Cooking for Creative Monday

Joining in with Claire Justine over at:

Today I am going to blog about something that is a pretty rare occurrence for me - actually following a recipe as it is written plus taking some photographs to share!

The occasion was a dinner party we hosted over the weekend for some of the local people my hubby has got to know since he moved over here more than a year ago.  Before I actually moved 100% over here too he was rather by himself during the week for the best part of a year and these kind souls took him under their wing so it was a bit of a thank you.

Hubs is one of those who likes to do rather OTT cooking (in my opinion being somewhat more in touch with good old fashioned nosh!) and he ALWAYS follows the recipe to the dot.  He also rather worships Jamie Oliver so his menu came straight from a variety of Jamie's cookbooks.

Being the helpful sort, I said that I would help out with the deserts and was promptly given - yes you've guessed it - Jamie recipes for a chocolate with brandy desert plus orange polenta biscuits.  I have to be honest and say the recipes weren't TOO difficult to follow and here are the photos I took -

 butter, plain flour, sugar, polenta all needed to be rubbed in together before adding the eggs and orange zest

 The chocolate puds looked pretty much like the photo

Jamie's biscuits were FAR neater and all the same size than mine!

However, the chocolate puddings were rather too rich for my liking and incredibly stiff - it was like eating heavy chocolate fondant - so if I was to do this again I'd probably make them more mousse like by adding egg white as Jamie suggest you can!  I also don't know which espresso cups Jamie uses but the recipe made far more than would have fitted in six of mine - hence the pots!  The orange polenta biscuits were a BIG hit with everyone and they did taste like nothing you'd be able to buy in a supermarket so that was good - however zesting oranges was VERY time consuming so I'd only be doing this again on rare occasions.

But in all of this I must say that the BIGGEST hit of the entire meal (which did make me feel rather sorry for my dear husband who had spent as you can imagine HOURS in the kitchen preparing and cooking the main courses of a stuffed lamb dish, chicken in lemon sauce dish with accompanying different veg and potatoes) was my sherry trifle.  

I think I had better say how I make this amazing desert.
Take one bought jam swiss roll - price 69p and cut it into pieces and line a large bowl with it
Pour on liberally some sherry - found in the back of the cupboard - heaven knows how old!
Open a large tin of fruit salad - price 89p and tip that on top of cake slices
Boil a kettle to make packet of custard - price 33p - allow to slightly cool and then pour over contents in bowl
When all totally cool decorate by spraying a circle of cream from a can around the edge

Total preparation time - in region of 10 mins!!!!  Cost - approx £2 - serves 8-10
I didn't even bother photographing this desert mainly because as you can see it is not really cooking - is it?  However, everyone absolutely loved it and the remaining servings were fought over by two of the guests as take home treats!!

I'd love to know if you have any funny stories about cooking recipes that possibly didn't work out the way you expected or gave unexpected results or couldn't even be considered cooking as most people think of it?  Leave a comment and let's share a laugh or two :)

Cut Up Poetry

I so love it when a lesson brings results that far outweigh my expectations!

Therefore, I'd like to share one such lesson on the joys of Cut Up Poetry with a class of 30 six to seven year olds with almost three-quarters of the class made up of boys!

They were allowed to choose their working groups of 4-5 children) with the proviso that too much noise or not joining in would mean that I would be free to remodel the groups!  This naturally led to a good mixed ability range for each group.  I then chose one child from each group to be the leader, who then chose from within their team one to be the reporter, one to be responsible for resources and one/two to be the artistic director/team

Although, I teach a two week poetry unit this lesson would probably work as a stand alone.

The ideas, history of the concept and the task were explained and some examples shown - most notably from some of The Beatles songs.

Each group then sent their resource manager to collect a selection of local newspaper pages and advertisement flyers, enough pairs of scissors for each child and a large piece of coloured sugar paper - at this stage NO glue was given out.

The children were then given approximately 15 minutes to read and cut out interesting headlines or phrases and gather these together for the next stage.

The next 15 mins were for the children to discuss and sort their headlines and phrases into a poetic form and it was at this point that I was blown away by their speaking and listening skills as they discussed their options, talked about how the words sounded and which bits fitted better and why, commented on each other's suggestions without anyone getting upset and positioned and re-positioned their words upon the large sheet of sugar paper.

They then had approximately 5 mins to meet with another group to read through and discuss any changes they thought might make the poem even better and discuss a title for their poem - then and only then were they allowed to stick their words onto the sheet of paper as their final poem with additional artistic elements added by their chosen group member.

