• daffodil biscuits
    baking - Family Life - gingerbread

    Daffodil biscuits for spring

    March 28, 2012 - By 

    The sun is shining so I thought I would make some daffodil inspired biscuits. Daffodil biscuits for spring I baked simple biscuits using a gingerbread kit from Morrisons. The kit contains a gingerbread mix with a cutter, a tube of white icing, a sachet of golden syrup and raisins, so all you need to provide is butter and 2tsp of water. The mix made a satisfying dough which came together really easily and smelled lovely. The golden syrup made it quite sticky so I used plenty of flour when rolling out the dough. Instead of using the enclosed cutter I…

  • st patricks day biscuits
    baking - Crafts for kids - gingerbread - St Patrick's Day crafts

    St Patrick’s Day biscuits

    March 8, 2012 - By 

    To celebrate St Patrick’s Day we made some four-leafed clover biscuits and decorated them with a simple line of green icing. I always know we’ve made something that looks interesting when I see my son’s arm reaching up to grab a biscuit from the plate when he thinks I’m not looking. St Patricks Day biscuits We tried a new gingerbread dough for these biscuits – Gingerbread cookie dough from Cake & Biscuits. This was really cheap and it showed, difficult to roll without crumbling, it cut badly, tearing every time I tried to lift the shapes from the floured board…

  • baking - gingerbread

    Enjoying my kitchen

    February 20, 2012 - By 

    I have the tiniest kitchen, it is actually smaller than our bathroom, yet I spend an increasing amount of time in it. Aside from preparing seemingly endless meals for the four of us, my week isn’t complete without some baking. As space is so precious it’s really important that the products I use are both practical and stylish. The one product I must have is decent scales. I’ve gone through a few in the pursuit of perfection but my Brabantia digital kitchen scales do a great job. Most importantly they are compact – essential in my tiny London kitchen. They…

  • baking - gingerbread

    Tesco Easy Home Bake Gingerbread dough

    February 18, 2012 - By 

    I spotted a new product on the supermarket shelves last week, Tesco Easy Home Bake Gingerbread dough. I quickly hid it in the trolley before my husband could start muttering that we didn’t need to try another product! We tried this out when we fancied a bit of home baking and made some biscuits. It’s simple to use – roll the dough, cut your required shapes, place on a greased baking tray and bake for 12-15 minutes. The easiest biscuits ever! The dough is advertised as sweet and crunchy, which I was a bit sceptical about, but they were sweet…

  • baking - gingerbread - gingerbread house - Valentines Day crafts

    Valentine’s Day gingerbread house (Ikea Pepparkaka Hus)

    February 11, 2012 - By 

    Last year it was all about the felt, this year it’s all about the edible gingerbread house! I had an Ikea Pepparkaka Hus which I had bought to make over Christmas and never got round to building so it seemed like a good time to make it and decorate it for Valentine’s Day. The kit contains ready baked and stamped house pieces – front and back, two sides, two roof pieces, four small pieces to make a chimney and printed instructions. It doesn’t contain any icing or sweets to decorate but the instructions helpfully contain a recipe for icing. The…

  • baking - gingerbread

    Gingerbread for your valentine

    February 10, 2012 - By 

    A couple of weeks ago I came across a great challenge – the PinAddicts Pinterest Challenge. The idea is to choose something from your Pinterest boards to create and link up each month. As I am addicted to Pinterest I just knew I had to join in, the only choice was what to make? I searched my boards and decided upon something for Valentines Day. I couldn’t resist baking some gingerbread men and decorating them as a Valentine treat for my husband. Love is not lost in our household (despite a 2 and 23 month old trying their very best!).…

  • baking - Cath Kidston

    Biscuits fit for a Queen

    February 6, 2012 - By 

    There’s a  whiff of patriotism in the air today at the gingerbread house thanks to the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. I picked up some fantastic new cookie cutters at the weekend from Lakeland. The 3 crown cookie cutters are, according to their website, the ‘crowning’ glory of any afternoon tea table, cookies made with our trio of cutters will lend a regal air no matter what the occasion. Perfect to help celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. I absolutely love them and knocked up a quick batch of gingerbread biscuits. The image of the finished biscuits in the Lakeland magazine look amazing…

  • baking - gingerbread

    Home-baked treats for your Valentine

    February 2, 2012 - By 

    I don’t normally go overboard with Valentine’s Day but this year I haven’t been able to stop baking. I’ve been whipping up batches of cakes and biscuits and working on improving my decorating skills. They say the way to a man’s heart is via his stomach so I baked some heart shaped gingerbread for my husband, and decorated them with Renshaw’s Ready to Roll coloured icing in red for the ultimate home-baked treat. The icing was simple to use, just roll out and cut the required shape with a cookie cutter. I kept the icing in place with a brush…

  • baking - gingerbread

    Stained glass biscuits

    February 1, 2012 - By 

    I’ve wanted to try baking stained glass biscuits for a while and with Valentine’s Day fast approaching I thought I would have a practice run! Big Brother loves to bake with me so we made a simple gingerbread dough and cut out the biscuits using a heart shaped cutter. We then cut a smaller star shape out of the centre of each biscuit and baked the biscuits for about 5 minutes, until the edges went brown. To make the stained glass you simply put a couple of boiled sweets (I used red sweets) in a freezer bag and bash with…