Baking challenge - Black Doris Plum and Rhubarb cake from 'The Caker' cookbook.

I'm a big fan of black doris plums - along with omega plums they would be up there is my favourite varieties. There is just something so scrumptious about them, delicious sweet, yet tart and full of flavour. I also love stewed rhubarb for the same reason - the delectable tartness and that feeling of it really being autumn when you eat it. The taste to me, conjures up crisp clear mornings and cool evenings, eating apple and rhubarb crumble in front of the fire.

So with these thoughts in mind, how could I resist the black doris plum and rhubarb cake recipe?

The Caker (also known as Jordan Rondel) is a master of using interesting and unique ingredients to create cake masterpieces. With delectable treats such as 'Roasted Apricot and Quinoa Cakes with Rosemary' and 'Caramel Cake with Sea Salt and Fennel Seeds', there is nothing run of the mill about this book. And that is just how I like it! For those of you who may be dairy/gluten intolerant, you might be interested to know that quite a few of her recipes are dairy/gluten free :)

Anyway, with the weather looking dreary outside, Henry sleeping and Vivi tucked up on the couch with her favourite cartoon on, it was the perfect day to bake a cake!

The recipe called for rhubarb 'poached' in orange juice. This is a really easy way to stew rhubarb - basically, all you need to do is chop it up, throw it into a saucepan, and add enough orange juice to cover it. Then bring it to the boil and simmer for 5 minutes.

And even easier, the black doris plums just needed to be taken out of the tin, and halved and stoned (haha) sweet!

So after making the batter, I had to divide it between two cake tins, and then spread the rhubarb and plums on top. I was a bit dubious about the amount of topping (it seemed more than the batter) but upon checking the cake in the oven, it appeared that the cake had risen significantly and that the fruit had sunk down into the cake, ensuring layers of deliciousness upon eating. Mmmm.....

Fresh out of the oven.

The next step was to allow the cake to cool and then ice it with a delectable cream cheese icing. The cool part here was making pink cream cheese icing using a black doris plum - just chuck it in the icing mixture and blend it up, thus eliminating a need to use food colouring! In this cake, icing was required between the two layers, and then on top as well. I ended up with HEAPS of icing left over, but luckily my little person was able to help me eat it :)

'Helping' Mummy!

Lastly, the finishing touches were added. The author recommends using things like fresh flowers to decorate cakes, so I thought 'why the hell not' and foraged outside in the garden for a bit before coming across the last blooms of the pink rock roses and a white rose. Not bad considering it's nearly winter!

Sandwiched together with cream cheese icing.

Lastly, there was nothing left to do but eat the darn thing. I mean, damn! although it went down rather well after spending over an hour in the early evening trying to settle the baby down to sleep (he must have known he was missing out)

The reward :)

Seriously?

Ok, so I get that my son is small. He is almost six months old and weighs about the same amount as an average two month old. He was born small (two weeks late and barely over the 3kg mark), he has been small ever since, and I think we can safely rule out him ever being 6'2.

But what really annoys me, is how many comments we receive on a daily basis regarding his size. Why is it that people seem to think it's funny to compare him to other babies his age?

Yesterday I attended a playgroup where one woman laughingly commented 'He's probably smaller than Thomas' (pointing to her seven week old baby). Maybe she was just trying to make conversation, but it's those kinds of comments that really piss me off. Why is it that people always feel the need to compare babies in terms of their size? I suppose it's because when all they do is eat, poop, and sleep there's not much else to talk about? but it's 'conversations' like the one I had the misfortune of being part of today that really upset me.

'How old' asks a woman holding a baby at a playgroup I attended this morning.

'Six months' I reply

'Really?' she says, with a look of complete disbelief.

'Yes.'

'Really?!!'

'Yes, Really. He's six months old.' I reply. What, does she think I don't know how old my own son is?!

'But he's so tiny..... I mean, look at Jack' she holds out her own baby who is about double Henry's size. 'He's seven months and he's huge next to your boy!'

'Well, they're all different, aren't they.' I reply before walking off. I don't want to lose my temper, but boy it's tempting to tell her where to stick it.

I really wish people would keep their thoughts to themselves sometimes :(

Marmalade

About a week or so ago we got given a HUGE bag of yummy organic grapefruit, grown by Peter who Tim carpools in to work with every day. I don't know about any of you, but I struggle to know what to do with grapefruit. I mean, it's good as a breakfast if you're on one of those crazy diets and probably nice crushed up in some kind of cocktail (mmm..... Seabreeze....sigh) but since those days are well and truly over I was at a loss as to what to do with it. Then it occurred to me, I would make marmalade! I mean, what yoghurt maker wouldn't want to master the fine art of marmalade making?