After breaktime:  the reporter from each group then read out their poem and each of the other groups gave a positive comment or a constructive criticism on it.  Yet again their comments showed how much they were listening and engaged with the poetry they were all creating.

I think one of the main reasons for such success with this lesson was that it took physical writing out of the picture which for many of these boys they still struggle with.  They didn't have to worry about spellings or punctuation or how neat their hand writing was.  Instead they could just focus all their energy into reading and "playing" with the words.

I am so sorry that I wasn't able to photograph their finished poems in all their glory to show you here but instead I'll try to give you a taste by one of the all boy groups who would normally have struggled a lot during a literacy lesson -

The poem was framed by a goal mouth

Saturday Football
Davidson Scores
A Hat Trick       Penalty
Free Delivery
Get it now
Turn Around
Why wait ?
Traffic Cops
Car Theft
Are your windows safe?
Homes in Your Area
Tea Time    
Take Away


That's why I've got a smile that stretches from ear to ear :)

Have you ever tried this type of process to inspire a poem or song lyrics or even a short story?  Have you done this type of poetry at school yourself?  I'd love to know - so please leave a comment below :)

Come Drive With Me!

Well the Road Trip is now underway and if you'd like to sign up then simply click on the badge above to be taken there.

Last year, I visited those blogs that I liked the sound of on the original sign up list and I probably only visited another 50 or so during the Road Trip but this year I've decided to do it in order working from those at the top and going on through and I might just make a few notes on those that I land on.

But before I begin I do want to say thank you and award a big

to a lady I encountered at the very end of the Challenge but who has since kept in regular contact and left comments on many of my posts and that my dear is you, Yvonne - over at NashvilleCats2.  This extraordinary lady, I learnt recently, was the very first person to sign up for the very first A to Z Challenge and she has made it her mission to help and support those along the way.  So a really big thank you for all that you do :)

Now back to those blogs who I've recently visited on my first few miles along the highway that stretches out before me -

Nicole at The Madlab post wrote really long and detailed posts for her A to Z Challenge and in her review was wondering why she hadn't received as many comments as she'd have liked.  My personal thought was that maybe her actual style of writing because of its high quality might have put certain people off?  I know I can be rather intimidated because some people are SO good you just feel rather inadequate in your response.  Also long blog posts take time to read so if you were like me trying to get through about ten new blogs a day as well as keep up with those who you already really liked or those you had found along the way that were talking your language then you probably wouldn't revisit those longer ones.

C Lee McKenzie headed one of the teams for the Challenge and her blog posts for April covered Burma and her recent visit there.  Lots of lovely photos and obviously lots of info about a place I don't know much about so made for some interesting reading.

Alex J Cavanaugh is another awesome co-host who I have had visit my blog a number of times and has left me really useful feedback.  He seems to always have endless energy or is a sucker for punishment and is co-hosting another blog hop with Heather Gardner as we speak.

Sue's Trifles is probably a blog I will be dipping into for future reference as she has a penchant for craft activities - she posted pictures of crochet on her latest blog entry I visited before heading backwards to see her Review post and some of her A to Z entries.  I think if I had come across her during the Challenge I would have left a message but probably not returned as her topic didn't really interest me.  I suppose this shows that choosing a theme might put some people off who might respond better to your more everyday posts?

Due to now taking part in the Celebrate the Small Things blog hop I have also visited several members who also took part in the Challenge as well -

Carole Ann Carr - an established author blogging about her life in England with lots of photos and interesting tit-bits - I'll certainly be coming back for more :)

Precious Monsters - who writes books about zombies - so not really my thing but her celebrate posts give an insight into an author's life so I will be visiting her to find out what she gets up to.

Tanya Miranda - one of Stephen Tremp's Troops - who rather like me writes everything at the last moment so is forever playing catch up but in a good way!!  She wrote a short story for each letter -something that I am toying with for the next challenge!!

Stephen Tremp himself - who always had lots of really good questions to hook you in as a reader and commentator.

Eclectic Ali was also writing short stories for the Challenge - however as her name suggests she is eclectic and so far I have been catching up with all of her May posts which have been great reading for me!

Remember I have only just begun this Road Trip and these are only my views.  Everyone is different and what appeals to one might not float the boat of another - but that's life.  As I continue on, I hope to find more blogs that I will become a follower of and learn many new and fascinating facts about this world and possibly others!!

I'd love to know whether you're signing up or if you've begun your journey and who you might suggest I visit?

