Like a redder than red cranberry sauce just about to burst its sharp juicy baubles of berry goodness and ooze out all their festive tartness into a sweet candied condiment I'm ready to burst with Christmas cheer.
I have just watched the austere and wretched Ebenezer Scrooge energetically transform into a humanitarian figure of society in
'A Christmas Carol ' whilst nursing a home made ( of course! ) mince pie . Eartha Kitts sultry rendition of ' Santa Baby ' is smoothing its dulcet tones around my kitchen and Christmas cake no.2 is just about to be stabbed sadomasochistically to test for readiness.
The problem is that it is 7am on a Sunday morning.
My early morning Christmas kitchen
I say a problem, to me there is no predicament it is R that it causes much distress. I think that over time my body has become intolerable to sleep choosing instead to switch a high voltage strip light on in my minds eye making it glaringly impossible to ignore. Over time i have come to grown quite annoyingly fond of these moments as they do proceed in giving me a heads start into the day before me, perhaps not the healthiest way to look at my sleep deprivation but after all is not true that all the greatest entrepreneur have their best money making brainstorming ideas at night? ( I'm still waiting ). Whilst my brain engages in a white knuckle roller coaster ride of food induced ideas my body has become perfectly trained to stay patiently motionless so my agitated behaviour does not stir my unknowing husband.
Eventually i become unable to bear the inner sounds of my multitasking thoughts and if timed correctly can make my way surreptitiously out of bed and skulk my way down the stairs unheard, a talent that has taken some time to perfect.
Going back to my festively productive morning, i was feeling an over whelming sense of achievement at the tasks i had undertaken all before the light of dawn as my phone rang, it was R. Thinking that he had been awoken gracefully by the mildly spiced aromas of my Christmas cakes i was all to eager to answer thinking that i was about to receive a congratulatory phone call, smugly i answered -
R: Is it necessary that you use every kitchen appliance at this ridiculous time in the morning?
Me: Erm...
R: Or that you insist on watching annoyingly merry Christmas films at high volumes that bore through the living room ceiling into our bedroom?
Me: Er...
R: And how long has that oven been on for??
I was quite clearly getting the picture, old grumpy pants upstairs was awake and not happy that his lie in has been rudely interrupted by my attempts to bring some seasonal festivity's into our house hold.
The thing is this overenthusiastic compulsion of mine is a habit that I'm not to willing to give up, Ive just had to simply make some slight adjustments to my own production of ' Nigellas Christmas Kitchen ' Ive got going on in the early hours of a Sunday morning.
The next week like clockwork in the early hours of my day off my mind started to indulge its self within the task i was about to embark on , I tiptoed around the known creaky floor boards, pitter - pattered down the stairs and popped my earphones in to send waves of lyrically festive songs throughout my veins, unable to be herd by any other members of the household. The intended recipe was ( of course ) a pre - Christmas morning muffin, i say pre - Christmas as the act of eating a muffin on Christmas morning seems to me like an endurance on your stomach given the fact that you are probably going to secretly challenge yourself to an eating contest during your likely to be enormous Christmas feast. Start off small i say and build up yourself to a massive crescendo by over indulging on that lonely looking last piece of trifle or that solitary piece of Stilton when everyone else has given up and gone to bed.
Brimming with cinnamon, nutmeg and crammed packed with dried cranberries these have been the first muffins that don't try to be an imitation of a stodgy, hard to swallow cake, with the assistance of some polenta and a gratifying amount of white chocolate, these muffins make even the most mean spirited Christmas humbug a chestnuts roasting on the fire type of warming glow.
Pre weighed ingredients and muffin tins prepared the night before the mixture only needing a gentile stir with a wooden spoon so there was no need to use my pneumatic drill sounding mixer and no chance of stirring the light sleeping ogre upstairs nor was it likely that i was to have any energy wasting accusations thrown at me via the phone.
Pre - Christmas Cranberry and White Chocolate Muffins
250g plain flour
50g polenta
2 tsps baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarb of soda
1/2 tsp mixed spice
1/2 tsp grated nutmeg
150g caster sugar
100g white chocolate chunks / chips
100g dried cranberries
90ml vegetable oil
1 free range egg
200ml milk
Preheat the oven to 200oc and line a muffin tray with with the muffin cases.
Place the flour, polenta, baking powder, bicarb of soda, spices and the sugar into a bowl then stir in your white chocolate and cranberries.
In a jug mix together the vegetable oil, egg and the milk then pour over the bowl of dry ingredients.
Stir gently with a wooden spoon until it just comes together, lumps are no bad thing!
Divide between the cases and bake for around 20 Min's.
These muffins are best eaten as soon as there cool enough to digest but if like me you make them at a time when not even the early morning birds have started singing, simply warm them up in a microwave or in a low oven to recreate that just baked freshness.
