Christmas or Yuletide

Celebrations of a birth, or just the beauty and community of spirit when people from all around the country, or people you have never met come together for a meal. For me each year is one of ‘waifs and strays’ as one might call it, or in a more generous turn of phrase, I accept that my mother with good heart and unconditional love, invites to Christmas Lunch all those who would otherwise be on their own. A lady who has been coming for many a year brought a friend who would otherwise have been on her own – 92 years young and bearing gifts of homemade almond and lemon tart. So many stories and wisdom to share with us during lunch and the yearly Scrabble game, fiercely contested as always. Rules re-explained , help given and much laughter.

Each year something interesting is cooked, this year was no exception. A starter of a soup that I had accidentally made in the flow of creativity and discovered it was tasty and, more importantly, I could remember what ingredients and method I had used.

The main dish was one Mum had seen on TV, and I hunted for the recipe and made with a few tweaks of my own – Grandma Berit’s Russian Leg of Lamb, with accompanying veg.

A trio of desserts and a surprise extra for each plate but one – the gluten free plate missed out on the chocolate and rum and fig fudgy square of delight.

Courgette & Celery Soup

Russian leg of Lamb, with honey roasted root vegetables, sprouts and green beans

Red wine Raspberry & Cherry Sorbet, Kiwifruit Sorbet, Mexican meringues with a Crème de Mur flavoured whipped cream and a square of yummy chocolate fudgy fig goodness.

Courgette & Celery Soup

I would like to think that the key to this soup is that the potatoes I used to thicken the soup came from the marinating root vegetable bowl. When I first made this I had a batch of potatoes, beetroot and carrots sitting in a bowl absorbing flavour from and Italian seasoning herb mix, olive oil and copious crushed garlic. I thought about peeling extra potatoes for the soup and the thought of an itchy head (a side of peeling potatoes for me!) put me off that course of action. Instead I lifted the Clingfilm and filched a couple of potatoes from the bowl and diced them into the sweating celery, onion, and courgettes.

 Of course the best flavour is the dirty english celery and not the nice clean spanish celery!

Ingredients

1head of celery, washed and chopped coarsely

1 onion, peeled and finely chopped

1 courgette, washed and cubed

2 small potatoes, garlicky or not, diced

Knob of butter

3 pints of vegetable stock ( I used marigold bouillon)

2 tablespoons Crème Fraiche

Method

1. Put knob of butter into heavy based soup pan – or any pan, and allow melting on low heat.

2. Add onions and allow to gently sauté  on low heat, as they become translucent, add the celery, courgette and potato.

3. Put on lid of pan and allow to sweat for at least 5 minutes on a low heat.

4. Stir to remove any stuck potato and add the stock. Turn up the heat and bring to a rolling simmer.

5. Allow to simmer uncovered, for at least 25 minutes.

6. Liquidize the contents of the pan. If you have a handy squidgy blender all well and good but I have a large jug and a liquidizer that is attached to my food processor. I blend the soup in the liquidizer, and add more liquid or water as necessary, and return to the pan.

7. At this point taste and season accordingly, and add Crème Fraiche and allow to simmer on a very low heat for 5 minutes to combine.

Delectable Courgette & Celery Soup

 Russian Leg of Lamb

This was a recipe that my Mum saw on TV and decided ‘we’ must try it - for which you should translate ‘Ursula’ will try it out.  I finally found the recipe on the ITV.com site with only  the vaguest description of the programme she had seen. 

I ordered a 1.9KG leg of organic lamb from Riverford –the box people where I get all my vegetables, fruit and meat.

• 2kg leg of lamb on the bone
• At least 4 big cloves of garlic, each sliced in three length-ways
• Paprika powder (unsmoked)
• 2 tbsp fine sea salt
• 3 tbsp chopped, pickled silver skin onions
• 80-100g3½ oz butter, at room temperature -
• 2 tomatoes – I used cherry tomatoes – so much easier to pat on to the butter paste
• 1 small bunch of parsley  - I picked a handful from my herb pots.
• 8 anchovy fillets in oil, chopped
• 3 tbsp brandy
• 200 ml7 fl oz dry white wine  ( you can used vegetable stock if like me you’ve run out of wine)
• 200 ml7 fl oz lamb stock (I used a cube)

For the Gravy

• 2 tbsp corn flour
• 50-100ml single cream.

