Recipes for Round Mini Lemon Drizzle Loaves

Here they are, the two recipes I used to make my R.B.O.K. Round Mini Lemon Drizzle Loaves.
I used a pre-made syrup from Vanessa Kimbell's Prepped! and the Nigella Lawson recipe Mini Lime-Syrup Sponges.


Lavender Lemonade
Makes 1 litre
Prep time 25 minutes
Cooking time 5 minutes
20 lavender flowers (in bud)
500g caster sugar
500ml water
Zest and juice of 7 lemons
1. Put the lavender, sugar and water into a heavy-based saucepan and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for about 5-6 minutes. Ass the lemon juice.
2. Strain and allow to cool before transferring to a clean bottle. This should store in the fridge for 3-4 weeks. Dilute to taste for Lavender Lemonade, or use as Lavender & Lemon Syrup.


Mini Lime-Syrup Sponges
125g unsalted butter, softened
175g caster sugar
2 large eggs
Zest of 1 lime
175g self-raising flour
pinch of salt
4 tablespoons milk 
8-bun mini-loaf tin, buttered very well. (I used a 12 cupcake tin)
Preheat the oven to 180oC/gas mark 4.

Cream together the butter and sugar, and add the eggs and lime zest, beating them well. Add the flour and salt, folding in gently, and then the milk. SPoon into the mini-loaf pan, and cook for 25 minutes.

While the cakes are cooking, prepare the syrup by putting the lime juice and suagar into a small saucepan and heating gently so that the sugar dissolves.

As soon as the mini-sponges are ready, take them out of the oven and prick them witha  cake-tester all over. Pour over the syrup evenly. Try to let the middle absorb the liquid as well as the sides, then leave it to soak up the rest. Don’t try to take the cakes out of the pan until they have cooled slightly and the syrup looks like it has been absorbed, but be aware that if you leave these to cool completely they might be very difficult to get out of the pan.

So, after an hour or two, turn them out onto a rack and grate some lime zest over them before serving (or selling).

Makes 8.

Enjoy!

xxx

Random Bake of Kindness

Random acts of kindness are brilliant aren't they. I've heard so many wonderful recounts of people's experiences with showing kindness to often strangers. One being, giving the car park attendant, on the dry summer's day, a cool can of coca cola. Or paying the car behind you at the motorway toll.
I know that when I've given a random act or received - it's made my day. So I thought it was great when Vanessa suggested we join in with the Random Bake of Kindness. It seemed to me to be the next level in showing gratitude. You need to decide who you're going to bake for and why, and to tell them why you're doing it. I feel that we don't express enough just how much we appreciate things sometimes. So this is brilliant, and I know of at least two more people for whom I want to do it already!
So for my R.B.O.K. I decided to bake little round lemon drizzle cakes.

I used two recipes for this creation. Firstly I had a bottle of Lavender Lemon Syrup which I'd made from Vanessa Kimbell's 'Prepped'. Again a brilliant flavour which can be used for several other recipes and for making lemonade. I made mine when the lavender was in bud, and it does give a delicious flavour, it isn't essential however so can be made as just a lemon syrup.
The second recipe is from Nigella's 'How to be a Domestic Goddess'. Its based on the Mini Lime-Syrup Sponges and made a useful reference for quantities as I wanted to bake them in the tray as she had done with a mini-loaf tin.
This was such an easy recipe, and although I was over generous with the syrup - they were very, very moist - having the syrup ready made it a very quick bake. I will post about these two recipes in a day or so as I don't want to take away from the R.B.O.K. focus right now.
It wasn't difficult for me to choose who I would give my first R.B.O.K. to. And I know already that I won't do justice to how much gratitude that I and others I know feel for Anne's loving and caring nature.

As it happened I knew of Anne before I met her. Iain (my Hubby) and I did an internship at a church in Solihull in 2009, knowing that he would next be studying at a Ministry college in London. To where it just so happened the previous minister of the said Solihull church was now lecturing. In Solihull we realised how appreciative the people had been of Peter, the previous minister, and just how much they missed Anne his wife, so I was keen to meet Anne and felt confident that I wouldn't be disappointed.
It seems funny looking back, not knowing Anne, because I know Anne so well now. Not only do I join Anne with the other partners of those working or studying at the college for fellowship and shared times, but I go to the same church and we work at the same school. Infact, we always have so much to talk about and it doesn't matter if we've seen each other every day, there's still more to share!
Now it's not that Anne is only good at chatting as she is excellent at listening and remembering. So often I see Anne with people and she remembers so much about what is going on in their life and asks after them. Anne would probably be the first person to say she's not perfect, but it is so refreshing and encouraging when she shares something that has maybe not gone the way she hoped, and she reflects on why that might be. It's so healthy, she doesn't bury it away but shares it and is considerate of it in the future.
Here is a Truly Good Woman and she is inspirational in her friendships, marriage, family, work and church. I know I am blessed in having her friendship, while Iain is at college, and I very much look forward to years of shared times and catching-up when we have moved to a church of our own.

