January favourites

I've decided to a monthly favourites video on the last day of each month, highlighting what I've been loving during the month. These are either new products I've discovered, things I've been enjoying using or eating or items I've been wearing a lot.

Kenwood FP580 Food Processor



I've been wanting to buy a food processor for literally years but always talked myself out of it thinking that I could get by with my stick blender and hand mixer. Grant was asking me to make more vegetable soup and I was moaning about how long it takes to chop everything, even with my Pampered Chef food chopper. I mentioned buying a food processor so he was like, just buy it, what are you waiting for, woman? So I did. I cashed in some Nectar points (for those outside the UK it's a reward card that you can use at various stores and petrol stations) for Amazon vouchers and got this food processor - it was on sale as well, so it didn't cost much.

I freaking LOVE it. I use it so much. It has three graters, beaters for light things like cream or egg whites, a chopping / mixing blade, a dough blade, a juicer and a blender jug as well. I can't believe I waited so long to buy a decent food processor and I'm amazed at how much I use it.

Dulux Once satinwood paint



I've been painting all of the trim and doors in our house. Think about that for a moment. ALL. OF. THE. TRIM. AND. DOORS. Do you know how many miles of woodwork and how many doors are in this house? And three of them are glass paneled doors too! Okay, deep breath, moving on.

In our years of DIY Grant and I have tried various brands of paint and I always come back to Dulux. This particular paint - one coat satinwood - is the perfect paint for trim and doors. First, let me say that I don't do gloss. It looks too shiny, highlights imperfections and goes yellow in like five minutes. I much prefer satin, I just think it looks so much classier. This paint goes on smoothly, covers well and is hardwearing, but best of all it dries to a perfect, smooth, brilliant white finish. I love it above all other paints for trim and doors.

Samsung N220 Netbook



We have been meaning to buy a laptop for a while. We'll need it once we ship all our stuff to New Zealand or we'll be without a computer for at least 6 weeks plus Grant might need to take it to college with him when he's away there for 5 months so he can Skype with me and the kids.

We waffled between a laptop or a notebook and decided on the latter for our needs. After hours of research we purchased the Samsung N220 and I adore it! I may or may not have been heard calling it My Precious.

I love being able to watch shows in bed, head off to my room for some alone time on the internet during the school holidays, have it in the kitchen if I'm baking a recipe off the internet, and more. It's just fabulous and I love the portable little size.

When Grant is home he reads to Noah and I read to Daniel at bedtime. When Grant is at work I used to not read to Daniel but read to Noah because he needs more encouragement to stay in his bed at bedtime. Now with the netbook I can still have that time with Daniel because Noah is quite happy lying listening to a StoryNory story from the netbook. (StoryNory is another definite favourite of the month!)

e.l.f. Cream Eyeliner



I adore e.l.f. products in general but this is a new favourite. It's only £3.50 and it goes on amazingly. You only have to barely touch the brush (included) onto the product to pick up enough. It dries quickly on your eyes and lasts forever, it honestly doesn't rub off, smudge or melt. (I also have it in plum but it's so dark you don't really notice the purple colour.)

Miss Sporty Sheer Shine Lipstick



I bought these lipsticks for £1.45 each at the local market and I love them. They are so shiny and moisturising it's like putting lip balm on but they have colour. They are sheer, not like regular lipsticks, so you can put them on without a mirror and they are shiny enough that you don't need to add lip gloss. My lips are about the same colour as my skin so without lipstick I look like I have no lips - these lipsticks give me the perfect natural colour for everyday - not as bold as regular lipstick, not as liquid as a gloss. I went and stocked up on some more at the market as I'd hate to run out of them.

Ball stud earrings



I got these earrings in an inexpensive set from Matalan and I find myself wearing them almost every day. They are so shiny and pretty and are casual enough for everyday but big enough that they complete my look. Love them!

Scrabble on Facebook



Grant and I love playing Scrabble with his parents when they are visiting. Now, with Scrabble on Facebook, we can still enjoy playing with them even though they live 6,000 miles away. Plus we can have numerous games on the go at a time. I love the little chat panel and dictionary that's included.

