Tag: cakes
More from around the Internet
I couldn’t think of anything to write about today, so I’ll let the Internet do my entertaining for me… Here are some of the best things I’ve come across out there in the web recently.
- The artist Dave Devries has taken children’s drawings and turned them into realistic looking works of art. Fantastic!
- The Middlest Sister is my new favourite blog! It’s a web-comic based on the author’s memories of growing up with four sisters and it’s fabulous!
- This BBC comic about a Somali couple raising their family in Norway makes me sad. If Jan and I ever have children, I’m afraid they will end up being completely German and rejecting my culture as something that bears no relation to them. (This isn’t as far-fetched as it might sound. I’ve heard stories of children in Germany who have rejected their English parent’s culture entirely, to the extent of refusing to speak English even at home).
- I loved these innocent things that will make you feel filthy. And I definitely had to look twoce at the one with the pigs…
- Finally, check out these incredibly bizarre and awful cakes. Warning: Some of them are not for the faint-hearted!
It’s linky time again
Because I have no time am too lazy for a proper post today (whaaat? It’s Sunday!) here is another roundup of cool links I’ve come across recently.
- The Worst Things for Sale on the Internet – a daily blog that lists all the really bad things that are available for purchase out there on the web. Like the iPad potty for kids and spam-flavoured macadamia nuts, which sound even more disgusting than Marmite! . Why are these things even things?!
- I was never a fan of Pokémon (I was born too early), but these Pokemon characters as Tim Burton creature drawings are fantastic!
Photo credit: Wikipedia - IKEA or Death? – In this game, you have to guess whether various words are the names of IKEA furniture items of Death metal bands. I got 15 out of 20.
- Halloween is coming, so here are 63 mindblowing Halloween pumpkin carvings for you to admire.
- From pumpkins to cake… these 27 painfully honest cake messages are pretty funny.
- For anyone who is struggling to understand the current German election crisis, Tina at KulturSchock has written a fantastic blog post that explains it all… with dinosaurs!
That’s all from me for today. Have you come across anything entertaining on the Internet recently?
It wasn’t supposed to be an actual mud pie…
Yesterday, I fulfilled my “provide sweet treats for your colleagues after you’ve had a birthday” obligation and made Mississippi Mud Pie.
Crushing 600g of chocolate biscuits took a while!
These marshmallows came with a warning to only eat one of them at a time!
The last time I made this, I was still young enough to require supervision in the kitchen and I’d forgotten how annoying marshmallows are to melt!
Yes of course they stuck to the bottom and started to crystallise because I had the audacity to leave them to their own devices for 30 seconds while I sorted out another ingredient…
My dad’s instructions called for one pint of double cream (this dish is not for people on a diet!). My jug, being German, only does millilitres, so I measured the cream in a pint glass:
Finally I was ready to start mixing all the ingredients together.
Once everything was well combined, I poured it onto the biscuit-crumb base (which had been hardening in the fridge while I made the topping) and the whole thing went back into the fridge while I headed to the train station to buy something to decorate the pie with. I’d forgotten I needed decorations the day before and, being a Sunday, all the supermarkets were closed. At home, we always used Milky Bar Buttons for decoration, but no such thing is available here. Also, being a crappy train station shop, the selection of decorative streets was rather limited, so I ended up going with M&Ms then adding some sugar confetti that I still had in the cupboard. The result wasn’t too bad:
Now all that remained was to let the pie set overnight then bring it into work this morning and hope my colleagues didn’t object to finding the occasional piece of caramelised marshmallow in their pie… oh so I thought. I hadn’t reckoned with the torrential rain when I got off the train this morning… or the little holes where the handles of my cake carrier met the rest of the plastic…
My colleagues were willing to give the cake a try anyway, and pronounced it good… despite the fact that the M&Ms had been completely washed clean of colour! Poor cake, as Jan said when I texted him about it…
Feeling hot, hot, hot
After days and days of weird, wintery, can’t-make-it’s mind up weather, with rain one minute, then five minutes of sunshine followed by wind and rain again five minutes later, the sun decided to come back out in full force today. It has been boiling! Too hot for me – as we all know, I get sunstroke at the drop of a hat. I’m definitely a Spring kind of girl! (I do like snow, but winter gets depressing after a while with all its dark nights). It was hot enough in our office, with the fan going full blast, but once I got outside it was so much worse. I had to go into town anyway though, then I had to slave over a hot stove making tea for myself and the boyfriend. Naturally he is not home yet, and his half is still sitting in the kitchen waiting to be reheated. Luckily that task will fall to him – I don’t fancy spending any more time near sources of heat today!