METHOD

Preheat oven to 175°C. (Do it to 180°C if you want it medium not pink)

1. Cut most of the fat off the lamb (to allow the flavours to penetrate the meat) and put the fat in the bottom an oven pan. I didn’t have too much fat, and with the amount of butter in the recipe, a leaner leg of lamb is a bonus.

2.  Make slits at regular intervals in the lamb, and insert the garlic slivers. I always double the garlic content for a recipe, so many pieces inserted.

3. Then rub the lamb with the paprika powder and salt.  I put on the salt first, and then the paprika. The only way to do this properly is to use your hands.

4. Put the leg of lamb on top of the fat in the roasting tin.

5. Mush the anchovy and parsley into the butter to make a paste – use a fork it is easier. Cover the leg of lamb with this paste. I only put this paste on the side facing me and did not attempt to put paste on both sides. That’s why you can use less butter. Using cherry tomatoes makes it much easier to make the pieces stick to the paste.

6. On top of this paste spread the onions and tomato.

7.  Put a bit of lamb stock in the pan.

8. Put in oven and roast for 45 minutes, then baste with the rest of the stock, wine and brandy.

9. After 2 hours remove from oven and ensure that it is cooked all the way through. This will give a pink lamb.

Making the Gravy.

1. Take out the lamb and put to one side to rest.

2. Using a metal spoon, take off some of the fat floating on top of the stock – as little or as much as you wish. It is best to leave a little for the gravy as it adds to flavor.

3.  Add to the roasting pan the water you have saved from the vegetables. I used the sprout water, but you can just make up some vegetable or lamb stock to add.

4. Mix up the cornflour in a cup with some cold water, and then add to the pan along with some single cream.

5. Turn heat to low, and stir continuously until the gravy begins to thicken and comes to a low boil. Add more stock as required, or more white wine if you wish. At this point I always add a dollop of damson jam to give a little sweetness to the gravy. The anchovies and salt rub generally bring too much salt to the dish for my liking.

6. Spoon some of the juices that have come from the resting lamb into the gravy.

I accompanied this with roast root vegetables, sprouts and green beans. Salt and pepper on the table, but otherwise you don’t really need any other condiments.

Music for this creative process was unusual in that it was a combination of Karunesh and Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band.

http://youtu.be/Xj2bmQ4P4cM

http://youtu.be/kfvZmOXeQv0

Recipes for the sorbets are to come when there are less children and more time for writing.

Beautiful artwork with practical applications

For about 8 months I have been looking for a new mixing bowl for my cake and sweet making. I have a beautiful bowl that i have had for 20 years, that is nearing the end of its life. I cook and bake so much using the favourite bowl that a new bowl has to be beautiful and functional. Most of the bowls I see are beautiful and non functional, or beautiful and too small.

The mixing bowl for my baking and creations of all varieties of magical intent cooking that comes from dedicated kitchen witchery deserves a bowl that matches the vibrational resonance of the magic that is created within the bowl and results from the cooking.

The bowl I had, I always called my gren bowl - when in fact it was actually a cream colour with shell pattern and green piping around the edge, but it was a decent size, china and beautiful and always merged with my free flowing cookery creativeness.

When I visit Norwich on those rare quarterly occasions for supplies this is the bar/eaterie I frequent - Franks Bar 

The food is interesting, different, stunning and always inspiring. The crockery upon which it is served is beautiful and resonates as a alliance of beautiful food with beautiful serving plates. They have a deal with Iitala, a Finnish company, to use all their tableware in their business - http://www.franksbar.co.uk/iittala/

Stunning and different tableware - a joyous experience to drink a latte from a mug such as the one's above. So now you may see what I mean by inspiratational cooking impliments. Much like we all have a favourite spatula, or a silicon spatula for making caramel - I wish for a bowl that inspires my creations in the kitchen.

I received a present from a lovely lady of some Melamine heart shaped red/orange mixing bowls - which are beautiful to use, but too small.

This is a beautiful bowl to use for mixing up chocolate chestnut bars

I came across this site when googling for beautiful bowls - http://www.catspawpots.com/gallery.htm - and it's in Americam so I am unlikely to be browsing this collection in 2011.

