Sunday, July 31, 2011

Lemon cake

Lemon Cake


Many of you who come by this space every now and then may have noticed that if I start baking a cake I tend to most of the times make the wonderful lemon cake from the Rose Bakery breakfast/lunch/teak cookbook. I altered the recipe slightly over time and also like to add berries on top of the cake which makes it really nice and fruity. Many of you asked me to share the recipe....and here it is...

What you need:

250g soft, unsalted butter
200g caster sugar
4 organic eggs
juice of a lemon
grated zest of 2 lemons
1 rounded teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of salt
50g ground almonds
280g plain flour (sifted)

200g frozen (or fresh) berries
2 tablespoons raw sugar

>> For the glaze
juice of 1/2 lemon
100g icing sugar

Preheat the oven to 180C

1) beat the butter and sugar until the mixture is very light and creamy
2) add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition
3) add the lemon juice and zest
4) Mix together the baking powder, salt, ground almonds and carefully fold into the mixture with the flour
5) Butter your loaf tin and line its base with a parchment paper
6) Pour the mixture into the tin, take your frozen berries (you can take basically whatever berries you like, e.g. blue berries) press them gently into the dough and sprinkle the raw sugar over the berries.
7) Bake for about 45 minutes or until a knife inserted in the centre comes out clean and the top is light golden.
8) Remove from the oven and cool the cake in the tin before taking it out
9) After the cake cooled down, mix lemon juice with enough icing sugar to make a thick but pourable mixture. Let it drip down over the cake and if you have a bit of lemon zest left, use also for topping.

I always make this cake in a loaf tin but you can use any shape.

Happy baking and stay tuned I just decided to make soon Nigel Slater's amazing pistachio & blood-orange cake:)

Maria

Lemon Cake



Wednesday, July 27, 2011

A new magazine

Having lunch and reading in a new magazin\
new magazine / the Weekender
new magazine / the Weekender
new magazine / the Weekender
new magazine / the Weekender
new magazine / the Weekender
I have heard of the new German magazine 'The Weekender' already a couple of weeks ago, however it took me quiet some time until I could actually hold a copy into my hands. I read that some people found many similarities to the wonderful 'apartamento' magazine. And I can partly see why, which is not a bad thing, I think.
After I was sitting down for lunch on Saturday I had the time to browse through the magazine. I liked the non-shiny paper a lot, the apartments they visit, the stories around the people who live there, the images and perspectives of what they show of the different spaces of living...

From an apartment in Berlin, a farm house somewhere in the south of Germany, to a massive shared apartment in New York to end at a house boat in Belgium ...

The 'Casual Friday' section in the magazine shows Sarah Illenberger in her studio in Berlin. I was writing about Sarah's amazing work here and was again just amazed by her great sense of creativity. How amazing is the raining melon 'Meloncholie'!

I hope you are having a wonderful week, here is a song which I can hardly get out of my head.

Thanks for your comments on my sea post. I will share the lemon cake recipe very soon with you.

Maria

1) lunch 2)shared apt in NYC 3) Meloncholie by Sarah Illenberger 4/5) in Sarah's studio 6) housboating

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Ein Tag am Meer (A day at the sea side)

Royal National Park
Royal National Park
Royal National Park
Royal National Park
Royal National Park
Royal National Park
lemon cake after the walk

The other Sunday we went to the Royal National Park to go for a little bush walk. It was beautiful weather and I was amazed by the colours there. How nice it is to spend time out side the city.....at the end of our walk we all put the food we had brought with us on the table and had a lovely picnic. I had made a lemon cake with berries on top. I don't know but somehow I always end up making this cake, I should try something new - but well, I just like it so much. :)

Wednesday greetings
Maria

Sunday, July 17, 2011

Winter days in Sydney II

Me
Sydney Harbour
Winter in Sydney
Winter in Sydney
Winter in Sydney

Thanks for all your sweet comments on my last post, it was so nice read what your plans for the weekend were....
Here are the last images from the film...and I have some more from a bush walk from last Sunday which I will show you soon.

What I did:
Trixi has sent me a beautiful package filled with lovely things like this new wonderful new magazine in which I enjoyed reading a lot this weekend. I was also knitting on my scarf while we were on our way to Canberra to wander around the National Museum and Portrait Gallery....and now off to a dinner with friends....Life is good

Maria

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Winter days in Sydney I

Sydney Winter
Surry Hills Flea market
Surry Hills flea market
Sydney Winter
Surry Hills
Again Room 10

I know I keep on writing it, but Winter is stunning here in Sydney. The other Saturday I went out for a long walk...

#1 Enjoyed the blue sky of this day
#2 strolled around the flea market in Surry Hills
#3 Suit cases at the flea market
#4 more blue sky
#5 and shades
#6 ended up back in our neighbourhood at the lovley café 'Room 10' reading

How is your week so far - are you looking forward to the weekend?
Maria

Saturday, July 9, 2011

favourite café

favourite café
At our favourite café
At our favourite café -the cutest sausage dog-
At our favourite café
At our favourite café
three colour tights

We are so lucky that we have a café in our neighbourhood which has everything I like about a good café, amazing coffee and food, super friendly staff and a nice atmosphere to hang out there with friends or on your own reading in a book.

I hope you are having a wonderful weekend. It is again an amazing sunny Winter weekend here in Sydney. We will go for a little bush hike to the Royal National Park tomorrow. Can't wait to get out of the city and we might even see whales. So exciting.

Two great songs for you which are hard to get out of my head...this one from a new band from Perth which we saw yesterday and that lovely one.

Maria

Sunday, July 3, 2011

°^°

do you read me?!
things
Muji socks

Hello everyone,
I wish for those of you who are not living in Sydney I could share one hour of these amazing Winter mornings here in Sydney with you. It's beautiful. I was out with my pentax yesterday, enjoying the sun on my nose, I hope I can show you soon some images of that.

#2 Exploring a magazine, found an analog photo-booth here in Sydney (yeah!) and a scarf I got at the flea market yesterday + litte stickers
#3 a little weird to post a picture of socks, but I just love my Muji socks so much, their colours are just perfect

A beautiful project and a beautiful song

Hope you are well,
Maria