Tuesday 29 October 2013

Halloween fun

We normally bake a lot of gingerbread for Christmas but I have bought 3 Halloween shapes this year and we have started early! I have also stopped a simple way to make a gingerbread man into a Halloween themed. So I'm sharing these with you!
It's a great activity idea for kids - it's like a play dough, you roll it out and use the  cutters, but the fun doesn't finish there. Because you have a biscuit to eat at the end of it!

































We have been using gingerbread recipe that I love, though I'm not even sure where I got it from anymore! This time I have used wholemeal flour instead of plain because I happened to not have plain when we started baking. And I liked the texture a lot more with wholemeal flour, just had to be aware that the biscuits were darker than usually.

350 g/12 oz plain flour
10 ml/2 tsp ground ginger
5 ml/1 tsp ground cinnamon
2,5 ml/ ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
100 g butter
175 g/6 oz soft brown sugar
60 ml/ 4tbsp golden syrup
1 egg, beaten
Method:
1.       Sieve the flour, spices and bicarbonate of soda into a bowl. Rub in the butter with the fingers until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.

2.       Stir in sugar.

3.       Add the syrup and the beaten egg to the flour mixture; mix to a soft dough. If it’s sticky, add a little more flour.

4.       Knead the dough lightly until smooth.

5.       Roll out as desired. Basically if it’s thin, the gingerbread will be crispy, and if it’s rolled out thickly, it will be softer. Bake in the preheated over at 190C. Most items will take 8-10 mins, smaller biscuits might take less time and bigger ones may take longer.
And for decorating I have just used a simple designer icing in a tube that I bought in a supermarket! You might have better ideas :)
Enjoy!

 


Saturday 26 October 2013

One year later - family photography

I know I have said it many times before, but it's very true, so I will say it again - I love to photograph the families who I have worked with before! It's always great to see how much the children have grown http://tamaratoveyphotography.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/three-sisters.html Two of these lovely girls were old enough to remember me from a year ago and greeted me as an old friend. Everybody is more relaxed and we all know what to expect from each other - I already knew that all the outfits will be perfectly coordinated and they knew what kind of images to expect at the end.
The girls were absolutely amazing - they kept asking to be photographed and were posing! Made my job so easy!

 
 


 
© Tamara Tovey Photography