Something for everyone.

I do enjoy a good school fair, and this year was no exception: welly throwing, plant sale, tombola, beat the goalie . . . all the classics.  And once faces had been painted, and castle bounced on, we headed over to the cafe for some home-baked goods.

The following is my go-to any time the kids come home with the letter asking for cake: it's easy, you've probably got most of the ingredients already and, best of all, they can be assembled in 5 minutes or so.  I give you

Mini Choc Choc Muffins (makes 24)

Preheat oven to 200C / 400F / GM6
Grease the muffin tins

5oz (150g) plain flour
2 level tablespoons cocoa powder
1 level tablespoon baking powder
0.25 teaspoon salt
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1.5oz (40g) caster sugar
4fl oz (120ml) milk
2oz (50g) plain choc drops
2oz (50g) butter, melted and slightly cooled

Topping
2.75oz (65g) plain choc drops
glace cherries / skittles / smarties or whatever


-Sift the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt into a large bowl
-In a separate bowl mix the egg, sugar, milk and butter
-Sift the mixed dry ingredients into the wet
-Fold the dry into the wet ingredients for 10 seconds or so.  It'll look a bit lumpy, this is ok
-Fold in the 50g of choc drops - again, don't overwork
-Spoon the mix into the muffin tins (approx 1 heaped teaspoon per cup)
-Bake for 10 minutes until well risen
-Leave in the tin to cool a little then transfer to a cooling rack
-While cooling, melt the 65g choc drops and when the muffins are cool enough to handle spoon a little chocolate onto each.  Add topping of choice

Over the years I've discovered that while adults go for the cherries, the primary school market prefer skittles / smarties.  Also, don't forget to add the choc drops to the cake mix - they don't taste so good without!

The final stage is to sample, with a nice cup of tea.

When is too much?

While building up the wool collection I found myself rummaging through a lot of 'craft' baskets (generally in the darkest corner of the shop, next to the golfing kit etc, etc) and found myself buying in a couple of other categories:

Needless to say this is just a small sample of what is, quite frankly, an absolutely ridiculous number of threads - but who can resist the jewel colours and fantastic names?

The other category, available in abundance (down on the floor, behind the back-issues of 'Busy Needles') is that of knitting pattern.  Mmmm.

Work those cheek-bones, ladies!

So that's the sound of one hand clapping.

Day 2

I love a nice bit of wool, and when I noticed tapestry wool in our local charity shop I knew I had to find something to make with it.  Lots of lovely colours, moth-proof, colour-fast but not massively long . . . stripey scarves were the way to go!  I knitted seven scarves of different widths, changing the colour whenever I got bored and this is what I ended up with:

But then, of course, I couldn't stop buying tapestry wool.  And once both children had a blanket (and I was so over scarves) I needed to find a new project to justify the hoard collection:

A basic granny square was all it took (probably cost more to buy the cream wool for the background than the rest of the wool in the blanket) and suddenly there's space in the cupboard for more crazy.

Because now, of course, I still have some wool but not enough to make something with and it seems to be tapestry season again with lots of great colours . . .