sweet nothings...

woooooo....
After the sad demise of our beloved week old espresso machine (which was taken back to the shop yesterday for a refund) this cute little bialetti moka pot was bought to take its place

I watched in amazement as the coffee appeared as if by magic from the little spout thing inside. I still can't quite get my head round the fact that the water manages to float upwards through the coffee thing in the middle, and transform itself into coffee in the top part!

It makes a very different kind of coffee to the espresso machine, not as strong and without the crema on top, but I think I might actually prefer it that way! It is more like a nice strong filter coffee Fun to make too

I made aubergine pasta for tea last night. I love aubergines

Aubergine, 2 tins of plum tomatoes, bunch of fresh basil, 1 tbsp dried oregano, olive oil (to cook aubergine), 1 tsp white wine vinegar, 3 cloves of crushed garlic, 1-2 chopped dried chillies.

Aubergine is chopped up and cooked with olive oil and oregano until soft and golden.

Tomatoes, garlic, chilli, vinegar and half the basil stirred in, then left to simmer for 20 mins.

The other half of the basil is added just at the end. A few more basil leaves and some grated parmesan is then sprinkled on top to make it look pretty before serving

This was the lovely breakfast I had this morning. My boyfriend bought an espresso machine yesterday when I was at work, and couldn't wait to show me what it could do this morning (hurray!)
To go with our magnificent espressos we had lovely warm toasted croissants with butter and jam The espressos were perfect too

My boyfriend made this sweet little film of Eilidh after we went to visit her and the rest of my family on Friday. It was the week of Eilidh's second birthday and my gran's 88th. We all got together from the Highlands/Italy/Stockbridge to celebrate Every time I watch this film I get all emotional!
I love it so much!

I made my favourite bean burgers for the first time in the new flat today. I love how easy they are to make, and how I always seem to have all the ingredients for them in my cupboard

Everything is all mixed together in a bowl, then squashed into six little burgers. They are brushed with a little oil before being grilled for a few minutes on each side.

I like to put them into toasted wholemeal pitta breads with some salad leaves and some lime juice flavoured greek yogurt (or ketchup if i'm feeling lazy!).

I have blogged the recipe for these before, and so I will add a link for anyone who light like to make them too http://my.opera.com/kirstycat/blog/2008/09/29/bean-burgers-and-spicy-patatas-bravas

This time I made them with a whole teaspoon of dried basil, and that was even better (chopped up fresh basil leaves are what you are supposed to use though!). I also forgot to add the chilli today, but found that they taste just as lovely without the spice!

I made this for lunch today, and then sat outside with it in the sun in my parent's lovely garden. It was heaven! It's amazing how something with only four ingredients in it can be so incredibly lovely, I put it in the same magnificent sandwich category as smoked salmon, lemon and creme fraiche

I used my mum's beautiful home made pesto (made with my dad's home grown basil!), a good quality mozzarella, really nice vine ripened tomatoes, and lovely crusty french bread from waitrose

I offered to make some fairy cakes last night, so I could have the opportunity to play with my new tubes of writing icing They only came in three colours though, which was a little disappointing! It was like drawing on my cakes, very strange!

It was a lot more difficult than I had expected too! Oh how I mocked and snorted at the simple illustrations on the box beforehand...before proceeding to cover my cakes with what looked like a drunken snail had crawled all over the icing! hehe, I think I prefer the effect of sprinkles or cherries on top, certainly much faster! It was fun trying it out though

The cakes are just my easy fairy cake recipe, 100g of butter, 100g of caster sugar and 100g of self raising flour, mixed together with two beaten eggs. I want to try out some other ways of decorating them though, normally I don't spend much time on that part of baking. Once things have been cooked they are usually eaten straight away or put in the freezer for a rainy day.










This one was still my favourite