I don't know what it is about circus graphics that delight me so. I've had these circus and carousel tins for ages. And what better thing to fill them with than some home made...
Peanut Butter Cookies!
1/2 cup butter or margarine
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup peanut butter
1 egg
3/4 teaspoon bicarb
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/4 cups flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
Cream sugars, butter or margarine, and peanut butter. Beat in egg, then stir in remaining ingredients. Shape dough into a small balls; place on lightly greased baking sheets then press the dough balls down with a fork to make ridges down the center.
Dip fork tines in flour the fork each time before pressing a cookie. Bake at 350° for about 12 minutes. (Bake for a little less time for chewier cookies.) Makes about 2 dozen peanut butter cookies.
This is the bag worn by Vanessa Hodgens (Gabrielle) in High School Musical 3. It was woven by Zanele this weekend just so that you could see a decent picture of it. Thanks so much, Zanele!
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I have always loved pottering around junk shops - so much so that I have created whole holidays with a junk shop itinerary. But that was looong ago in my before-kids life. I just can't bear the "Mom, I'm bored" and "Can we go nows?". In fact, I have often thought that my eldest sees a junk shop as an alternative place to serve a short-term prison sentence.
So imagine my surprise when on our recent visit to Kalk Bay he suggested that we go and browse at the Kalk Bay Trading Post. I discovered the real reason for this new-found enthusiasm was the fact that a classmate's dad had purchased an old map at the store for a song, and it had turned out to be very rare and ergo, very valuable.
Well, whatever our personal motivations were, we all spent a blissful hour or so browsing in the trading post, all the while listening to timeless classics on a scratchy old gramophone. Bliss.
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Don't you just love being a tourist in your own town? You can rediscover places you love but usually just rush past... without ever getting lost! Saturday's weather was glorious and so we took our new boy, Gregor, to see Muizenberg, Kalk Bay and the penguins at boulders.
To be honest, the penguins were a bit disappointing, I think because we got there late afternoon, so they had already gone swimming and fishing and were looking decidedly lazy. But Kalk Bay, with its fishing harbour, its colourful fishermen with their, erm, colourful language, was glorious.
On Sunday Niki made our current favourite dessert, Choc Pear Pudding, which I copied down from a Nigella food program. Does anyone know the blog-etiquette governing the sharing of recipes?
Choc-pear Pudding
Pre-heat the oven to 200°C.
Drain two cans of pears and place them sliced side down in a pie dish.
In a food processor add together:
125g flour
125g caster sugar
25g cocoa
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp bicarb
150g unsalted butter
2 tsp vanilla - nomu is the best
2 eggs
Process until smooth - the batter is quite thick. Spoon evenly over the pears - it doesn't matter if a bit of pear sticks out.
Bake for 25 - 30 minutes. It should make a soft crust on top and be slightly gooey underneath. Serve with vanilla ice cream Yum!
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So as predicted the weather this weekend was stormy and the sea was wild... the perfect way to say goodbye to winter (wishful me!).
Furthermore, this here little blog is two months old, and I'd like to share one of my favourite daily moments with you:
Every morning I look up my blog stats to find out how many people look at my blog, which pages they viewed, how long they spent at Mielie Peeps, and most interestingly to me, where they come from. So thank you, all you people in the US and South Africa; hello, Singapore... Argentina... Latvia! How are you, Kuwait!!! Oh my goodness, I love it!
On a different topic altogether, I'd like to introduce you to Thaka, who sews bags together and also stitches leather handles. Thaka is a very enthusiastic drummer in his church's marching band. They recently went to Johannesburg, where a highlight was meeting the bishop and receiving his blessing.
Thaka is very gentle and has a great smile. He is a pleasure to work with... except when he steals your scissors!
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