No Bees Till July

At Purbeck, Dorset, for work today and snapped this white tree.  Only a little bit of processing done to the photo - it already looked cool.

We started going to Lindy Hop classes tonight.  I think we have some way to go until we reach Hellzapoppin standards.

New Year’s Eve 2010: Mr No Bees juggling with lightsticks.

Playing with the new DSLR at London’s South Bank and at the Tate Modern on New Years Day.  I find that I’m starting to look at the world in a different way, mentally composing images, seeing shapes, colours, lines and beauty in all sorts of unusual things. 

We made a video of our toffee making too!

Tonight we’re making Honeycomb Toffee to be sprinkled on a friend’s new year’s eve cheesecake tomorrow night.  

100g caster sugar

3 tablespoons golden syrup

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

Cover a small baking tray with baking paper.

Heat sugar and syrup together in a small saucepan until molten and goldeny brown (150C).  Add bicarb and mix then let it bubble up.  Pour onto tray and allow to cool.  Smash with hammer.

The recipe is from The Guardian which also tells you all about the science of it too, much to Mr NoBees’ delight: 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/blog/2010/sep/24/sugar-honeycomb-cinder-toffee

What a great Christmas. Lovely Husband surprised me with a digital SLR camera. It snowed. We went for a walk and found these incredible giant snowflakes.  And Little Sister got me taking pictures of some of her knitted creations.

My attempt at making these:

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1941/lebkuchen?pager.offset=20

Not very pretty, but still damn tasty.

I was in a baking mood today, so made chocolate cherry brandy cupcakes.  Very boozy, and seriously good.

I just spent the weekend in thus amazing place. Lake District, November, sunshine. So blessed!