Have a great weekend :)

Celebrate the Small Things 3

This is my third week of joining in with

And I want to say a big thank you to those of you who have welcomed me into this special band of bloggers and left such nice comments.  I am working my way through the list and will be visiting more of you to discover what's been going on in your world this week :)

To anyone else out there who would like to join in - just hit the button above and it will take you over to the amazing Lexa Cain's blog who will then sign you up.  Her two co-hosts Katie TheCyborgMom and L.G.Keltner also deserve a mention :)

So what am I celebrating this week?

Firstly and most thankfully - the builders have finished and have packed up and left!!  Not that they were noisy or bad or anything like that but it is just so nice not to have to have people passing by your windows when you're in a downstairs room or asking you to move your car or being in your garden when you so wish you could be out there getting sweaty and dirty pulling weeds!!  So I can now start to rebuild my garden and boy is there a lot to do!!

Secondly, that we have had a few days of half decent weather so that I have actually begun to tackle the garden - although what I want to prioritise is different to what my hubby thinks I should be prioritising!!

Thirdly, that I sorted out and passed on some craft makes for the charity garden party coming up next week - so I can say something has left the building!!  However, due to the amazing second hand book sale I stumbled upon the other day 12 books have somehow wandered in (which are I have to admit are rather larger in volume - and certainly heavier - than what has been taken out!  But they are wonderful books :)

Fourthly, something I posted about earlier this week in that I won a competition and will be receiving a first edition later this year of Guilie Castillo's new book

and finally - so grateful and pleased to receive the following comment on one of my reading games on TpT

"My daughter loves to play this! Especially loves to steal the coins. We play so she has to read her words and mine and it is great."

It is so lovely to hear back that somewhere in the world (outside my school) a child is enjoying their learning because of something I did - this just warms the cockles of my heart and has put a smile on my face all week :)

Now I'm off to hear what others are celebrating - but I'd love to know what have been your top three thanks this week?  So please leave a comment below :)

Concentration - Throwback Thursday

Today I am throwing you back courtesy of Angela over at:

to my 2014 "C is for ..." post of last year's A to Z Challenge.  Unfortunately, the issues are still there that I wrote about when looking at concentration skills for children.

But I also confess that I seem to be too quick to lose focus myself these days.  I rush, rush, rush.  I don't have time to spend intent on anything - telling myself there's too much to fit in to my busy day. So I find myself flitting between tasks, letting my mind wander to other things when I should be working on the thing before me.  At home, if nothing grabs my attention on television I am constantly changing channels, if I am struggling with an activity I put it to one side rather than persevere, if I haven't got into a book by the end of the first chapter then it's back on the book shelf.  And I know I didn't use to be like this but now we seem to expect everything to be at hand and quick and instant! No wonder children are having a hard time of it!!

Over on her blog, Fil is writing about a lovely evening she was part of that might just offer a cure - a slowing down - a chance to become absorbed with what is happening around oneself.  The occasion she writes about was to reflect on peace between communities all over the world but maybe it also offers a chance for inner peace and thereby the ability to re-focus and concentrate?  I urge you to head over there and read all about it - http://fil-campbell.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/bake-bread-for-peace.html

If you've been able to concentrate up to this point then click the button below to head over to my original post and let me know what you think your concentration is like these days?

What makes your brain head for the hills?  What makes you focus?  Is new technology to blame or are we just becoming lazy in our ways of thinking?

Climber - Wordless Wednesday

Competition Winner - Yes ME!!!

I was looking through all the lovely comments people had left me yesterday when I scrolled down to one from Guilie Castillo a writer who took part in the A to Z Challenge over at Quiet Laughter

"I'm dropping by to congratulate you: you're one of three winners for the giveaway I ran on my blog throughout the challenge"

And what have I won I hear you ask?  A copy of Guilie's new book :)  Here's what she wrote:

THE MIRACLE OF SMALL THINGS, a collection of short fiction -- a novel in stories -- set in Curaçao.

Blurb: International tax lawyer Luis Villalobos is lured to the tiny island of Curaçao anticipating a fast track to the cusp of an already enviable career. 

But... The paradise we expect is so rarely the paradise we find.

The book will be released this summer (2015, Truth Serum Press), so this giveaway is me jumping the gun a bit. ("A bit...") I hope you don't mind waiting :)

Guilie Castillo

I am truly delighted - I do not usually have the winning touch so this is a real bolt out of the blue :)
Now of course I am wondering did anyone else win anything over the course of the A to Z Challenge or as a teaching prize (as I know lots of very generous teachers also have competitions and rafflecopters)? I'd love to know!