Cat Sitting

This weekend, I am back at my mum's house cat-sitting Muffin for her while she's in Amsterdam.  My first week in my new home and a bit of a busy week at work, made this the perfect plan.  We lit fires, made apple crumble and gave Muffin lots of TLC.  I did squeeze a little housey-shopping in and got a heart shaped bath mat and some colourful knifes.

 Apple Crumble straight out of the oven, ready to be devoured 

So comforting on a cold and windy day

 Admiring my work in-front of the fire which we kept on the whole evening

 Sunday morning, woke up to muffin snoozing on my make-up bag in the bathroom

To make a comforting warming crumble you will need:

100g Butter

100g Flour

50-75g Sugar plus 3 table spoons for the apples

3 Apples

2 tsp Cinnamon

2 whole cloves

This is a very quick and very tasty recipe. Pre-heat your oven to 180°C, then peel, cut in half, and slice the apples.  In a blender, or by using your fingertips, mix the flour, sugar and butter until you get dry yet buttery crumbs. Add the apple slices to a bake-proof dish and mix 3 tablespoons of sugar, cinnamon and the two cloves so each apple slice has a bit of both.  Pour the crumbs on top and pop into the oven for about 45 minutes until golden on the top.

On a cold day, anyone you're with will be thankful for this, and they may even stroke you to sleep in return

Birthday 27

Last week was quite busy and exciting.  It was my older Brother's birthday on Saturday and we had a mini BBQ party for him at my mum's house.  I volunteered to make him his cake this year and thought long and hard about what he would like.  I chose to go with a light raspberry and cream sponge with was inspired by the classic British Victoria Sponge (Which my mum used to make us for many birthdays).

I used the wonderful weather to ride my bike, a 21st birthday present to Coop to get all the goodies. One of the perks of living in Switzerland - everywhere is accessible by bike !

On my bike, the Roadcat with ingredients on the back

 The cake in action with the candles

 Fresh raspberries, white chocolate '27' and a star on top

200g Butter make the cake yummy !

 Mum's cat Moon Muffin

 Found a snail on the way back to the car

To make this summer celebration treat:


200g (~1cup) Butter at room temperature
200g (1cup) Sugar
4 Eggs
200g (1.5 cup) Flour
2 Tablespoons baking powder
1 Tablespoon of Orange Zest/or Lemon
as much Vanilla essence as you wish


For Filling/top
250g Raspberries
500ml Cream
1/2 cup icing sugar
white chocolate
50g butter

Pre-heat oven to 180 °C (375°F). Cream butter & sugar, then add each egg one by one and mix (if it curdles, add a spoon of flour with each egg). Stir in the essence & peel,  then sift in the flour & baking powder while carefully folding it into the mixture.  Bake in oven for about 20 min if you split the mix between two cake tins.  If you choose to split the cake later, bake for about 25 min, then lower temp to 130 °C for another 15-20 min.

 To decorate add generous layer of whipped cream on bottom half and sprinkle raspberries all over. To ice, mix a few blended rasberries & a spoon of sugar & vanilla essence with the left-over cream and spead all over top. Add last rasberries & to make decorations, melt some white chocolate, spread on a greased plate/surface & mould with cookie cutters, or cut out number/letters with knife and cool in fridge until needed.

P.S Because of all the baking on Friday, my love suggested that he make his special southern spiced burgers for dinner.  We did a bit of teamwork and I made these lazy amazing 'chips'. Par-boiled potatoes for 15 min, slice, then drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt & fresh rosemary and pop in the oven until golden! hmmmmm! 

 Lazy but amazing 'chips'