Evolution of the Sourdough

Sourdough is, I am convinced, mostly made by magic. 

You need to care for it. Feed it.  

Astonishing it's just flour, water and (most importantly) time and patience.

And alright, a bit of salt and a lot of heat at the end. 

It has been a very zen thing to create. 

It actually feels like real creation. From simple things, I have made another thing. 

And it has combined to absolute freaking yeasty perfection and I am a very smug baker. 

Sourdough starter made as per River Cottage instructions. Baked according to the Yumblog.co.uk method. Eaten mostly by me. Nomnomnom. 

Cooking with Plink: Christmas Cake Part 1

Hullo and welcome!

A few weeks ago, we make Christmas Cake. Here are the ingredients! 

That's lots of mixed fruit soaked overnight in brandy, flour, sugar, eggs, butter, spices, citrus zest
We used Nigella's recipe from "How to be a Domestic Goddess"

You'll also need to be good friends with some of this...

She didn't get any. 

Lining the tin is terribly important. 

O hai!

See? And apparently I got the wrong idea about what creaming means.

We beat the heck out of it!

I think you're allowed to make wishes when you're stirring Christmas cake... I didn't really have time for that, cause I was licking the loose mixture off of my fingers. Yum!

There was mixture on the Makie, the floor, the ceiling... 

But I guess the one wish I had did come true... the human did all the cleaning up!

And it took *ages*

We'll be marzipanning and icing the cake next weekend. Can't wait! 

Anyone...

...for a Makie apron tutorial?

It's got a heart. She wanted a skull and crossbones. 

On my list of things to do once this week is safely over!

Cooking with Plink: Carrot Cake!

HULLO and welcome to Cooking with Plink!

I guess you all missed me, huh? Well, I've been hard at work perfecting my latest recipes* and I'm ready to show you how to make an astonishing low fat taste-tastic carrot cake; perfect for when your humans are on the lardy side like mine. This week's challenge is technically bread, but that's on the 'naughty' list at the moment, so we're going to concoct a low-fat carrot cake. This comes in at about 250 calories a slice, assuming your human is prepared to divide it into 10 slices and not scoff the whole thing, the savage brute.

Make sure you're ready to cook; have your human make you a new apron and ensure that you wash the tuna guts off of your hands if you've just been feeding the giant squid.

Here are the things you'll need:

That's 250g of unpeeled carrot, 1 1/2  tsp baking powder, 3 large eggs, 100ml sunflower oil, 100g soft brown sugar, 200g self raising flour, 1 orange (well-scrubbed), 1 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp nutmeg, 100g sultanas.

Oh, and hand one of these to your human.

Peel those carrots! 

First, peel and grate the carrots. This is hard work, so get your human to do it.

She did NONE of the work.

Whilst they do that, line the base of a 23cm springform tin with greaseproof paper, brush some oil on the sides and heat that oven to around 180 degrees.

Next, crack your eggs into a bowl and prepare to beat the heck out of them.

Posing.

Once thoroughly beaten, add the sugar and oil and whisk whisk whisk!

Mix in the carrot and orange zest, then stir in the flour, sultanas, spices and baking powder. Make sure everything is evenly combined.

Mix everything thoroughly.

Plop into the baking tin and smooth out.

Remind your fat human at this point that she's not allowed to lick the bowl. 

Bake for 25-30 minutes depending on the ferocity of your oven, leave to cool for 5 minutes in the tin, then take out, removing the greaseproof from the bottom. Pose with your sexy cake.

Sexy, sexy cake. Notice how it's pretty thin? That's because my springform tin is 27cm. D'oh!

Once cool, you can either sift over a little icing sugar or make the cake even sexier by spreading half a tub of low fat cream cheese mixed with 2tbsp icing sugar and the rest of the orange zest on the top.

Even sexier cake!

Feed to your humans to make them less grumpy about losing weight.


