Week Word: Tea

I happen to work just down the road from a place that's very famous for afternoon tea and I think it dominated my tea-related scribbling for this Week Word.

I doubt they serve party rings, Rich Tea biscuits or fondant fancies there, though.


Head over to The Gift Shed to see what other people have done with 'tea' and to see where to go for next week's word.

If I were you...

I'd head over to visit Emma at The Gift Shed. 

Emma's one of those people who seems to manage to squeeze more out of her days than the rest of us, and her blog's making that very apparent at the moment.

First, she's guest hosting this month's Crafty Photo Scavenger Hunt and everyone's welcome to join in.

Second, she's picked this week's Week Word and chosen 'tea'. 

And she's also going to be at The New Vintage in Brixton this weekend which I'm really looking forward to.

Anyone else planning on popping along?

Remember, remember...

Pleased to report that the 17th century supper was a success. It was very definitely historically inspired rather than accurate though, as Tooting Sainsbury's is not well known for stocking usefully obscure products. 


(They do sell jellied eels though. Just FYI.)


All my recipe inspiration ended up coming from the same website, the marvellously named Seat of Mars, except for the dessert which I made up a bit. Links below to the original recipes along with anything I changed.

Spicy Pork Ball Soup

This should have been mutton, but I wanted to do lamb for the next course so went with pork instead. The flavour was amazing... we all thought it reminded us of something but couldn't figure out what. Still haven't.

Oyster Lamb Casserole 

Spinach and Date Fritters

Red Coleslaw

You can get tinned oysters. Did you know? Very useful here. And artichokes in jars, too. The recipe for the spinach fritters misses off the amount of spinach and eggs, but a full bag of spinach and two eggs seemed about right. Oh, and use dried breadcrumbs, not fresh.

The red coleslaw I made up as I thought we needed something a little bit fresher and lighter. I figured 17th century people probably would have had red cabbage, purple carrots and beetroot. If not mayonnaise...

Cider Syllabub

I felt that cider was more authentic than sherry, so went with that. It was supposed to have been served with gingerbread  but that... was not a success. So I grated some ginger Green and Blacks on top instead. Cocoa had just about made it to Europe, right? 

Cider Syllabub

300ml double cream
rind and juice from half a lemon
50g caster sugar
125ml cider
15ml sherry


Mix everything except the cream together in a bowl until the sugar has dissolved. In a separate bowl, whisk the cream until it forms stiff peaks then slowly fold in the liquid. Divide into four bowls and refrigerate until ready (a couple of hours, at least).

I think the most revelatory thing about this meal was that everything tasted amazing! I'm not usually a fan (at all) of fruit in savoury dishes, and would never have dreamed of cooking with oysters, but everything got eaten and enjoyed. It was a really good experience in stepping outside my comfort zone, both in terms of ingredients and style of cooking.

Playing Trivial Pursuit later, however, taught us a different lesson:

No-Bonfire Night

Saturday is bonfire night. I like bonfires and fireworks and the excuse to wear wellies and mittens. Despite the fact that I only ever go to London fireworks these days, and it's generally warm enough to have spent the day wandering about without a coat, I still find it impossible to go to a firework display without putting on wellies, about fifteen layers and, if at all possible, mittens on a string through my coat sleeves. Anyone else do that? A mother's influence lasts a long time...

Anyway, the Powers That Be have decided that due to the Economic Situation the good people of London aren't allowed free firework displays anywhere useful (read: near my house) this year. So we're not going to one. 

(I'm sure there's something insightful to say about the wisdom of upsetting the general populace by not allowing them to celebrate people failing to blow up the establishment, but it's Friday afternoon and I can't quite find it...)

Instead people are coming for supper. And I decided I wanted to cook something suitably themed, so have spent today coming up with a 17th century menu in honour of Guy Fawkes. 

Bangers and mash and a pudding with sparklers in just seemed too obvious.

Come back on Monday to discover whether it was a success! I shall tantalise you with the information that people in the 1600s seemed to really like meat. And prunes. 

When not thinking about meat and prunes (that sounds like an innuendo, it wasn't meant to) I've been working on my keys design:

I'm thinking greys and/or browns for the colours. But that could change.

Have a good weekend, bonfires or not.