So I set out on my marmalade adventure on Sunday, thinking that surely I would have fresh marmalade made by that afternoon, just in time to spread on a bit of toast for afternoon tea.

Boy was I mistaken.

Firstly, you need to blitz the grapefruit (and a couple of lemons) in the food processor (or chop them up but honestly, who could be bothered doing that!) and then soak them in a bowl full of water. Overnight. Oh, and did I forget to mention that before you do this, you need to deseed them (which takes AGES). Sigh.

Then, the next day you need to place the tangy smelling concoction in a large saucepan, boil for 45 minutes to soften the fruit, and then measure the pulp, before placing it back in the liquid and adding the required amount of sugar. You're supposed to add one cup of sugar per one cup of pulp, but I just guessed it, hoping for the best.

Next you just boil the c@#p out of it until it reaches the 'setting stage' and then pour it into sterilised jars. Phew.

And that's it!

So that is why it has taken me until today to actually make the marmalade.

Here is a picture of it in it's finished perfection:

Anxiety

One of the hardest aspects for me regarding being a parent is how to manage the anxiety that I feel on an almost daily basis.

For me, the anxiety is caused by the overload of information out there. I'm talking about what you read in the newspaper, on the internet, in books, on TV...... with such a wealth of information, it's hard to discriminate between what is useful for you as an individual and what isn't. It's so easy to just google a problem that you may be having, but this can lead to conflicting advice. For instance, I recently went through a stage where my son was not sleeping for longer than 45 minutes at a time. In hindsight, this was just a phase he was going through and I should have known that like all phases, it would eventually pass. However, I got really wound up in finding 'a cure' for his catnapping. I talked to other parents, I posed questions on Facebook and on parenting forums. I googled endlessly for a 'solution'. All the advice I received made me feel more and more confused as to how to proceed. Should I play white noise through an iphone like one friend had suggested? should I wear him in a sling? feed him back to sleep? take him for a car ride to try to get him to sleep longer? the more advice I received, the more confused and anxious I became.

A lesson I have learnt through this experience is to parent your kids in a way that feels right to you. Trust your instincts. It is so easy to get caught up in the latest 'fad' of parenting, or to feel as though you're not doing an adequate job because you are not doing the same thing as everyone else. Another thing that has helped is learning acceptance. It feels like forever at the time, especially when you are going through a rough patch with your baby, but it won't last forever. This too will pass - a useful piece of advice from a friend that I keep in the forefront of my mind when things get tough. I like to think that raising kids is a mixed bag - the best of times and the worst of times all rolled into one. I'm not going to delude myself and feel disappointed because it's not what I expected when I set out on this parenting journey. There are magical moments, sure, but the majority of the time it's routine, it's repetitive, and it's damn hard work. But is it worthwhile? of course. That goes without saying.

Sleep like a baby - yeah, right!

Everyone has heard the phrase 'sleep like a baby', right?

It seems that everyone but our son understands it's meaning!

To Henry is seems that 'sleep like a baby' means to only sleep for half an hour at a time during the day, forty five minutes tops!

He fooled us into thinking that it was going to be easier this time around. For the first six weeks of his life it has difficult to keep him awake. He would sleep anywhere, through any amount of noise. His sleeps would last around 2 - 2 1/2 hours at a time. I should have known it was all too good to be true.....

These days, the boy just doesn't want to sleep!

Take this morning for example, here is what has happened so far:

6am - Henry wakes up for the day.
8am - he is put down for his first sleep of the morning. He wakes up again at 8:30am!!!!
10am - back to bed for another catnap (opps, I mean "sleep"). He doesn't want to go to sleep even though he's been rubbing his eyes like mad and yawning heaps. He is finally asleep by 10:30am after lots of rocking, white noise, swaddling etc.
11:15am - Awake once again!!

It's only 12:30 and it feels like it should be the end of the day already. I've had enough. Seriously. It's hard to adequately describe how depressing it is to be pacing around the house with a crying baby in the sling, trying to get them to sleep. You pace and pace and pace, passing mountains of washing as you go, dishes that aren't going to be washed anytime soon and all the while your toddler is screaming for attention too, but you know that if you stop moving, your baby won't go to sleep.

According to most books and websites, babies aged around 3 months need between 4-5 hours sleep during the day (broken up into two long sleeps and one shortish nap). At the moment, our son is getting around 2 hours sleep during the day in total.

