inner pickle

delicious carrot cake recipe!

Hello!

Nope, still no baby... My problem is I have thought since last Sunday that the event was imminent; but apparently not. 

Ah well. 

What do I do when I'm at a loose end? First: read. (At night after the kids are in bed, obviously.) Which is why my knitting and sewing projects are sitting unfinished and ignored at the end of my desk right now. 

Tilly and I went to the library today. We love the library. She borrowed two books and I borrowed one: 'Crime and Punishment', Dostoevsky. Oh yes. Not because I'm highbrow and gagging for some heavy Russian narrative. 

I am suffering serious insomnia. 

I thought this might be a plan. And then talking on the phone to my Mum tonight, it turns out when she was pregnant with us, and waiting waiting waiting in hospital, she read 'The Brothers Karamazov', also Dostoevsky, and promptly fell asleep after one page every night. How funny is THAT?! 

So I think this is a good plan. Well tested.

Second loose-end occupier?

I make stuff up in the kitchen. Like carrot cake!

This one was inspired by a dreadful one I made a fortnight ago. So dreadful I actually threw it away. I'm not actually going to tell you which book it came out of because everything else out of that book is good, and maybe I was just having a bad recipe-following day. 

But that being the first carrot cake I'd ever made, I knew what tasted good (and what didn't - I've eaten a lot of it, just never baked one myself) and knew I wanted something that was low sugar and low fat for the kids. And no nuts. And no sultanas. Tilly doesn't like them.

So I ventured out on my own. I split this mix into two and made an adult version (below) in a loaf tin with cream cheese icing sprinkled with flaked almonds. YUM.

Then I made lunchbox-sized muffins for the kids...

I am delighted with this cake. So moist and sweet and carroty and delicious. 

INGREDIENTS

½ cup brown sugar

100ml macadamia oil

3 eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

2 cups plain flour

2½ tsp baking powder

1 tsp bicarb soda (baking soda)

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp ground ginger

2½  cups grated carrot (I used 3 medium carrots)

½ cup desiccated coconut

1x 440g tin crushed pineapple (drained)

METHOD

Preheat oven to 180° celsius. Beat sugar and oil for a minute, I used electric hand beaters. Add eggs one by one and beat well. Add the vanilla. Sift in the flour, baking powder and soda and the three spices. Stir to mix. Add carrot, coconut and pineapple and combine well. 

I made one loaf tin and a dozen small muffins. 

The loaf cooked for about 25 mins, fan forced oven. The small muffins took about 20 mins. 

Gosh they're yummy. 

Hope you like them!

Off to bed now, hello raspberry leaf tea + Dostoevsky.

xxx

 

well hello!

 

No, not hello new baby, hello brain! (And hello enormous belly!)

How interesting is acupuncture!? Wow. I had a small moment of panic as she came at me with a needle for my tummy, but gosh, what a cool treatment. And I swear I felt like I was seeing the world more clearly when I was finished. Clear. That's kinda how it felt.

Anyway, while being slightly less knocked about by the blood pressure meds today, I thought I'd drop in and say hello. 

We've been having the most lovely time, Tilly and I. 

Doing a bit of IKEA shopping, the kitchen section. Gah, LOVE it. 

Look at these cupcake (actually 'patty cake', more like it) pans:

(And you KNOW I'm not here to sell you anything, right? But seriously, these are $1.99 for 65 papers. That is SO cheap.) 

And with the Drömmar pan, they make the cutest stand-up shaped cupcakes. 

 

The skill I am most proud of in my three year old? Her ability to smoothly crack eggs, zero shell. Awesome. 

  

Yum!

Good to go. 

Happy as Larry. 

Right as rain. 

OK UNIVERSE?! CAN YOU HEAR ME??!

  xxx
 

break in the program...

The good news is I went back for another scan today and everything looks fine - fluid levels, blood pressure, behemoth bubba (no not really.)

No induction booked yet, they're giving me another week and then they'll check the ol' blood pressure again and we'll negotiate. 

In other news the medication they've got me on for the BP is totally wiping me out and as a result I'm taking a small blog break this week. 

As soon as anything happens (e.g. birth) I'll let you know as soon as I can, I promise! 

If the effects of the BP meds reduce, as I keep being told they will, I'll be back in, but in the meantime, thank you so much for all the fabulous advice, I'm off to sip (more) raspberry leaf tea, stir the curry and book some acupuncture.

Wish me luck!

xxx

where am I? (and what's my name again?)

Hi! At around lunchtime yesterday I took myself off to the nurse to get my blood pressure checked. I felt OK but had high blood pressure at the end of pregnancy with Henry and it was a little high on Saturday when I saw the midwife.

Nurse reported it was totally fine. Excellent. Went off and did a hundred little errands that needed doing. Last one was picking up Henry from school and as I stood in the playground I felt very very odd. 

Make that: sick. 

With a crushing headache.

Came home, called Adam, asked him to come home straight away if he was able to. He jumped in a cab and was home in half an hour, we left Henry and Tilly with our beloved neighbours and went to hospital.

