Tree and Santa Pattern Christmas Cards

These two cards are mainly made from a mini set that contained a few pieces of patterned paper and one sheet of die cuts. I think they are quite fun but there is also something a bit masculine about them, I think because of the colours and also the geometrical shapes.

On the first card, I covered a square card blank with the patterned paper and mounted a die cut tree with adhesive pads. It's also a little hard to see but there are a few tiny die cuts in the shape of presents and snowflakes also on adhesive pads so they stand out. To finish off, I used a 'noel' shiny red sticker from a different pack.

For the second card I covered the bottom half of the card with patterned paper and used a piece of washi tape across the edge as a border. The two child (elf?) stickers at the top were actually left over from a pack of Christmas address labels that I think came from Ikea a couple of years ago. Finally a 'tis the season' sticker in the top right corner completes the card.

I am sharing this with Crafty Hazelnuts Christmas Challenge and Cardz 4 Guyz where the theme is Christmas trees.

Read More

Baby Cow Gender Reveal Cake - For My Own Baby!

Read More

Meal Planning Monday 2017 - Week 45

I have a day off this week to visit some nurseries - I was staggered when I found out recently that our local ones have a one-year waiting list. It's lucky I asked when I did! I'm then working from home the following day to have a repeat scan - everything was fine at the last one but there was one thing they needed to check but couldn't as baby was lying the wrong way around and wouldn't move!

Monday
Breakfast Didn't get time for breakfast today
Lunch Leftover curry from Sunday
Dinner Strangely didn't fancy eating tonight after I cooked dinner for us both, which has happened a couple of times since I've been pregnant

Tuesday
Breakfast yogurt with fruit
Lunch late lunch as I'm on a course til 1pm - will have a sandwich as it's quick
Dinner salmon and sweet potato mash that I was meant to have yesterday

Wednesday  my husband and I both have a day off
Breakfast porridge or yogurt
Lunch will see what my husband fancies!
Dinner sausage casserole I was going to make on Sunday but we got back from visiting his family too late

Thursday working from home as I have the scan
Breakfast  yogurt with fruit
Lunch  homemade broccoli soup assuming I get back from the hospital in time
Dinner pork chop with sweet potato fries

Friday
Breakfast yogurt with fruit
Lunch sandwich
Dinner probably microwave risotto if I go to yoga

Saturday
Lunch soup and bread roll
Dinner pan-fried hake in lemon butter sauce I was going to make last week but didn't

Sunday
Lunch out at Stylist Live
Dinner probably something quick from the freezer

Join in the blog hop!

An InLinkz Link-up

Read More

Restaurant review: My Old Dutch, Chelsea, London

Read More

Fish in Lemon Cream Sauce with Hasselback Potatoes

My mother-in-law came to dinner recently and as she’s vegetarian and I don’t eat a lot of purely vegetarian food, that always involves a bit of thought around menu planning. Then I remembered that she is actually pescetarian, meaning she eats some – but not all – types of fish. She likes white fish and I had some in the freezer.

I don't eat fish as often as I should, as my husband doesn't like it and I find plain fish quite dull, so it needs a proper recipe - and during the week I don't tend to have time to cook complicated recipes from scratch. Of course, the recipes don't have to be complicated, but sometimes even getting out all the ingredients is more bother than I want when I get home from work!

It was a week night when we had my mother-in-law over but I was working from home. I always think that will give me plenty of time to make something a bit more elaborate for dinner but I usually end up logged on to work for far later than my official finish time (who doesn't?) so in the end it's still a bit of a rush. However on this occasion my husband was late home from work so we had quite a late dinner!

That gave me the opportunity to do some potatoes I've wanted to try for ages - have you come across hasselback potatoes before? They look a bit like mini hedgehogs - I think they would be a nice treat to serve on Bonfire Night (instead of jacket potatoes which a lot of people make then) as they are a bit different. They would also go down well at children's parties (so I imagine) - especially if you added little edible eyes to make them look like hedgehogs!

Back to dinner and sensible things.... to make these potatoes all you do is take a fairly large potato (not quite a baking potato size but a large standard potato) and make several slices into it, going two thirds of the way down, spacing the slices evenly apart by about a centimetre or a bit less depending on the size of your potato.

You can see the baked potato in this picture here:

Melt a little bit of butter in a pan or the microwave and brush the potato with the butter, getting into all the cuts you've made. Then put the potatoes on a baking sheet and bake at 180C for around an hour - it will depend on the size of the potatoes. The potatoes will be nice and soft in the middle when they are done and the slices you've cut will have fanned open a little and gone crispy. We really enjoyed these!

For the fish, I used this recipe by Nagi at Recipe Tin Eats - I didn't add the shallots/ spring onions at the end because I wasn't sure if my mother-in-law liked them (though in retrospect I'm sure she does - never mind!). It was a very easy dish to make and tasted delicious.

 

Read More

Smoked Haddock with Creme Fraiche Butter Sauce and Ozeri Electric Grinder Review

Another fish recipe from me now... I was going through the freezer seeing what needed using up and found some smoked haddock I'd bought to make a fish pie. I've gone off home-made fish pie a bit though -for some reason when I make it, it's always more bland than the shop-bought versions. I think I need to play around with the recipe a bit!

I had a look online to find something else I could do with the smoked haddock and found a recipe from Delia Smith online for smoked haddock with crème fraiche and a chive and butter sauce.

It's easy and quick to make - put the fish in a frying pan and add some freshly milled black pepper. Pour in some milk and simmer until the fish is cooked.

Remove the fish from a pan, increase the heat and add the crème fraiche to the pan. Simmer until reduced, then whisk in the butter and return the fish to the pan to heat through.

 

You are supposed to then scatter with chives but I used dill instead as I didn't have chives!

 

I used my brand new Ozeri Artesio electric pepper grinder for this recipe; it was part of a set (with the salt grinder as well) that I received from the company to review.

It took me a while to get started as I hadn't realised each grinder needed four batteries, and I didn't have eight of the right type in the house. I'm hoping because it needs so many batteries that they will go a long time without needing changing but I haven't had the grinders for long enough yet to know!

I had to read the instructions to figure out how to unscrew the grinders as I hadn't used ones like this before, then put some whole peppercorns into the chamber at the bottom. For such tall grinders there isn't actually much space for the salt and pepper as the chamber is mainly for the batteries! But you only use a little bit of salt or pepper at a time so shouldn't have to refill too often.

The simplest touch of the button sets the device grinding and you get a fine dusting of freshly milled pepper which is really nice - I almost got carried away and used too much as I liked pressing the button and seeing the pepper come out!

The grinders are sleek and stylish, and with black for pepper and white for salt, you won't confuse which is which. You can buy the grinders from Amazon.

I don't actually use pepper that much and have never had electric grinders before but I think I'm converted!

Read More

Meal Planning Monday 2017 - Week 44

Read More