For instance, one well known baby sleep manual suggests letting your baby 'self settle' after being awake two hours, and then 'waking them up' after they've been asleep for two hours, wow, that is some great advice. I can imagine parents to be reading it thinking 'that's easy - I'll just put my baby to bed and then wake them up two hours later', as if it was that simple. So when my son wakes up after only half an hour of being asleep, should I just let him lay there screaming for another hour and a half until the official 'wake up times'? nice one!

It's just depressing.

The silver lining for us though, is that Henry is an awesome sleeper at night (once he goes to sleep). He wakes up once and that's it - feeds, then goes straight back to sleep, so I can't really complain.

I just keep reminding myself that 'this too will pass'.

One day.

Good thing he's so darn cute.

I was once idealistic too.....!

Ah, my parenting ideals..... where have you disappeared to?

I'm sorry to say that they disappeared into the ether as soon as we had children.

You know  - the standards that you are sure you will aspire to (and attain) when you have small children of your own.

I remember taking a plane trip many years ago, with my husband. We were on our way back from Bangkok to Sydney - a nine hour flight. During that time, the family seated in front of us had a young kid that screamed the whole time (well, what felt like the whole time to us). I recall thinking 'his parents obviously haven't put enough effort into parenting him properly' and that 'no child of mine will ever carry on in such a way!' I also used to scoff at people who let their kids watch TV, gave them dummies, and let them 'run riot' in people's houses (our house, typically!). Boy have I changed my tune since then. I look back on those days and feel a huge sense of embarrassment at how opinionated and sure of myself I was, as though a child's behaviour could be a direct result of the energy and time a parent puts into them (and sure, there is some truth in that but at the same time it's not so straightforward).

Here are some of the ideals I used to uphold about being a parent:

My child/ren will never watch TV:
For many years my husband and I didn't own a TV (I hadn't owned one since I was around 19) and I was adamant that our children would grow up without a TV in the house too. I had read numerous books on the subject, and was very wary about children growing up exposed to media influences not to mention the effect of TV on young minds when children are at the age when they cannot distinguish between fantasy and reality. Well fast forward two years and our daughter now knows all of the wiggles by both name and colour and is fast being acquainted with Dora the Explorer. Let's just say breastfeeding a baby and occupying a toddler at the same time has proved more difficult than I anticipated. 'Feeding time toy boxes' just didn't cut it!

I will never have one of 'those kids' who run wild through my friend's houses:
Oh how far this is from the truth. I have realised over time that no amount of telling a toddler not to touch great aunt nellie's special vase or that beautiful antique dolls house that belongs to your trendy childless friends is going to deter them from doing what they do naturally - being curious creatures, the world really is their oyster and they are going to seize it with both of their chubby little hands. Literally. I know some people that spend the whole time following their child around when they go to someone's house, averting potential disasters, but that must be exhausting. You might as well just stay at home!

My child won't be a fussy eater:
I used to believe that fussy eating was a direct result of a parent being 'too lazy' to give their child 'proper food' (ie, home-made and free from additives and sugar and other nasties). This belief began eroding away when our daughter's reflux gave her an aversion to being fed - firstly by bottle and then she became very picky with what she ate as a result of months of being in pain without it being properly managed. I now understand that sometimes you will give your kid crap food for dinner - you may not want to, but when the little blighters downright refuse to eat anything else and you know that they will probably wake up hungry during the night as a result, a couple of chicken nuggets really isn't the evil you originally thought it was.

Our daughter will be breastfed, not bottle fed:
Before our daughter was born, I knew that we would be breastfeeding her. After all, it was the best source of nutrition and as everyone knows, breast is best. I had never gambled on having a child who simply refused to latch on from the moment she was born. After weeks of persevering, and three months of expressing milk every three hours around the clock I finally gave up.

No child of mine will ever use a dummy!
After spending the past few years before having children observing my cousin and her son who still had a dummy at age four, I knew that this wasn't a track I wanted to go down. But then we had Vivi and she would scream and scream in pain from reflux. For hours. The only thing that brought us some peace and her a bit of relief was a dummy. However, I am pleased to say she graduated on to chewing a grotty old bit of fabric instead.

Our child will fit into our life, and our life will carry on as normal:
Ok, who was I trying to kid here! and how the hell did I ever think that things would just carry on as though nothing had changed?! Talk about naive!

What were/are your ideals regarding parenting?