I have just watched the austere and wretched Ebenezer Scrooge energetically transform into a humanitarian figure of society in
'A Christmas Carol ' whilst nursing a home made ( of course! ) mince pie . Eartha Kitts sultry rendition of ' Santa Baby ' is smoothing its dulcet tones around my kitchen and Christmas cake no.2 is just about to be stabbed sadomasochistically to test for readiness.
The problem is that it is 7am on a Sunday morning.
My early morning Christmas kitchen
I say a problem, to me there is no predicament it is R that it causes much distress. I think that over time my body has become intolerable to sleep choosing instead to switch a high voltage strip light on in my minds eye making it glaringly impossible to ignore. Over time i have come to grown quite annoyingly fond of these moments as they do proceed in giving me a heads start into the day before me, perhaps not the healthiest way to look at my sleep deprivation but after all is not true that all the greatest entrepreneur have their best money making brainstorming ideas at night? ( I'm still waiting ). Whilst my brain engages in a white knuckle roller coaster ride of food induced ideas my body has become perfectly trained to stay patiently motionless so my agitated behaviour does not stir my unknowing husband.
Eventually i become unable to bear the inner sounds of my multitasking thoughts and if timed correctly can make my way surreptitiously out of bed and skulk my way down the stairs unheard, a talent that has taken some time to perfect.
Going back to my festively productive morning, i was feeling an over whelming sense of achievement at the tasks i had undertaken all before the light of dawn as my phone rang, it was R. Thinking that he had been awoken gracefully by the mildly spiced aromas of my Christmas cakes i was all to eager to answer thinking that i was about to receive a congratulatory phone call, smugly i answered -
R: Is it necessary that you use every kitchen appliance at this ridiculous time in the morning?
Me: Erm...
R: Or that you insist on watching annoyingly merry Christmas films at high volumes that bore through the living room ceiling into our bedroom?
Me: Er...
R: And how long has that oven been on for??
I was quite clearly getting the picture, old grumpy pants upstairs was awake and not happy that his lie in has been rudely interrupted by my attempts to bring some seasonal festivity's into our house hold.
The thing is this overenthusiastic compulsion of mine is a habit that I'm not to willing to give up, Ive just had to simply make some slight adjustments to my own production of ' Nigellas Christmas Kitchen ' Ive got going on in the early hours of a Sunday morning.
The next week like clockwork in the early hours of my day off my mind started to indulge its self within the task i was about to embark on , I tiptoed around the known creaky floor boards, pitter - pattered down the stairs and popped my earphones in to send waves of lyrically festive songs throughout my veins, unable to be herd by any other members of the household. The intended recipe was ( of course ) a pre - Christmas morning muffin, i say pre - Christmas as the act of eating a muffin on Christmas morning seems to me like an endurance on your stomach given the fact that you are probably going to secretly challenge yourself to an eating contest during your likely to be enormous Christmas feast. Start off small i say and build up yourself to a massive crescendo by over indulging on that lonely looking last piece of trifle or that solitary piece of Stilton when everyone else has given up and gone to bed.
Brimming with cinnamon, nutmeg and crammed packed with dried cranberries these have been the first muffins that don't try to be an imitation of a stodgy, hard to swallow cake, with the assistance of some polenta and a gratifying amount of white chocolate, these muffins make even the most mean spirited Christmas humbug a chestnuts roasting on the fire type of warming glow.
Pre weighed ingredients and muffin tins prepared the night before the mixture only needing a gentile stir with a wooden spoon so there was no need to use my pneumatic drill sounding mixer and no chance of stirring the light sleeping ogre upstairs nor was it likely that i was to have any energy wasting accusations thrown at me via the phone.
Pre - Christmas Cranberry and White Chocolate Muffins
250g plain flour
50g polenta
2 tsps baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarb of soda
1/2 tsp mixed spice
1/2 tsp grated nutmeg
150g caster sugar
100g white chocolate chunks / chips
100g dried cranberries
90ml vegetable oil
1 free range egg
200ml milk
Preheat the oven to 200oc and line a muffin tray with with the muffin cases.
Place the flour, polenta, baking powder, bicarb of soda, spices and the sugar into a bowl then stir in your white chocolate and cranberries.
In a jug mix together the vegetable oil, egg and the milk then pour over the bowl of dry ingredients.
Stir gently with a wooden spoon until it just comes together, lumps are no bad thing!
Divide between the cases and bake for around 20 Min's.
These muffins are best eaten as soon as there cool enough to digest but if like me you make them at a time when not even the early morning birds have started singing, simply warm them up in a microwave or in a low oven to recreate that just baked freshness.
No comments:
Post a Comment