Pick a Plum, Bake a Plum, Eat a Plum

Morning all!
Yesterday was a horribly grey and wet day. Some days you wonder what to do on those days, curl up in front of the fire, patchwork, read a much loved book or go into the garden with the parentals and a step ladder and pick plums off a very wet plum tree. Yup we did the latter. I was not allowed up the ladder... Humph!
We managed to get most of the plums off the tree and amazingly this year the plums are the most delicious little mouthfuls of purpleness. The past few years if the tree were to be honest with itself its crop has not been a tasty one at all.

So what to do with all the plums... well the Mothership took some home to freeze as our Granny Ivy freezer is too teeny tiny. I on the other hand decided to make a crumble. I don't know why I thought this was a good idea as we had decided to go on a pudding ban after the weekend and you have to have cream with crumble. Shame!

So to the crumble. I like doing crumble. It's something I can do sitting down. You just sit and crumb all the dry ingredients together while the plums soften down in the pan.

For the crumble topping you need:
75g of chilled butter, diced,
175g self-raising flour,
110g Demerara sugar.

Pop the softened plums in your pot. Pop the crumble over the top. Pop the lot in the oven until everything is golden brown and bubbling. Serve with lashings of cream and try to be patient so you don't burn your mouth. We failed... enjoy!

P. S. Any spare crumble can be popped in a bag and popped in the freezer for the next crumble day.

I have a new top...

I have a new top...I have a new stripey top...I have another new blue stripey top...

Good morning all! How are we all doing on this sunny, cloudy, sunny, cloudy, yes definitely cloudy Friday morning? I've had a bit of a blip this morning but I am endeavouring to overcome it by blogging to all of you.

So back to the top. Many of you will know that there is a mug embargo (I'm not sure that's the right word but I like the sound of it) out on me. I am prohibited from allowing any more mugs into the house and I fear that the same may be about to happen to me with stripes...

You see my lovely new top has been added to an already flourishing collection...

Please look at the following exhibits...

I mean seriously, how many stripes can one person have?

Whenever Mr Lardshow takes me out into the land of the living my eyes are just automatically drawn to stripes, it's as if I'm a bumblebee looking for other bumblebees so that I can compare stripey, fat tummies with them! 

In truth I think my love of stripes is down to just one thing; I like to pretend that I'm French! If I could just find myself the perfect beret then I'd be sorted, after all, I already have the stripey top and a string of garlic...

So there you have it, a little insight into the stripey madness of my world. 

Next blog...spotty dressing gowns...

How To Eat The Perfect Scone

Hello all,

Recently it has come to my attention that some of you have been struggling with the very delicate task of scone eating and I want you all to fret no more, I am here to help you all out.

Raspberry jam and cream, simply delicious

I've baked scones twice this week, the first batch was fine, lovely and light inside with just enough of a bite on the crust. The second batch, baked in a rush when Cath popped over for coffee and a chat, was a disaster, hard, uncooked little hockey pucks. Not even the birds would have touched them! I don't really understand what went wrong with them. I hate that. I like to know how I can improve my baking. Maybe it was because I rushed them and used too much flour when rolling out? I have to say I am a firm believer that if you cook when you're stressed or not in the mood, you won't end up with lovely baking...

So to the important matter at hand, how to eat the perfect scone. First things first, the pronunciation of the word scone. There is only one way to say this word and quite frankly on a donkey if you can't say this word in the correct way you should not be allowed to even contemplate eating them. The word is SCONE said in the same way you would say GONE. None of this SCONE rhymes with MOAN business. OOF! There you've been told now carry on.

I like to eat my scones (remember, you should be reading this and saying the word so that it rhymes with 'gone') slightly cooled out of the oven with jam on the bottom and lashings of clotted cream. None of this butter underneath the jam malarkey that Mr Lardshow seems to think you should do. NO that is wrong and is almost a crime against bakery.

Summer clearly doesn't want to visit us this year so I feel we should bring summer to us, through the medium of scones. Go on, be a devil and have one, lashings of cream and ginger beer in a frosted glass on a picnic blanket on your living room floor.

Enjoy! xBx