10 Fun Things You Didn’t Know About Me.

• I recently passed my Grade 5 piano exam.
• I love growing plants from collected seeds. I collected fallen tree seeds in Amiens and have loads of little baby trees coming up. Don’t know what to do with them!
• I make all my own cards—birthday, wedding, birth congratulations, Christmas.
• I enjoy walking in the countryside. I live in an area that is good for that. Both hills and flat areas.
• I like cooking and baking. I have written a recipe book which includes many very old recipes from my grandmother, dated 1909.
• I don’t enjoy housework, although it has to be done.
• I learned to tat when I was at school. It’s a dying art. We moved to a new school and the cookery rooms weren’t finished, so we did craft instead. The teacher offered to teach us to tat. I and my friends took her up on it.
• I have been using computers since the very first pcs came out. It was called a PET and we still have it, although it no longer works. This was in 1979.
• I hate crowds and cities, although I didn’t used to worry about it. I prefer the countryside.
• My family has farming roots. Dairy farming. My sister was still farming until last year.

What is interesting about you that we didn’t know? Let us know in the comments.

Feel free to share with your friends. Please link back to my blog if you do.

baking

I made this bun loaf. It’s delicious served in slices with butter.

Here’s the bun loaf recipe: It was one from my Mum’s sister, Auntie Millie.

Ingredients

375g flour

250g sugar

170g mixed dried fruit

1 egg

A little milk

½x5ml teaspoon mixed spice

2x20ml tablespoons marmalade

Method

Cream the margarine and sugar together until light and creamy.

Add the egg and beat well.

Fold in the flour and then add the other ingredients.

Put into a well-greased loaf tin and bake at 180C for about 1½ hours.

And now for a rock cake recipe. This was from Auntie Millie’s friend, whom I called Auntie Wyn. (In those distant days, any adult was either Mr or Mrs , or Auntie or Uncle if they were friends of the family. Children calling adults by their first names was not done.)

Ingredients

250g SR flour

125g caster sugar

125g margarine

1 egg

Dried fruit to taste.

Method

Rub margarine into flour until it resembles fine breadcrumbs. (Or use a mixer.)

Add sugar and dried fruit and mix well in.

Add the eggs. This is a very stiff mixture.

Break into pieces and bake on a baking tray at 180 o C for about 10 minutes.

They are delicious straight from the oven. Well. I suggest letting them cool a bit first!

You can find more of my family’s recipes for only 0.99 (£ or $) from today until March 6th in Viv’s Family Recipes.

This little book is not only a recipe book, but gives insight into how different things were in food preparation and cooking in the past. Some of the recipes date back to 1909, from my Grandmother. Many of these old recipes contain a lot of fat, and require long cooking.

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