Pumpkin Loaf and Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

Pumpkins aren't just for Halloween you know?  If all you've ever done with a pumpkin is carve it out and stick a candle in it, then you're seriously missing out.  Don't get me wrong, it's great fun and I love scaring the kids with my silly squash faces just as much as the next gal.

But using the tasty orange centre for cooking is really where it's at.  Pumpkins are a member of the squash family and are a nutrient dense plant; which means high in vitamins - low in carbs.  So if you're into eating healthy or just into eating yummy - then this is for you!


There are all kinds of delicious dishes that you can use pumpkin for as it's a super versatile food; from pies to smoothies, salad to soup.  But I decided to go for something a little different this time and perhaps a little less healthy!  Bring on the muffins and the cake bread!

What ingredients will you need for these yummy treats?

• 1 cup plain flour
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 1/4 cup olive or sunflower oil
• 300g grated pumpkin 
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1 cup oats
• 1/2 cup raisins

Now to make them you need to mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and baking soda in a mixing bowl.  Put that to one side and mix the grated pumpkin, oil, egg and milk together, then add to the dry ingredients.  Stir them all together in the bowl until the mixture is nice and moist, then add in the raisins and oats.  

Preheat your oven to 190 or Gas Mark 5.  Grease your loaf tin and spoon in the mixture, then use the remaining amount to fill the muffin cups.  In a small bowl combine 1/3 cup brown sugar with 1 tbsp plain flour and 1 tbsp of butter and cut in until crumbly.  Sprinkle 1 rounded teaspoon of this mixture over each muffin.  Bake for 15 minutes, then sprinkle a few oats over the top and place back in the oven for a further 5 minutes or until a knife comes out clean.

Allow to cool for about 5 minutes and then serve warm.  The pumpkin loaf is lovely as a snack with butter and a big mug of tea!  

Now hold on, because we're not finished yet, you might be thinking "what on earth more can I possibly do with a pumpkin?"  You can toast the seeds is what!  Every time someone just uses a pumpkin for Halloween they throw away easily a hundred seeds or more; yet they're fantastically tasty little lunch box snacks and creative finishing touches for so many meals!  That's if they ever make it that far, mine barely last five minutes they're so yummy!

Keep your oven on as you're going to need it again soon.  So assuming you've already washed your pumpkin seeds and pulled off all the stringy flesh, (if not, now's the time!) you're going to want to spread them out over a baking tray and cover them in a few glugs of olive oil.  Now to choose the ingredients; the essential one is always sea salt but after that it's really up to you and you can make them sweet or savoury!  There's a thousand different ways of seasoning pumpkin seeds and they're all super yummy!  So get imaginative, raid your ingredients and experiment with whatever takes your fancy!  The following are some of my favourite versions (remember all of these have sea salt in too):

• 1 whisked egg white, 1/3 cup sugar and 1 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1 tsp paprika, 1 tsp cayenne and 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tbsp ground fennel and 1 tbsp chili flakes
• 1 whisked egg white and 2 tsp curry powder

Once you've chosen your ingredients give the seeds a good toss, so that they're all covered in the herbs and spices you've chosen.  If using the egg white version you'll want to pop the mixture in a bowl and then dunk the seeds in; allow them to drain a little and then place on the tray, don't put any olive oil on this version as you want them nice and sweet.  Oven bake your seeds at 180 or Gas Mark 4 for about 10 - 15 minutes until the seeds are golden, then remove and munch to your hearts content!

Lovely links - Elephant Journal

Something special to carry you into a positively charged and wonderful weekend.



The other day, thanks to a lovely little friend, I discovered a rather magical website known as Elephant Journal.  It was so beautifully put together and with so many interesting posts that I couldn't believe my life had existed before it!  It's a truly divine little net space focused on discovering your abilities, understanding yourself and exploring just what spiritual awareness and harmony can bring.  So open your mind and embrace your adventurous side, because trust me, this time it will really pay off.  The website has a definite female focus and is the most nourishing, gentle, virtual hug I've ever come across.  It not only makes you feel proud to be you and completely beautiful inside and out, it even manages to make your brain feel freshly cleansed and envigorated!

http://www.elephantjournal.com/ 

http://www.elephantjournal.com/2015/01/for-the-free-spirited-females-with-fiercely-sensitive-hearts/

Above is the link to the home page and a link to one of my favourite articles, go and have an explore for yourself and let me know what you think?

Bloglovin' Newbie

I'm Bloglovin'  - this is the new link for my Bloglovin' account!  I'm joining the blogging community one pigeon step at a time and what a wonderful world it is!  A candy floss feast for the eyes with all these beautiful little windows into fascinating and fantastic people's lives!  I think I'm in love all over again <3

How to Produce a Radio Show

Another one of my New Year's resolutions this year which has actually stuck is my promise to myself to get involved with radio once again.  I used to produce and present a show once a week on a Monday afternoon, I'd review new music and even have guests in sometimes to do live sets.  I remember being really excited on the day when Frank Turner came in to do a live interview in the studio, it was around the same time he was touring as support for Greenday.  He was such a nice, down to earth guy!  That was one of the best parts of the job - being able to meet people and get a real sense of who they were off stage and away from the spotlight of showbiz.

So last Thursday I went along for my first training session at Future Radio, it was pretty sweet to meet the other folks who I'd be training with; to swap tips on interviewing, indulge in talking about music for ages and drink far too much coffee!  I returned this week and we had a great time interviewing one another and then making our soundbites radio ready.  

Audacity is a free program which you can download to any computer, whether it's a PC or a mac.  It's super easy to use and has loads of different effects and alterations that you can make so that your track ends up sounding really professional.  A few years ago when I was originally on the radio I used to do a lot of editing, of various interviews or music beds (the music that you hear when the presenter is talking) but as it's been a while my internal decks have got a bit rusty.  It was really fun to play around with multiple tracks and edit soundbites, jingles, songs and news all together to make a smooth sounding show.  I can't wait to go back next week and get more involved!

