Yesterday evening, I managed to sit down and take a look through my blog posts to see what I’ve missed. From my list of ideas which I wanted to write about this week I feel that I am playing catchup now. All this has been due to the updating of my blog and website. I didn’t think I would have to spend so much time changing things and I still haven’t finished yet but it is getting there. 🙂 Looks like it is going to be another long day – not helped by the poorly children I have at home with me today. There is something to be said for working from home and being able to look after sick children at the same time. No stress of asking for time off from work to look after them. Thankfully they have both had some Calpol and are settled on the couch watching a film. I am sure they will be back to school tomorrow.
In the mean time, I am not going to bake anything today and just concentrate on the writing side instead before catching up on cuddle time with the children. After bedtime, I will get back to reorganising my blog and add some more back links into it. Looks like a day of playing catchup for me. These back links really help with the google searches which are being made. On my analytics page the Google and Bing organic searches are starting to out perform the direct and social searches. I might be totally wrong on this but that is what I think is happening and what is causing it.
Enough about analytics, back to what I feel I have achieved this last week. I sort of missed out “International Hummus Day” which was on the 13th May. I love hummus too – it is one of my favourite foods. I recently made my own homemade hummus as a recipe for my new book. I wanted to add hummus to my picnic ideas as it is lovely with crackers and crudites. My hummus recipe did not include [amazon_textlink asin=’B002E2N8CE’ text=’tahini’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’wwwlovetobake-21′ marketplace=’UK’ link_id=’013cb298-3aeb-11e7-8629-135264ad5f27′], the day I made it but it was delicious and is something which I make a lot now as my eldest daughter loves it for her packed lunch. Hummus is one of those foods which can be made into so many different flavours from sun-dried tomato to roasted red pepper. I will be adding some other ideas about hummus at a later date as it is something to eat alot of in the summer. Looks like I will be playing catchup on this too.
I did manage to write about “Eat What You Want Day” and my recipe for Protein Bars which went down a storm in my house – well with my husband and myself. These were so easy to make and have endless possibilities for other flavours to try. This is something I will be working on too at a later date.
Also this last week, I made a variation on a Key Lime Pie. Initially I was going to make a Lemon Meringue Pie but I changed my mind at the weekend and went with messing about with a Key Lime Pie recipe. I used to make these pies for the market stall but found they were a seasonal item which only sold in the early summer. Instead of using limes in the recipe at the weekend I used lemons as I had some to use up. Also there were a packet of biscuits which the children had not broken into and they had been there a while so I decide to make them into the base of the pie. I melted some soft spread in a pan and added the crushed biscuits to them to make the base which was pressed down into a loose bottomed round tin. For the filling, I mixed the condensed milk with egg yolks and lemon juice and zest. This was poured on top of the biscuit base. I saved the egg whites to make into meringue to cover the top of the filling before baking it on a low heat for at least 40 minutes.
This Key Lemon Pie was delicious but the next day it was even better as the lemon flavour had intensified. I will share this recipe later but with a minor tweek as I feel the meringue could have risen more if I had used more egg whites, only two were used in this recipe which does not seem enough to me for the size of tin I used. Also I want a photo of the pie before it is cut into but I wasn’t quick enough this time and my husband had cut it before I got a chance. I will be working on alternative ideas of this pie as I have already thought of making this with mandarin segments layered underneath the filling which I then will swirl melted [amazon_textlink asin=’B009ZY9I0K’ text=’chocolate orange’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’wwwlovetobake-21′ marketplace=’UK’ link_id=’383bd472-3aeb-11e7-8896-c1d84cd18908′] into before covering with the meringue. I feel the meringue is there to stop the filling from burning?? but I am going to try making this pie without the meringue just to see what happens – mainly because I want to use fresh cream on the top instead. My husband did pay me a compliment about the meringue.He said “that it was better than some we had eaten when we had been out together not so long ago”. This recipe has given me so many other ideas to try to make it into something all my family will eat because not all of the children would try it – “don’t like lemon”, “don’t like meringue” were just two of the reasons why they wouldn’t try it. Can’t please them all of the time.
Finally, this week is “British Sandwich Week” of which my favourite flavours are cheddar cheese with salad, tomatoes and pickle or avocado, salad, cherry tomatoes, parmasan slithers and black pepper. Now I am hungry and it isn’t even lunch time yet. 🙁
Back to the writing now though before I stop for a sandwich. I might still be playing catchup at midnight tonight.