Hi all,
So I'm back from visiting my folks in South Wales which was just lovely. Can't beat a weekend at your mum's no matter how old you are. Mum's home cooking and fussing over you as only a mum can is always so comforting, and now that I have children of my own, a weekend at mum and dad's has the added bonus of being a bit of a break for me on the childcare front too. It was lovely, I slept in, went and got my nails done, and had a night out with friends for cocktails and the theatre. We returned today for a kids party and now the little munchkins are tucked up in bed fast asleep after an afternoon of jumping on the bouncy castle, running around screaming and stuffing their little faces full of chocolate cake.

Speaking of parties...A number of friends, including my lovely sister in law, are about to pop and become mummies themselves so baby showers a - plenty are being planned left right and centre. As my sister in law was visiting us recently I took the opportunity to throw a little shower for her at my home.  I have to say I do love party planning, especially if I get to use my collection of vintage china, so I threw myself into the task with gusto even though I had only 4 days in which to pull it all together. I asked a good friend to provide one of her fabulous 'ruffle' chocolate fudge cakes, and I baked a batch of chocolate cupcakes, scones with jam and clotted cream(the key to a perfect scone is to knead the dough as little as possible), some gorgeous little heart shaped sandwiches and my piece De resistance...white chocolate macarons which I filled with white chocolate buttercream in pink and blue, as we don't know the sex of the baby. I absolutely adore macarons and their gorgeous velvety chewiness but they are notoriously difficult to make.  After endless experimenting with different recipes and rules, I have settled on what seems to be a fairly foolproof recipe and it works every time:

100g icing sugar (confectioners sugar if you are I  u.s)
100g ground almonds (almond flour)
2 egg whites
55g caster sugar
Heat safe food colouring

Sieve the icing sugar and almonds together. Any bits that won't go through the sieve can be blitzed in the food processor and then pushed through the sieve, this is really important as it needs to be really fine, any lumps in your mix can ruin your macaron. Beat the egg whites in a separate bowl till they resemble fluffy clouds, then add your caster sugar and colouring. Continue to beat until you have a fairly stiff dry meringue. At this stage add your almond and sugar mixture and fold it in.  The object here is to knock a good deal of the air out of the mixture so don't hold back, you will know your mixture is ready when it resembles molten lava, it shouldn't be too runny. Now you're ready to pipe your macarons onto a lined baking tray. Try to pipe nice even circles, or even use a silicon macaron tray.  It's crucial to give your tray a good few firm taps on the work surface before you put them in the oven, to get rid of any trapped air and avoid cracking. Bake in a preheated oven at 140 degrees for 12 mins; this will depend on your oven though, you may need to have a few trials to find the perfect time and temperature for you.  Let them cool completely before peeling them off the baking paper. You can fill them with ganache,  buttercream, chocolate or anything you fancy. This is just a basic recipe but they are super delicious and if you can master this recipe then it's fun to experiment with different flavours.  www.bravetart.com is a fabulous baking blog which dispels the macaron myths and gives some great troubleshooting for those macaron disasters which inevitably will happen. But when you finally make that perfect batch,you will be hooked! They are just the prettiest little bites of perfection.

The baby shower was a roaring success and left me feeling like I need to plan another little tea party soon, i'm thinking just an afternoon tea with friends this time, so watch this space! Xx