Perfect Cheese on Toast

A quick recipe for cheese on toast.
You might think that cheese on toast is the most simple thing in the world, some bread and a couple of slices of cheese and Bob is your proverbial uncle. However I am here to tell you that with only a couple of extra steps you could turn this simple dish into a culinary delight.

Always use a good cheese, this recipe does lift a boring cheese a bit, but for proper perfect cheese on toast use a good cheddar. I am using some Wyke Farms Mature but creamy cheddar because Wyke Farms sent me some cheeses to try. It is lovely and creamy too, not crumbly but still with a nice mature bite, so it's easy to grate.

This is handy because grating the cheese is where we begin.

Rainbow Cake

DD has always fancied making a rainbow cake. We have tried in the past and found that either the cake was pale and barely looked like a rainbow, or we had to use so much colouring that the cake tasted horrible!

As DD just came out as gay it seemed the perfect time to do this thing properly!

So I asked twitter who told me about gel colouring, specifically Wilton, when our local Hobbycraft let us down we turned to next day delivery from Amazon and on Sunday we grabbed our Mary Berry cook book and DD began her Great British Bake Off style fun. She decided that the recipe for a 4 layered cake was not good enough, so she doubled the quantities and made a 6 layer cake... it was HUGE!

Wordy Wednesday's author interview with Amanda Jennings (again)

Back in August 2015 I interviewed my friend Amanda Jennings for Wordy Wednesday. Back then she was a newish author - now she's world famous (I can say this with conviction as my blog is read all over the world, and her fame is totally down to me *cough cough*)

Then she had published two books and now she's published 3 , has an agent and even has audio versions of her books available (this always impresses me - I'm not sure why!)

So I thought it would be fun to do a catch up post and see if anything had changed in a year...

Halloween Fun, Fear and Fancy Dress

Halloween has become a proper mishmash of cultures and ideas since it all started. And who even knows when it all began? The celebration seems to have started around the ancient Gaelic festival of Samhain, a sort of harvest festival linked to the collecting of crops and the slaughter of animals for winter, the Celts also linked this time of year to a thinning of the walls between the worlds, where spirits may pass.

Later, half stolen by the church (as so many pagan festivals were) it became All Hallow's Eve, the eve of All Saint's Day (hallowed meaning holy) and All Saints day a day to honor the saints. Of course people liked to cling on to the superstitions and fears of the past too, so spirits and the departed were caught up in it all over again.

The idea of dressing up seems to stem from the Scottish tradition of guising, where children dress as the dead and perform entertainments in exchange for apples, cake and nuts. In Americia this has become trick or treat with vague threats for those households not giving treats to those dressed up!

The Day of the Dead in Mexico (Dia de Muertos)  also occurs around this time so it is of no wonder that it too is stirred into the melting pot of myth, magic, respect and fears of the dead in costume and decoration, though it's origins are slightly different.

Zombie Bride

In the US trick or treat costumes have totally moved away from those of the dead or of scariness, with people dressing as cowboys, cartoon characters and animals. But in the UK we still look to scare or at least cause a squeak of surprise with our costumes, drawing from around the world with vampires and werewolves from Eastern Europe, mummies from Egypt, voodoo and zombies from Haiti, ghouls, wraiths, goblins, ghosts and skeletons. (and even killer clowns!)

Spider Ghoul - guaranteed to give you nightmares

While I won't be attending a halloween party this year I do plan on greeting the trick or treaters that visit the house in costume!

Stop staring at my coccyx!

There is no excuse not to look fabulous while terrifying if you pop over to the Morphsuits website and check out the amazing costumes. This year I will be wearing the gorgeous Sugar Skull suit, with a mask of course. But there are many frightening suits to choose from. How about a clown costume? A monster? an alien?

What would you choose?

Pop over to Facebook and let me know - or let Morphsuits know! and visit me on twitter to see me in the suit on halloween.

You still have plenty of time to choose and buy a suit - prices start at  £9.99 and they have suits and fancy dress costumes for all shapes and sizes, adults and children.

I was sent a Sugar Skull Morphsuit in exchange for this post. And for reference, I'm a size 12/14 and the ladies large is slightly too big on me! So while there is extra room for pumpkin pie and sweets, you might be better buying a medium if you are a 12.