I am mad about food so there has been plenty of opportunities to taste some wonderful dishes whilst doing the photographs. The site is set to launch in around a  month’s time and I am really pleased with it at the moment.

Nigel in healthier times

Nigel is really not well, he can’t walk properly.  I think he has got a case of scaly leg mite.  I am hoping that he’ll recover in a week as most do according to the sites I’ve looked at.

I’ve isolated him and he’s had “spot on” which should kill the parasites.  I suspect that previous doses he has had were too small because he is a big rooster.  Or else he picked them back up again, they can be a recurring problem I am led to believe.  I have cleaned his legs and rubbed in vaseline, which is supposed to suffocate the beasties.

I am regularly syringing water into his beak to keep his fluids up.  I really hope he recovers, because nursing him like this is only making me care about him all the more.  He’s had the last of the sweetcorn from the garden, which has perked him up a bit I think.  He’ll be on the birds-eye tomorrow, because it’s all gone now.

So fingers crossed for Nigel, the ladies are missing him.

I am excited about the O’Brien’s site, our photoshoot on Monday went well and the sun actually came out for us whilst we were at the farm. There is a real challenge to make this site different from the McCarthy site although the products are fairly similar. I was thrilled with the McCarthy site and I have some different ideas for O’Briens so it will be interesting to see how it will develop.

So I thought I’d try making Courgette Cake.  Do you know it is really nice, just like a carrot cake recipe with a sunflower oil base.  I did the icing with Mascarpone Cheese.  Looked so good my toddler thought it was a birthday cake so we had to put on a candle and sing happy birthday to one of her dollies.  I’m not going to put the recipe up because it is from the Nigella Lawson “How to be a domestic goddess” cookbook.

As a postscript – she wouldn’t eat the cake – just licked off the icing!

Wholemeal Scones

150g Self Raising Flour

100g Wholemeal Flour

25g Soft Brown Sugar

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

25g Butter

1 large egg

4tsp milk

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees. Rub the dry ingredients with the butter to make breadcrumbs.  Beat the egg and the milk and mix to a dough – it is good not to put all the milk in in one go as some flours have different absorbency.

roll to about 2 cm in depth and cut out with a fluted cutter – this recipe will make 8 to 10 scones depending on the size of cutter you use.

Place on a greased tray and bake for 15 to 20 minutes – again it depends on how big your cutter is.

Some hours later and after a computer crash, some gardening, toddler tea-time, bathtime and bedtime, I am fairly happy with the new look.  Now I need to sort out the content!

McCarthys of Kanturk

The new sales site I designed for Jack and Tim is now launched. I am thrilled with its appearance, content and functionality. Now I hope that the orders flock in. I am busy helping them to market the site now to drive business.

The press release went out and Tim got a slot on local radio, we are waiting to see how effective it was with the press.

Today was the third session and they seem to be getting increasingly hard.  I think the she has learned that she will get mummy back by crying and so thats what she does.

So then you feel that you are encouraging her by returning.  They even suggested she was unready, that she was the first inconsolable child they had had.  Surely not.  So then the “I’m a terrible mother with a spoiled child” feelings surface and you think it might just be easier not to bother.

I think she’s clever and she’s playing us all, but I never did like the let them cry it out approach to parenting that so many people have.  I’ll try again next week though and hopefully it will get easier.

rosemary isabrown chicken

It was just another Monday afternoon, the sun was shining and the chickens were pecking around just outside the coop, happily scratching for worms and eating some grass and dandylion leaves.  Suddenly, there was a tremendous clucking, Nigel with panic in his voice.  What could have spooked them?

I ran to the door, slipping on my trainers and counted the chickens.  Two hens, one rooster – where were the other three?  In an instant I was at the end of the drive checking the lane.  Delia was sprinting, as fast as I’ve ever seen a chicken run, away from our house and then I saw her dart into the hedge.

Hastily I got the girls to put on their shoes and come with me to save Delia.  With no regard for our own safety, well there was nothing on the lane to regard, save a few large piles of horse manure, we made our way to where I had seen Delia vanish.

We searched and called her to no avail.  Yet when we turned to look back she had emerged, encouraged by our calls.  She returned to the coop with us.  There were still two birds missing.

Pru quickly became apparent.  She had flapped into the cottage garden and was with our dog.  She was easily rescued and reunited with the flock.  It was the first time any of the chickens had entered the cottage garden.

Rosemary is still missing.  I imagine that Delia had run off after whatever creature had taken her.  Delia is always the first to charge at any foe, dog, cat or, I guess, a fox.

So Rosemary, the first chicken we got, having survived a December attack by a neighbour’s Jack Russell now appears to have been prey to a fox. With sadness I share this dramatic tale…

Monkey Birthday Cake

Monkey Cake

This is the cake that I made for my toddler’s birthday.  I was really pleased with it so I thought I would share how it was done.

I made two normal sponges using Nigella’s buttermilk birthday cake recipe.

One I used just as it was for the shape of the monkey’s face.

With the other I used a cookie cutter to cut out two round ears.  Then I cut a banana shape out of the remaining piece and fed the rest to the chickens as a special treat!

To decorate the cake I used butter icing with a little bit of milk in to give it an easier texture to work with.  I put a little coco in and did the face shape and then added more to do his forehead ears and any other visible cake.

The eyes are minstrels and his nose and mouth are strawberry laces.  His ears are circles of ricepaper.

The banana is decorated with butter icing coloured with a small amount of turmeric and the green lines are lime flavoured laces.

It was a real winner and it tasted nice too.  My toddler was thrilled with it.