must buy for the Minx) and she was accompanied by Leslie Shewring from A Creative Mint, who had also taught on the Blogging Your Way course. I also got to meet the very charming Victoria, of sfgirlbybay fame; the delightfully effervescent Alix (who had been a very fun team mate on the Blogging Your Way course) and Dottie from Modern Kiddo; the lovely Maja Brugos from Tikoli and Crystal Gentilello of Rue Magazine among other luminaries of the San Francisco design and blogging world.

Leslie Shewring and Alix from Modern Kiddo with Holly

All in all I had a fabulous couple of days and came away tremendously inspired to work more on this blog and throw myself more fully into the design world. It’s time for this Mamma to have some ‘me’ time.

Oh and the book? Well, it’s fabulous of course. Unlike many decorating books which are all about recreating the author’s own style, Decorate is all about uncovering and developing your own personal style and vision. It is chock full of gorgeous pictures, inspirational quotes and tons and tons of innovative, accessible and eminently do-able ideas for every room in the house. The book is sitting on my nightstand and is perfect way to unwind with a little bit of pretty at the end of a long day. And my house will definitely benefit in the long term.

As for Holly herself, well, she is as warm, charming and thoroughly lovely as her online persona. But then you knew that already. And also very tall.

And now I really must stop gushing and have a lie down. All this being nice does not come naturally at all.

Cherry Cake and Ginger Beer

September 1, 2011 By Paola 8 Comments

I set myself a low bar when it comes to mothering. If the Minx grows up to have good manners, to love books and to be able to cook then I figure she’ll probably always have friends, be passably well-educated and never go hungry. And that way it seems to me happiness lies.

Certainly I can think of few greater pleasures in life than devouring a good book or some good food. So you can imagine how much I enjoyed reading Cherry Cake and Ginger Beer by Yarnstorm’s Jane Brocket, which discusses all the delectable foods found in classic children’s literature, accompanied by scrummy-looking recipes and pen and ink illustrations from the works in question.

The Minx and I are currently on a bit of an Enid Blyton jag at present and revelling in descriptions of fabulous picnics with boiled eggs and sticky buns, Aunt Fanny’s cakes and of course lashings of ginger beer (which according to Brocket, Enid Blyton never actually says in her books).

I am amused to note that, while the plot intricacies of many of these books have completely receded into the mists of time, I can remember almost verbatim many of the food descriptions, such as this one from What Katy Did.

“.. and there – oh, delightful surprise – were seven little pies – molasses pies, baked in saucers – each with a a brown top and crisp, candified edge, which tasted like toffee and lemon-peel, and all sorts of good things mixed up together. There was a a general shout… a tumult of joy… in an incredibly short time every vestige of pie had disappeared, and a blissful stickiness pervaded the party.”

Oh how I wanted to taste one of these pies – ‘molasses’ sounded so delicious and exotic to this little British girl – and now I can, because I have a recipe.

Unfortunately the book is already out of print and quite difficult to get hold of – I suspect the market for it was rather too esoteric. American readers might be particularly frustrated as it focuses primarily on British children’s classics and old-fashioned British baking, though Little Women, Little House on the Prairie and What Katy Did all make an appearance.

But buy this book if you, as I did, grew up with the likes of The Famous Five, My Naughty Little Sister, Pippi Longstocking, Milly Molly Mandy, Paddington Bear, Anne of Green Gables, The Secret Garden, and Malory Towers. Get it doubly fast if you are re-reading these books with your kids and enjoy baking with them.

What do enjoy cooking and reading with your kids? The Minx and I are sorely in need of recommendations in both categories.

Oh and speaking of the Minx, she went back to school yesterday, oh frabjous day! So now I’m back blogging properly.

Postcard from Orcas Island

August 20, 2011 By Paola Leave a Comment

Loveseat

Postcard from Orcas Island

August 19, 2011 By Paola 2 Comments

Fancy Hotel of the Week – Melenos Lindos

August 18, 2011 By Paola 2 Comments

Ha! You thought you’d got away with no more Greek holiday snaps. Unfortunately it remains my intention to bore you all into submission. After all, what else is a blog good for?

I mentioned that we liked to stay in little unassuming hotels while in Greece, but we decided to break that rule for the first few days by booking into the Melenos Lindos, high in the acropolis of the ancient town of Lindos in Rhodes. This hotel gets so many fabulous mentions, that it seemed churlish not to try it out.

Images from hotel website

Unfortunately they contacted us a few days before we left and said that there had been a double booking and they had no space for us. They pulled out all the stops to secure alternative accommodation (which, thanks to its enormous swimming pool and spacious grounds was actually much more suitable for the Minx) and offered us a free dinner on their beautiful outdoor dining terrace.

Architect Anastasia Papaioanou and Australian artist-designer Donald Green worked together to recreate a traditional multi-levelled, multi-terraced Lindian mansion, decorated in a timeless way using traditional local crafts and antiques.

Here are some of my photos from our dinner, supplemented by the couple above from the hotel’s website, as I didn’t have my wide-angled lens with me.

Enjoy the spectacularly pretty.