Food photography

Encouraged by my lovely husband and the many people who are always asking for my recipes, I've been putting together a recipe e-book. It's a work in progress but as I was going about photographing the various treats I decided to do a post here about food photography.

There are three parts to food photography:
1) the preparation / cooking / baking of the food to be photographed
2) food styling - making it look appetising and appealing
3) photographing the food (including editing and cropping of the photographs)

Of course, I do all of these steps myself because I am that awesome :) In the publishing world, however, you'd have experts cooking the food, stylists arranging the food and all the photographer would do would be the actual photography.

I have to stress that I am an amateur food photographer, self-taught, and don't claim to know everything (or hardly anything at all) but this is just what I've learnt and the way I go about photographing food.

I'm only going to be covering step 3: photographing the food. In fact, for this demonstration I chose not to really style the food at all - in this case chocolate waffles.

This is the standard standing-in-front-of-the-food shot with my camera set on auto with the flash employed:



Mmm, tasty! NOT. It looks like waffled dog poop. Time to use the first tip:

Turn off your flash and use natural light
For portraits you're usually wanting the light to hit your subject from the front or side. For food you want the light to hit the dish from the back or side. I've shown you here how I photograph with the light coming from the side but usually I like to use this piece of counter with the light coming at the food from the window behind it.



This is the same standing-in-front-of-the-food shot with flash turned off the natural light coming from behind:



Already better! The texture and colour show up better. But it's still kind of boring and of course I don't want the same counter top to appear as the background to every shot of food that I take.

Time to get out some scrapbooking paper.



First up, I tried the orange paper. The warm colours looked nice against the brown waffle when I held them together, but I didn't like the way they photographed. The dots compete with the grid texture of the waffle.

Please note that from here on out I employ the second tip:
Get in close. Now get in closer.



Moving onto the blue patterned paper - I liked this one better.



Third tip: shoot from different angles. Go high, go low. Try it all.



Hmm, let's try the green paisley paper and tip number four: shoot vertically as well as horizontally.





I decided I wanted a little more texture in the background. The beauty of photographing food is that it's generally small and can be placed on top of paper, fabric, even an item of clothing. I've photographed a pudding on top of a skirt before. I decided to try a chenille throw:



Ooh, I'm loving the colours together and that texture is perfect!





I decided to try one more thing; let's call it the fifth tip: mess with the food. Try scooping a spoonful of the pudding and resting the spoon on the plate; try crumbling a piece of the cake; try slicing apart the loaf; try tearing apart the waffle. This reveals more of the texture of the food and highlights any hidden details like chocolate chips.





I still haven't decided which picture to use next to this recipe in my e-book, but I now have a bunch to choose from that are way more appealing than this shot:



And because I wanted to prove a point, here are some photographs I took with my point-and-shoot camera. First, the standard with-flash shot:



And then with the flash turned off and the light coming from behind and slightly to the side:





Now go forth and play with your food! I'd love to see your experimentation if you want to share the shots with me. Have fun with it - and enjoy eating the stars of your photoshoot.

If you're interested, I'll do a separate post on the things I've learnt about food styling.

New driveway!

When I posted this little teaser video a few days ago you might have guessed that we've had a driveway put in. It took two days to do but then we had to wait for dry weather for them to do the pointing on the sides and sand the paving. If you look up "damp" in the dictionary you'll see a picture of the UK in January - it doesn't help that the front of our house gets very little sun.

But they came today and finished it and we are so excited - hence the forty bazillion pictures in this post.

I've been asked how come we put in a driveway when we're about to leave. Two reasons, really:

1) I suspected that we had so little interest in the house when it was up for sale because potential buyers were driving past and seeing that it had no off-street parking and a double yellow line on our side of the road (no stopping). When we eventually come to sell I believe it will greatly increase saleability to have a driveway.

2) The calibre of rental clients we'll be targeting will expect off-street parking.

So, here are the photos. Again, I apologise for so many pictures but we are excited!

