Lent: A progress report

Sorry sorry sorry, I've been poor at blogging this past few weeks. Avoiding cake clearly gives me nothing to write about! Thought I'd give you a status report to get me going again.

I've actually surprised myself by sticking to Lent so far. Not that it's been too hard! It's not like I'm actually addicted to cake so I'm not having cravings the way I would if I'd given up, say, cigarettes. And I'm not having to avoid cake-based social situations the way I would if I gave up alcohol - I even managed lunch at a cake shop yesterday without having any! Yay me. And a weekend at home for family birthdays without eating cake, if only because there wasn't one (highly unusual in the Heslop household).

There are two reasons I've managed to avoid cake so far though.

1) There are myriad alternatives to cake that still fill the cake-shaped hole in my belly - so far I've had chocolate bars, caramel shortbread (biscuit), scone (savoury), rice crispie cake (not baked) and baklava (may be called a cake in Greek but as far as I'm concerned it's a pastry). I've not even had to resort to the emergency brownie option (borderline cake).

2) You don't have to observe Lent on Sundays. This amazing nugget of information came from my brother, who heard it on Songs of Praise (clearly an authorative source), and has been verified by at least one independent source since, so it must be true. From now until Easter, Sunday will officially be known as Cakeday in this house.

Let them eat cake (but not me)

Lent. Ah, Lent. I've written before about my strange attachment to giving something up each year. Maybe it's like setting a personal challenge, seeing how long I can abstain. Or maybe my willpower is so weak I need an added pressure to force myself to be sensible!

I thought about giving up alcohol again - I think it's the only time I've actually succeeded at Lent, if you discount the first half pint a couple of days in when I forgot I wasn't meant to be drinking - but I only have a couple of glasses a week, so it wouldn't be much of a challenge.

A few years ago I gave up sweet things, but the category was a bit broad and there were far too many caveats for my liking. So this year I've narrowed the field and I will be giving up cake. Yes, cake.

I know, I know, I eat so much and blog about it so often that surely there is no hope of success! But have faith, dear reader, Lent is after all only 40 days. I'll just have to avoid birthday parties and wear dark glasses when I take Ella to cafes. Easy...

Fried egg cake anyone?

My lovely bro made me a birthday cake but because it had to travel he didn't decorate it. I think his plan was to sprinkle it with icing sugar but i couldn't resist decorating it with Logan! We were aiming for spots, but I inadvertently discovered how to create icing fried eggs. Oops...

Advent day 23: Mince pies at the ready

2 sleeps...

Advent day 17: Christmas cupcakes

8 sleeps...

Cake of the day #8: Afternoon tea at Shakespeare's Globe

Mum bought Mark and I a Red Letter Day last Christmas, for a tour of Shakespeare's Globe theatre on the Southbank followed by afternoon tea. We finally got round to it today - I wanted to be able to appreciate the cakes without a baby in my tummy! - but it was worth the wait.

The tour was interesting, although it was disappointing that we couldn't go backstage or explore behind the scenes. The tea and cake were delicious though, and it was lovely to take our time over it. They lost a point for no choice of jam, and the scones could have been bigger (and warmer), but otherwise very tasty.



Ella was a star too, I think she's a fan of cake!

Advent day 6: Luxury Christmas cake

19 sleeps...

Cake of the day #7: Dina's pumpkin bread

For Thanksgiving last week Mark's colleague Dina gave him a tin of pumpkin puree and a recipe for pumpkin bread (from allrecipes.com). It would have been rude not to bake it!



It's more of a moist cake than a bread, a bit like ginger cake in texture but not as gingery. It's delicious, so I thought I'd share the recipe - a bit late for Thanksgiving but it would make a tasty Boxing Day treat.

Ingredients
1 tin pumpkin puree
4 eggs, beaten
8 fl oz vegetable oil
6 fl oz water
675g caster sugar
350g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp ground cloves (we substituted with all spice)
1/4 tsp ground ginger

Preheat the oven to 175 C (350 F). Grease two square 23cm (9") tins with butter then dust with flour.

In a large bowl, mix the pumpkin puree, eggs, oil, water and sugar until well blended. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and ginger. Stir the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture until just blended. Pour into the cake tins.

Bake for about 50 mins, until a prong (we use a chopstick) inserted into the centre comes out clean. Leave to stand for a few minutes then remove from the tins and slice into squares (might be easier to slice it in the tin first).

Cake of the day #5: Banana cake

One cake wasn't enough today! I was trying to be good but by the time I'd viewed a flat, had a late lunch at Crocodile Antiques and fed Ella it was too late to head home before going back out to pick up Logan from nursery, and too cold to hang around outside, so I just had to find shelter in a cafe.

Feast, on Muswell Hill Broadway, is a deli with a cafe next door. They'd run out of brownies (disappointing) but I had a very tasty banana cake and orange juice instead.

Cake(s) of the day #4: Fabulous Bakin' Boys

After last night's indulgence I was having a 'good' day today - healthy breakfast, soup with brown bread for lunch. And then I collected a parcel from the post office. I've been carrying the slip for it around with me for a couple of weeks, and today was the first day I managed to get up and out of the flat in time to collect it (the depot closes at 12.30 - yes, okay, still not that early but it takes a lot of effort to get two of us dressed these days!).

I had no idea what it was, so imagine my delight when I opened the box to discover a whole host of baked goodies from Fabulous Bakin' Boys, to apologise for a box of jamless jam flapjacks I bought Logan for halloween last month.



And to top it all off, Abel & Cole delivered a complimentary mini mince pie with the veg box this afternoon. I'm clearly not meant to diet. I've managed to hold out all day but there's a cherry muffin in there with my name on it...

Cake of the day #3: Belgian chocolate brownie, salted caramel and pecans

AKA the one from the latest M&S ad campaign. Delicious - all chocolate cake should come with a side order of salted caramel, it's divine.

And yes, I had half a cake. But we had half fat creme fraiche instead of cream, so I was allowed.

Cake of the day #2: scone at Maison Blanc

I was going to take a brisk woodland walk today, instead of heading into Muswell for cake, but events (and toddlers) conspired against me so I found myself in Maison Blanc on the Broadway.

I was tempted by their amazing patisserie but eventually settled on a scone with clotted cream and strawberry jam, which seemed more satisfying. The scone was lovely and light, although not warmed the way I like them, but the clotted cream was too cold, so it wouldn't spread or stick to the scone - I do like my clotted cream sticky! It still tasted great though.

I was more excited about the tea - Jasmine Silver Needle white tea, which is beautifully fragrant. I love white tea and it's nice to see it on the menu. Not a bad cream tea for £4.50.

Advent day 2

Christmas cupcakes