Life bas been busy. Busy, busy busy. Not only is it the middle of busy season at work (they don’t call it that for nothing) I also decided it was a good time of year to move house. Well thought out plan huh?
Some how, in and around passing out and dragging myself up at the crack of dawn to head in to the office, I have managed to find time to road test the new kitchen.
This year instead of buying Christmas presents, I decided to send a few care packages, Coco Rosey style. I have two go-to recipes tucked up my sleeve, they’re tried, tested and pretty damn good every time I make them. They are, of course, brownies and truffles.
I have reached a stage where I can make these brownies in my sleep. The need for a recipe disappeared a long time ago as it is now fully cemented in my mind. I doubt this recipe will leave me even if I suffer an attack of amnesia and forget who I am; I will be sat in a hospital bed knowing nothing of who I am, yet knowing how to make the best brownies in the world. The secret? Magic. And chocolate. Lots of chocolate.
Ever since the truffle course I did in September, I have had need to make truffles on a weekly basis. What can I say? They’re popular.
So we all know how much I love baking, second to that though, my next love is packaging things up by hand to make them as beautifully enticing as possible. I think my family may say I take this a bit too far. Possibly demonstrated by the ribbon spools I attached to my “baking trolley”. One fantastic thing I have discovered this year is Japanese masking tape. It comes in all sorts of pretty patterns and colours and makes anything look lovely, quite literally by just sticking some tape to it. Second to the Japanese masking tape, my other great discovery this year was raffia. How great is raffia?! So many colours, so easy to use, and looks much nicer than the shiny shiny curling ribbon you see everywhere.
Once covered in Japanese masking tape, and tied up with some cream and gold raffia, the Christmas care packages started to look pretty good. Based on the feedback, they tasted pretty good too.