Before:









During (Noah loved watching the digging):













After:











With the car on:





And because we all love a good before-and-after comparison:









They will be returning in March to seal the driveway. Here are the details of the contractor. I highly recommend them. They really care about their work, didn't slack off, were neat and tidy, efficient and friendly, gave great attention to detail and were reliable.

New poll --->

I'm wondering how often I should be updating my blog. I'm not sure how often you guys check it. Do you check the blogs you follow every day, or more seldom? How often would you prefer to see new content?

Please vote in the little poll in the sidebar, and if you have comments about the topic please leave them below this post. Can't wait to hear from you!

Choc and Chat

We had a record turnout last night for Choc & Chat and had SO much fun! Here's a video I put together of some of our antics - turn your volume up and enjoy. Thanks to Rachel, Sue, Jo, Kayleigh, Mhairi, Elaine, Liz and Julie for dancing and singing and to Chris for holding Jo's baby!

Shorn

Sometimes you don't even realise how badly your child needs a haircut ...



until you give him one!

NZ update - SA PCC

As I have probably mentioned before, as part of our emigration application we have to provide police clearance certificates from England and also South Africa as we have dual citizenship. We had acquired them but they only last 6 months and they had expired so we had to reapply for them. Even though we hadn't even entered the country since they had been issued. (Don't get me started.)

We applied for them last year. Once issued they were to arrive at Grant's parents' house in Cape Town, and they would send them on to us. A week ago Grant emailed his mom and asked her to check up on them. His email said, "On their site they say it takes 21 working days, well I've worked out if they received it on 22 Nov, then that's been 40 working days. Another website says it takes between 6 and 8 weeks and tomorrow will be 8 weeks passed. So maybe give it another couple of days and then ring them?"

She kindly did so and emailed back, "We've received no post for the last two days so this morning I started phoning - always no reply, just rings and rings - but I kept on trying and eventually got through - to an answering machine !!! Had to listen to minutes of jargon but I just waited until I at last heard a real voice. She told me that your (Grant) ID No had been entered into the system incorrectly !! Can you believe it !! She said she has now corrected it and I must phone again next Tuesday to inquire if they have processed the applications. How absolutely disgusting and annoying - they're unable to do much right. Anyway I'll phone early Tuesday again."

As you can imagine, we were so annoyed! Grant asked her about my application and she said that my application was just sitting next to Grant's. Aargh!

Anyhoo, thanks to my mom-in-law's diligence, here's what she emailed today: "Well I phoned them early this morning - well before 8.00am - and it was all good news !! The phone hardly rang before it was answered - not by an answering machine, but by a lady, Warrant Officer Kriel. When I inquired about you two and gave both ID numbers, I then had to hold on and wait for a very long time. But she eventually came back to me and said that they had both been posted off on Monday (yesterday)."

Good news!! Now for the fun of getting them here (the South African postal system isn't the most reliable. Spot the understatement). We're hoping that a friend who lives in the UK and is currently visiting SA will bring it back with him for us.

The only other thing we are waiting for is the physical copy of the job offer. Time to start putting pressure on them, methinks. Once we have that we can lodge our application and then things should start happening!

(Huge thanks to my mom-in-law for her help!!)

My cupcake recipes

I have two vanilla and two chocolate cake recipes that I use for cupcakes that are reliable and, most importantly, absolutely delicious. And because I love you I will share them with you today!

Vanilla cupcakes are a staple and can become different flavoured cupcakes with the addition of orange or lemon zest or various extracts such as strawberry or almond. Chocolate cupcakes, of course, need no adaptation and go well with just about any type or flavour of icing.



Vanilla cupcakes I

I've had this recipe for years, ever since my mom found it in a magazine back in South Africa. She used to sprinkle chocolate sprinkles or hundreds-and-thousands on top of the cupcakes before baking them, and then didn't ice them, or she'd push a piece of canned apple into each one and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar before baking.

This recipe makes a LOT of cupcakes if you make the fairy-cake size - I like to freeze them (all baked goods freeze well).

