Findlay’s teacher at school this year has been an absolute godsend. Findlay’s Primary 3 experience was quite negative and I was extremely anxious about his future schooling but his teacher this year is experienced, kind and encouraging whilst managing to maintain a class of over 30 children. No mean feat! I haven’t ever done the end-of-year teacher gift before but this year I felt that I really needed to. But what to give? Long-term readers may remember my musings on handmade versus shopbought – I have always doubted my homemade gifts as being ‘sub-par’ in comparison to shop bought presents – but to be honest as we’ve had no income for 7 months I can’t justify spending money that we don’t have right now. So, handmade & homemade was the way forward.

With lots of teacher friends (like Kirsty) I’m well aware of things to avoid: bath products, chocolate etc are very thoughtful but my friend Fiona who is a teacher told me that one year she didn’t need to buy any bath products at all because she’d been gifted so many by her pupils. Mrs Lindsay has made such an impact on our family that I felt it only right to put some effort and thought into a gift for her and eventually came up with Smitten Kitchen’s Watermelon Lemonade. I trotted down to Ikea to collect some of their really nice Slom bottles, went into one of my favourite fruit shops in Pollokshields to grab a bag of lemons and a watermelon and set to work. Findlay came into the kitchen just as I was getting started and we had a pleasant time just chattering and squeezing the juice – time which I hold very dear, knowing full well that he is not going to be a child forever – so this really was the gift that kept giving.

In the recipe, Deb suggests swapping out some of the water with sodawater or sparking mineral water. Now I live in Scotland – a country blessed with the most pleasant-tasting clean fresh water in copious quantities – and the very concept of bottled water enrages me. The waste aspect of all that plastic really upsets my green thinking but recently we acquired this baby:

A sodastream! When I was a kid we had one and I remember it had three different sized bottles when we got it, all of which were subsequently lost in packed lunch boxes or under beds and so my Mum put it away. I loved the sodastream and was asking my Mum if she knew where it was recently when I discovered that they’re still being sold AND they actually look quite sleek and sexy these days too! With the amount of fizzy juice that we go through in a week, the sodastream pays for itself and I love the green credentials from using the concentrate instead of buying big 2l bottles. (Argos are selling the white one for £29.99 just now. The one we have is £49.99).

So anyway, I changed half of the water for sodastream-enhanced fizzy water and this is absolutely amazing. I made a bottle for Findlay’s teacher and a bottle for my pregnant sister who celebrates her birthday tomorrow.

Because I made so much, I’ve posted the quantities I used here and this made just over 1.5 litres.

8 fl oz freshly squeezed lemon juice (this was 4 lemons for me)
16 fl oz fresh watermelon puree, pushed through a sieve
Roughly 7 fl oz sugar syrup*
12 fl oz tap water
12 fl oz fizzy water

Mix it up and it’s good to go!
*sugar syrup – also called gomme – is easily made by mixing equal parts of sugar and water then heating until all the sugar has dissolved.

The surprise to me with this is that Nairn absolutely loved it. Erica wasn’t quite so sure but was still willing to give it a try. Findlay doesn’t do breakfast and Greer eats pretty much anything. As part of my new healthy eating plan, this muesli has been a lifesaver because it completely kills my cravings for toast and chocolate!

Because there are six of us in this house who eat cereal, I made a huge jar of muesli – I estimate this is roughly 2.25kg

and this is what it looks like from the top

To make it, this is what I used:
1kg rolled oats (rolled oats are bigger & tastier than porridge oats)
250g weetabix (I used Sainsbury’s basics range)
100g ground almonds
100g sunflower seeds
100g pumpkin seeds
250g dried apricots
250g dates
200g raisins

I used Sainsbury’s basics weetabix because they don’t have much added to them in terms of sugar, but they also disintegrate really well. Get your oats into your jar, crush the weetabix over the top and add the almonds, seeds & raisins. Chop up your apricots and dates – I chopped mine into roughly raisin-sized pieces – and add that to the jar. Put the lid on and give it a really good mix. That’s it! Remember that muesli is what you make it so if you don’t like any of these ingredients, take them out and change them for something else.