Yep, blood pressure through the roof.

Weird how that can happen.

But yet another reason I'm glad I don't live in the Middle Ages. They have excellent drugs for that. Which made me feel better really quite quickly. And they could confidently tell me the baby was fine. 

I stayed in hospital overnight and was released late this afternoon after more monitoring and scanning of the (apparently BIG) baby and appointments made for next Tuesday morning to go be inspected again.

I was on the maternity ward with lots of very cute very tiny bubbas being carried around so am now really very excited about meeting ours. (And for her not to get too much bigger!!!)

They say they'll discuss induction if I don't go into labour naturally by late next week. The main reason being not the size of the bub but the fact that we're apparently running a little low on amniotic fluid. 

So TIPS AND TRICKS please!! Old wives tales are my favourites. 

Anyone know anything that works?!

Or have a good hot curry recipe?!

xxx

quick kids lunchbox muffins

Henry, like his Dad, adores sultana cake. 

Every week he gets to pick something for his morning tea snackbox at school and this week his pick was sultana cake (again.)

As the Best Recipes one I've been using has a LOT of butter and sugar and eggs in it, I whisked up these muffins instead this week, using wholemeal flour for fibre and cutting the fats and sugar. 

Going down a treat, I have to say.

Lunchbox Sultana Muffins

Ingredients

125g butter, softened

½ cup raw sugar

2 free range eggs

2 cups wholemeal self-raising flour

1 cup milk

1 cup sultanas

Method

Cream your butter and sugar. Beat in the eggs. Beat in one cup of flour then half a cup of milk. Then the other cup of flour and then the rest of the milk. Stir through the sultanas. Makes 18 morning-tea sized muffins (or 12 large). Bake at 180°C for approx 20 mins or until firm and golden. 

Notes: You could easily make these dairy-free if needed: there's an argument that 'good oils' (sunflower oil, nut oils) are better for children (and us) than butter anyway. However, I'm not convinced that the amount of butter (125g across 18 muffins for instance) is harmful enough to substitute oil which I do not love baking with. You could always replace the cup of milk with a cup of apple or orange juice. With two eggs and self-raising flour these little golden gems will always rise. (And vanish for afternoon as well as morning tea.)

xxx

 

right, then

So we may have left it a tad late to discover whether we can fit three kids car seats across the back of our car. 

We drive a smallish car, a Prius, which is probably, what? 40cms across at the back? Maybe not that narrow but I did keep glancing back there over the last couple of months wondering exactly how we were going to do this. Hmm.

I called a professional baby carseat fitter, who sounded dubious, and Tilly and I optimistically bounded in on Friday, took the old car seats out and let the lovely lady attempt to fit two new most-narrow-on-the-market kids seats and one baby capsule into our beloved shoebox.

No, they don't really fit.

Well they fit, but you have to shunt everyone across when shutting each door and when the last door is shut it creates an unholy vacuum and we risk the windows blowing out with the internal pressure. 

Also, the seatbelt clasp bit, the crucial bit you have to stick the belt into, is conveniently located underneath the baby capsule (in the middle.) Both sides. The fitting lady sagely advised to leave a fair bit of time to go anywhere, getting the kids in and out may take some time, dear. 

WE DRIVE TO SCHOOL. 

Because it's really a bit far to walk. 

Which means we have everybody-in-and-out-of-the-car at school drop off and pick up every day. Right, then. 

Tilly and I, with windows warping, drove straight to my friend Lucy's place (who sensibly has one child and a large car), and she made me two strong cups of tea in a row. 

And on Saturday, because he's just excellent, Adam suggested we get some seatbelt extensions so at least we don't have to lift the baby capsule to get at the clasps. And so we did and they work pretty well. Henry even did his own seatbelt up this afternoon. High fives all round. 

And we're thinking about the future of the Prius. 

It's either that or give away one of the children and we quite like the two we've already met and we're guessing the third will be at least as endearing. 

Wee buggers. 

xxx

slowdown

Hi! We've wound down a bit here.

There's a lot of tea (me) and protein-enriched milkshakes (Tilly - on a hunger strike) and diluted organic apple juice (Henry) and talk about:

:: When is the baby coming out, Mum?

:: How did the baby get into your tummy? (I passed this one to Adam. It was early. Our coffee machine is in being fixed. And he's awesome at questions like these.)

:: Did God kill the dinosaurs?

:: If you're a vegetarian do you eat leaves?

:: Can we call the new baby Hen? (- Henry. Me: don't you think we might get you muddled up? Henry: No. *blank look*. My name is Henry.)

:: Can we call the new baby Tilly? (- Henry. Me: We already have a Tilly. Henry: No we don't. Her name is Matilda. *blank look* . Me: Ask your father.)

:: Mum, are you asleep or are you pretending? (Me: I'm asleep. Yes I know I'm sitting at the dinner table. Eat your noodles.)

:: Mum can you make me a shrinking hat? 

