This And That ................

Well, in response to my previous post today, my sister has emailed me to explain how I should link up with other blogs -  I think I've got it now!

On the annoying front, the battery in my camera went flat last night whilst trying to photograph some fairy cakes that my younger daughter had made and decorated for a table party at school lunchtime today - 36 fairy cakes, one each for the whole class plus some extra invitees!  Because of the nature of the decoration we had to use three containers this morning to transport them to school, I do have some large flat boxes that are perfect for this number of fairy cakes, but she was insistent that it would not fit in her locker!  Hence the three smaller containers.

We used some orange candy melts for the decoration of several of the cakes which gave me the opportunity to use my new gadget - the chocolatiere from Cadburys.  Hmm, not sure if I like it really.  It did the job, easier than messing about with a saucepan of water and a bowl balanced on top, but, it doesn't hold very much, so we had to melt twice. Think I should have bought a proper pan to sit atop the saucepan of water.  The handle on the little pan bends back and forth - not sure that it is supposed to do this, I think it's just that the metal is so soft it bends - hope this doesn't mean that the handle will eventually drop off!  I'll just have to wait and see.

So, I have no photographs to share, although the batteries are charging as I write but will still need a few more hours.  My daughter took some photographs with her camera but that has gone to school with her so no luck there.

I have plans for so much today.  I have some clementines cooling after having simmered for two hours - these are for a clementine cake a Nigella recipe from How to Eat, I love this cake and haven't had it for a long time - the clementines remind me of pumpkins, well at least mini pumpkins and of course are in season, so its win win all round.

Being Samhain - the medieval festival which marked the end of the harvest - the end of the "lighter half" of the year and beginning of the "darker half" of the year, which coincides with All Saints Day tomorrow and All Souls Day on Wednesday I thought I would bake some biscuits for both days.  Apparently in medieval times there was an element of a Festival of the Dead attached to their festivities and the bones of slaughtered livestock would be thrown into the flames of bonfires.  I have found two recipes - one for All Souls' biscuits which are brittle and dry like old bones (which ties in nicely with the animal bones being thrown into the bonfire) - these are eaten all over Italy on 2nd November - their Italian name ossa dei morti means bones of the dead!  Lovely.  The biscuits for All Saints' Day tomorrow  are sweet pastry beans - again an Italian recipe that are traditionally made for All Saints' Day - I'll show you when they are made and hopefully my camera is re-charged.  Both recipes are from Ursula Ferrigno's La Dolce Vita - I love this book and find it so inspiring, don't know what I would do without it.