Christmas

Wherever you are I hope you all had a lovely Christmas! Did you get lots of rest & treats? 
Hilariously, Christmas lunch swiftly turned into Christmas dinner this year after an electric malfunction. 
Only on Christmas Day of course! 

Whilst the head elf sorted all the food out, the rest of us walked Scooby along the beach. He sprung along with not a care in the world, with his finest Christmas ribbon flying in the wind.

On the way back, we spotted Father Christmas on the last of his rounds and stopped off at a pub in Kemp Town for a festive drink with the locals and some carol singing. 

Upon our merry return, we were greeted with canapés (those elves do work hard you know) and began dishing out the presents. 

Rudolph Bark

Twas the night before Christmas...

And a little snowy robin hopped on to my windowsill & let me into a Christmas secret: St Nicholas has his eyes on all things delicious, shiny & new this year. He wants a bit of pizzazz at the bottom of that sooty chimney. 
I think he may have finally had enough of those mince pies too, the gossip between the elves is that Santa has a gluten based issue. No pies for him. He's gone all LA on us kids. 

Of course, we've got to cater for Father Christmas's needs (or there will be no pressies!) so we've upgraded to double chocolate marbled Rudolph bark. 

Dark and white chocolate marble, scattered with crushed pretzels and glittered with dried fruit & nuts. 

You'll need:

200g dark chocolate 
200g white chocolate
150g dried fruit & nuts Christmas mix
50g raisins 
25g pretzels 

I used this mix: 

But if you can't get a mix, just use 100g of mixed nuts & 50g of fruit, or the other way round depending on whichever you prefer.

Start by breaking the chocolate up into a microwaveable bowls then melt it in the microwave for 2 minutes.

Double wrap a baking tray with cling film

Dollop the melted chocolate onto the baking tray, taking turns to spoon the white chocolate then the dark chocolate

Now for the fun part, marble it with a thin knife, swish it about. Make a pretty pattern, you know what to do. 

The chocolate may need some teasing with the aid of gravity. Try and get it into a nice block shape.

Toss on the fruit & nut mix 

Sprinkle over the raisins. 

The salty pretzels help to bring out the flavour in the dark chocolate. So, break off chunks from each pretzel and scatter over the chocolate marbled bark.

 Stick the Rudolph bark in the fridge for an hour or so to set.(Pasta sauce, yoghurt & potatoes optional) 

Et voila!

Snap, break, smash your Rudolph bark.

And to gift any leftovers bunch up in cellophane wrap & add a suitably festive ribbon. 

Enjoy! Eat, drink, & be merry! 

Supernova

Yesterday I woke up with a stuffy head, bundled myself up in my scarf and begrudgingly headed out to get some air.
The chestnut man cried "hot chestnuts, get ya hot chestnuts" it echoed down the street and seemed to stop just where Supernova sits, a little soup kitchen with only a cluster of chairs, selling hot homemade soup and crusty toasties. 

We both opted for a hearty lunch of roast pepper, lentil & bacon soup topped with local cheddar and a good ol' ham & cheese toastie. 
Then it was on to find coffee... 

Stonehenge - Salisbury

C's family have been over from the East Coast. 

Never one to miss out on a bit of a road trip (full of snacks and sing-alongs), some tourist attractions and buckets of pub grub, I hopped into the car and we to hit the road.

A scarf that can give me a good hug on a cold, bleak morning comes very high up on my list of essential winter buys.
My red & navy tartan scarf is from Zara. 
It's huge! Super soft and snuggly and huge. I already said that, but it could probably double as a blanket...picnic anyone?