Sunday, 14 August 2011

Blueberry American Pancakes

****If you stumbles across here because of pancake day, here are 10 facts I found out, courtesy of *ahem* The Mirror. Full link here*****

1. The first recorded pancake race was in Olney, Buckinghamshire in England in 1445.
2. The first pancake recipe appeared in an English cookbook in the 15th century. And it’s a tradition that continues all over England. It is said to have originated in Olney as a housewife was so busy making pancakes that she forgot the time. When she heard the church bells ringing for mass she ran out of her house, still carrying her pan and pancake. Olrney still has a pancake race every year.
3. The largest number of pancakes tossed in the shortest amount of time is 349 tosses in two minutes, which was achieved by Dean Gould at Felixstowe, Suffolk in 1995.
4. The longest race in the quickest time was held in Melbourne, Australia. Jan Stickland covered 384m in 59.5  seconds on 19 February 1985.
5. The largest pancake ever made and flipped measured 15.01m wide, 2.5cm deep and weighed 3 tonnes. It was made in Rochdale, Greater Manchester during August 1994.
6. It is customary in France to touch the handle of the frying pan and make a wish while the pancake is turned, holding a coin in one hand.
7. On Pancake Day in Newfoundland, Canada people place items in the pancake batter before it is cooked to tell the future for family members. If it happens that boy receives item for a trade, it means he will enter the trade but if a girls receives item from a trade, it means she will marry a person from trade.
8. Maple Syrup was originally a sweet drink, discovered by the Algonquin Indians who collected sap from Canadian sugar maple trees and then boiled to produce the delicious beverage.
9. Taking the easy way to make your pancakes is not a new thing. The first ready-mix food which was sold  ommercially was Aunt Jemima pancake flour. It was invented in 1889  in St. Joseph, Missouri. It wasn’t very popular at the beginning.
10. Pancake Tuesday is known as Carnivale in Italy which comes from the Latin for ‘goodbye to the flesh’.

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I decided one weekend to go all out, and cook breakfast. It took two hours. Two hours of my precious weekend time when I can have a lie in and don't have to think about stocks or exchange rates and stress about the red numbers on the computer screen.
...nope, I think I was still doing that. Its's an infection! Like chicken pox!
But it never goes away!!!

Sunday, 31 July 2011

Bento box: Froggy faces

It's Kermit The Frog! Or as my friend said when I asked him what he thought I had made this time, 'oh, that's obvious, it's Kermit The Toad'.

It's like that time when my other friend was reading the paper and asked 'what's a Wayne Rooney?'.

I love my friends :D

Sunday, 24 July 2011

The House That Xinmei built!

Yes I know the photo isn't great, but it sure tasted good!

I made this for my boyfriend's birthday, Notebook style (because if I can't make a house out of wood, I can at least make one out of cake!) - except I'm being Noah here... :) There is a story, but that's for another day... (Hope you had a happy birthday!)

The cake is coffee cake, because it is The Boyf's favourite. The roof is shortbread because I like it (and yes, I just said 'Boyf'... please don't hate me, I don't think I'll ever say that again!). The icing is white chocolate, because it was on offer in Tescos ;)

Sunday, 10 July 2011

Brown Sugar Fresh Fruit Cake


Sorry I've been so rubbish with my blog lately. I thought that after I'd finished my exams, I'd have loads of time to bake and blog and read things and occasionally do Other Meaningful Things.

But I was wrong!

Investment banking internships take up a lot of time :(

Especially when you have to be in work by 6.45am. (And no, we don't get to leave at 5pm). However, I quite like what I'm doing and learning...

I think.
I hope....
I pray.

I mean, I better, since I have 8 more weeks to go. So, sorry for not catching up with reading your blogs out there, but don't sorry I still click through and drool over the photos! :) Oh, and thanks for those recommendations about places to eat on my last post, hopefully one day I'll actually get to try some of those places out!



Sunday, 26 June 2011

Meringue Roulade With Chocolate


I'm worried that since exams I've gotten less... funny :S I mean, not that I'm saying you guys were falling-off-your-seats-lolling about at my blog (yes, lolling, not 'haha'-ing, because if so, you are living in the dark ages), but I'd just run out of sarcasm (mostly pointless, sometimes witty) and jokes (mostly at myself, sometimes at someone else) to keep even myself entertained :O

I blame it on the exams. I blame it on the stress. I blame it on the lack of sugar I've been eating recently.

But it's fine, this meringue if full of it! I'll be back to normal in no time!