Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 67 Comments

Bake-off

Yesterdays announcement of my new signature dish – The Pizza Cheesecake – seemed to be as popular as Trump announcing that he would be starting to model revealing beach costumes…. So I have decided to slightly tweak the dish. Just a superficial change. I’ve kept the base and ditched the rest of the cake. So it’s goodbye pizza and hello to strawberry, blueberry and marshmallow cheesecake.

It might not look much but wow it tasted good. Definitely my new dish.

Warning… if you don’t like this version of the cake then I will may be forced to model beachwear. Trust me that’s a step you don’t want to unleash on the world. The last time I took my shirt off on a beach, I was quickly surrounded by whale specialists. Buckets of water were then thrown over me until the tide came in, so they could attempt to refloat me……

It’s the Great Bloggers Bake-off this weekend. Let’s get baking. All the tremendous creations and my awful ones are appearing on Mel’s wonderful site.

Crushed Caramel

Remember to send in your creations to Mel (CrushedCaramel). Maybe your entry is not baking just something for a picnic like a sandwich, drink or salad….

crushedcaramel@gmail.com

Let’s see if we can literally blow Mel’s and our wonderful judge Jeanne’s (A Jeanne in the kitchen) socks off with our creations and monstrosities (in my case).

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 62 Comments

Oh no it’s baking time

When you get a day of homeschooling disasters then you might as well add to the mayhem. Baking mayhem.

First up a simple sponge cake. It rose about as much as my bank account balance. Not at all. But a bit of homemade whipped cream came to the rescue. At least it tasted good.

Then it was a flour free mini chocolate cake. Ok it started off as a soufflé. In temperatures over 170C it did rise beautifully. Anything lower – who let the air out….. Sadly even whipped cream couldn’t really save it. At least it tasted almost ok.

The Great Bloggers Bake-off is fast approaching on the 18th-19th July. Why don’t you join in the fun. Whether you can bake or not. Let’s have fun.

Remember to send in your creations (you can start early) to Mel (CrushedCaramel). Maybe your entry is not baking just something for a picnic like a sandwich, drink or salad….

crushedcaramel@gmail.com

Let’s see if we can literally blow Mel’s and our wonderful judge Jeanne’s (A Jeanne in the kitchen) socks off with our creations and monstrosities.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 73 Comments

Inevitable

Well the Great Bloggers Bake-off is fast approaching on the 18th-19th July. Why don’t you join in the fun. Whether you can bake or not. Let’s have fun.

Remember to send in your creations (you can start early) to Mel (CrushedCaramel). Maybe your entry is not baking just something for a picnic like a sandwich, drink or salad….

crushedcaramel@gmail.com

Let’s see if we can literally blow Mel’s and our wonderful judge Jeanne’s (A Jeanne in the kitchen) socks off with our creations and monstrosities.

So in the spirit of baking, here we go then. Time to get serious. It’s Soufflé time. That’s a gluten and diary free version. Stand by your panic rooms. Extreme baking photo is coming…..

Ok it’s not quite High End Food. But as a certain broad chinned Marvel Villain would say. I AM INEVITABLE. So tomorrow we will have Round Two of the Soufflé Wars.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 96 Comments

Baking Disaster

After a recent run of relative baking success, normal service has returned. A mad idea to produce a bread bun. Here we would call it a Stottie Cake. But no ordinary Stottie. This one has to tick a few boxes.

  • Vegan so dairy and egg free,
  • Gluten Free,
  • Baking Agent Free,
  • Microwaved.

Well that was the plan. The end result 5 minutes later was interesting.

Well it kinda tasted of bread. But it’s texture was anything other than bread like. Imaging cutting into rubber. Only one thing for it. When I chucked it against the wall, it bounced back and I caught it. I had baked a bouncy ball. Most useful for a summer picnic.

The Great Bloggers Bake-off is fast approaching on the 18th-19th July. Why don’t you join in the fun. Whether you can bake or not. Let’s have fun.

Remember to send in your creations (you can start early) to Mel (CrushedCaramel). Maybe your entry is not baking just something for a picnic like a sandwich, drink or salad….

crushedcaramel@gmail.com

Let’s see if we can literally blow Mel’s and our wonderful judge Jeanne’s (A Jeanne in the kitchen) socks off with our creations and monstrosities.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 90 Comments

Donuts – Really

July will see the second Great Bloggers Bake-off (18/19th). This year it’s a massive picnic. So in the spirit of things here is this weeks baking submission from Yorkshire. Oh it’s a doozie….

These are supposed to be donuts.

As son rather harshly pointed out.

“Looks nothing like any donut I’ve ever seen…”

“More life a UFO”

“Your not going to get much Jam in that one…”

Well I think I’ve set the bar very high on the donut front.

Remember the Bake-off is for everyone, including those like me who can’t bake. It’s not often we get a chance to show off our complete incompetence in the kitchen. Lets embrace our inner baking muppet. Let’s have a laugh and give everyone a giggle as well. You know it makes sense.

So from now until the big weekend I am going to do at least one bit of baking each week. No practice runs. Photograph the disaster.