Beautiful British Food

August 17, 2011 By Paola 8 Comments

Funnily enough, given that I was brought up by, and learned to cook from, an Italian woman and cook in a very Italian way myself, I have found myself being a bit of an unofficial ambassador for British food here in Seattle, where it’s as much maligned as it is everywhere else on the planet.

I tend to make classic British dishes for potlucks and gatherings (people are so surprised that British food can actually taste good) and really want the Minx to grow up understanding her culinary heritage in the land of mac ‘n’ cheese and pumpkin pie.

New Zealander Joel Penkman moved to the UK and started painting beautifully detailed portraits of classic British foodstuffs which make me want to weep with nostalgia.

Every British kid grew up on these biscuits.

No trip to the seaside was complete without a stick of rock to take home.

My favourite ice lolly. At least until they invented Magnums.

No kid’s birthday party was complete without Fondant Fancies, though my mum had enough of a fear of food colouring that we never had them at home.

Custard tarts. Always hated those.

And pork pie. One of the top five things I miss most about the UK here in Seattle. I think I would cry if I had this picture on my kitchen wall.

Joel’s website is here. Buy her prints here.

The Story of the Cake – Part II

August 16, 2011 By Paola 3 Comments

The day before the party the Husband and I set to work assembling all the various cakes I’d been making and freezing over the previous week.

The top tier was a classic Victoria sponge filled with chocolate buttercream. The rainbow cake filled with vanilla buttercream formed the middle tier and the bottom tier was yet another Macrina Bakery ‘Mom’s Chocolate Cake’, which I’ve been using for birthday cakes ever since the Minx was two, as it is very moist and forgiving, and much beloved by the grown up kids in attendance.

Stupidly I’d made my cakes in 9”, 8” and 7” sizes which didn’t really make for enough of a tiered effect and also left nowhere for my fairy cake toppers to sit. Fortunately I’d made a big batch of cupcakes ready for a cupcake decorating activity at the party so we used a few to create plinths for the fairies to sit on.

Here is the whole edifice covered in its crumb coat. (Please ignore hideous green kitchen countertops).

And here is the finished article, covered with easy moulded flowers and chocolate bunnies, made using candy melts; vines and leaves iced on in green buttercream and a set of five Disney Fairy cake toppers. The Husband has asked me to point out that he is the person who actually wields the icing bag (under my direction) and he certainly did a fabulous job.

I was however nervous for the final piece de resistance. Would the central rainbow cake be sufficiently lurid and rainbow-like?

It seems I needn’t have worried.

And the kids ADORED it.

I am indebted to my father-in-law for the last two photos. Note the careful styling in this bottom pic, it took me ages to get the mustard bottle just so.

The Story of the Cake – Part I

August 10, 2011 By Paola 3 Comments

Yes, it’s that time of year again, where I get to make my daughter a crazy cake for her birthday.

Actually it’s a different time of year this time round, as we couldn’t actually get our backsides in gear to organise a winter birthday party for her, so this year we’re celebrating her half birthday. And she gets a summer party and her grandad gets to spend it with her, so it’s all good.

But I digress. This year a Tinkerbell cake has been requested and I thought I’d go along the lines of the Nemo cake I made a couple of years back – three tiers, green icing and then an assortment of fairies and flowers rather than fish and shells.

I wanted to add an additional surprise though and make the middle tier a ‘rainbow’ cake, as has been demonstrated all over the internet. Yes, it’s going to be ridiculously tasteless and OTT, but if you can’t get outrageous for a six year old’s birthday cake then when can you.

So I set to work. A friend of mine in the UK, who has made a beautiful version, had success using a classic Victoria sponge recipe so that’s what I used. I doubled it (8oz butter/sugar/flour + 4 eggs), weighed the mixture, divided it equally by six (the indigo layer seems to get missed out of these cakes) and worked out I had about 150g per cake to play with.

And then I set to work with my paste food colourings, as you can see above. I ended up with some thin but still springy sponge cakes as a I wanted, so that I’ll end up with a not too steep middle tier. Here’s hoping that the more subdued colours of the outside of the cakes end up looking suitably garish when we cut into it.

More cake madness to follow.

Adventures in Knitting – Annis

August 4, 2011 By Paola 7 Comments

While we were in San Diego my aunt admired a couple of the shawls I’d knitted previously, so I decided to make one for her.

Since I’ve been sharing my researches into our family tree with her, and since I’ve discovered that we’re both descended from Spitalfields silk weavers, I thought it would be appropriate to knit something in 100% silk laceweight yarn.

A nice, relaxing, lightweight project to take with me on holiday, I thought. Boy was I wrong. This yarn is the slipperiest, shiniest, tangliest yarn known to woman and this project was the slipperiest, tangliest, tricksiest project I’ve ever done. I even added to my woes by doing things called ‘nupps’ which involve creating 7 stitches in on at the front of the work and then purling through all seven at the back. Yeah right.

And now I have to make one for myself. My aunt really doesn’t deserve me.

If you’re a complete masochist the pattern is here and you can buy similar silk lace yarn here, though the colourway I used, Beach Glass, is no longer available. Here’s the link to my Ravelry page, do stop by and be my friend.