P is for Perfect

One of the nicest things I’ve ever heard Girl Lacer say was to her brother. One day she just touched him on the shoulder and said, so tenderly “You’re perfect.”, made my heart melt that did.

Whats on my Cookbook Stand? (Part 03) – Chocolate Truffles from Cook Yourself Thin

I had high hopes for this one (recipe here). They looked delicious when they were demonstrated on TV in the programme of the same name and they’re ‘skinny’ to, excellent. I’ve just tried to make them and it did not go well. It all went apparently well until the point where I had to put the truffle mixture in the fridge to cool for 1/2 hour, 1/2 hour came and went and the mixture was not the ‘almost solid’ the book promised, so I left it in there for a further 20 minutes and although a bit more solid when I checked again, when I tried to roll the truffles it was nigh on impossible, as the mixture was just too floppy and wouldn’t remotely hold its shape. I’m going to leave the mixture in the fridge overnight, you never know, it might be ok tomorrow. I’m wondering if it’s because I brought the wrong chocolate, one of the hazards of getting your food online, you can’t read the labels properly. I brought Menier Chocolate which when I checked the label after I unpacked it said that it was patiserrie chocolate for ‘cakes and fine desserts’, I’m wondering whether that would of made the chocolate too runny? I’d be very interested to know if anyone else has tried this recipe and had more success than I had. Feel like I would have made better use of the chocolate if I’d used it in that chocolate cake they made last Tuesday.

Whats on my Cookbook Stand? (Part 02)

French beans with sesame and ginger from the Cook Yourself Thin cook book

Last nights Cook Yourself Thin demonstrated this dish (for the recipe click here), encouraging the viewers that if they eat more veg they’ll drop that dress size and the best way to do it was to cook flavoursome dishes like this one. I’m, like I suspect a lot of people, not that keen on veg, I like salad and certain meditarrean vegetables and that’s about it, so I was very pleased when I tried out this dish, that considering I don’t really like french beans, this dish was really delicious! The method for cooking the french beans leaves them still really fresh and crunchy and the combination of the soy sauce, sesame and ginger, flavours them really nicely, so as a whole you just get really just the pleasant taste of the sesame rather than anything else and sesame seeds are good for you to! It’s easy to cook to, specially as I cheated a bit and used pickled, ready prepared ginger.

I cooked this for my kids, also confirmed veg haters and unfortunately they took one look at it (without even trying it) and proclaimed they didn’t like it, however I’m not giving up and will definitely be cooking this dish again and again.

Marathon Mummying

Flops into an exhausted pile besides the laptop as the kids create hell in the other room.

Having one of those days, where it seems like this morning was mmm about a year ago and yet bedtime still seems a dim and distant prospect. All triggered really by Mr. Lacer working away at the moment, with the knowledge that the cavalry won’t be arriving just before bedtime this evening, it makes the day seem even longer. So today it feels like I’ve run a marathon and it’s only 4pm, so still got tea and bedtime to go.

