Party, party

There's been a lot of this at work this week. I normally go in closer to 10am and finish later but living on the student bus route into Manchester means that during Freshers Week and for a few weeks after it's mayhem around my usual travel times. So I've been leaving to get in for 8.30 and taking breakfast with me with lots of overnight oats so I can just grab the jar from the fridge. The flip side is that I can finish at 4pm which has freed up essential time that I need to finish some artwork for an exhibition I'm having in a few weeks.


There was a very happy event this weekend. My nephew and niece turned two! My sister asked me to make their birthday cake using this Food Network recipe. It made a big cake and at one point I was worried that it wasn't cooking through the middle. I kept it in the oven for longer than the stated cooking time, covered the tops with foil and it turned out fine.


I was really pleased with it in the end and it seemed to go down well at the party.


The decorations are little fruit flavoured stars made by Humdinger that I picked up in Lidl. I also noticed them for sale in Aldi too this week. I finished off the sides with Humdinger White Chocolate Buttons.


I was pleased to see this lady on the buffet table. She was always a highlight of our childhood birthday parties. My gran made her from a skittle and you fill her skirt with biscuits. Check out the mini packs of vegan friendly jammy and choccy dodgers in there!


Edit: Boo just looked at a packet of the mini Jammy Dodgers and unlike the full sized ones they have Whey in them so they're not vegan - how annoying, I just don't get why companies do that! It's like Oreos being vegan in North America but nowhere else. Anyway, the Choccie Dodgers seem ok so I will be finishing the leftovers of those with my teabreaks at work this week.

Comments

  1. Joey26 September 2012 at 08:00

    That cake looks so great - what a winner!

    I didn't know that about mini Jammie Dodgers being non-vegan. Slightly baffling given the full size Dodgers aren't. Mind you, I equally didn't know that chocolate ones were animal-free either, so that's a bonus - I'm off to discover somewhere that sells them ASAP.

    I heard the lemon ones are also vegan, but have never sited a packet. Perhaps they're migratory biscuits, currently wintering in the tropics or something...

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Cola de Mono

Image
Colo de Mono (Tail of the Monkey) is a Chilean concoction traditionally drunk ice cold at Christmastime. Obviously their winters are a lot warmer than ours so in the UK it's more suited to this time of year. The Chileans use aguadiente an overproof cane spirit. I use Cachaca 51 which I have in for Mojitos and Caipirinhas. Traditionally made with cows milk, here is my vegan version. Colo De Mono Makes 1 pint Serves 4 2 cups of vanilla soy milk 1/3 cup of caster sugar 1/3 teaspoon of cinammon 3 teaspoons of instant coffee 1/2 cup of spirit* Bring the milk, sugar and cinnamon to a low boil in a pan stirring until the sugar is dissolved. Turn off the heat and stir in the coffee. Leave to cool. Once cool add the spirit and chill in the fridge. It will keep for 2 weeks. Serve over ice or straight up but make it cold. * Spirit - I use Cachaca but have heard that people use tequila too.
Read more

Interview With Lisa Goddard of Lily and Dilly

Image
If you've eaten vegan cake in Manchester City Centre in the last few years then chances are you'll have eaten cake baked by Lisa Goddard of bakery Lily and Dilly . We caught up with Lisa to find out what set her on the vegan baking path! So, Lily and Dilly? What made you set up as an independent bakery and where does the name come from? Having worked as a stop frame animator for 12 years, I was getting rather fed up with short term contracts, so the last time I was made redundant, I decided not to chase work round the country, and if that meant a career change, then so be it. A friend of mine had just set up The Cocoa Emporium as an independent Chocolatier, so I gave her a hand whilst navigating through the benefits system, mostly to get me out of bed on a morning! Doing baking for her farmers market was fun, as it was one of my main hobbies, so when she asked if I fancied getting a little shop  with her, it seemed a nice chance to start something new. We got the shop
Read more

Growing your own, bargains and a breakfast recipe

Image
I've started sprouting again! In my old flat I used to do sprouting all the time. The flat was in an old 1930's building and had radiators run from a central boiler room and it was always nice and warm. The constant warm temp made sprouting pretty fail safe. Now I'm in a Derbyshire stone house where it's not as warm the results haven't been as great and I gave up trying  but with this very hot summer we are having I thought I would give it another go and I'm glad I have done. As I already have the seeds it kind of feels like free food too! I'm using these sprouts  from A Vogel. This week I've grown alfalfa but pictured is my first attempt from the week before which was a mix of radish, lentil and rocket which grew into lovely peppery tasting sprouts that we used to garnish our bowl meals for the week. These took 4 days to grow and I nearly gave up on day 2 because I could see mold. Luckily I googled and found out that it wasn't mold at all but r
Read more