I’ve been eating mine with a variety of fruit on top – if I have a banana or a grated apple, the muesli is sweet enough that I don’t need to add honey with the yoghurt but this obviously depends on your own tastes. I prefer it with yoghurt than with milk but again this is your choice – just remember that the weetabix will soak up your milk or yoghurt so always add a bit more than you think you need. Let me know if you try it

This is my 250th post! Thank you all so much for reading along with my adventures so far.

and now I do! I remember making yoghurt in 4th year biology and not being particularly impressed but this time it was extremely easy and felt rewarding because I’d made it myself. A point to note if you decide to do this is that home-made yoghurt has no thickener added so it’s going to be a lot runnier than store-bought yoghurt which some people might find offputting. I’m reliably assured that adding approximately a cupful of dried milk powder will solve this issue. I made mine in the slow cooker and this is how:

You will need:
A slow cooker
Milk (I used a 2.2l jug of semi-skimmed)
Optional: One cup dried milk powder
A small pot of plain live yoghurt (you need this as a “starter”)
Storage for your home-made yoghurt.

One word of advice – there are long periods of leaving things to work while you’re making yoghurt. Personally, being a bit of an old fart I don’t like pottering around in the kitchen late at night so leave five hours before you go to bed to start this off. I wouldn’t kick this off any later than 5pm at night.

Before you start, make sure you have appropriate storage for your yoghurt. I sterilised a few 1l kilner-type jars (available from Ikea for 89p each or Lakeland for £14.99 per half dozen) and since we expect to use this yoghurt quickly this size of jar works well for us. I wouldn’t sterilise your storage until about an hour before your yoghurt will be finished.

Take out your slow cooker (I have a Morphy Richards 6.5l one which I’ve found here for £29.99) and turn it on to the low setting. Pour your milk in (if you’re using milk powder add that now & whisk), pop the lid on and leave it for three hours.
After the three hours, switch your slow cooker off. Take your pot of natural yoghurt – this will be your starter – out of the fridge and leave the yoghurt and milk for a further two hours.
After two hours, add your yoghurt into the milk working quickly so as not to cool the milk down too much. Replace the lid of the slow cooker and cover the slow cooker with towels then leave it overnight for a minimum of eight hours.

When you wake up, sterilise your jars and allow them to cool before adding the yoghurt – you don’t want to kill off the good bacteria, not least because if you want to make yoghurt again then you’ll need a decent cupful of this stuff as the starter for your next batch! This will safely keep in the fridge for a week or so.

I also made my own AMAZING muesli yesterday which I shall blog tomorrow for you – this yoghurt goes really well with it topped with a spoonful of honey

Being of a green and thrifty nature myself it’s really pleasing just how much money and plastic packaging we’ve saved by making this yoghurt and the kids are totally tickled with the idea of home-made yoghurt. Hopefully this can be my first step on the road to eating a little better. Let me know if you try this!

Findlay says, “It wasn’t me…”

Nairn denies all knowledge

Erica looks at the camera and shouts, “CHEEEEESE”

Whilst Greer looks cute

So in the meantime I’m afraid you’ll need to make do with photos from my phone. Luckily we have now located said memory card so when I’ve blogged up the camera photos we should be back to normal service. Well, I say normal because knowing my terrible children and messy house I don’t doubt that something else will go missing soon!

Anyway. Today I’m going to show you another wee taste of my childhood. My Nana and Grampa are children of the war era and so had a fantastic ability to eke dinner out on a budget. As classic Scottish weans* we’d get mince an’ tatties and if we ate all that, we might get bread an’ butter pudding after. What a treat that was! As I was the eldest grandchild it was my job to help my Nana and I can remember standing on a stool at her kitchen sink when I was probably about Findlay’s age, peeling potatoes and turnips and being allowed to help bake in return.

Thus, I decided last week that my kids should have some bread an’ butter pudding. Admittedly this was influenced in part because we were skint and had very little food in the house, and in part because I had about 20 million eggs needing used up! Nana always told me to use bread that was a little past it’s best, but bread doesn’t get a chance to go stale in my house so I used an outsider on the bottom layer.