Remember to send in your baking creations (you can start early) to Mel so that they can be featured in the Great Bake-off.

crushedcaramel@gmail.com

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 72 Comments

Gluten and dairy

Sorry having to milk the red flowers. They don’t last long and then that’s it for another year. Sadly shopping comes round much more frequently.

Another weekend shopping experience to be quickly forgotten. Yes we are always thankful to get some stuff. Things like bathroom rolls (toilet paper) and soap are getting easier to find. Finally some popcorn. Ok it’s just salty but we can add honey to it. But then the inner grump comes out in me.

So many items we take for granted are now becoming a luxury. The words out of stock, no alternatives, unavailable are becoming such a frequent part of the wonderful shopping experience. In terms of our Son it applies to a number of his favourites

  • Tomato ketchup (has to be Heinz)
  • Pasta
  • Skinless sausages
  • Baguettes
  • Tortilla wraps
  • Mini fairy cakes
  • Tinned carrots
  • Corn on the cob.

For me it’s the gluten free and IBS friendly alternatives. Yesterday I drew a complete blank. Yes you could get a few glutenless meat sausages and a couple of soya based meal options. Not great when you are trying to be a veggie and soya blows you up like a balloon. No dairy free milk option except Soya. Not one single gluten free bread based option. Looks like I’m trying to bake my own again – the last one ended up painted and used as Jurassic World play island… Yes we got some jacket potatoes but they look like they have just been used as projectiles in the latest Highland Games, then sent to the army range for target practice.

So unless I can find some super expensive options on Amazon then this weeks meal options will be another challenge. I’m ok, I can just walk around looking permanently pregnant thanks to my inflamed IBS. It’s more of a challenge for our Son with his set eating patterns. Moving from them causes so much anxiety for him.

“Dad I’ve got an idea. Let’s just have a week eating crisps and chocolate. Wash it down with full sugar coke. Not good for us but at least it will be fun.”

I’m so into this idea. Yes I will end up very round. Having a body that looks like the perfect figure. A 6. But is that not a better option than looking pregnant from dairy and soya intake. Decision made. Where’s that family sized packet of potato crisps.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 93 Comments

Food

Now we are into the aftermath of the Easter Egg hunt. Son is happily piling on the calories and his Dad is looking at a bowl of dairy free cornflakes. Is this what my life has been building to…..

To be fair that calorie balance is right. Son tends to be very long and always below the median weight for his height. That is tall and slim. His Paediatrician told him that it was a great excuse never to diet. His Dad is average height (or to be strictly true – 0.5 cm above average) and keeping to an ideal weight is a bit of a struggle. That is big boned.

Son’s diet has been a struggle recently. Aspergers likes order and routine. We stick to the same 7 day food rota every week. To be fair it’s a reasonable diet with much fruit and vegetables. And many sausages…… But over the last few weeks many of his foods of choice have become unavailable. This has required change and change means STRESS. On top of the enforced food switches an increased fear of becoming ill has surfaced. So now he is desperate to eat healthy and avoid too many calories.

So the parents dilemma is trying to put that into a routine which is both sustainable and is actually a balanced, healthy diet for him. That’s at a time when fresh fruit and vegetables are often much harder to source. So keeping the calorie intake sufficient going forward might be a serious challenge. He has already started to refuse foods he considers unhealthy. He’s even started to question his chocolate intake. As the paediatrician explained a couple of years back

his weight is right at the bottom of the perfect band, but don’t let it drop below that. If that means a few more bars of chocolate than usual then that’s just fine. But just watch him. We really don’t won’t to go down the line leading to eating disorder.

Eating Disorders within the Autistic community is a significant issue. Research into eating disorders such as anorexia have found that anywhere between 15% to 35% of total cases can be linked to people on the autism spectrum. However food disorder health care is still largely done in isolation from autism specialists. Autistic services continue to be squeezed as a result of government policy priorities. So improved care and support for autistics with food disorders is unlikely to improve under the current UK government.

This may well be the latest challenge our son has to face down. So long may he tuck into his chocolate egg.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 90 Comments

Cat Stew

Sometimes wonderful views take your breath away. This was taken on our last holiday. While my partner and son slept I would sneak out for an early morning run. The run would take me along a path which ran along the edge of Lake Thun. It was just stunning.

Sometimes it’s other things that take your breath away.

Last night I had made a stew. I left my steaming plate of food on the kitchen table while I delivered our son his stew and 2 tons of tomato ketchup. Crash. On my return to the kitchen I had an out of body experience. We have a very accident prone boy cat. Yes you have guessed it. He was lying in my stew. Waiter there appears to be a cat in my food. He was covered in gravy and vegetables completely oblivious to the world. He seemed most puzzled when I pushed him onto the floor. He was even more puzzled and slightly terrified as the dog decided to feast on the four legged plate. My option b meal, a cuppa soup was far less appetising.

I’m still finding bits of stew strewn around the house.

Usually the dog won’t have anything to do with the boy cat. His bestie is the girl cat. However today it’s a different story. Now he’s discovered the boy cats talent as a mobile dinner plate. He is hopefully following him around trying to be friends. Let’s hope the boy cat has learnt his lesson as tonight it’s a curry.