Bananatoffeerama....

Buds are starting to appear on the fruit trees, ferns are bursting through the ground and there's the coconut  smell of the bright yellow gorse flowers whenever the sun shines. We've made use of the sunshine by clearing the garden. It's stage two of the garden plan which should take us about five years to get looking presentable. This week we had friends to stay and they helped Gareth put in the chicken run. (These chickens are going to have one of the best views in the world.) They'll arrive once the passenger boat starts running in the next couple of weeks. 

I've been working on the old entrance. I've been clearing brambles as thick as a 50p piece and as long as swimming pool. I'm constantly followed by a robin and a fat blackbird taking advantage of all the bugs and worms that are exposed as I pull rocks back. 

Then this week the sunshine stopped. The forecast said snow (which we kind of ignored as it's so rare.)  But it did snow and very heavily. Unfortunately it didn't stick. I had high hopes of building a sledge but there wasn't even enough for a snowball.  

On our friends' last night we cooked pizzas in the wood fired oven. We had a few black bananas left and between them they came up with this recipe....which may become a post pizza tradition.

Wood fired bananas with fudge, chocolate and biscuits (serves 4)....

4 bananas

4 chunks of fudge (preferably Veronica Farm Fudge available here) 

8 chunks of chocolate

4 chocolate digestive biscuits

Chop up the fudge and chocolate. 

 Make a slice down the middle of the bananas (leaving them in their skins.)

Stuff the bananas with the fudge and chocolate. 

Wrap them tightly in foil. Pop them in the embers of the woodfired oven or barbecue for 5-7 minutes (or a 200'c) oven for 15 minutes (using oven gloves). Crush the biscuits in a bowl. 

Carefully take the bananas out and very carefully unwrap the foil using oven gloves. Sprinkle the crushed biscuits over the top. 

Presents of mind....

I'm not one of those people who automatically know what to buy people from Christmas. Occasionally I'll have a flash of inspiration but rarely hit the jackpot. I've been trying to look back on some of the best presents I've ever received....here are my top four...

1. A perfume making kit when I was seven. A million different fragrances and bottles to play with. I must have smelt dreadful when I mixed them all together and drenched myself in some kind of apple/strawberry/marigold concoction. But I loved it.


2. A soda stream. This was from the other half last year. The most useful gadget ever. We use it everyday.


3. A pony mug filled with fizzy cola bottles. One of the first gifts ever bought for me by my little sister. Ponies. Check. Cola bottles check. Great present.


4. My boyfriend booking us a holiday as a surprise. We were running out of time (ie a week before we were meant to go somewhere) and he came home and said "right I booked somewhere on my lunch break....we're off to Margarita on Saturday." I loved the decision being made for me.

Anyway I love being given homemade presents so today I spent hours making Christmas fudge as I do every December.

Christmas Pudding Fudge Balls....(Makes 20)

1 batch of your favourite fudge recipe that makes about 1.5lbs fudge. (I'm sorry my mum would hunt me down if I gave it away...)
2 handfuls mixed dried fruit
1/4 pt brandy
1 handful red glace cherries
1 handful toasted mixed nuts chopped up
1 tbsp mixed spice
1 tbsp clotted cream

1x medium sized bar of white chocolate
1 tub red and green glace cherries

1x edible gold spray

Before making your fudge, soak the dried fruits and nuts in the brandy. When your fudge mix is boiled to perfection add the fruit, spice, nuts, cherries and clotted cream. Beat until thick and creamy and it's starting to set. Pour into a lined tin.....




Leave for 10 minutes until it is cooled a little. Then take a melon baller and scoop the soft fudge into little balls. You might need to use your hands with some of them. Pop each ball into mini cake cases.

Break up the white chocolate into a glass bowl. Place over a pan of boiling water and leave to melt. Pour a tsp of the melted chocolate over each mini pudding and let it drip down the sides. Chop up the red glace cherries into little "berries" and the green cherries into "leaves" and place on the top of each pudding.


I'm not sure how long these will last....I reckon a couple of days.

Golden Vanilla Fudge Stars.....

After those I decided to make some vanilla fudge. I poured the fudge into a lined tin and then used edible spray over the top so it was a shimmering gold. I tried to cut out stars with a mini biscuit cutter but I was too slow and it set too quickly so I cut it into chunks of gold instead.....

Homemade Fudge....

Once upon a time there was a thirteen year old girl who lived on a tiny island with 85 people on it. She watched a film called "Mermaids" and saw someone making fudge. She ignored the storyline and thought it would be fun to make fudge. So she went home and she found her mum's cookery book with the faded yellow pages and she found a family recipe for vanilla fudge...She made it and it was delicious.

But there was too much......so she sold some at the island fete. People loved it and asked for more. She started selling it by the side of the road every summer and it paid for her dance lessons......


A long time went by.....When she came back from University in the summer she didn't need a summer job anymore because the fudge paid for that. She just kept making fudge. Vanilla fudge, clotted cream fudge, chocolate fudge, coffee fudge, rum and raisin fudge, whisky and ginger fudge, cherry fudge...you get the idea. She made her stall pretty and sometimes people left her notes telling her how much they loved the fudge....

One day a hollywood star stopped and told her he loved the fudge and visited the stall every year.

But the little girl had to get a proper job one day so she left the island and the fudge behind....
But people kept knocking at the door asking for fudge so the little girl's mummy started making it. She made the kitchen bigger and shinier but kept making the fudge one batch and a time and stirred it by hand. She started using local milk, cream and butter so it didn't come from the mainland.

And people still knocked at the door.....so the little girl, her sister and their mummy made a website so people can order the fudge online. A TV crew came and follow the mummy for a BBC 2 series.....

You can now buy the fudge here

I would post the recipe but it is a top secret........