*stealing them from the Hairy Biker's "Love Food, Lose Weight" Cookbook... buy it! It's brill!

Great Makie Bake-Off

If anyone asks, Millie started it.

Cooking with Plink

"HELLO and welcome to Cooking with Plink! Today I'll be teaching you how to make some delicious cheese scones!

Yes yes. Wave at the camera. 

First, make sure you're wearing your prettiest apron and have your hair tied back. If you've been working on your rocket ship, you might like to wash your hands too. Have your human pre-heat the oven to about 180 degrees centigrade (a bit hotter if it's not a fan oven... you can work out the flipping gas mark yourself).

Now gather your ingredients! You'll need...

6 ounces butter, 12 ounces flour, a chunk of cheese, baking powder, salt, pepper, milk. 

The manky apple is not required. 

Put the butter in a bowl. Sieve in flour, a teaspoon of baking powder and a pinch of salt. Mix through the pepper.

Pre-breadcrumb stage. At this point, I threw it in the food processor. 

Plink had not yet irritated me enough to meet a similar fate... 

Rub the butter into the flour until it looks like breadcrumbs. If you're lazy, like my human, you can whizz this step up in a food processor.

Now grate your cheese and stir through the mixture. You could add some more exciting ingredients at this point if you like! Cheese and ham works well. Cheese and Jellybabies is less of a success.

Do be careful with that. No nylon in the food.

Carefully settle yourself out of falling-into-the-bowl distance whilst your human adds enough milk to bring the mixture together and make a dough. Remind them several times not to over-knead this; it's not bread, you know! Press the dough into a round and get ready to roll out.

Rollin' rollin' rollin'

Cut out your scones; I like to use a tumbler for this, because my human is too cheap to buy proper metal biscuit cutters.

Harrumph.

Place on your floured pizza rock, if you're middle-class enough to have one*, otherwise bung the scones on a greased baking tray. Brush each scone with a little milk and top with some grated cheese. Be sure not to irritate your human too much at this point, as you may find yourself baked.

Apparently, I blurred the 'main photographic focus'. Diva.

Ask them nicely to put the scones AND NOT YOU in the oven for 15-20 minutes, until they're a little brown on the top and sound hollow when tapped on the bottom. Poking your human repeatedly in the head and asking if they're cooked yet is a great way to ensure they don't wander off and do something else in the meantime. 

I wonder if she'd fit *in* the kettle?

Admire your work. Have a nice cup of tea. Dream about your TV show/cookery book offer that's inevitably just around the corner. Chastise your human."


*I WILL get around to teaching her some manners, honest.

Chef Plink

When I volunteered to make Benoonbenoon's chef outfit, it was quite obvious that I was never going to get away without letting Plink try it on...

No, she didn't make this. She's just posing, as usual. 

So. The tunic is just my standard blouse pattern, with the left front extended and an extra cm on the length all the way around. Although I managed to construct most of the body on the (borrowed) sewing machine without jamming it this time, the collar and sleeves were set on by hand, as was the velcro. Really annoyed I couldn't find my stash of white velcro, but buggered if I was going to go and buy any more. Although currently covering Plink's... *ahem*... you knows... I think this should fit nicely on a boy Makie just as well.

The trousers are the first pair I've ever made for human or Makie. I could do with adding another cm onto the crotch-to-waist as these are rather hipsters, although I guess it doesn't matter if they're worn with a tunic... wouldn't go wearing them with a t-shirt unless you're partial to builder's bum.

The hat is rather a triumph, I think. Large enough to be ridiculous, but not too big to be completely insane. This was entirely hand-sewn and I'm a bit chuffed with it. Bandanna fastens behind with a popper, it was going to be red but I've got absolutely no red fabric. This is a bit of a surprise. Still, I think the check works quite well.

Prettier than Gordon Ramsay? 

Benoonbenoon, let me know your address and I'll get your outfit off of Plink the impostor and in the post! ...and if you're reading this, Polk, can you email me too? Ta!