Dulce de leche cupcakes and Birthday

So had a birthday last week, and it was very low key this year, but very nice.

The day before I baked birthday cupcakes for myself, inspired by food and thought blog, and they didn’t turn out they way I had hoped look wise, but tasted like a little piece of heaven.

Then on my birthday my friend bought a picnic box from Le Pain Quotidien, with substitutions for the things with dairy. And we meet in Hyde park by the Diana Memorial, with her new 3 week old baby and dog for a wonderful picnic.

And because my fiancé was working the evening on my birthday, he had gotten tickets for Wicked the next day. And it was such a good play, with amazing costumes, wigs and makeup. Defiantly a play I can recommend for all ages.

For the cupcakes I just used a dairy free chocolate cupcake recipe.

For chocolate-cream cheese frosting I used 100g cream cheese, 50g bitter dark chocolate and 200g icing sugar. Melting the chocolate and mixing it all together, and letting it cool of in the fridge, before using.

For the Dulce de Leche I used 500ml whole fat milk, 125g sugar ¼ teaspoon sea salt, stirring it all together in a pot, and letting it simmer for 1 hour 15-30 minutes, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon not letting it burn, and it is don when it turns into a brown custard like consistency. Good idea to use a whisk at the end, and stirring quite a lot for the last 15 minutes. Will thicken a lot more once cooled.
(I used Lactose free Milk and cream Cheese, and dairy free chocolate.)

Greenwich Park

Had a wonderful day out to Greenwich park the other day.
It is a place where you can easily use a hole day, it has everything you could need for a good day out, like the 3 interesting museums , beautiful places for picnics, a wildness area, a flower garden and a children’s boating pond.

The National Maritime Museum, The Queens house and an amazing view of London seen from the top of the hill.

The entrance to The queens house

The Royal Observatory (the small thing on top of the hill)

The Meridian Line

The Red Time-Ball

Astronomy Centre

Pavilion Tea house (more like a cantina unfortunately)

Map of the park. It is possible to park your car on blackheath avenue for 1 pound an hour for max 4 hours.

"My one weakness"

Have been watching Lark Rise to Candleford on dvd the last few evenings, a bbc series from 2008, and wishing it was me having tea and cake in the post office.

It is such a sweet series set in the 19 century, about young Laura that moves from her parents house, to the nearby town Candleford, to start apprenticeship as a postmistress. And by following Laura coming of age, you also follow the people of Lark Rise and Candleford.
One person that I really like in this series is Dorcas Lane, played by Julia Sawalha, and her saying “it is my one weakness” of which she has many :)
But it has made me think, what is my One weakness??? Defiantly delicious cakes, good movies and sleeping late is also a pretty good weakness of mine, even if they don’t happen often enough :)

chocolate sandwich cookies

Had friends over this weekend, that have lived in the states, and was missing it a bit. So I decided to make these lovely little things, that I had invented a few months ago, they are a cross between woopie pies and oreo cakesters.
They where a big hit, and I would have to say, that I was being extremely good diet wise and did only have one :)


Cookies:

100ml Yogurt Natural

6 tablespoons cocoa powder
75g margarine
200g sugar
1 egg
1tsp vanilla sugar
½tsp bicarbonate of soda
½tsp fine salt
125g plain white flour

Filling:
100g cream cheese
300g icing sugar

Preheat oven to 175°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4.
To make the cookies, cream together the margarine and sugar in a bowl, add the egg and mix well, for a few minutes.
Mix in the Yogurt.
Add all the dry ingredients and mix well.
Drop small blobs (2 teaspoons) of dough onto a baking tray lined with parchment paper, spacing them 2 inches apart.
Bake until the edges of the cookies spring back when lightly touched (7 to 9 minutes).
Transfer to wire racks and allow to cool.
To make the filling, mix together the cream cheese with half of the icing sugar, then add the other half of the icing sugar and mix well.
Split your batch of cookies in half and pipe or spoon 1-2 teaspoons of the filling onto the flat sides of one half of your batch. Sandwich with the other half of the cookies, pressing the flat sides to the filling.

have also tried freezing them, and they are great to have in the freezer to take a few out and thaw when you feel like a snack, but also good frozen almost like an ice cream sandwich.
(I used dairy free margarine, lactose free yoghurt and have a nice cold glass of lactose free milk with them).

Ealing

Watch Mandy the other day, an amazing film from 1952 about a little girl that is born deaf, and how the parents cope with it. Such a heartfelt movie, and really worth a watch.

But was a bit surprised when I saw that it was made in Ealing Studios, that I have past many times.
The studio is In Ealing, a nice little place at the end of district and central line.

older part of Ealing studios

Newer part of Ealing Studios

And a few houses from the studios, there is Pitzhanger Manor House, where they have free art exhibitions, art classes, and a great little park.

Pitzhanger Manor House

A few good eating places in Ealing, on Ealing green and St. Mary's Rd:

Osteria del Portico, a little Italian place that is set up in what looks like a drive way, but super cosy.

Farm W5 organic food market, vegetarian food.

Joie de vivre, antique shop, afternoon tea and Mediterranean food.

And last but not least, Ealing has a Tiger, a Danish chain, equivalent to the pound shop (tiger means tiger but also ten’ner in danish, and ten crowns is the equivalent to one pound). So funny to walk into the shop, it is like exactly like being back in Denmark for a few minutes, and I could even get some Danish sweets, joy.

Richmond

Went to Richmond today, and it is such nice place, it is one of those places in London that still has some old charm.
Ans it is defiantly one of does places, that are best explored by going down the small side streets.
Before coming to Richmond you go past Kew gardens (botanical garden), which I also have on my to see list.

Before crossing Kew bridge, you can see Eco Village and a few steps on to the bridge you can see all these amazing house boats.

such sweet houses

The Original maids of honour, near the main entrance to Kew Gardens, they have some amazing cakes, and serve afternoon tea. But I was being good and didn’t have any.

Lovely book shop

William Curly another place with amazing cakes, chocolate and ice cream.......hard place to be on a diet in.

Amazing places you will find by going down side streets.

Trapeze and Dog treats

Have been very busy the last week, so haven’t had too much time for the blog.
But I really wanted to share this, I had a trapeze class a few days ago, and I can only recommend it. It was super scary and I crossed a lot of my own boundaries, but I am so glad that I did it, and it won’t be my last time either.

I have also decided to lose a few pounds, and that means that the baking has to be put on hold for a while. So what better way to satisfy my baking craving than to make dog treats, and perfectly I had to meet my friend in Hyde Park the next day, which dog turn 10 on that same day.


The dog has a few allergies so I found this recipe, where he could have all the ingredients. They were so easy to make, and the dog loooooved them.

Doggy tuna treats

1 cup/2 dl rolled oats
1 cup/2 dl fine cornmeal or Semolina
1 tablespoon flax seed/linseed
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 can tuna in brine with water
1/3 cup water (or as needed)

Preheat oven to 175°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4
Grind flax seeds, set aside.Grind oats to a coarse flour, set aside.
Put the tuna in your food processor beaker add pulse until smooth.
Add all other ingredients and pulse on and off until mixture comes together to form a ball.
The dough might look as it is a bit to dry, but try kneading for a few minutes and it should come together.
Roll out the dough till it is about ¼ inch/½ cm thick.
Then cut out with cookie cutter of choice (I used the tip of a piping bag, to make small treats), just make sure that the shape doesn’t have any sharp edges that can scratch the dogs mouth.
Place on a baking sheet covered with parchment, and bake until light golden for 10-25 minutes depending on the size.