This morning I went to Hoxne Artisan market and met a guy who does stoneware. I described what kind of bowl I wanted, beautiful and functional and he was intrigued with the idea of a beautiful artwork that also had a practical purpose for magical cooking and I have commissioned a bowl from him.

beautiful functional magical

The most recent creation was a recipe from the Ottolenghi cookbook - Khalid's Chocolate Chestnut bars - which includes white chocolate chips, or in my case white chocoalte chunks, and figs (which I pre-soaked in rum) on a shortbread base made from white spelt. The recipe is for crushed biscuits, or gram crackers would work I imagine. I used the spelt shortbread so my Wheat intolerant friends could partake. As a first try they turned out reasonable well, but next time I will soak the figs longer, overnight  perhaps, use the freshly dried figs, which are large and sweeter, I may use crushed biscuits, and perhaps use a less dark chocolate, because they were very dark and rich and not very sweet.

Time, Therapy and shop bought Filo

A few days ago I was looking through my old journals, looking at where I was when I was young - many moon's ago when the goddess first visited me - and marvelling at how so much had changed with me, and how that was reflected in my external world. When I was about 14 or so, every year when the Orchard was laden with apples - the request came thick and fast for Urs's Apple strudel. A recipe I had taken from my Grandmother's old recipe book that came from with ready packaged flour - a remarkable new convenience in my Grannie's day - so new that special recipe booklets came as standard -although to be fair this was when she moved from India to England.

Many moons ago before the Moonopause arrived, there was a time in a land not unlike our own, when Phyllo/Filo pastry was not readily available in the freezer section of every supermarket. In those days there was no such thing as a packet mix for shortcrust pastry in every local corner shop – in fact a time before convenience, instant gratification, but a slower time when pastry was created and mixed by hand by most of us.

My Granny was alive and well in those times with her repository of cookery pamphlets, recipes and an old fashioned book of family recipes. She grew up in Burma, and moved to India during the war (WWII) where flour was fetched from the local mill in a ‘gunny sack’ – and wheat flour was a rarity; Gram flour (chickpea), lentil or rice flour were more normal. Only with a move to England after the war in the late 1940’s and the advent of the 1950’s brought the  ‘packet’ of flour came with a special recipe booklet for this already sifted flour – this was modern convenience ! Washing – well that was still done by hand and mangle and the good clean fresh air for drying.

The new ‘sifted plain flour ‘ or ‘self raising flour’ came in packets, and with them came those little booklets of recipes to make using this new modern convenient packaged flour. It was from one of these booklets that the recipe for homemade apple strudel came – with homemade Filo pastry. To look at modern recipes from Greece for Phyllo pastry one can see that olive oil is an integral part of the process, but in the 1950’s olive oil could only be bought in the chemist in small amounts for medicinal purposes.

I was at home listening to my cooking music of those times - a little different - http://youtu.be/Ny04UI3IkPI - Grendel by Marillion. I really loved that kind of epic soft rock music - a retelling of the legend of Beowolf.

My curiousity was piqued - and there was no chance of a visit to the shops - I decided to make my own Filoesque pastry from this old recipe. Apple strudel with a few tweaks for my adult tastes. I did a little research on Greek recipes for Filo, but and I may yet try them, although all seem to involve olive oil and very hot water.

Now having made the pastry there is something therapeutic and comforting about making my own filo. So much so that I'll be making it again this week.

This is from http://www.greekfood.about.com/

APPLE STRUDEL - HOMEMADE FILO PASTRY

Preheat oven to 375F / 190C / Gas mark 5


Ingredients

Pastry:
8 oz white spelt (all purpose / plain flour)
1 tspn salt
1 egg, beaten
4 tablespoons hot water (from tap not boiling)
2 oz melted butter.

FILLING

2lb cooking apples, 4 oz porridge oats (if you are not wheat free, use breadcrumbs)

2-3oz melted butter

Zest & juice of 1 lemon

4 oz dark brown sugar (use muscovado for darker flavour)

½ tablespoon mixed spice (I use cinnamon, nutmeg and hint of ginger)

4 oz sultanas ( I used raisins)

METHOD

Note – you can pre-soak the raisins or sultanas in a little rum if you want a boozy kick. I served with a rum and raisin laced cream.