You will need:
6 slices of bread
Butter
Raisins
Cinnamon and/or nutmeg to taste
2 egg yolks
2 tbsps sugar
3/4 pint milk (or more if it’s not enough to cover your bread)

Preheat your oven to gas mark 5 (375F). Butter the dish you’re using to make your pudding in, then butter the slices of bread and cut them diagonally in half. Cover the bottom of the dish with bread slices then sprinkle over a small handful of raisins. I really like cinnamon so at this point I sprinkle a teaspoonful of cinnamon over the top but I know my Nana prefers nutmeg – do whichever suits best or leave it out altogether. Repeat this layering again before topping off the dish with bread. Do NOT put raisins on the top of your dish because they’ll burn in the oven, and nobody likes a burnt raisin.
In a saucepan, mix your milk and sugar together and heat until the milk mixture is bubbling. Make sure you stir regularly to help the sugar dissolve and ensure it doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pan but be careful not to let the milk boil. Beat the egg yolk quickly in a jug then add the milk, whisking gently to combine. Pour the mixture back into the pan through a sieve and simmer for five minutes, stirring regularly. Pour over the bread slices and leave for at least half an hour, gently pushing the bread into the custard occasionally before sprinkling the top with the brown sugar and cinnamon. Pop in the oven for half an hour until the top is a golden brown colour. Serve with custard or vanilla ice cream.

*Wean means child, literally “wee ‘ane” or “wee yin” meaning “little one”. You’re a wean until yir Granny tells ye itherwise!

These spread a little more than I was expecting so they’re not the neatest. Bear this in mind when you’re baking these! Next time I’ll split them between two cookie sheets.

You will need:
100g of butter, softened
100g light brown sugar
1 tbsp golden syrup
150g self raising flour
100g peanut butter M&Ms (I bought these on eBay)

Preheat the oven to 180C/Gas 4. Beat the butter and sugar together until light and creamy, then beat in the syrup. Add roughly half the flour and mix until combined, then add the rest of the flour with the M&Ms. Get in with your fingers and make sure the M&Ms are evenly mixed in. Divide into 14 balls (or more if you prefer a smaller cookie) and place onto baking sheets lined with greaseproof paper. Bake for 12-15 minutes until light brown around the edges. Place on a wire rack to cool.

I also cheated as I made these at 11pm the night before we left to go on holiday so instead of using the ganache to sandwich the biscuits together, I used chocolate spread which worked wonderfully.

You will need:

225g butter, softened
60g icing sugar
25g dark chocolate, melted
170g plain flour
2 tbsp cocoa powder
3 tbsp rice flour
2 tbsp icing sugar for dusting

for the filling:
225g unsalted butter, softened
180g icing sugar
25g dark chocolate, melted

Preheat oven to 180C/Gas 4. Beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy then stir in melted chocolate. Sift the flour, cocoa powder and rice flour and stir into the creamed mixture.
Pipe the mixture using your largest fluted nozzle into 2 inch rosettes spaced 2 inches apart on a baking sheet lined with greaseproof paper. Bake for 10-12 minutes.

For the filling: Beat butter and icing sugar, then stir in the chocolate. Spread the filling onto the bottom half of the cookies, and then sandwich together with the other halves

Dust with the icing sugar.

Flapjacks are the first thing I ever baked by myself. I’ve mentioned before that my Nana the person who encouraged me to bake, knit and sew and I can remember standing in her kitchen making these in a baking tin that is probably older than I am! They’re so easy to make and my kids go mad for them. This is the recipe I’ve developed over my flapjack making years but it’s very easy to swap ingredients in and out.

You will need:

90g butter
90g light brown sugar
100g ground almonds
190g porridge oats
Generous handful of raisins

Preheat the oven to gas mark 4. Melt the butter and sugar together then add the rest of the ingredients. Mix thoroughly before dumping into a greased square baking tin. Bake for about 20 minutes until the top is golden brown. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for five minutes before marking out your fingers then leave to cool completely (preferably overnight). These flapjacks are quite squidgy – if you like yours a bit more crunchy then use a little less butter.

Yum yum!

Firstly, you’ll notice that my macarons are a bit lumpy. The reason for this is that my ground almonds were not fine enough – it’s not enough to pass it through a sieve, ideally you want to have these mixing in a food processor with the icing sugar and cocoa. Alas, avid fans may remember my food processor had a bit of an accident and I haven’t been able to replace it yet. I have subsequently been told that this is the definitive recipe for chocolate macarons but it’s slightly different to what I did.

You may have noticed that my photo quality has been – well, abysmal lately. Unfortunately I’m relying on my mobile phone just now until I get my camera sorted so please bear with me!

