Snap it {red}

I saw today's theme and knew this would be a cinch for me.
Inspired by Sarah and Ally. I decided to do a collage of my favourite red photos.
As you can see red features a lot in our hut, I'm trying to find some more red for my wardrobe too (today I'm wearing a new red skirt).
I look forward to checking out some of the other red links later today.

Playing along here.

Monday Menu {the Hoot cake}

Well this last week was all about one thing the cake. My sister sent me a text a while ago with a photo of a Hoot cake (up until that point I admit I had never heard of Giggle and Hoot). It looked doable. I gave them a few types of cakes to choose from (for inside) and they decided upon a caramel mud cake.
So over the last couple of days the cake took shape, I baked two mud cakes, made some buttercream, Rob sandwiched them and covered them in the white fondant (he's much better at that than me, and believes he has a second career in plastic surgery if he ever desires a career change), then the cake was carefully transported to my sisters. Where, on a very cool and miserable Friday evening, she and I set to work with 2 kilos of coloured fondant and that photo. We're pretty proud of our effort. Although it didn't start promisingly when I was quickly trying to make some royal icing to use in sticking the bits together with. I hit a spatula in the mixing bowl with the electric mixer throwing icing sugar and goopy icing all over me and the bench and the wall. My sister just heard me say "oh no". She had the good grace just to laugh at me, and the damage wasn't too bad. But we moulded and rolled and cut and came up with:


My sister had cooked up a storm, baking cupcakes, jelly cakes, scones, biscuits. meringues, fudge and fairy bread. I offered to make a second cake just in case the 40 guests were still feeling hungry. I quickly made the Annabel Langbein lemon and coconut cake on Saturday morning, covered it in cream cheese frosting and added some pink mini bunting. I left the coconut out of the icing this time, as I thought that last time it made it look a bit lumpy.


The party was a great success, the birthday girl walking around (yes she can walk), dancing to music, opening lovely gifts and being loved by all her many Aunties, Uncles, grandparents, great grandparents, great aunties and uncles, and friends. I'm not sure what she thought of the Hoot cake, she smiled and looked intently at it, and seemed shocked by us all suddenly bursting into song. But she knows how to clap and clapped along with us.

I got the icing from a new-ish cake decorating shop in South Hobart, A Tiny Bit Marvellous. A bit like a lolly shop for cake decorator professionals and wannabes like me!

The rest of the weekend was spent relaxing and doing some de-beige-ing.
The menu this week (apart from the cake):
Monday: leftover beef and quince tagine with pumpkin and fennel couscous, and a fennel and orange salad.
Tuesday: a fish-less paella, with roasted red peppers and olives.
Wednesday: a spinach and pine nut omelette.
Thursday: Tomato pasta sauce, with red peppers, olives and fetta.
Friday: THAT cheese (1792, a washed rind matured on a piece of Huon pine board).
Saturday: Beef, mushroom and red wine pie.
Sunday: Beer braised ham hocks, with fennel, apples and cabbage.


What's been on the menu and your place?

De-beige-ing chairs

The cake worked well, and Maisy's party was lovely. I'll share some photos tomorrow.
We bought a few more Piper Tru-line blackwood chairs a while back. The style matched our two red chairs (the ones I saved from the tip). But they were covered in horrid beige vinyl.
So today was the day, it was grey and cool so we stayed inside and tackled the chairs. The other chairs had come apart easily once you unscrewed the screws. But the cushions on these ones didn't budge. We worked out that the vinyl had adhered to the timber frame, perhaps if they'd been in the sun. So we took to them with a razor blade and a knife. Cutting then free! We recovered them with the same red as the other chairs. We did two, but will need to buy some more fabric to finish off a 3rd chair. We're pretty happy with them!
Hope you had a lovely weekend. I'll be back tomorrow with the Hoot cake.

Growing and planning

A cool wet week at the hut.
The little seedlings are growing well in the vegetable garden, broad beans and peas, the lettuce has slowed down, but we thought we might harvest some mini rocket for a little salad with dinner tonight. I'm not usually into the micro-herbs thing. We bought a Bruny Island cheese yesterday, a 1792, and it is beyond ripe, it was so smelly we put it in two plastic containers, which may now need to be thrown away! But I'm sure it will taste fine. Friday cheese night is back!


I couldn't resist a little more garden retail therapy this week, and justified it by purchasing vegetables and flowers, it's so not frivolous that way.
So I ordered some (ahem 48) Mary Washington asparagus crowns, some red Ad Rem tulips, Golden Parade tulips, red ranunculus, and Gerbera Garvinea plants in red, pink, yellow and white. Apparently they are cold hardy. I haven't seen any leaves pop up yet from the other bulbs we planted, but I guess I'm being impatient.


All images courtesy of Garden Express and Tesselaar.
It's a big weekend coming up, tomorrow is my niece's 1st birthday party! I can't believe it's a year since I went to visit my sister in hospital and got to hold her tiny baby, less than a day old. She and I are making a Giggle and Hoot birthday cake, tonight we're decorating the top of it. I hope it works out ok.
I might drop by here over the weekend, the weather is shaping up for an inside kind of weekend.

Lemon linguine

I meant to post this recipe (if you can call it that) yesterday, but blogger was having some weird issue with the length of the post. I did ramble on a bit yesterday, sorry about that, but I wanted to capture the feel of our weekend.

This is my favourite pasta meal to make, it's so easy and delicious, and we usually have all the ingredients in our home, so no special shopping required. I found it in my first Nigella cook book, How to Eat, the page has became dog eared and splashed.  I remember when I used to dine alone I would make this for myself, serving a rocket salad on the side and drinking a gin and tonic as I waited for the pasta to cook.
I have left out the cream from Nigella's recipe, that used to make it a bit runny, this sauce is much thicker and voluptuous, clinging to the pasta, rather than pooling in the bottom of my bowl.

Lemon linguine

{based on Nigella's recipe in How to Eat}
To serve 2

300g dried linguine pasta
2 egg yolks
2 eggs
1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese, plus more to serve on top
Finely grated zest and juice of a lemon
salt
pepper
1 tablespoon butter
Italian parsley

While your pasta is cooking in a big pot of very salty water, mix together the egg yolks, whole eggs, the grated Parmesan, the zest and juice of the lemon, salt and pepper and whisk to combine well.

Once your pasta is cooked, drain quickly and then return it to the pot (off the heat), add the butter and stir to coat the pasta well. Tip in your sauce and stir around to coat. Tip into your bowls, top with extra cheese, chopped parsley and some more pepper.

Eat. Rocket salad and gin and tonic optional.