Turmeric muffins, blogging friends & bodice ripping
Turmeric. It relieves inflammation and it chelates iron and there are plenty of high quality scientific studies showing this. As a magical substance, it sure beats rain dancing, and is more useful. This afternoon I was in whipping up a storm in the kitchen in preparation for term time (storms in my kitchen often look more like mess than completed food items). I'd made some chocolate brownie and was contemplating pumpkin muffins. Then it occurred to me that I could slip some turmeric in. This, with approximate measures for the spices as I simply tipped them from the packet, is what I made:
2 C self raising flour
3/4 C sugar
75g butter, melted
3/4 C milk
1 egg
3 small-medium pieces of roast pumpkin (which I didn't think to weigh)
1 Tablespoon cream cheese
1 teaspoon each of powdered ginger, cumin, turmeric & cinnamon
black pepper
Mix flour, spices and sugar into a bowl. Melt butter. Beat egg. Mix egg, butter and milk. Mix cream cheese and pumpkin and black pepper together roughly. Add liquid mixture and pumpkin mixture to flour and mix til just bound. Put in muffin tray (I use paper cups because anything else is too infuriating) and bake for 14 minutes at 200 degrees celsius.
Turmeric is fat soluble, so the cream cheese and butter offer that. The black pepper also increases the absorption rate of the turmeric significantly.
Taste test? They were very nice. I will make them again.
This morning I had the great pleasure of meeting up with Anna from The End is Naenae and her family. In a celebration of provincial life, they were on their way back from family time in Central Otago and chose to stay last night in Greymouth. As a 70s baby who grew into early adulthood without the internet, I'm more confident of my ability to discern friendship compatibility in a physical room. But today my confidence in my online people-reading skills was boosted - Anna has all the thoughtfulness and vivacity in a cafe setting that I've long enjoyed on her blog.
I was disappointed that I forgot to tell them about the Rotary book sale, where they could have stockpiled Virginia Andrews, Shirley Conran and Stephen King to read on the ferry. In amongst the 80s bodice rippers are sometimes some gems. I, for example, now have my own copy of Sandra Cabot's The Liver Cleansing Diet (I do object to books with the D word in the title, but was curious given my current interest in liver health), another Joanna Trollope, another Alexander Mccall Smith and a slightly random pick by someone called Jane Rogers. I also bought up on the classics of my own childhood for when Brighid is older - some Anne of Green Gables, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Noel Streatfield and Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.
There is no better way of finishing a holiday than with a novel. I'm off to bed soon with Kitty by Deborah Challinor. I've read Union Belle before, and the signs portend for some bodice ripping already, but bodice ripping on the mission stations in the Bay of Islands? Loving it so far. Enjoying stories set in Enzed doens't have to be confined to Lit. A. Ra. Ture.
2 C self raising flour
3/4 C sugar
75g butter, melted
3/4 C milk
1 egg
3 small-medium pieces of roast pumpkin (which I didn't think to weigh)
1 Tablespoon cream cheese
1 teaspoon each of powdered ginger, cumin, turmeric & cinnamon
black pepper
Mix flour, spices and sugar into a bowl. Melt butter. Beat egg. Mix egg, butter and milk. Mix cream cheese and pumpkin and black pepper together roughly. Add liquid mixture and pumpkin mixture to flour and mix til just bound. Put in muffin tray (I use paper cups because anything else is too infuriating) and bake for 14 minutes at 200 degrees celsius.
Turmeric is fat soluble, so the cream cheese and butter offer that. The black pepper also increases the absorption rate of the turmeric significantly.
Taste test? They were very nice. I will make them again.
This morning I had the great pleasure of meeting up with Anna from The End is Naenae and her family. In a celebration of provincial life, they were on their way back from family time in Central Otago and chose to stay last night in Greymouth. As a 70s baby who grew into early adulthood without the internet, I'm more confident of my ability to discern friendship compatibility in a physical room. But today my confidence in my online people-reading skills was boosted - Anna has all the thoughtfulness and vivacity in a cafe setting that I've long enjoyed on her blog.
I was disappointed that I forgot to tell them about the Rotary book sale, where they could have stockpiled Virginia Andrews, Shirley Conran and Stephen King to read on the ferry. In amongst the 80s bodice rippers are sometimes some gems. I, for example, now have my own copy of Sandra Cabot's The Liver Cleansing Diet (I do object to books with the D word in the title, but was curious given my current interest in liver health), another Joanna Trollope, another Alexander Mccall Smith and a slightly random pick by someone called Jane Rogers. I also bought up on the classics of my own childhood for when Brighid is older - some Anne of Green Gables, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Noel Streatfield and Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.
There is no better way of finishing a holiday than with a novel. I'm off to bed soon with Kitty by Deborah Challinor. I've read Union Belle before, and the signs portend for some bodice ripping already, but bodice ripping on the mission stations in the Bay of Islands? Loving it so far. Enjoying stories set in Enzed doens't have to be confined to Lit. A. Ra. Ture.
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