miahenryandrosa

Happy Mothers Day

 

My wonderful Grandma who raised 10 (ten!!!!!) children. 

My beautiful mum.

My first Mothers Day with Mia sixteen years ago. Wow.

friday music video

 

My Birthday

Painting from Rick, Autumn in New York, Matte Stephens.

Flowers,

Cards,

Picnic, 

 

Thank you.

friday music video

 

Recently

Judy with a Parrot on Her Shoulder. (Belle and Sebastian)

Where Should I Put These Fish ?

Also:

• I had no idea there were so many paperdolls out there, check out Paper Dollywood and Parerdoll Review.

friday

 

I Draw and Cook

I came across this very cool website a while back where you can illustrate your favourite recipes., theydrawandcook. 

I submitted a recipe today. This is a wonderful cake, very moist, not too sweet (I use 1/2 cup sugar not one full cup - a matter of taste). I have made this recipe with limes when I had no lemons and I prefer lemon. I was wondering about orange though, I love all things orange flavour. Then I thought what ever happened to orange and poppy seed cake, back in the 90's every cafe about town sold it, I haven't seen it around lately. It was quite a favourite back then, so I may have to make one very soon. Click on the image below to make it larger so you can read it, and make it!

 

Also check out the adorable (really!) kidsdrawandcook to see more gorgeous work like this,

the drawing alone is amazing, but check out the ingredients! YUM!

In other news,

• Very excited about Okkervil Rivers new album coming out in May, get a taste here.
• Wondering if I dare to make this.
• I am horribly hooked on the BBC mini series, Lark Rise to Candleford (although I see by the reviews on Amazon, I'm not alone!)

Cold Pack Covers from an Old Towel

For years I have been wrapping those cold pack things that go in the children's lunch boxes in tea towels to prevent condensation ruining their lunches. I've looked around briefly for a cheap alternative to purchase but to no avail, maybe I'm missing something, if anyone knows of anything I'd love to hear from you. Anyway I have been able to sew some very simple little covers myself and they are working very well, so here is a little how to for Cold Pack Covers from an Old Towel.

Get an old towel.

Put your cold pack on it to see how big you need to cut the rectangle that will make the cover. (Mine was 15 x 5 inches. That cold pack is the standard size (150ml) you buy at the supermarket for lunch boxes.

See I cut the rectangle out! I kept the bound edge of the towel as this will save me finishing that edge.

Now you overlock or zigzag the short unbound edge of your rectangle.

Fold the rectangle as shown above.

Overlock or just sew the sides. Remember there is three layers of towel to get through at one end and your overlocker may be a bit offended by this so maybe switch to the sewing machine (I didn't but I'm pretty sure my overlocker wished I had).

Turn out. See!

So cute!

Naan Bread

I absolutely love naan bead. I thought it would be time consuming and difficult to make in any authentic way, however I have found a recipe that is wonderfully simple and the results are spot on.

 

1 1/2 cups warm water

1 tablespoon sugar

2 teaspoons active dry yeast

1 teaspoon salt

3 cups flour, plus a few tbsp for workspace

1 Combine warm water, sugar, and yeast in a bowl. Let stand for 5 minutes until foamy

2 Add salt and flour. Mix thoroughly. Knead dough on a floured workspace about 20 times and form into a tight ball. Put dough in a well oiled bowl and cover with a damp towel.

3 Put in a warm place to rise for 30-45 minutes. Dough won't rise much, but it doesn't need to.

4 Turn dough out onto a floured workspace. Divide dough into 8 pieces and roll out with a rolling pin to about 1/8" thick.

5 Grill naan pieces on a grill or electric griddle. In a pinch, a frying pan sprayed with some nonstick cooking spray will work. Grill for 1-2 minutes on each side.

I used the food processor from start to finish for mixing the dough.

This is what I did: Put the warm water, yeast and sugar into the processor, short pulse to mix, wait until foamy, add the flour and salt, mix until smooth and elastic. 

A few notes:

• I needed to add around a half cup of flour as my dough was a little too wet
• If you use a food processor don't overmix as the dough can overheat causing the yeast to die off. This is easy to avoid though, you can do a few shorter sessions of mixing with a cool off period between each mix. My food processor was able to mix the dough to the correct stage without overheating, but it may depend on the processor. Of course you could kneed by hand.
• I used a dough blade which is slightly shorter than the regular blade.
• I left my dough to rise for quite a few hours (only because I had other things I had to do) so my dough had risen considerably, more than double , when it came to rolling it.
• As the naan came off the griddle I brushed them with a little melted garlic butter. 
• I put the leftover cooked naan bread in the freezer to be reheated in the oven. 

Some other ideas, season the dough with cumin or nigella seeds, top with sesame seeds, or herb butter (cilantro). You could use naan bread to make wraps, filled with leftovers maybe for lunch or a gorgeous salad and some garlicky yoghurt dressing!

Other healthy Indian recipes can be found here.