Found one among the woollens, didn't make it:

:: Can you still see me? I'm the size of a pea now. I can fit in the doll's house. 

 :: You won't tread on me, will you? BE CAREFUL!

:: Did you give Tilly a vanishing hat?

xxx

nut butters

You know I'm a big fan of the homemade peanut butter. BIG fan. 

I had some leftover nuts this week and we've run out of the above ("we've" being Tilly and I: the boys are vehemently averse to peanut butter of any incarnation.)

So I dumped a variety of nuts into my food processor and made this:

Yes the label may look a little Stepford.

No I'm not apologising. 

The state I'm in I could easily have used it as a facial scrub unless I whacked a label on it. 

(Besides, I have blank labels left over from making coffee labels for Dad's coffee beans.)

Sadly I cannot give you the volumes of different nuts thrown in (please refer to statement about 'state' above. Insomnia. Curse it.)

But damn it's yummy!

If you make it and it works, maybe send me the nut volumes?!

P.S. Apparently there's an "ABC" butter which is excellent - almonds, brasil nuts and cashews. Might try this next time. If I can remember where I put my food processor. Or my brain. 

xxx

new things

I'm about to reconfigure that 'new things' to-do list over on the left hand column, and I am thinking up some fun new things to put on it. 

(This time, no deadline. No point setting myself up to fail. I will do a wrap-up post sometime shortly about what's coming off the list that wasn't accomplished by June. Why I canned the soap-making, abandoned homeschooling, delayed the Miracle Fruit etc.) 

So much fun though - some of those 'new things' really shook stuff up for me. 

I'd never really gotten into knitting and always wanted to. After finishing a couple of things I'm now flying through little projects like this one:

A narrow little soft scarf for a little neck - a small friend who sent Tilly the sweetest skirt, who lives in a cold clime - I posted this off to her today. It's a lot like this one that I made for Tilly, but in a much softer acrylic yarn which seems to stretch better around wee necks and is less scratchy than wool and cosier than cotton. This one is just twelve stitches on, then knit one row across, purl, knit, purl, knit and then repeat this pattern (k, p, k, p, k) to create the 'stripes'. Super quick to knit. Not sure what ply the yarn was, sorry, a bit hopeless, but knitted up on 7mm needles. 

Anyway, a self-fulfilling list that makes stuff happen. 

No pressure!

Any ideas?

xxx

little black book

I have a little black book.

No, it's not a lascivious list of old flames. (More's the pity really.)

It's a dinner party book. One I started years ago, after I made my very good friends Jodie and Andrew (fabulous foodies) cheesecake for the third dinner party in a row and someone mentioned it and I realised I had no idea I'd made it for them before. A few times. Oops. So I started making a few notes. Date. Who. What we ate. 

The first entry is Friday 3 January 2003. Our place, Manly. Present were Jenny Walmsley, Rachel Walmsley, Julian Lyden, Naomi Weir (my sister) and Ad and I. This is before Jen became my mother in law, before Rach's partner Craig appeared, and there's a note at the bottom of the page that says it's Julian's last night in Australia after three weeks here over Christmas. I think he and Nomie must've been dating and this was before she moved to Singapore with him. (Now married with two divine children who have made special appearances here when they're in town.) It says Jen was staying with us on a break from cleaning out her Mum's house in Tumut.

So it says a lot really. 

It says I made garlic and lightly melted cheddar on toasted turkish bread to start, followed by chilled cucumber soup with garlic prawns. Main was chicken with mushrooms in cream and fresh herb sauce with roasted beetroot and dessert was vanilla icecream with River Cafe Chocolate Nemesis cake. And in small writing: (cake in sauce form!!! not set!!!) 

Oh yes. I remember this one. My crappy oven of the time blew out half way through baking. It looked set. I released the spring-form tin and the cake made a spectacular slow-moving waterfall over the side of the bench onto my shoes. Naomi, not being paralyzed by horror at the couverture hitting the floor, managed to grab a clean plate and intercept the chocolate waterfall - enough to salvage some kick arse sauce for the icecream. 

Lots and lots of good things in this little book. 

There are loose-leaf degustation menus:

Goodness, yes. The elaborate dinners I'd do for fun. Scrawled on the inside cover is a list of Adam's favourite foods. 

Then there's this one:

Adam's birthday dinner, six years ago, with a note about 'no fish' for one guest which unfortunately was imparted to me right before I served up snapper pie, and 'no oranges' right before I served up passionfruit flummery for dessert with orange juice in it. WINNER.

There's lists of medieval dinners and family dinner parties and people's favourite foods and notes about a dish here or there I wouldn't do again. 

There's this:

Not Dad's 60th but his 65th (I must've been drinking the cooking wine when I wrote that note.) A friend of ours did the wine matching. That was a good dinner. A degustation for 11, my book says. 

Anyway, it's fun to flick through it. 

And it means I won't accidentally cook you the same thing twice, unless there's a note to remind me you'll do all the washing up for one more piece of flourless chocolate cake. 

xxx