You will need:
3 egg whites
50g granulated sugar
200g icing sugar
110g ground almonds
2 tablespoons cocoa powder

Preheat your oven to 150C/Gas 2. Combine the icing sugar, ground almonds and cocoa powder and put them in a food processor to get rid of any lumps. In a glass or metal bowl, beat the egg whites until they begin to hold a shape then and slowly add the sugar. Beat until they are stiff then fold the dry ingredients into the egg whites half at a time. Pipe them on baking trays lined with greaseproof paper and bake them at 150C for 12 to 15 minutes. Sandwich them together with a chocolate ganache or if (like me) you’re a bit lazy, get some nutella on the go.

Let me know if you’ve made these and have had better success than I did!

ANYWAY! As I showed everyone in my attempted self-sufficiency blog post the rhubarb I’m growing in my garden might feed a couple of gnomes, but it’s not really up to feeding a family of six! Luckily, my wee Nana has an abundance of rhubarb in her garden which she actively encourages me to half-inch as she doesn’t use it.

I’d collected some when I was last over to visit but hadn’t used it yet. For me, rhubarb is one of those ingredients that I could use every day. I was raised on rhubarb crumble, rhubarb sponge, rhubarb jam etc and I love it. In fact, I think rhubarb was the first thing I ever cooked on my own with my Nana when she taught me how to stew it! Problem is, I haven’t been terribly adventurous when cooking with it and this batch was going to end up in the bin if I didn’t use it.

So! I had read this entry on Laura’s blog where she’d used rhubarb in cupcakes. Sounded excellent, but I’ve “sampled” so many cupcakes over this last week between Bob and I’s bake swap practice runs that I couldn’t face anything too sweet. This was my compromise.

Now I’ll be the first to admit that these don’t look like much, but they really hit the spot. Not achingly sweet but enough to curb a craving. I was quite surprised when both Bob and Findlay ate these too and declared them delicious – definitely a recipe I’ll use again.

You will need:
300g rhubarb
3tbsp caster sugar
1tsp vanilla extract

300g plain flour
1tbsp baking powder
1tsp cinnamon
3 eggs
200ml milk
100g butter, melted
Brown sugar

Preheat your oven to 180C/Gas 4. Chop your rhubarb up into reasonably thin slices (I’d say no more than 0.5cm thick) and place in a baking tin (I used a 20cm square tin but any tin will do). Sprinkle your rhubarb with the caster sugar and vanilla and pop the tin into the oven.

Sieve the flour, baking powder and cinnamon into a bowl then add the sugar. In a jug whisk together the milk, butter and eggs. This will hopefully have taken you around ten minutes by which time your rhubarb should be nicely softened. Scoop the rhubarb into the dry ingredients bowl, trying to hold back the liquid if you can as you don’t want your mixture to be too wet. Pour the jug contents into the bowl too then stir until just combined – with muffins, you want the mixture to stay a bit lumpy.

Split the mixture between 12 muffin cases, sprinkle with the brown sugar and pop into the oven for roughly half an hour (mine took around 35 minutes and my cooking times are notoriously dodgy so just keep an eye on them raising and looking golden brown). These are amazing warm and I can imagine them being glorious with some warm custard.

Let me know if you try them!

Now, being the kind soul that I am I’m going to give you two alternative recipes for the caramel. I misread the recipe from the side of the condensed milk can and ended up with a treacley caramel which made more of an adult cake. My Mum’s is a lighter caramel.

You will need for the base:
100g butter
50g caster sugar
150g self raising flour

Preheat your oven to 200C/Gas 6. Cream together the butter & sugar then add the flour. Spread into a greased & lined 20cm square tin and bake for 20 mins. Allow to cool.

You will need for my Mum’s filling:
100g caster sugar
100g butter
1 tbsp golden syrup
400g tin condensed milk

Place all ingredients into a pan, bring to the boil stirring constantly. Boil for 4 minutes then spread over your cake base and leave to cool.

OR, you will need for the filling I used:
25g butter
150g dark brown soft sugar
400g can condensed milk

Place the butter and sugar in a pan and stir over a medium heat until the butter melts and the sugar has mostly dissolved. Add the condensed milk stirring continuously until the first bubbles appear on the surface. Remove from the heat and spread over the base.

Once your caramel has set, melt 200g chocolate (I used 100g milk and 100g dark) and spread over your caramel. Leave it for 15 minutes to cool and if your chocolate has semi set, lightly mark out the squares on the surface before leaving in the fridge to set properly.