Sunday 8 January 2012

Lemon Meringue Pie...


As always with culinary experiments where one completely ignores all known recipes and just goes for it things don't always go to plan. The taste however was brilliant even though the meringue wasn't given enough time in the oven nor was it whisked for long enough looking at the resulting structure. Next time I make this I'm going to do it *after* I have bought a new mixer as I whisked this for a good 20 minutes (with a bit of help from the kids) and it still wasn't as fluffy as it should have been.


I cheated a bit and used frozen pastry (which I blind baked in the oven first) and a jar of lemon curd to make this - then used 2 egg whites and 140 grammes (that's just about 5 oz) of caster sugar which I beat for ages in a bowl I'd wiped with lemon juice first to make sure any grease left in the bowl would be removed and not spoil the meringue. i then baked it for a bit in the oven. Not the best of methods as the resulting meringue wasn't completely cooked through (though the part that was cooked was divine!) So if you want to re-create this I'd advise looking for a real recipe lol.

Borders update


Not much to say here at this point - this is how far I am with the borders so far, still only using one of each colour as mentioned in my previous post about the borders Borders.... already?  I have done as much border as I can for each colour I used in the quilt so far and will be doing the orange, yellow and red as soon as I have finished making the blocks for each colour. I have found that I rather enjoy sewing these little hexagons together and then when I go back to the 1" ones the seem so very large lol.

Screaming Oranges



I don't know if there is a better way to describe how loud these oranges are but they are anything but shy and retiring. They are so bright they make the white background look bluish. They are however perfect as a colour to be sewing with during the dark days of January just after all the Christmas stuff has been cleared up and put away and things are seeming more than a bit dull.

I'm not really sure what's next - the reddish oranges require me to cut a load of red fabrics as well to see what suits and I don't think I have enough salmon to make a full block yet.. so there too more cutting will be required.
 
I won't be adding the link to the Imgur gallery view this time - I find it really ugly and you can see it better if you go to that site itself.


This is the 32nd block and the 2nd orange one.


For more information see:  The insane hexagon quilt
To see all the quilt blocks together look here:  Insane Hexagon Project

Thursday 5 January 2012

The ghost of Christmas past...


As always after Christmas the time comes to tidy up - somehow it's always a huge mess but this year when I looked at the piles of stuff I still had to tidy up it somehow had a balance to it that made me photograph it and I rather like the resulting image so I thought I'd inflict it on you.

Wednesday 4 January 2012

Summer Sunset.


Just when you thought I'd forgotten all about my hexagons here I am back with a new block that I finished a few hours ago. Things had gone a bit more slowly due to me being busy with other projects and because I had some troubles getting the colours decided for this block and the block that is next.  This block is orangey yellows and I'm putting it with the oranges as it feels more orange than yellow to me.

This is the 31st block and the 1st orange one.
Next up: the second orange one - Screaming Orange

For more information see:  The insane hexagon quilt 
To see all the quilt blocks together look here:  Insane Hexagon Project

Time flies...

Goodness it's been a while since I last updated this - it's not that I didn't have anything to update it with - it's just that I lacked the time - below are some highlights of what I've been up to in the mean time.. Just images or I'll never catch up lol.


The WCD baking competition:



The 2+ meter strip of brown mini hexagons that I'd put in a jar for a competition elsewhere in early October.


Halloween cookies and mini cupcakes in odd (and not so odd) flavours (melon, cranberry, toffee and peach)


Taco's done our way:


The gift wrapping for oldest's "Sinterklaas suprise" for a class mate (she loved it!) that I made in 3 days flat including sewing the scraps together to make the fabric.



Christmas decorations:



 The Christmas eve bacon quiche:



Last night's dinner - Secret Chicken noodle soup: