Saturday, 15 March 2025
MY 100 ULTRAS CHALLENGE - 2024 PROGRAMME
Thursday, 13 February 2025
I LOVE MEETING PEOPLE WHILE I'M OUT DOING MY TRAINING!
When I'm out training for my next ultra, or just getting the miles in - and I'm doing about 40-50k a week ATM - I often strike up a conversation with people I meet.
This morning, 13th February 2024, returning home after a 10k walk, I met Garrett (sp?) and his lovely family. He asked initially about how much weight I carried in my backpack - about 3kg it was today. I told him I aimed to carry as much weight around as I would carry on one of my ultras. From there we went on to my health since going vegan - and from there into the whole speil. He wasn't able to take a copy of my leaflet, so I told him to search for 'No bread is an island'. I hope he sees this!
Monday, 27 January 2025
VEGAN CHOCOLATE CAKE - How easy (and cheap!) is this?
Ingredients:
25g vegetable oil (I use olive oil)
No microwave?
Bake in the oven at 175C for 30-35 minutes.
No oven?
Cost:
I'm amazed at how little this cake costs (these prices are from Lidl products):
Sugar 22p
S/raising flour 15p
Cocoa powder 15p
Veg oil 10p
Total 62p
Who says that it's expensive to be vegan? :)
The story:
Anybody who's taken a look at some of the bread conversations I've had on this blog will know I'm not a cake maker - bread's my thing.
Whenever anyone asks me if I make cakes I always tell them there isn't time - there's always another bread I haven't made yet!
However, it was the birthday of both my daughter and my son-in-law this week, and there are bound to be plenty of cakes when we meet up tomorrow. And none of them will be vegan.
Apart, that is, from the one I've just made!
I followed this recipe here:
And tweaked it slightly.
It was a bit of a faff, since each step is on a separate page - unless you sign up, which I didn't want to do. And it's in cups, which I've weighed off into gms for the next time I make it - which I will.
166g s/raising flour
30g cocoa powder
198g sugar
1/2 tsp salt
80g sunolive oil
250g water
2 tsps vanilla extract
Stir the dry ingredients, add the wet ingredients, mix together and pour into 2 18cm (7") lined cake tins. (I placed 354g of batter in each tin.)
Bake at 175C for 20 minutes.
I shall sandwich the cake with the vegan chocolate spread I made yesterday:
And probably spread a bit on top - just to finish it off!
I decided to forgo the salt and the vanilla: I never use salt in my sweet bread recipes, and I see no place for it here; I couldn't detect any vanilla flavour, but others may.
3 days later. I ate the last remnants of the cake - and it was as moist and lush as when it had just been made. I did think of seeing if it would keep into a 4th day - but who keeps chocolate cake for four days?
(Well, my mother might - she used to extol the virtues of her madeira cake - "It'll keep for a fortnight!" she used to announce to all and sundry. And every time we went home and we were served cake, she felt she had to make good her claim. The damn cake was always well over a week old! In every other respect she was a decent cook. Well, I suppose we all have a chink in our armour!)
3rd November.
After telling my colleagues at my Thursday care home about my cake-making, I was prevailed upon to make one for the residents.
Since we needed a large cake, I doubled up the recipe:
330g s/raising flour
If you're going to make a cake - may as well make a big one! |
That's Melissa's hand applying the chocolate icing |
The doubled up recipe actually made 2 dozen of these. Thought at first we hadn't put enough batter in each one |
But when they came out of their cases and were iced - the size was just right! OK, the icing's not very neat - but that didn't affect the taste one iota! |
I've been making this cake weekly since I first made it - and today I made a chocolate log with it:
Next time I'll divide the batter between two Swiss roll tins - and then it won't split! To keep it vegan it was spread with jam. I need a vegan filling for next time. |
Wanted to make a couple of Yule logs for the family - but I'm far away from my scales, so I did these with the original cup measurements in the link above.
I used a coffee mug to measure with and made enough to fill two Swiss roll tins and make three large cup cakes.
One was filled with sweet chestnut puree (the puree was mixed with some sugar and soya cream) and the other was consumed as it was - everyone thoroughly enjoyed it.
I'm planning to cover the cake with melted chocolate. I'll post a pic when I do.
Tuesday, 7 January 2025
EARLY CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT - A DISSERTATION
Hi! If you've happened on my blog as a result of meeting me walking around Taunton, welcome. As I probably said, I'm passionate about early education, wanting every child to meet their full potential.
If you find any merit in what you read, well, I'm currently fundraising for Viva!, the leadingUK animal rights charity. If you wish to donate, you'll find my fundraiser here. Thanks.
Sir Kenneth Robinson was, IMO, one of the greatest educators the country has ever produced - His TED talk is the most viewed of all time. Well worth watching!
In the year 2000, at the age of 63, I completed a degree in Education and Training at Plymouth University, gaining a 2:1 - which contrasts with my first brush with education, which resulted in 2 'O' levels!