PASTRY

1. Put flour and salt into a large mixing bowl and make a well in the centre. Add in the beaten egg, 1 oz of the melted butter and the hot water.

2. Mix in the flour into the centre using circular motions, dry into wet until a dough forms.

3. Tip dough onto a lightly floured board and knead a little until a smooth dough/paste is formed.

4. Put aside for 20 minutes and allow to rest in a cool place, while you make the filling.

FILLING

5. Peel, core and slice the apples and mix with oats, sugar, sultanas, and lemon zest. Finally add the lemon juice and mix together and allow to stand for a few minutes to really bond the flavours.

6. Add more oats if you there is still too much juice add more oats to absorb the juice. You  don’t want the pastry to get soggy.

7. Flour the board a little and roll out until very thin into a long oblong. I use a very long rolling pin and turn and flip at first. Always ensure the board is lightly floured so the pastry doesn’t stick.

 The more sophisticated among you can use a pasta machine to get the thickness you require. I don’t need it to be perfect, just scrumptious. I usually cut the dough in half and dough each separately and roll until I have an oblong.

5. Brush the rolled out pastry with melted butter and then put a line of the filling down the centre.

6. Roll up and place on greased baking tray and brush all over with melted butter. If you have holes from the apples apply the pastry trimmings with melted butter to gain the filo flakiness.

I usually form it into a crescent, and if I am doing it in 2 halfs I use my large enamel pan to get both onto it.

Bake 30-35 minutes.

I have a fan oven so I usually look at 26 minutes.

Leave to cool a little and serve with Rum and spiced raisin cream as I did or with homemade custard or even if you are feeling energetic - rum and raisin ice cream.



Tesco's Rum & Raisin Cream



You can do a little lemon water icing over the top if you want to add sweetness.

Another old favourite follow on music - http://youtu.be/fBkvcQEGq9k

Misty Mornings, Dimensional Travel, Clementines

This morning I got up early and went out into the foggy misty morning, over field, through hedges and down to the river. Walking in the mists across the fields always feels like I am walking between the worlds, wandering in and out of the dimensions at will. It becomes a walking meditation flowing with nature and hearing the calls of all those beings wandering in the mists between our world and theirs.

When I eventually come back in to the kitchen I am renewed, energised and inspired. Of course there is the all important first and only cup of fresh coffee to be made and imbibed while choosing the music that inspired the above recipe. Still a cold and foggy day outside, and the only place to be is in a warm kitchen filled with music, a sage green candle burning, and some incense burning – a new delivery incense made in Santa Barbra of all places – such amazing aroma - shifting into a higher vibration and cooking and creating to create soul nourishing, light and flowing, heart warming food.

Requests were made for stew, a hearty winter casserole of chicken and vegetables – ‘something to stick to ya bones’ – and yet that wasn’t the energy that returned with me.  I wished to create a summery golden, dish that was bursting with light and harmony and reminiscent of warm days in the garden eating and laughing.

The music of the moment was the Bliss album – Hundred Thousand Angels.
A Hundred Thousand Angels

Another track that invokes a full throated sing along is I am the Light

Looking round the kitchen I saw an abundance once more of Clementine’s – they seem to multiply in the fruit bowl until they spill over and shout out for attention.

I went into the depths of the kitchen cupboard to dig out the perfect cooking dish – a Spanish terracotta dish I bought years ago in Spitafields market, after failing to buy one in Spain.

INGREDIENTS

2 chicken breasts, cut in half lengthways

2 small leeks, sliced in small chunks

1 red pepper, sliced thinly

1 sweet potato, sliced into small chunks

Juice of 12 Clementines

1/2 pint water

1 teaspoon vegetable bouillon

Salt,

Freshly ground black pepper

Fresh or dried thyme to taste

METHOD

Pre heat oven to 190C/ Gas Mark 5

1. Put chicken and vegetables into the dish. Season and add thyme and bouillon powder.

2.  Add clementine juice and water and stir a little to mix in powder.

3. Use tin foil to cover the dish and put into preheated oven.

4. Cook for 1 hour and then take out to check chicken is done. Taste and adjust the seasoning as required. At this point I add a little orange zest and use cornflour paste to thicken.

