Well another year’s gone by and yet another notch on my belt…im not old but i do feel old ha ha! My birthday was ok i guess, my mother in law made us lunch and then on the weekend i went on a shopping spree with my hubby and dinner that night, then a bbq at my parents place…in the end with all that food you’d think i’d need another shopping spree!I made myself a cake, it was yumm! But silly me with all the rushing i forgot to take a pic of it…but i’ll explain it to you…it was a light butter cake with a whipped cream frosting in coffee flavour. I made 2 cakes and made 2 layers, the middle consisted of whipped cream and sliced strawberries. I covered the whole cake in the whipped coffee cream and added flaked almonds on the side of the cake. For the top i arranged strawberries sliced in 1/2 with the green bit still on and created a boarder around the rim of the cake, it looked very elegant with the smooth coffee cream and the red strawberries with a little green on them.Everyone was very impressed with my cake and it all went in one day! I usually have to keep cakes in the fridge for days until they’re gone! ha haBut because of my stuff up, i really want to post a cake so im going to make one in the next couple of days and post it for you all Take care guys oxox

 Iced Duck

Iced Bunny

Basket

Egg Basket

Coloured Eggs

My Easter weekend was good. I spent most of my time preparing Easter lunch and making a range of desserts. Though i have not taken a pic yet, which is disappointing but i have plenty of cakes left over for your viewing, i will hopefully get the pic taken today, fingers crossed!!

One of the first things i made were my Easter Iced Cookies. These were abit of a headache, not making the cookies but finding the cookie cutters!! I searched everywhere in my area for them, going into the major department stores and the little $2 shops but to no avail!!Then in my final attempt i rang a cake decorating shop and i was relieved to find that they stocked them!! Feewwww! Once i had them in my mitts i could get on with the baking!! They turned out really nice and i iced them with homemade royal icing, using real egg-whites mixed with icing sugar and a little lemon and coloured with food colouring.

Once my cookies were complete i attempted to make my mums Walnut Syrup Cake, which turned out wonderful. My husband loves this cake which is why i made it especially for him, plus when making it, he reminded me to flood it with the syrup…so i did!

My next attempt was a cake i saw on Martha Stewart’s website for an Apple Cake. This cake turned out spectacular! The texture and the smell was Divine, considering because i was fasting for lent that’s all i could test But once Easter Sunday came along i was able to try my cake and it was surprising…it actually tasted like a Christmas fruit cake, though the only fruit in it was apple. It tasted like it had raisins and other dried fruit, very surprising. I made a caramel to top the cake by boiling a can of sweetened condensed milk for about 4hrs, soooo divine!

At the same time as my apple cake, i made a Coffee Walnut Swiss Roll filled with Coffee Walnut Cream. This cake is very easy with only afew ingredients but tastes so soft and creamy you’d think it took alot of skill!

So having all of my cakes ready to go, i spent most of the day preparing the lunch menu. With the help of my Hubby we decided on what to eat.

For entree i made a Chichen Noodle Soup, complete with chicken pieces. Our main meal consisted of a Roast Leg of Pork, Creamy Mashed Potatoes, Cauliflower Florette’s covered in a Cheesy Bechamel Sauce also a side of Steamed Asparagus and Carrots and a Mixed Garden Salad complete with Fresh Tomatoes, Cucumbers, Mixed Lettuce Leaves and Avocado with a fresh Vinaigrette Dressing.Once finished on our lunch meal, we had to have a break considering we’d stuffed ourselves silly and had no room for dessert! But don’t fret, we got to try all of the dessert goodies!!I will hope to get some of the pics up soon!

Happy Easter to all and God Bless!

Thanks to all who have ventured to my blog and I’m sure I have peeked at yours as well! I can’t wait to see who the winner will be!!

WOOHHOOOO!!

These days there are so many good Frozen Food choices you can make. You can even make your favorite dishes, divide them in containers and freeze so when you’re in the mood for a yummy meal but have no time to cook, blitz it in the microwave and enjoy. The best meals you can freeze include such delights as lasagna, curries, stews, casseroles; the list is pretty much endless.

Did you also know that you can freeze un-baked bread? Yep freeze the dough once it’s baked it’s like as if you made it that day! You can also freeze un-iced cakes and muffins again blitz in the microwave and enjoy! 

Then there are some of us who wish they were that organized so we buy our frozen meals from time to time. One of my favorite frozen treats is Pastitzi. They are not pre baked they are frozen in raw pastry so when you put them in the oven they cook beautifully!

Spinach & Ricotta Pastitzi 

The reason I love these pastries is that they’re filled with great ingredients. I love the Spinach and Ricotta filling with a little Greek Yoghurt on the side makes a great snack!

Delish!!

Great Company

So I hope you enjoy my
Orange and Poppy Seed Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting J

Freshly Baked

Orange & Poppy Seed Perfection  

Yummo

Bon Appetit

I tried had a hint of orange from the orange zest and juice I added, I will post the recipe soon!

Till then, enjoy the magic of La Madeline…

Madeline Batter

Madeline’s with Tea

Dusted Madelines

 I have just entered in my first every Hey Hey Its Donna Day and the topic couldn’t have come at a better time! This is the 10th HHDD held.

 Its…Cheesecakes!! Im totally in love with Cheesecakes and seeing as i just made one from Mr Jamie Oliver i figured that would be my first entry!

This time the host is Peabody from Culinary Conconctions by Peabody who won HHDD #9, check out the link!

Wish me luck!!

http://www.culinaryconcoctionsbypeabody.com/2007/03/02/hay-hayits-cheesecake-all-the-way/

 So when the weekend came along I was eager to try a new recipe and who else to choose from but Jamie’s Cookbook. His writings are interesting and very easy to follow instructions made my job as his apprentice a whole lot easier J I chose a recipe I’ve never attempted before, Cheesecake…It looks like a lot of technical ability is needed to get the texture and the flavors right. But with the help of Jamie I aced it! Well, the only thing I would do next time is not over cook the crust!! 

Jamie’s Easy Vanilla Cheesecake

This Cheesecake turned out delicious! The texture is rich and creamy, sticking to the roof of our mouth so the flavor lingers on your taste buds as it melts! MMMmmmmmm

Jamie’s Recipe

Jamie made it with a Cherry Compote, but as I didn’t have any cherries on hand I just lathered lemon curd over the top! 

This Cheesecake was not only easy, but very inexpensive to make. If you have some plain coffee biscuits hanging around use them for the crust, you only need 2 eggs and less than ½ Cup of cream. The cream cheese I used wasn’t expensive at all. I used the Home brand cream cheese and for the same 250g size as the Philly I paid only $1.50 and I bought 3 packets. That’s it, the cake only cost me around $6 to make. It’s pretty good considering one slice of cake at a café will lost u $6 and up! Enjoy Guys!