Cooking 9/10ths of the time

This is one of the saddest posts I've ever had to write. Donna Hay failed me, not just once - but twice. Now I can't entirely blame her for the general lack of tarragon in Melbourne - but I think that I can definitely feel annoyed that she told me to fry feta and it melted (duh) and so it was melty and not friedy. Luckily for her, the dish that feta went on still tasted great! This is tarragon, don't try looking for it anywhere in Melbourne, Australia. There is no point.  My plan was to blog about the cake that I was making for my dinner party. I was having some dear friends over for wassail and merrymaking. Actual Wassail, not just another way of saying merrymaking. Google it, it's a drink and it's very good. So I decided, in what seems like a foolhardy manner now, to make three new things for the dinner. A beetroot starter, Wassail and this Chocolate mousse meringue cake. I started out taking a few photo's but quickly stopped because I was getting depre...

This post will talk a lot about poo, brace yourselves. I had one of those child/poo experiences that made me both glad and sorry Gabe isn't still in nappies. We were visited by the Gastro fairy, a total bitch who give you the shits, makes you tired and then leaves you with a five day malaise to sort out. If that sounds like some one you know, then your friends suck. When you've spent a weekend wiping your son's backside repeatedly you start to smell poo everywhere. You catch a whiff and think "it's on me, somewhere". Or it's just that your nose is so accustomed to the smell. You can't tell, you are poo de-sensitised. Gabe was home on Tuesday as the last of the poo ravages left us and so we decided to bake. Because that's fun and we can do it indoors and the weather was pretty damn bad. Thus the treacle cakes, Gabe wanted cupcakes of course with pink icing. I compromised by putting these little loaves into cupcake tins. So they are meant to be...