Beetroot Fair

Inspired by the idea of brownies with with prunes made by Julie last weekend I decided to make my own.

I've never baked before, so these were no cheap brownies since I had to buy everything bar a bowl to melt chocolate in, including the baking parchment and deep baking try I think I spent around 8 quid, taking away the things I can use again the cost is possibly nearer 3 quid, although cost doesn't really mater its the fun of making your own and the novel ingredients you can put in.

For my brownies I used Delia's on line recipe for Brownies with prunes and then swapped most of nuts for beetroot.

The chopped beetroot and prunes.


The recipe was simple, no technical cooking terms, a bit of maths to adjust the quantities to suit my baking tray and then nothing harder than mixing stuff in bowl.

The melting chocolate and butter.


The final mixture was a possible a bit too moist since Delia said to spread the mixture, my mixture was quite fluid and filled the baking tray without any spreading, I had a egg left so chucked it for good luck, possibly not the wisest decision.

The runny mixture.



After the required period in the oven the brownies were taken out and the hard top had raised leaving the moist brownies to crumble apart as I cut them, perhaps to long in the oven or some other mystery of cooking that I'm not aware of.

Just out the oven with the unwelcome crust.

The final result tasted wonderful and I have eaten about a third, which is probably a good 200 grams of sugar and butter based on the ingredient used, yikes that's a lot of calories to burn off.

Yum :)


On Saturday before making the brownies I went to the Living History fair with Julie and Dave, ran into very few people I knew Doug and Izsy from Larp and Alan and Jayne from reenactment, I'm never quite sure why this fair is not as popular as TORM since in my opinion it is the slightly better fair.

The car park though was a quagmire on yellow clay mud, which plastered everything, Dave described the mud on the tracks as potters slip, which about some it up, since it splashed up you jeans.

While there I bought some animal skins and Larp safe spear, I nearly didn't buy a hat, but while walking by the fudge store with Julie, she pointed out a tall hat on stall, which I found attractive and within no time I had my cash out buying the hat in the photo below.



Julie bought some smoke peanut butter, but also tried some citrus relish on the same stall Martins Jerked Meat which made her eye water since I think it should have been labelled citrus chilly relish. The smoke beetroot on the same stall was also nice, but the small jars a tad expensive.

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Sand

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Dave kitted and ready for waargh


Dave on his way to waargh

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With lack of good photos here is one from the weekends LRP event

Day out in the Black Country.

This weekend I went with Julie and Dave the Black Country Museum at Dudley to celebrate Dave's Birthday.

The Museum as can be seen from the photo below is mainly about reproducing what it was like to live in the Black Country area at the beginning of the 20th Century. A whole village as been built from houses taken down from the local area and then rebuilt creating a fascinating authentic place to visit.



Julie and Dave riding a Trolley Bus, basically a tram without tracks or bus that has to follow overhead power cables

A Trolley Bus at the museum.


The village has many working shops that sell their goods to visitors, this is Julie and Dave outside the sweet shop, Dave bought us all a cake from the shop next door, further down the street was a fish and chip shop. We visited the cafe while there for lunch all of use deciding to have the large black country sausages which were yummy.


Unfortunately it was a cold day, since most of the museum is outside I would recommend you go when its warmer.


Most of the shops and houses had working fires which were lit to keep the costumed characters that worked at the museum warm and were excellent to keep us visitors warm.


Julie knitted me a cowl for Christmas, it was very helpful in keeping me warm, not that I wore it pulled over my face like in the photo below, most of the time I wore it just around my neck. I highly recommend a cowl as a alternative to scarf.


Picture of the canal inside the museum.


I had a great day out, I assume Julie and Dave did, I wished it was better weather since it may have been more enjoyable, next time we pick a indoor place to visit in winter.

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Rusty rivets