Cal and Cake!

Finally I am catching up with my Mini Rings of Change Cal that Kate is hosting.  Above is last week’s rounds 15 – 19.

This week’s rounds were very simple and enabled me to catch up quickly.  However it is starting to get quite sizeable and heavy to handle.  I can now see it as a rug for my bathroom.  I am very pleased with it.  It is really interesting to see how colour affects how the design looks.  Even though we are all using the same pattern they all look so different because if our colour choices.  Head over to Kate and see!

It was a national holiday yesterday – Waitangi Day.  I was going to the park to watch the celebrations but I wimped out as it was stormy strong gale force winds, eek! I felt bad for the people that organized things, especially as by middle afternoon the weather had cleared and blue skies prevailed.

So, instead I spent time in the kitchen and prepared vegetables for pickles and did a big batch of freezing beans and tomatoes.  To celebrate my housewifely skills I treated myself to some baking, one of my favourites  -  Muesli Slice.

It is an old Edmonds cookbook recipe (for those outside NZ the book is a national treasure and I wouldn't be surprised if every home had one!)  Originally published by Edmonds in 1907 to promote their Baking products.  For many years I think till the 1960s every newly married couple was given a copy by the company.  It is being constantly revised and recipes change as trends in food change.  My first one I got from my grandmother when I married is very fragile and falling to pieces, but I keep it as there are some old favourites that are not in my current copy err pub in 1994! I will need a new one again soon as pages are starting to come out and are rather brown! I wonder what recipes are in the current edition.

There that is my input for celebrating NZ!

Anyways I spent the afternoon doing my patchwork, sipping tea from my favourite china, really girly pink afternoon and all!  The patchwork is nearly finished and I have decided on the crochet panel but will tell all next time.

The Muesli Slice was yummy, I changed the recipe a bit,  its meant to have chocolate icing but I don’t like icing (yeah really).  But I needed my chocolate fix so I added chocolate buttons to the mix, divine!  Here’s the recipe if you are interested.

Muesli Slice

50g butter

½ cup brown sugar

2 eggs

¾ cup s/r flour or use plain and add Baking Powder 1tsp

1 cup muesli

2 tsp grated lemon rind

½ cup chopped mixed peel (I don’t add this as my muesli has flavours that would clash!)

¼ to ½ cup of chocolate buttons or chips.

(I make up my own muesli by adding dried fruit, such as figs, currants, raisins, apricots, cranberries, nuts such as almonds walnuts and coconut flakes to rolled oats)

Cream butter and sugar, Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each one.  Sift flour and add BP if using.  Fold in the rest of ingredients to mix.  Spread into tin and bake at 180 C for 25 minutes or till golden.  Add icing if you want.

Enjoy!

Thanks for visiting and I will see you next time.