I’ve been living in London for almost 3 years and I’m ashamed to say I’ve never really attended the English Afternoon Tea before. So finally I arranged to try the afternoon tea at the Athenaeum Hotel (apparently award winning) with the ladies. It was also a good opportunity for me to catch up with everyone since I’ve been away for 2 months.
According to Wiki, afternoon tea is a light meal typically eaten between 3pm and 5pm. Traditionally, loose tea is brewed in a teapot and served in teacups with milk and sugar. This is accompanied by sandwiches (customarilycucumber, egg and cress, fish paste, ham, and smoked salmon), scones (with clotted cream and jam, see cream tea) and usually cakes and pastries (such as Battenberg, fruit cake or Victoria sponge). The food is often served on a tiered stand; there may be no sandwiches, but bread or scones with butter or margarine and optional jam or other spread.
The spread is quite standard (nothing to shout about) but the tea is amazing. The deco seems a bit ‘cold’ and I was quite annoyed that we were pressured to leave even before we could finish our cakes as the second session was about to start.
Steph’s rating: 6/10. Will definitely try afternoon tea in another hotel.
Dav has been crazy about ferrets lately. He keeps telling me he wants to have one as a pet.
Few days ago he found a farm in London which has ferrets. So yesterday we decided to check out the farm to have a look.
The farm is located in Vauxhall, very near to the train station. It is relatively big and has quite a few animals. Now Dav is very much into the animals, while I’m indifferent. But when I saw they also have a big garden with lots of different flowers and plants, I got excited (as you can see from my pictures collection, I only have one picture of the animal!).
I LOVE the sunflower in the garden. I was surprised they have apple and grape trees too.
If you’re into animals and plants, this place is definitely worth a visit. It’s free too!
AA called it the ‘Ferrari’ of cake mixer. It is one of the best mixer one can get… it certainly is the most expensive! When I was doing research on mixers, a lot of Kitchenaid owner tend to hand down the mixer to their children. That means longevity of the equipment!
Dav wanted me to try baking Famous Amos Cookies. What a challenge. So I went in search for its recipe and found several similar recipes. Here’s the ingredients and instructions.
Ingredients
2 cups butter
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups flour
2 1/2 cups oatmeal, blended to powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
340g chocolate chips
100g nuts (your choice, I used pecan), chopped
Method
Preheat oven at 190C
Cream the butter and both sugars
Add eggs and vanilla, mix evenly
Fold in flour, oatmeal, salt, baking powder, and soda.
Add chocolate chips, grated chocolate bar and nuts. Mix well (I used my hands in a food grade plastic bag, as it is too thick for my mixer).
Roll into small balls (around 1 inch in diameter) and place two inches apart on a cookie sheet/tray.
It’s been a while since I cook or bake. So this morning I browsed through Rachel Allen’s bake book and instantly the swiss roll caught my eyes (although I have to say it doesn’t have a picture in the book.. hahahaha).
The ingredients are fairly standard baking ingredients. I just needed to get fresh double cream and strawberries as a replacement for jams. I prefer to have fresh berries in my swiss roll.
So, this evening while Dav was preparing dinner, I started preparing the roll. I have to say, baking can be extremely difficult without an electric mixer!! Dav and I took turns to whisk the egg with caster sugar for a good 30 mins!! Both our faces says it all while ‘whisking’ away… not a pretty sight. The electric mixer is definitely on top of my shopping list.
The end result is surprisingly yummy. Dav rated it a 10/10 … but of course he is biased!
Will definitely try different flavours swiss roll next time (chocolate or green tea anyone?).