My charity tea party plans are coming together. I’ve actually managed to find a free date for it now, and a few people have already accepted the invitation so there’s no going back! It shall be on 9 July. Now I just have to complete my list of foods and get on with the baking! I’m going to start by making Yorkshire Parkin a week before – it actually gets better if you leave it in an airtight container for a couple of days so there’s no risk of having ruined cake on the day. Although it will require a lot of willpower to stop myself from eating it all! Perhaps I’d better make extra… By the way, those don’t know what I’m talking about should read this post then go over to The Dormouse’s Last Stand to find out how to host their own charity tea party for a rather excellent cause, namely The Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths.
That’s all for today. I have some work that needs to be done before I go to bed.
Multi-tasking
I’ve managed to get quite a lot done today, most of it at the same time. Write some notes for my dissertation, wash the dishes, a few more notes for my dissertation, spray cleaning stuff on the shower, sweep the bedroom floor, back to the shower to rinse. Who knew I could be so productive?
Last night Jan and I went to see out with some friends to see a… well, not really a band. A choir really, I suppose. An A Capella choir. But instead of choir music they sing pop songs. Covers of pop songs, songs using the tunes of pop songs but with the lyrics changed. They were very good and very, very funny. Unfortunately, most of their stuff is in German, but there were a few English bits too. Anyway, they’re called Füenf and you can find their website here in case you feel like checking them out.
I made cupcakes today as well. I even put little hearts on the top, in honour of Valentine’s Day. Jan and I don’t really do Valentine’s Day. It falls right after our “anniversary” (it still seems weird saying that when we’re not married), which is obviously way more important. And everyone knows Valentine’s Day is just a card manufaturers’ scam anyway. So we didn’t exchange any cards or gifts today. Instead, we took a break from our respective dissertations to eat cupcakes and drink coffee together. It’s always nice to spend time just being together, no matter what the occasion. But coffee and cake… I’m turning into a German! Oh well, happy Valentine’s Day anyway. Cupcake anyone?
Oh weekend, how do I love thee
This has been a long week. OK, officially it’s been the same length as every other week. It seemed much, much longer though. Who invented 5 day working weeks anyway? I would love to track whoever it was down and shoot him! (It has to have been a him, surely no woman would have come up with anything so insane?)
So yesterday was Friday. The end of the week. A night for meeting up with friends, having a few drinks and planning the weekend ahead. At least I seem to remember that’s what Friday evenings were meant to be like. I wouldn’t know. Last night, having tidied the living room (an event that practically deserves a blog post of its very own. Or a fanfare at least) I was in bed by 10:45. Not even in bed reading either – although that was what I had intended to do. I picked up some new books from my local bookcrossing zone last weekend and I was looking forward to getting started on Two Caravans. But I was too exhausted to even write a blog(!!) so it was straight out with the lights. I think I need a holiday. As in some actual time off work, not just a weekend away. Paris was nice but it wasn’t particularly relaxing.
God, it’s 25 past 10. Where does the time go? And I have so much to do this morning. Wash dishes (which have been sitting there since Tuesday!), finally post the present for my friend’s baby who was born 3 weeks ago! Make cakes for Fest at my old student residence this afternoon (will explain that later when I have more time), take out the rubbish which is staring at my accusingly even as I type. Washing – handwashing no less, for I have no washing machine and the boyfriend is in bloody America. Aaargh, so much to do! See, this is why 5 day weeks are a bloody crap idea!
Confuzzledom 