All twittered out, Muffins and Song of the day.

With the problems blogger had been experiencing, i found myself on twitter. Which isn't actually that unusual for a Friday as i like to do shout outs for friends and companies that i like but today i was a bit obsessed with reading some of the sob stories for prizes that are given out, i mean come on. Most of us have a really crappy life at some point but to bleat on about how bad everything is for you for a prize that's of minimal value seems a bit like selling your soul to the devil. Some people are quite obvious liars too but i won't go in to that this evening and will save that for when i have more time on my hands. What i want to know is do companies really fall for these sob stories? Ok, maybe not all of them are lies. Maybe life is bad for some of them and i'm very sorry for those who are going through a bad phase but something just doesn't feel right when i see tweets of a begging type nature.

I was also observing the people that advertise via twitter for companies, some are really good at it, others not so much.
I have had a fair few DMs this week mainly from companies who just want me to RT (retweet) their messages. Yeah as if. If i like you i will ##FF (follow friday) you or interact with you and hopefully my followers will notice you and eventually do the same. I will even RT if i think my followers would be interested in something that's mentioned but if you follow me and then in turn i follow you and then straight away you hound me in DM for RT's without even the courtesy of a "hello"..well you can forget it. Yes..you know who you are!


On the whole though i am lucky, i do have a lovely load of followers who are really nice, even the companies i speak to have someone in control of the twitter account who seem to see how important the customer / potential customer actually is. I even managed to sort out a royal mail problem via twitter. It was all handled very quickly and to my satisfaction.


Moving to something i was discussing yesterday. I didn't get to make the Banana and Cherry muffins *sad face*

I will share the recipe with you all though and i will get round to making them very soon.

Banana and Cherry Muffins

Makes - 6 Prep time - 10 minutes Cooks - 20 minutes

150G self-raising flour
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
50g light muscovado sugar
1 ripe banana
150g Morrisons eat smart fat free yogurt
2 tablespoons of vegetable yogurt
1 egg white
70g cherries (stoned and chopped)

1. Heat the oven to 180C/ Gas mark 4 and line a 6- hole muffin tin with muffin cases
2. tip the flour and bicarbonate of soda into a large bowl. Hold back 1 tablespoon of the sugar, then mix the remainder with the flour. Make a well in the centre.
3. in a seperate bowl, mash the banana until nearly smooth. Stir in the yogurt, oil and egg white until the mixture is evenly combined.
4. Pour the liquid mixture into the well and stir quickly and sparingly with a wooden spoon. The mix will look lumpy and may have the odd speck of flour still visable, but don't be tempted to over-mix. Tip in the cherries and give it one more stir.
5. Divide the mixture between the muffin cases- they will be quite full- then sprinkle the tops with the rest of the sugar. Bake for 18-20 minutes until risen and a dark gold colour. Cool for 5 minutes in the tray before lifting onto a rack to cool completely.

This evening my song of the day is Joe Cocker - You are so beautiful. Dedicated to my followers, friends and family xox

Food Glorious Food

Have you ever watched My Family? If you have then you will know how famous the character Susan Harper is for making up rather bizzare recipes and forcing her family to eat them. Like Kipper balls, some beetroot slop or when they had tuna surprise which from what i remember was just Tuna.  Anyway every episode seems to centre around at least one attempt of her cooking something "different" apart from the odd occasions when the lucky family get to have a chinese takeway.

I don't liken myself to her, i am pretty sure my cooking isn't THAT bad but i suppose i do like to "play" about with food.

A few of my favourite ingredients would be peppers, i love the colours and they can brighten up so many dishes.Courgettes, Balsamic Vinegar, Aubergines,Mushrooms, Honey, and olive oil are also top of my list.

There is some glory to be had when you make a meal from scratch and everyone enjoys it. I will admit i cheat with pastry. I'm just no good at getting it right and the ready made pastry is so convenient.

The ingredients above are what i used to make a puff pastry dish. I made two different ones. The kids opted for chilli cheese meatball pastry open parcels (can't think of what to call them other than that) and we opted with the milder honey chicken and veg parcels. Both might i add tasted lovely and everyone finished every last bit. Ok so it might not look that fantastic but it did taste very nice. Since then i have experimented with gammon parcels and they were by far the best. Especially when you drizzle honey over them before placing into the oven.

I love making fun food for the kids too and mine loved these bagel snakes which were really easy to make, just slice up a bagel and chuck whatever topping on you would like and then add something for eyes and make pattens on the body with tomato, cucumber, cheese or whatever you can think of. I went a bit mad and added a sun and grass but it was all in good fun.

I might start adding my weird and amusing food creations on a regular basis, they will either make you want to try them for yourself or grab a sick bucket but it could be quite fun as i do love to cook.

One of my daughters has the aim of being a chef one day and her cooking is amazing. At 5ft 7 and still not a teenager she seems to show an extreme talent with food. Her favourite things to make are devilled eggs,  cakes, soups in fact anything she spots in a recipe book of which she has a bigger collection than i do.

This is her Potato and Leek soup which she got spot on with her first attempt.

 

Here are some of her JLS cakes that she made and decorated. She made about 26 but they didn't last very long at all!

Anyway that's it from me for now as a strong cup of coffee is needed. I am so glad it's almost the weekend. 

Hopefully the sunshine will come back to us soon.