Ingredients
5 eggs
2 cups sugar
500g (1lb 2oz) self-raising flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
250g (2 sticks) butter or margarine
1 cup milk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract or flavouring

Method
Beat eggs and sugar together for up to 15 minutes or at least until very light and fluffy. [I am too impatient for 15 minutes - I last about 5 on a good day!]

Sift flour, baking powder and salt together and fold into egg mixture. [I never sift my dry ingredients, I just dump it in and mix in briefly. Don't overmix - it makes for tough cakes!]

Heat milk and butter in the microwave until the butter is melted. Stir quickly into flour mixture. Add vanilla.

Scoop into paper cups until three-quarters full. Bake for 12 minutes at 180°C / 350°F - that's for the fairy cake size. Regular sized cupcakes would be around 20 minutes I think.

Vanilla cupcakes II

This is actually a lemon drizzle cake recipe that makes a delicious, light cake with a very tender crumb. I like the texture so much that I use it for cupcakes - I just leave out the lemon zest and add vanilla extract, and of course leave off the glaze on top. This recipe was passed to my mom from a friend at church back in Cape Town about 20 years ago or so.

Ingredients
120g (1 stick) butter or margarine
1 cup caster sugar
2 eggs
½ cup milk
1 ½ cups self-raising flour
½ tsp salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract or flavouring

Cream butter and sugar well. Add eggs and vanilla and mix again. Add milk and flour alternately. Mix until combined.

Scoop into paper cups until three-quarters full. Bake for 12 minutes at 180°C / 350°F - that's for the fairy cake size. Regular sized cupcakes would be around 20 minutes I think.



Chocolate cupcakes I

This recipe is from the Pioneer Woman and is simply heavenly. It has a light crumb and a delicious richness.

Ingredients
2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
4 heaping tablespoons cocoa
250g (2 sticks) butter
1 cup boiling water
½ cup buttermilk [I never have buttermilk, I use milk with some lemon juice added]
2 whole beaten eggs
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon vanilla extract or flavouring [I always add 1 tablespoon when adding vanilla]

Method
In a mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, and salt.

In a saucepan, melt butter. Add cocoa. Stir together. Add boiling water, allow mixture to boil for 30 seconds, then turn off heat. Pour over flour mixture, and stir lightly to cool.

In a measuring jug or small bowl, pour the buttermilk and add beaten eggs, baking soda, and vanilla. Stir buttermilk mixture into butter/chocolate mixture.

Scoop into paper cups until three-quarters full. Bake for 12 minutes at 180°C / 350°F - that's for the fairy cake size. Regular sized cupcakes would be around 20 minutes I think.

Chocolate cupcakes II

When I was pregnant with Noah I was completely miserable the whole time. I hated being pregnant. One day I posted on a message board I visit, saying that I needed a make-from-scratch recipe for a really rich, moist chocolate cake and I needed it urgently. Bless the person posting this recipe - it is absolutely divine and completely hit the spot!

Yesterday Grant took some of these cupcakes to work and I got a marriage proposal from a 23-year-old whom I have never even met - just on the merits of the cupcakes. They're that good.

Ingredients
2 cups flour
2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa
1 ¼ tsp baking soda
¼ tsp baking powder
3 eggs
1 2/3 cups sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup mayonnaise [don't be alarmed!]
1 1/3 cups water

Method
Combine flour, cocoa, baking soda, and baking powder. In a separate bowl, mix eggs, sugar, vanilla and mayonnaise. Blend with mixer at high speed for 3 minutes.

Alternate adding flour and water to the mixture, blending as you go. Mix thoroughly.

Scoop into paper cups until three-quarters full. Bake for 12 minutes at 180°C / 350°F - that's for the fairy cake size. Regular sized cupcakes would be around 20 minutes I think.

Disclaimer: your results may vary. Just because these work for me, doesn't mean they'll workfor you. And for those in the know, this has nothing to do with the so-called Cupcake Wars, I've been meaning to post them for a while because my lovely readers have asked for them repeatedly.