Anne I thank you for your friendship, for your constant encouragement and advice, for Oswestry and for your example.

I pray that you feel encouraged by this post and that your friendships are always blessed.

Much love, xxx

Flavour Giveaway

At the risk of sounding like a Prepped! Groupie - seriously, I just keep going on about it! I just must recommend the Plum and Cardamom Crumble creation- it's sooo yummy! And so, I am giving away a humble and yet delicious packet of Green Cardamoms.
I love that the flavours are a paradox of being traditional and yet refreshingly new when combined together.

I'm now making Cardamom sugar and can't wait to try the other recipes. In the meantime, check out my reviews blog for how I got on with the crumble Truly Good Woman Reviews 'The crumbs of Crumble'.

The winner will be chosen by random number generator - just leave a comment to say which flavours are inspiring you in the kitchen and how they can be used. Entries close at 10pm on Monday 8th August.

(A chance of winning the Giveaway is only open to UK residents - sorry!)

Lavender time

On a house outing to Box Hill (as visited by Jane Austin's 'Emma') last year, with our fabulous friends from college, we stumbled across Mayfield Lavender. It was a gloriously sunny day, we'd had a cream tea picnic on Box Hill and visited the ruined Folly. With laughs and walking, it really couldn't have been topped.

Then on the way home we discovered a sensational field of bright blue. One of our cars had noticed it on the way and much to our joy it was open to visitors and had a shop!!!
If you're in reach of Surrey, Mayfield Lavender, is well worth a visit. They do have an online shop but being there in person is so much better because the smell is amazing.

The day was growing into a beautiful evening and we were standing in the middle of rows upon rows of lavender taking photo upon photo. Of course I bought a massive bunch of lavender, enough to divide amongst my friends, and to spread across the flat in various vases (dry) and to use for lavender sugar.

Another reason to love Vanessa Kimbell's Prepped! is the delicious lavender chapter. I can't wait to make my trip to Mayfield lavender and then get on with the recipes. Take a sneak of the types of glorious flavours in Vanessa's lavender chapter with the post on Mail Online 'Lavender and Lemon Cake'.

Twitter & the Prepped! book launch

For a while now I have wondered about twittering myself, and with gentle encouragement I have decided to take the plunge!

On the main I'm looking forward to keeping in contact with friends who already tweet, but there are also lots of lovely bloggers who tweet so I'm looking forward to that too.
My tweets will probably include lots of things I thought I might blog about but never actually get around to.
You can find me as @trulygoodwoman I'm going to see how this user name feels for a while, I'm not too sure about branding myself as truly good, but hopefully people will realise my intention when they link to my blog.

Talking of lovely bloggers, I had the joy of making it to the book launch of Vanessa Kimbell's Prepped! at Rococo Chocolates Motcomb Street in Belgravia. It was brilliant of course to meet at last Vanessa, but it was also lovely to meet other fellow recipe testers. Vanessa so kindly gave me a signed copy of Prepped! for testing several of her recipes. I know that this will be a book that I come back to time and time again.

Those that were able brought samples of the recipes they had tested and it was a time of foodie discussions, congratulating Vanessa, and browsing and buying some of the delicacies of Rococo Chocolates - I personally bought the Otto Rose, and Otto Lavender.

After the official launch bit we then went onto a nearby pub for wine and continued chatting.
I think what made the event even lovelier was seeing the friendships that had grown from blogging and through testing Vanessa's recipes. This wasn't just the end of the road, it was the beginning of friendships.

Back online!!!

At last I am here...back online from my laptop, with access to my 1092 emails - aaagh!!!


I sooo love being able to blog properly again, that although it's late and I can hear my husbands footsteps as I type and I know he's going to say it's too late to be doing this - I just want to post about so many things...