Today started at 6am on the dot with Girl Lacer yelling at the top of her voice “I NEED THE TOIIIIILET”, which of course woke up Boy Lacer (as they share a room), this led to a grumpy Boy Lacer. Today’s outing (we always have to do somethingeven if it’s just a trip out to buy bread otherwise we’d all go stir crazy, well me and Girl Lacer would, don’t think Boy Lacer particularly cares either way), anyway today’s outing was the dentist, something that has been put off since mmm February, yes bad mummy, it hasn’t helped that Mr.Lacer has been working away alot and well I need someone to leave the kids with if I have any work done and if it’s not Mr.Lacer it’s no one, well that was my excuse for not going to the dentist anyway. Turns out that by the time I got round to booking a dentist appointment, Mr.Lacer ended up working away again anyway. So anyway, today was just a check up, although I knew I needed work done, luckily the kids teeth are both fine, well as far as the dentist could tell with Boy Lacer as he wouldn’t let him near him, although the dentist did say that he thought Boy Lacer might have an overbite, if it’s not one thing it’s another with Boy Lacer. Then it was my turn and I was right about the work. Whilst waiting earlier in the waiting room I was eyeing up the price list with some trepidation, I joined the practice (which is private) whilst pregnant with Boy Lacer, so of course I had over a year of free treatment, but now I had to pay, shudder, almost makes it worth while getting pregnant again! So I was checking out the price list and when I saw the price of crowns I thought “Good god if they say I need one of those I’ll have to change practices again and go back to NHS”, luckily didn’t need those, the quote I got for the work I need seems reasonable in comparison, although still bliming pricey. Not going back to the NHS though, not if I can help it, when we moved here we joined a NHS dentist, which was not exactly local due to there being no local NHS dentists and this dentist was absolutely horrible, doing work that I’m sure was shoddy and the worst thing was whilst pregnant with Boy Lacer she performed a mercury filling on me without informing me that mercury fillings are not recommended on pregnant women! I found out mid course in the series of treatment (which for all I knew I didn’t need anyway), so when I turned up for the next appointment, I gave her full blast of my pregnancy hormone induced quite rightous rath and stormed out. Poor Mr.Lacer who was booked in for the next appointment after me was so embarrassed. I’ve looked on the internet and I know the effects mercury is supposed to (well some people believe anyway) on an unborn baby, so with Boy Lacer now having developmental delay issues, well you can guess what I think. So we found a new dentist, a lovely Kiwi women in a very local private practice, but still it’s a ‘luxury’ that economically we could do without. Mr.Lacer went and found another NHS dentist (he could hardly go back to the original) but even then his new one sounds dodgy. So anyway that was my morning. I don’t have to go back for the fillings until beginning of October, as the dentist quite rightly didn’t want to do them with two small children in the room and I haven’t got anyone I can leave them with until then.

After the dentist and a quick trip to the supermarket, we got home, had lunch, put Boy Lacer down for a nap and then the door bell rings, a new storage unit I’ve been waiting for had arrived. We’ve had for a long time major toy storage issues or as my dad would say “The kids have too many toys”, which I vehemently deny actually, we just live in a small flat, so it looks worse, I’ve been places where the kids have had far more toys. But anyway we ordered more toy storage, so I’ve spent this afternoon assembling it and putting toys away in it and yes at the moment, the living room looks a lot tidier, how long that will last I don’t know, I am well aware the birthday / Christmas season is coming up.

Note the two empty boxes that I’ve got left over, planning on putting books from the kids book drift in those. The storage unit is from Great Little Trading Company

And now Boy Lacer is awake and he and Girl Lacer are waging minor warfare, although strictly speaking it’s Girl Lacer on a major offence here, so I’m sick of acting as the international peace keeping force. Still only 2 1/2 hours till bedtime now, my plans for tonight are a mammoth pile of pancetta pasta (well I have been running a marathon after all) and if I have the energy and the time before Heroes starts, I plan on making those chocolate truffles from ‘Cook Yourself Thin’, I’ve been craving them all day, so darn having to actually make them first! I’ve been a good girl and not actually eaten or even touched the two bars of chocolate in the fridge brought specifically for the purpose. I’ll let you know how it goes if I do make them tonight.

PS I know from my blog stats that a lot of you have been looking for the Jamie Oliver ‘scourgette carbonara recipe, wasn’t that dish absolutely gorgeous last night on TV? Also been getting lots of people googling Cook Yourself Thin, I watched that too last night and didn’t that chocolate cake look to die for?

PPS Totally random bit – got this in some junk e-mail from Cath Kidston today

its a sewing kit, as in something you keep your sewing stuff in, not something that you actually make. You lift the lid off apparently to reveal the contents inside. Isn’t it so gorgeous! Now my sewing just about constitutes sewing the kids names on their coats but still it’s something to aspire to (specially at it’s £40 price tag).

O is for Orange juice

I love how Orange Juice tastes like sunshine.