Just one of those lazy banoffee days...

Good evening all!!
I'm not sure who paid the Sun King, but Scottish skies today were glorious - not a cloud in sight and enough blue to make a sailor a pair of trousers - most welcome as today we had friends over for a gorgeous Sunday lunch - and I think I can vouch that a wonderful foodie afternoon was had by all! (marinating ourselves slowly with cheese and wine in the sunshine was definitely my favourite part...)
So today I have for you a few sunny photographs and a delightfully kitschy dessert recipe - one of my all time favourites - banoffee pie! I have to confess that at first I got my butter measurements completely skewered and melted 200g of melted butter into 200g of digestives, with interesting results and much cursing taking place as I actually read the recipe! Anyway...

You need:
200g butter
250g digestives/plain biscuits
Can of dulche de leche or premade caramel (roughly 375ml)
4 bananas
300ml double cream
25g dark chocolate for grating!
A flat tin with a removable bottom
Melt your butter in a bowl in the microwave, and place your digestives in a plastic bag and them beat them to a fine pulp with a rolling pin - this is a great stress reliever! Mix your biscuits into the butter until it's all absorbed and then flatten the mixture into the tin so you've formed the base for your pie. Onto this, spread your dulche de leche, and then, if you are making it the day before, let these two layers set slightly in the fridge - mine chilled overnight which made for a firm base. Next, slice your bananas into pennies and place these on top of the caramel in concentric circles. Whip your cream slowly using a hand mixer (doing it the old fashioned way will give you unbelievable armache, honestly.) and then fold it over the bananas so it becomes your fourth layer. I grated some dark chocolate over the top of the pie, but you could decorate with left over banana pennies if you fancied. You can serve it at room temperature for softer caramel or pop it back in the fridge - whatever tickles your fancy!

After lunch we all staggered out into the garden for cheese and grapes (two of my favourite foods) and I spent the rest of the afternoon in a Cambozola-fuelled haze, soaking up the sun.

I hope you've all had beautiful days - I'm going to polish off the last of that pie!
Love,
Eloise xxx

Stormclouds make for sunny Easters

Best advice you ever heard, huh?











Happy Easter you wonderful people! Thank you for coming along for this intrepid bloggy ride - you make it all worthwhile!
Love,
Eloise xxx

In two shakes of a lamb's tail we'll have duck-egg skies, my love.

Hello, beautiful people!!
How are you all today? I've had a very lovely day tramping around Scottish countryside with lovely friends in the aftermath of the freakish snow we've been entreated to - and making friends with ghosts, goats, and fruitcake coloured pigs! (As well as baptizing lambs...)

So, for cold paws and rosy cheeks I prescribe...soup! But not just any soup!


For pea, baby spinach and tumeric soup you need:
3 diced onions
2 tsp tumeric
2 pints veg stock
225g baby spinach leaves, washed450g frozen peassalt and black pepper
3 tsp lemon juice

Heat some oil in a big pan and fry the onions until soft. Add the tumeric and peas and stock and simmer until are just cooked (keep the lid off if possible to retain the beautiful crisp green colour). Take off the heat, add the spinach raw and liquidise with a hand blender or otherwise! Return to heat add salt and pepper and the lemon juice, heat and serve. By not cooking the spinach you retain more vitamins as it wilts gently in the heat of the soup and as this serves six roughly you can freeze individual portions for consumption at your leisure!
I was most delighted that my nailpaint matched the duck egg hue of these beautiful bowls.

Perhaps a sign of sweeter skies to come?

Happy eating!Love,
Eloisexxx