5. I served this with Soba Pumpkin and Ginger Brown Rice Noodles

Soba Pumpkin and Ginger Rice Noodles

So a fat free and gluten free dish - you can serve this with brown rice or even potatoes, but I found we enjoyed this light citrus summer dish as an antidote to the winter blues.

11:11:11; New structures; Lemon scones

Unusually this morning I was wide awake and in a prime state of anticipation and almost jittery excitement, with no real basis for such a feeling. I got up at 7:00 am just so I could tune in and anchor in the energies down to the magnetic core of Mother Gaia.


Last afternoon I made beetroot chocolate brownies with coconut topping; lemon curd; and dinner for  2 - venison with juniper and black pepper with swiss chard and romanescu with almond dressing. And yet this  morning I felt the need to create once more. For years scones have been my bete noir - little crumbs of bricks with the consistency of a brick. Now I use white spelt flour and baking powder, the knack seems to have come to me.


This morning I thought of those strange people who say in all seriousness "I don't do chocolate" - perhaps the true humans of this world, rather than the star seeded beings such as the majority of us who love chocolate. 


I went to the door to discover scaffolders ready to put up the structure to support the new additions coming to this home - and felt that reflection in the energies of today - when we are all anchoring in the new energies into this planet so that we can generate a stable crystalline structure and the planet and we can share the load.  All the bracing in the right place.

The music for this cooking experience was a step away from the normal creative music and more a meditative experience - Meditative experience - Crystal Bowls and ocean waves ebbing on the shore!










Lemon & Coconut sweet scones


Makes approx. 9 small scones
Pre-heat oven to 220C or Gas Mark 7


8 oz white spelt flour
2 tspns baking powder
2oz cold butter - sometimes I do a Nigella and freeze it
2 oz sultanas - optional
2 oz unrefined natural sugar - caster or granulated is ok
2 oz dessicated coconut
1 egg softly beaten
1 small jug of milk (about 3oz) with a squeeze of lemon juice to curdle it

1. Put the flour in the bowl - I have a special bowl I always use for magical cooking and baking, and of course it does need replacing, so I must manifest with clear vision the type of bowl I wish to find - with the baking powder and a pinch of salt.

2. Add the cubed cold butter and rub into the flour lightly until it is somewhat crumbly.

3. Add the sultanas if using, sugar and lemon zest, and coconut and mix.

4. Stir in the beaten egg using  a fork or flat butter knife. Add the curdled almost yoghurt like milk. If you have live natural yoghurt you could use some of that. The mixture should come together in a ball and be damp - wetter than pastry, so do not add too much flour because this will lose the light texture.

The secret is not to handle the dough too much and to roll out - or even pat with floured hands into a round that is quite thick.

5. Roll out lightly, handling the dough as little as is possible. Cut using a small metal cutter (metal is always better than plastic for allowing the dough to keep it's lightness) and place on floured tin. Put straight into a very hot oven for 10-14 minutes.

6. Scones are done when the bottom when tapped sounds hollow. You can put an egg wash over the top if you wish, but I rarely do this except for cheese scones.

7. Serve with butter and lemon curd.

Homemade Lemon curd and Lemon Scones

Samhain Blessings and Pumpkin Solace sans Marmite

There is something about Samhain and the Autumn that brings me to yearning for warming comforting food - especially when the day begins with mist and fog, and the cloud never lifts. A blazing fire in the garden with Bay leaf trimmings, Rosemary and pine brings those cleansing and farseeing feelings and energies to all who inhale that scented smoke. What better to follow an invigorating fire that kickstarts the new year of incoming energies, than a heartwarming Pumpkin soup with a little kick.

A beautiful pumpkin and so many ideas and ways to go with this wondeful fruit for the autumn season. I look forward to my squash season and will order a box of various squash for the season. I had 2 pumpkins and several other varieties. My favourite are the crown prince squash which have the orange flesh and an incredible sweetness when roasted.

Normally I would make a heavy meaty textured soup with marmite and green tomato chutney, chilli and sage and thyme. This time I was looking for a flavour and texture that resonated with my energies in this moment - so very different to last year, much higher and more delicate to be reflected in what foods, textures anf flavours I use to nourish myself ( and any who wish to partake.)

I have been cooking with a Lebanese 7 spice mix - Nutmeg, Ginger, Allspice, Fenugreek, Cloves, Cinnamon & Black Pepper. I have been using it with meatballs, or for some spicy potatoes.