Muesli

So a few weeks ago we were at the Martinborough farmer's market, visiting Tim's Dad who has a stall there for Lighthouse Gin (a seriously nice gin that he helps produce). Anyway, as we were wandering around the market sampling the local delicacies, I came across a stall that sold, among other things, home made muesli. 'Try this', the trendy lady at the stall said 'it's packed full of goodies and I know your little one will love it'. She passed a small sample of the muesli over to our daughter, who gobbled it up, then added 'so will you be buying some of this today?'

I picked up a bag in the ruse of examining it's contents while glancing furtively at the price tag. $11 for a small bag of muesli! I mean, I'm all for supporting cottage industries and people at these farmers markets but I knew I could make this myself at a fraction of the cost - and get to put whatever I liked in it.

Needless to say, I politely declined to buy the muesli, although we did buy a bottle of an excellent sauce called 'wild meat sauce' - you can get it from:  http://glasseyecreek.co.nz/ and I would really recommend it!

Anyway, so today when pondering what to have for a quick and easy lunch (during the five minutes I got when both kids were asleep) I decided to make my own muesli. I mean, I wouldn't be an authentic 'yoghurt maker' if I didn't have home made muesli in the pantry now, would I?

And as it turns out, it's dead easy!

Here is how it's done, for anyone who is interested in such things.

Yoghurt maker's muesli

Ingredients:
3 cups rolled oats (I used Harraways)
1/2 cup coconut
1/2 cup pumpkin and sunflower seeds
1/2 cup sesame seeds
1/2 cup bran flakes
3/4 cup sultanas (or any dried fruit - cranberries are also very nice)
1/2 cup nuts (I used almonds)
1/4 cup canola oil
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup brown sugar

Method:
Heat your oven to 140℃. Mix the rolled oats, coconut, seeds, bran, and nuts in a large bowl. In a saucepan heat the canola oil, brown sugar, and honey on a medium heat until the sugar has dissolved. Pour the liquid mixture over the dry mixture and spread mixture out into a roasting pan. Bake for around 45 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from oven and mix in the dried fruit.

Seriously, how easy is that?!

Oh, and it tastes excellent when eaten with yoghurt (home made, of course) :)

Muesli fresh out of the oven!

What I love about being a parent

As yesterday's blog post was rather frazzled and a tad on the negative side, I'm going to spend this one writing about what I love about my children, and about parenthood.

We have two beautiful children. A girl, and a boy, exactly 23 months between them.

Our daughter is a whirlwind of energy. Her name 'Vivienne' is french for 'lively' and I don't think I could imagine a more appropriate name. From the beginning of each day she is constantly on the go, racing here there and everywhere - exploring, using her imagination, keen to discover new things. She loves having stories read to her, and her current favourites are the 'Greedy cat' series and 'Mrs. Wishy Washy'. She loves to sing and play with her dolls house, telling me all about what the dolls are doing. This morning it was: 'the dolls are in timeout' because 'they didn't eat their dinner' - her explanation as to why all the dolls were crammed into one room of the dolls house (with all the furniture too for good measure). She drives me mad with her obsession with 'The Wiggles' and insisting on naming colours for the wiggle they correspond to. For instance, her favourite yellow top is her 'sam top' (Sam is the yellow wiggle for those not in the know!) and her favourite purple cup is her 'Jeff cup'. She currently thinks it is hilarious to go into our bedroom in the morning and shout 'wake up Daddy' to her sleeping father. Vivi doesn't just sit back and let life pass her by, she actively pursues it and knows exactly what she wants. I admire her determination and persistance.


Our son, Henry is 15 weeks old. He has a cute little blonde mohawk and blue eyes. On the whole he is a really settled and sweet boy. One of the things I love about him are those little moments you get where you really understand the innocence of babies at this age - those smiles they give you that lights up their whole face, the way they hold their hands in front of them and look at them in wonder and you can just imagine them thinking 'wow, these are mine!'. I love the way that he curls his body up into the foetal position when I pick him up out of his bassinet in the morning. I love his perfectly formed fingers and tiny little toes. I love how fragile he is and how forgiving. He forgives me for not being able to run to him every time he cries, he forgives me for having to put his needs second sometimes as I juggle being the mother to two children. He forgives me my faults and gives me those sweet little smiles that melt my heart.


And as to parenthood itself? well this is probably a cliche but it has given my life so much more meaning. You no longer put yourself and your own needs first, but that of your children. Life before Vivi and Henry just seems so empty and meaningless now when I look back on it. As overwhelmed as I feel at times, and in the depths of despair because nothing is going as planned I still feel an incredible sense of privilege at being able to be a parent.