New Quilt!

Finally finished prepping all my squares for the new quilt and can start putting it together. It's always a bit disheartening at the beginning, as it feels like there's so far to go. This one's got larger pieces than the last one though, so should come together a little quicker.


Obviously, I forgot what size I was planning on making it in between cutting out the right number of pieces and starting. So I'm fully suspecting I'll end up with one too few or one too many squares. After spending a good hour lying on the floor trying to make the maths work I gave up and started anyway, deciding that if I end up with a gap I'll just add a red piece and it can be charmingly idiosyncratic.

And thankfully I've got the last quilt to sit under whilst I'm sewing this one, for inspiration.

Blitz: London's vintage department store

Popping over to Brick Lane for the Experimental Food Exhibition last weekend also meant we were within hopping distance of somewhere I'd wanted to visit for a little while... London's new vintage department store, Blitz.

It does actually feel like a department shop, as opposed to the jumble sale vibe you get in lots of vintage shops (not that there's anything wrong with that, of course), with home-wares, books, bikes, furniture and all the usual clothes and accessories. It's also got a little cafe which definitely looked more impressive than the usual weak-lemon-squash department store affair.

Books and quilts. Perfect.

Hats! Unidentifiable wooden things!

Lovely bikes, not sure why they were guarded by
slightly unnerving naked armless children...

As you'd expect, it's not cheap. You're paying extra for the pretty styling and the whole experience. But prices weren't as steep as I'd feared and the quality seemed very consistent. Which meant I bought a frock. Justified by the fact that it cost about the same as you could pay for a new dress on the high street, and there was no way anyone else would be wearing it!

Blitz can be found at 55-59 Hanbury Street, E1 5JP and blitzlondon.co.uk

Double-Decker+ Mud Cake

This year*, some mysterious how, all my school friends and I are thirty. 

Thirty. Actual. Years. Old.

Thankfully, this does mean we've had at least twelve years to practise partying (read: drinking) and dancing like loons.

And all these parties justify cake.

So, for one of the parties this weekend I attempted this double-decker mud cake from an Australian Women's Weekly book. (I love these books, and have lots. Why isn't the UK Women's Weekly anywhere near as good at recipes, I wonder?)

As there were going to lots of people celebrating this birthday I decided to double the recipe. The vague aim was therefore to end up with a quadruple-decker mud cake.

My oven disagreed. Despite putting four tins of identical cake mix in the oven, only one of them rose enough to be sliced in half. I have a feeling this might have been due to something of an inaccurate eye when dividing the cake mix into four, and an equally slapdash approach to knowing what size my cake tins are... This theory is backed up by the fact that all the layers were the same consistency and ready at about the same time.

Undaunted, I powered though and the final cake had five layers. It also required a little bit of trimming to get all the layers the same diameter, but I consider this a vital part of baking: you get to test the trimmed bits and check it's not horrible. I've not yet made a horrible cake, but I always think it's wise to check.

Yes, it is a bit wonky. But I decided that added to its charm and, anyway, I was serving it to drunk people. There was no way they'd notice.

Because of its remarkably height, it looked a bit... boring just covered in icing. So I stuck some grated white chocolate to the sides. If you do this you will have to tell every single person you offer it to that it's not coconut. But just consider that a useful icebreaker.

(Also: sticking grated white chocolate to the sides is nowhere near as easy as it sounds, gets a lots of mess in a lot of places, and may result in having to eat the left-over chocolate and icing from a saucer with a spoon to unstress afterwards.)

Due to the aforementioned drunkenness of all parties at the, um, party I didn't manage a decent picture of the inside of the cake. But I'm so proud of my achievement I want it recorded for posterity and am going to post rubbish ones anyway.

(Oh yes, there wasn't a big enough knife so I had to cut it with a butter one. Which was pretty much consumed by the cake.)

This cake was possibly one of the best-received I have ever made. This may be almost entirely due to the quantity of alcohol all the receivers had consumed, but I'm pretty sure all the bits I tested (when sober) were also delicious. Consequently, I think this may be a new favourite recipe; it's clearly impossible to screw up regardless of how slapdash or inaccurate you're feeling.

*Academic year, of course. Hence the thirty-parties only starting now.