So first things first - for a robust flavour, in as much as Pumpkin has flavour, always roast the pumpkin.

PUMPKIN SOUP

1 medium pumpkin

1 small acorn squash

2 tablespoons Lebanese 7 spice mix

Marigold Bouillon made up into 1.5 litres stock

Pomegranate molasses

Olive oil or sunflower oil

Lime Juice

Salt

2 shallots, or 1 small red onion

1. Chop pumpkin half and scoop out pumpkin seeds and stringy goop. Save the seeds to dry out and toast with tamari and sunflower seeds.

2. I don't skin the pumpkin until its cooked because it is way easier then to do so. Put pieces of pumpkin and squash in large pan - I have a large enamel pan that always feels right for this kind of roasting. Add a couple tablespoons of olive oil or any vegetable oil and the spices and toss the pumkin until coated - use your hands. Add a sprinkling of rock salt.

3. Roast at 190C or Gas Mark 5 for about 30 minutes until the pumpkin is slightly charred around the edges. Remove and leave to cool for a few moments.

4. Slice a couple of shallots, or finely slice a red onion - it rather depends on what you intuit to be the right colour for the dish- each person is different.

6. Add a knob of butter to a large pan - I have my Granny's soup pan I always use - and a couple of glugs of olive oil. Add the onion and cook slowly until it is translucent.

7. Take the pumpkin and squash flesh off the skin, and add to the pan -and put the lid on and allow to sweat for a 5-10 minutes. If it seems to catch add a little more butter or oil.

8.  Take the lid off and stir around and then add the vegetable stock - I use marigold bouillon for convenience.

9.  Turn up the heat and allow to simmer for about 35 minutes - and when the liquid has reduced and the soup is thickening take off the heat and liquidize. I use my liquidizer and a jug- the simplest way for me.

10. Return to the pan and taste and season as needed. Add a a couple of teaspoons pomegranate molasses and a couple of squeezes of lime juice. Allow to simmer for 5 minutes and then add some creme fraiche.

11. I served with Apple and Guinness Soda bread.



The Music for this little excursion into texture was a new album courtesy of my brother - http://youtu.be/ZgRnLM9Vi24

http://youtu.be/Se9yBvqQHxk



The following day I was moved to add the remainder of the Red Cabbage with apple and juniper berries to the soup, adding a whole new level - perhaps the background music inititated that move - Quivver remix of Led Zep - Babe I'm gonna Leave

Samhain - Chocolate Clementine Cake

I Allow my soul's vision and strength to come into my being.

The track below was my musical inspiration for this beautiful cake/dessert

Fearless - Indra Cooking creative music

Reading through my journal, I came across a list of affirmations I wrote a few years just before my Samhain ritual. Blessings and energies I wanted to welcome into my life, along with a list of all aspects, beliefs and habits I wished to release. All to be released through fire and to welcome in the new energies through the beautiful scented smoke of Bay leaves, and applewood from the fire in the garden.

Coming to 2011 Samhain I came across a recipe originally from Nigella Lawson before it went through the alchemical, magical process of creation, manifestation and energetic process that resulted in this cake.

Clementines



Thinner skinned than oranges, sweeter and juicier, were calling from the fruit bowl - destined for a superior goal than squeezed for juice, wishing for chocolate - always a good theme for Samhain.

Chocolate - always my cupboards have a store of chocolate - bought by the box wholesale - ready for use. Strong dark Green & Black's 85% Cocoa solids chocolate. Rich, intense, beautifully scented. An abundance of free range eggs beg to be used. Reading through the recipe as is often the way, I discover that the cake ingredient tin does not hold ready ground almonds, fresh from the supermarket, but the pantry does hold a jar of toasted flaked almonds from a previous foray into florentines. So I toasted my almonds a wee while more, and ground them in the, Goddess sent, food processor. Almonds will never grind as fine as those you buy, but the rougher texture enhances the cake, and allows this ingredient to shine within the cake.

CHOCOLATE CLEMENTINE CAKE

4-5 clementines (weight between 375 -400g) - I had 440g.

6 eggs

1 heaped teaspoon GF baking powder (leave it out if you wish, I did)

1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (don't leave this out)

220g Ground almonds

250g caster sugar (You can used granulated if necessary )

50g Cocoa powder (Green & Blacks unsweetened)

Pre-heat oven to 190 C, or 180 C for a fan assisted oven.

