Orange and Chocolate Chip Muffins Recipe

Oh dear......it's been a while.  But to get back into the swing of things, I have made some Orange and Chocolate Chip Muffins.

I made 3 different sizes, so the baby could have his own mini portion, but as you will see from the pictures below he went for the biggest one!

This is from an Annabel Karmel recipe book and is really easy to make:

4oz Self raising flour
2 tbsp Cocoa powder
4oz Margarine
4oz Caster Sugar
2 eggs
Grated zest of 1 small orange
2oz Plain chocolate chips

1.Preheat oven to 180 degrees C or Gas Mark 4
2.Cream the margarine and sugar together.
3.Add the eggs to the creamed mixture, a little at a time, together with a tablespoon of flour.
4.Sift the flour and cocoa.
5.Mix in the flour and cocoa until blended.
6.Stir in the orange zest and chocolate chips
7.Line muffin tray with paper cases, fill each case until 2/3 full.
8.Cook for 10-12 mins

Chick Chick Chicken - My Pinterest Board Chosen on Folksy Homepage

 Really pleased my Pinterest board was chosen for the homepage of Folksy!

Chick Chick Chicken!

Quick and Easy Flapjacks

When looking for a sweet treat - fast. I always make these flapjacks.  With only 4 ingredients, melting the ingredients in a pan and bake for 20 mins.  Simple!

2oz Butter

2oz Sugar

1oz Golden Syrup

4oz Rolled Oat

Pinch of Salt

1. Preheat oven to 190 degrees C

2. Grease 7 inch tin

3. Melt Butter, Sugar and Syrup in a pan

4. Take of heat and stir in oats with a pinch of salt.

5. Press into tin

6. Bake for approx 20 mins

7. Mark into squares while hot, take out of tin when cold.

Olympic inspired Knitted Union Jack Purse

This post came about for a number of reasons:

1.  I like a challenge and wanted to try and knit a union jack

2. Making a purse has been on my to do list for a while

3. And with the Olympic torch visiting our town this week I am feeling quite patriotic!

The challenge started by trying to draw up my own pattern to knit a union jack.  It took two attempts as the first flag was too small for my existing zip.

I then made up the purse using some white cotton fabric and sewed on the knitted union jack.

The result is a rather wobbly union jack but somewhere to keep my gold, silver and bronze!

Strawberry Strawberry Cupcakes baked in a teacup

Our veg patch isn't doing very well this year but our strawberries have flourished.  I love strawberries and they just look gorgeous at the moment.

I have been itching to try and bake a cake in a teacup and found this recipe from my Muffins and Bakes cook book for warm strawberry cupcakes baked in a teacup.

Recipe:

8 tbsp butter

4tbsp strawberry jam

4oz caster sugar

2 eggs

1tsp vanilla essence

4oz self raising flour

1lb strawberries

icing sugar , for dusting

1. Grease 6 heavy, round teacups with butter. Spoon 2 teaspoons of jam into the bottom of each cup

2. Cream butter and sugar

3. Gradually add the beaten egg and vanilla essence

4. Sift in the flour mixing well.

5. Spoon into cups.

6. Stand cups in a roasting tin, then pour enough hot water to come up 1/3 of the way up the sides of the cup.

7.Bake for 40 mins at 180 degrees C until well risen and when a skewer is inserted it comes out clean.

8.Leave to cool for 2-3 mins.

9.Place a few whole strawberries on each cake, dust with icing sugar

10. Serve warm with remaining strawberries

11. Enjoy!

Blue Fish Birthday Cake

It's been pretty busy here at Creative Heights the last couple of weeks, as it's birthday season in our family and we had one very special birthday on Saturday - Baby's 1st birthday (I can't believe it's 1 year already!) Despite the rain we had a BBQ with about 25 adults and 8 babies and apart from the massive downpour - which thankfully only lasted about 10mins and with everyone huddled under the gazebo, it was a lovely afternoon and everyone enjoyed themselves.
I made the birthday cake a Blue Fish Cake decorated with Smarties and with all the excitement I only have one photo.

And the Oolooloo Banana Cake made an appearance again.

A few more cake posts to follow - but hopefully I'll have some time to start crafting again soon!

And again - on the front page of folksy

Thanks to OddSox for pinning my Knitted Felt Sheep Bowl, now on the front page of Folksy

Thank you.