However, I've had the kiss on the head, and know that I shall have to wait till tomorrow to join you all in blogland.
I hope you're all well, and can't wait to catch up on your blogs.


Liz xxx


p.s. I just love this button that Vanessa gave me - check out her blog, her book is out in June and it's going to be tasty, tasty, tasty

/http://writingacookerybook.blogspot.com/

Grandmother's Christmas Cake

The words 'Grandmothers Christmas Cake' are evocative for me of family heritage and traditions. 
My father is an artisan baker, with his own bakery where everything is made on the premises, and where so many different types of loaves are baked from 4am every day. Just like it has been in my family since my Great-Great-Grandfather had a bakery in Sussex. 
So when Vanessa put a call out for foodie bloggers to test her recipes for her new book 'Prepped', which is described as Fabulous recipes for the Time Short Foodie, I was interested as it's aim appealed to me. 


Then after several email chats we settled on my testing Vanessa's Grandmother's Christmas Cake - I was ecstatic, as this was something I could chat about with my Dad - he doesn't seem to tire of food or baking! And it is such an apt recipe for this time of year when many of us are preparing for the feasts of Christmas.
Just read Vanessa's blog about finding her Grandmother's recipes, and you know that these are special recipes.

250g  self-raising flour ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda ½ tsp ground cloves ½ tsp cinnamon ½ tsp mixed spice 200g  butter 200g  caster sugar Zest of a lemon

6 eggs 2 tbs black treacle 2 tsp Vanilla essence 500g  sultanas ½ lb raisins 12oz currents, mixed peel and glace cherries 100g chopped nuts drop of milk to mix

1 Pre heat the oven to 150C/300F/Gas2.

2 Sieve the flour, salt, bicarbonate of soda and Spices into a bowl.

3 Cream the butter, lemon zest and sugar in a large mixing bowl and then mix in the treacle, and vanilla essence until light and fluffy.

4 Mix the eggs in just a little at a time into the mixture, to stop the mixture from curdling, add a tablespoon of the flour to the mixture.

Fold in the remaining flour into the mixture. Mix well and then mix in the dried fruit, mixed peel, glace cherries and the chopped nuts.

5 Grease a 20cm/8inch round or an 18cm/7inch square cake tin and line the bottom and sides with baking parchment (but not grease proof paper).

6 Turn the mixture into the tin and make a slight hollow in the centre – to keep the cake flat on top (you don’t want a domed cake to decorate!)

7 Bake in the oven for 1 hour and then turn the oven down to 110C/275F/Gas mark1 for about 3 ½ to 4 hours. Test with a skewer. If not ready bake for up to another hour testing every 20 minutes or so, until the skewer comes out clean.

Remove from the oven. Leave to cool in the tin for 20 minutes.

8 Turn out on to a wire rack and leave to cool. Once the cake is cool, poke a few holes in the cake with a skewer and pour over 3-4 tbsp of the Brandy. Let the brandy soak right into the cake.

Keep the cake wrapped in foil and in an airtight tin or plastic container, with the holes top side up and add another few tablespoons of brandy once a week for a couple more weeks.  

Decorate with marzipan and icing a week before Christmas.

I love that , although the recipe wasn't too intimidating, none of the richness you hope for in a great Christmas Cake has been missed. Vanessa's definitely onto a winner with Fabulous recipes for the Time Short Foodie because we are all winners with great food like this. 

Reading Blogs, Baking and Running - not all at the same time!

I'm loving the opportunities and challenges that arise from reading the blogs of others.
Tomorrow I will be filling you in on the privilege that I had in testing Vanessa's Grandmothers Christmas Cake for her recipe book 'Prepped'.
This was the first Christmas cake I have ever baked, and I am so pleased to say that although it wasn't too intimidating to bake, it certainly looks and smells impressive.

Tonight I also wanted to fill you in on the book that Naskren is offering on her blog 'Little Things, Big Stuff'. The book is Melissa Fay Greene's 'There is no me without you'. It's about a women's self given work to care for AIDs affected orphans in Ethiopia.
This reminded me of the work of Agape Home in Chang Mai, Thailand. To whom I was taken by a friend when visiting her work with my church from the UK. Another work my good friend Judy is involved in is Hope Home, also in Chang Mai. Please check out their blog, although it's relatively new, it's such a good work they are doing and I know they'd be really encouraged by your visits and comments.

And lastly, I managed to get to running with the Croydon Running Sisters. I'm so glad I actually get to do the things I say I'm doing!