METHOD

1. Put whole clementines into a pan and cover with water, and bring to the boil, and simmer for 1 hour until the fruits are soft and squishy. Do not peel them, skin and all is boiled.

Leave to cool and then process to a pulp in the food processor. Set aside.

2.  Butter 20cm springform tin and line with greaseproof or baking parchment.

3. Place sugar and eggs into bowl and mix. Do not whisk until soft and fluffy because this is a fudgy cake, not a souffle cake. You can use a whisk if you wish but not for longer than 2 minutes. Add rest of ingredients, adding clementine pulp last. Mix thoroughly with each addition.

4.  Pour into the lined tin and bake for 35-45 minutes in the oven. You may need to cover the top with a round of greaseproof to prevent the top burning. When you check the cake, it will come out slightly sticky, and that's perfectly fine.

5. Allow to cool in tin and then remove outer ring, leaving to fully cook on cake rack, on base, until cold. Then you can remove it and put onto to a cake stand or plate.

As you can see it's a bit rough and ready in appearance, but it is soft, moist and absolutely delicious. I will serve it with a little heated orange liquer and honey syrup, and a mix of lowfat creme fraiche and cream. The clementines were almost marmalade like in their texture and the toasted ground almonds added another level to this cake. A resounding success to be remade for Samhain and no doubt tweaked once more.

The decorating and serving process was enhanced by this beautiful track I'm listening to at the moment - Indra - The Other World. I have no idea how to get hold of this music, and I wish I did, so if you have any ideas let me know.

http://youtu.be/gxLEWPIKnjk

Abracadabra - healing journey

ABRACADABRA!

Melody's healing journey through poetry, words and the magic of manifestation of a healing path.

Click on the link

Creating through Love, Perception, and Flow

 http://starhawksblog.org/

I've been reading her blog and have been inspired on the idea of group process, and creating  a world and a situation where all views and opinions are listened to - where no decisions have to be made 'now, now, now!'

Every person talking has value, all is enjoyed and yet the space occuppied is peaceful and the energy is good. The account further down the blog about the energy raised from the spiralling and drumming and how that can have an effect both pacifying and provoking is fascinating.

How do we use this energy of these times to scale up the co-creation and manifestation of the New Earth for all who live on this planet. The higher frequency energies are causing us all to work through and release old patterns, the movement of Chiron through Pisces is allowing us all to work through our deepest held emotions and embrace, work with and cleanse ourselves from the detrius of all that we have stored within our body and mind. All stored because we have fallen for that belief system that asks us to detach from emotions, to deny that we do indeed feel, that creates a vision of a world where we do not feel anger, fear or jealousy - and in the denial of that we are storing up blocked energy.

Now is the time to be with and embrace those feelings, and release through crying, or grieving or whatever method we use to let go.

The potential for magical creation is accelerating!

Think about the whole. Step up and take your place in your power and hold it boldly as a spiritual warrior willing to defend, but never to invoke or create violence. Take action by allowing Love to flow through you - to perceive the other person, no matter how much you dislike them; to acknowledge their right to exist even though you wish they did not; Honour their right to exist and be different to you!


So Mote it Be!

Leeks Love Tomatoes don't they?

Several large leeks sit staring at me from the organic box, and the thought of buttered leeks fails to initiate glee or anticipation. Perhaps time to let got and flow into creation - and see what appears before me.

Butter Pastry with basil and oregano incorporated; leeks sauteed in a little butter and olive oil, in the pan for at least 10 minutes, before added the beautiful fresh tomatoes from the garden. A little dab of pesto and a search through the fridge for various cheese available.

perhaps not cream but cream cheese and eggs whisked together with seasoning. Blind baked tartlets golden from the oven, filled with leek & tomato soft from the hot pan, cheese crumbled over the tart, and filled with the eggy mixture - Light cream cheese to add to the lightness of the tartlets.

hmm, the leeks smell wonderful, but a final touch is needed to beautify the tarlets, perhaps a smidgeon of baked sweet potato to add to the overall theme of golden, solar plexus goodness. Love, healing and nourishing vibrations for the tartlets - to all those who choose to take those blessings.