What do you like about radio?  Would you change anything about it?

  

A look back at: January

Snow, snow, snow!  What more needs to be said about how awesome January has been?  We've had snow several times here and it's been so beautiful, big soft snowflakes like the kind you draw when you're a kid.  They even settled and turned our world into a Winter wonderland for a few days.  It was even more exciting as it meant I got to test run the new RAINBOW wellies!  Big thanks for my sister for once again scoring a big win!  It meant we can now go on proper walks across the flooded fields to see the swans, now the iced over puddles are childs play!

I've learnt a few things this January too, both practical and inspirational.  Best of all I learnt to forge!  Paul (my other half and sometimes better half!) is a blacksmith and he encouraged me to have a go at bashing metal things with big hammers.  How could a girl say no?  It was a lot of fun although really smoky when getting the fire going to heat the metal, but I loved seeing the steel shape up as I bashed with hammers larger than my arms!  We also had a go at melting copper, which was both exciting and terrifying as it was so hot - 900 degrees, that's one hell of a tan if you get too close!

So over all January has been a pretty diverse and fun month, with lots of new avenues for commissions with some new skills!  I really hope February sees me being less flu filled so I can get back out there with my new camera and do some serious exploring!  Roll on the new adventures!

How to Remove Dreads (And Not Become A Skinhead!)

I thought I would do a post on this as it's something that so many people have asked me about! Having dreads was a great decision for me, I loved the way they looked and I loved being able to decorate them with brightly coloured hair wraps and all sorts of beautiful beads. These days so many people make beautiful dread accessories that you're really spoiled for choice. It's also super fun to get some clay and beads to make your own! However it came to the time for me to take them out and make the transition back to my normal hair. I remember that I was in a yoga class and the girl in front of me was running her fingers through her hair and I realised how much I wanted to be able to do that again!

So decision made I tried to think of a way of taking them out, but they'd been in a long time and everyone I spoke to just suggested cutting them off! That would've meant having hair that was about 1cm long, no fricking way was I going to be doing that anytime soon! Especially as my main reason for saying goodbye to the 'locks was to have my long non-dreadlocked hair back. I took the tough road and decided I was just going to comb them out! So, if you're jumping on the crazy train too then welcome aboard! Here's what you're going to need to do: get 2 bottles of conditioner, this needs to be of a good quality as it's going to be the lifeline for your hairs survival. Make sure you have about 2/3 days to spare, it's going to be a really slow process and you're going to want plenty of breaks as your arms will ache like crazy! You will also need 1/2 industrial strength combs, think something that would survive the apocalypse, and then buy two! Also make sure you've got a good series lined up or a few films you want to watch, you'll be getting pretty bored over the next few hours!

It probably took me about two days in total, but that included combing well into the night! I smothered my hair in as much conditioner as humanly possible and then just combed out, starting at the very bottom and working my way to the top. There were a few knots that I had to grab the scissors for, I was never going to win with them and it's good to know when you're beat! I kept a little box on hand for all of the beads and pretty things that I'd had in my hair, so that I could make something cute from them later on. I also had a couple of plastic bags on hand for all the hair I was combing out and the old hair wraps. You will lose a lot of hair when you comb out dreads, but don't worry - if you had normal hair you'd have just brushed it out, it's just that with dreads it tends to stay put.

Once I felt like my arms were going to fall off and all the dreads (but one) were out I visited my hairdresser, The Little Hair and Beauty House. The girlies who work there are delightful little angels and it's such a cute lil place too! I kept one dread in, just as a little bit of fun, but was pleased to have my hair back and really loved the results!!!

Buttons and Twirls (How to Create Social Media Icons Post 2 of 2)

So I told you the other day about how I overcame my fear of HTML and got something to actually work on my blog, now here's some helpful info if you're trying to do the same.

Step 1 - Find the buttons you want to use, like I mentioned in my first post Design Bolts is a great place to look, or you can find links on Pinterest by searching 'free social media icons'.

Step 2 - Choose, download and open the file with your media icons, it may give you several different sizes so spend a couple of minutes deciding on the right ones to suit your style.

Step 3 - Click on 'create new post' and title it something like 'Not to Be Published' as this is a post just for you, in the background editing world.

Step 4 - Click onto the HTML setting and then by clicking the image icon upload all the buttons you want to use on your blog.  Once uploaded make sure there is a blue box around each one by left clicking on the image.  At this point it might give you options as to whether you want to centre your images or not, this is for you to decide how you want it to look on the blog.  Now click 'add selected' a whole load of HTML coding should appear, don't panic!  This means you've done it right :)

Step 5 - Switch to 'Compose' and you should see your images.  Now to link each one simply click on it and click link, if nothing happens do the same again as blogger is a bit stubborn sometimes!  When you click link insert the web address for that button (by copying from the website and pasting in the web address box) then click on 'open in new window'.  By getting it to open in a new window it means you don't have folks dragged away from your blog.  Click OK and repeat this for all the buttons you have uploaded.

Step 6 - Go back to the 'HTML' setting and copy all the text (highlight it all and press CTRL + C).  Click 'Save'.  Now head over to your 'Layout page', this can be found on your blog Dashboard, or if you're on your actual blog just click on 'Design' at the top right corner.

Step 7 -  Click on the 'Add Gadget' text and then when the box appears scroll down and click on 'HTML/Java Script'.  Click in the content box and paste (CTRL + P) your HTML text that you previously highlighted.  Click 'Save' then click 'Save Arrangement'.

Step 8 - View your blog and jump around in delight as you see the magic for real!