A lot of baking!

not JUST baking, in fact there has been a lot of KNITTING and a lot of SEWING and a bit of EMBROIDERY too!
I've been a bit hectic and not had chance to blog in sequence so have decided to just fling a load of pics and add a bit of something to explain it in separate posts.
FIRST the BAKING!
Above are the lovely chocolate muffins baked with a large chunk of chocolate in the middle that slowly part melts as they cooks and offers a nice chocolately surprise when bitten into! seriously yum and very quick to bake and only takes one egg ..
I bought some of these silicon muffin cases last week and find they are much better at holding the cake mixture than the paper cases so far I'm pleased with them!

Next is the seriously scrummy Ginger Sponge which is baked like a cake but is more of a "pudding" sponge - we are this yesterday hot with a dollop of vanilla icecream - very gingery I added some chopped stem ginger and the remaining syrup from the jar.  the top is nice and "crusty" too.

dried fruits soak in sherry before baking

the cake mixture in the tin

soaking the fruit cake in sherry while it "rests"

ahead of plastering it with marzipan

The Christmas cake is nearly done! all bar the icing!
I confess to using premade marzipan and icing this year but its SO much easier!
The cake is good old Delia Smith's classic rich fruit cake that she uses for Christmas and I carried on the family tradition of frightening the mixture with half a bottle of sherry for added "flavour" ! hic ..

walnut and rye bread

DELICIOUS with home made soup, I went to a knitting shop at the weekend with my knit-pal-Sally and we browsed the Farmer's Market outside and I bought this lovely bread.
I'd like to say I feel inspired to bake my own, but I don't! really! I'd quite like to buy a bread making machine but at £400 or so can think of other yarny stuff I'd rather buy at half the price!
I do like a nice bread and this was seriously tasty!

At the same time I bought a nice purple broccoli! looked HUGE until I cut off all the leafy bits surrounding and was left with THIS ..

but to be fair, it was nice! and luckily due to 2xlightbulbs having "gone" I was able to sneak it onto no.2.son's plate with his sunday roast without him noticing!! ha! sneaky? yes, but you have to be sneaky, I often "hide" bits of veg in food a bit like you press tablets into dog meat to fool a dog into taking his medicine, the same doesn't work, however, with CATS!  they are far too sensible to be fooled in this way and I find the best thing is to ask the VET to do it! which happily for us our vet is happy TO do - the cats are due for their annual check and worming etc as if we need more expense?  this year we have decided thats its too stressful for US to fit the pair of cats into one carrier so we need to buy another one .. its such an expensive time of year isn't it?
We're looking forward to fetching no.1.son home from Uni for the Christmas break! and he tells me that he may well be wanting to enjoy a can or three of his DAD'S BEER!  hmm not sure how that will go down? ..