The Interior DIYer
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Quarter-century

I celebrated my 25th birthday this week. I don’t think it’s sunk in completely though … I attempted to throw a mature dinner party, and ended up ungainly stuffing my face along with the people I hold dear, through strawberry tainted champagne. Mmm.

Homemade scones for breakfast. Strawberry jam and cream – the ultimate treat. I first had a strawberry-cream scone in Orillia at a fundraiser about 9 years ago. So good. I can only handle one though. They pack quite the punch. 
Tiered snacks, and mild moment with antique plates. I picked up this moss green plate the other day for €0.50 (Connemara earthenware). What a sucker.
Castleknock flowers. Including, of course, hydrangeas. 

Yummy shrimp, potato and basil salad I make on repeat, from my cookbook quick & easy healthy eating. It’s my favorite salad at the moment. To see the full delicious recipe, click to see more … 


Ingredients
12 – 16 new potatoes, cooked, cooled and diced
2 tablespoons basil leaves, torn into pieces
4 small radishes, sliced
1 scallion, chopped
Juice of 1/2 lime
1/2 cup plain yogurt
2 cups peeled cooked shrimp, cold
salt and freshly-ground black pepper
A few lettuce leaves, to serve

Method
Boil the potatoes until tender, drain, and leave to cool. Place in a bowl with the basil, radishes, scallion, lime juice, and yogurt and mix well. Season to taste. Just before serving, gently mix in the shrimp. Arrange a few lettuce leaves on each plate and place the prawn salad on top. Serve immediately. And stuff your face.

Click here for a handy cooking calculator, should you prefer to measure in cups, mls, oz etc.
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Ridonculous booze-hag cake with cherries

Ridonculous is a word I use far too often these days. It should be a word that you type, and not say aloud – kind of like ‘zomg’, ‘wtf’, and ‘yours sincerely’. They should be kept in either written or in your head, but not uttered. I unfortunately have crossed that line, and actually say it out loud.
I’ve made this chocolate love cake with cherries and booze several times now and it is a big hit in my household. A household of two, I would like to point out, who enjoy anything that involves mixing chocolate with Cointreau.
Jamie Oliver is pure genius for concocting this delight. It’s a straight forward recipe, which I like. {Mix one group of ingredients in this bowl, cook, then mix this group on the stove, et viola}. The ingredients for the most part, can be found in your cupboard and it may not be necessary for you to travel to the shops each time you want to make it. It is a very flexible recipe where ingredients can be swapped and replaced without devastating the recipe.
This cake is full of win every time. It’s a safe cake, and you really can’t mess it up. I would highly suggest this cake to everyone. For a quick and simple dessert for two, or multiplied, as a gushing dessert at a dinner party served with hot liqueur sauce.

My pictures really don’t do this recipe justice. Times the gooey scrumptiousness by about ten. To see the recipe for this cake by Jamie Oliver, click below …

Ingredients
Cake:
2 tablespoons cocoa powder
100g/3½oz butter, softened
100g/3½oz caster sugar
1 egg, preferably free-range or organic
100g/3½oz self-raising flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ tin of black cherries, drained {if you can’t find tinned black cherries, glacé cherries work just as well}
2 tablespoons hazelnuts, chopped for the chocolate sauce

Sauce:
25g/¾oz butter
142ml/4.9fl oz double cream
75g/2½oz good-quality dark chocolate, broken into small pieces
a splash of brandy, rum, Amaretto or Baileys

Method
Mix all the cake ingredients together in a bowl. Pour into a greaseproof dish. You can either mix in the hazelnuts, or sprinkle them on top before putting in the oven. Place in a 180ºC oven for 25 minutes.

While your cake is baking, make your chocolate sauce. Place the butter in a small pan with the cream and bring almost to a boil. Turn off the heat and add your chocolate pieces to the pan. Give it a good stir and leave for 5 minutes so the hot cream can melt the chocolate. Add a splash of your desired alcohol and stir thoroughly. 

Do the ‘clean knife‘ test on your cake. Once it’s ready, pour the chocolate sauce over the cake and either share it right from the dish or serve it up in individual bowls. Delicious!

Click here for a handy cooking calculator, should you prefer to measure in cups, mls, oz etc. Jamie Oliver’s chocolate love cake with cherries and booze recipe can be found here on his website, should you like to bookmark it.

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The proof is on the plate

It began innocently when I was doing my house-girlfriend duties yesterday morning – the dishes. I was cleaning one of my antique pie plates. I had bought a set of three; all detailing different recipies on the bottom of each dish. Quite cute, plus, they’re massive plates so they come in really handy.
So, getting to my story, while I was washing one particular dish, the recipe on the plate finally got to me. The particular recipe was for lemon meringue pie. I had never made lemon meringue before so I thought, why not.
Be warned: have about 2 hours to dedicate to this recipe. It took a while to make, since the center is lemon curd, and that takes some time on the stove top. Also, it demands your attention, so plan to make this tasty treat when you don’t have anything going on on the side that may distract you. It is worth it.
I was really pleased with how it turned out. The meringue was perfectly set and brown on top, although the curd was a touch runny / not completely set, so we referred to it as our lemon meringue soup for the evening {be stingy with the water at the beginning}. There’s always next time.
A word of warning: don’t go overboard with the lemon. Less is more in the case of this recipe.
I made a plain pastry for the base and blind baked it before adding the lemon curd. No specific recipe was used for the pastry – just straight forward. Nothing fancy.

If you’re interested, see below for the recipe from inside the dish …

Ingredients
1.5 cups of sugar
2 tablespoons of cornstarch
1 cup of water {be stingy with this bit!!!}
3 beaten egg yolks 
1 teaspoon grated lemon peel
2 tablespoons of butter
0.5 cup of lemon juice
9″ baked pastry shell 
3 egg whites
1 tablespoon of lemon juice
6 tablespoons of sugar

Method
Mix first three ingredients on saucepan, stirring in water. Bring to the boil over medium heat, stirring until thick for about 5 minutes. Remove from heat; stir small amount of hot mixture into the egg yolks, then return to hot mixture. Bring to the boil and cook for 1 minute, stirring constantly. Remove from heat. Add lemon peel and butter. Slowly stir in 0.5 cup of lemon juice. Cool to lukewarm, stirring frequently. Pour into cooled pastry shell. 

Beat egg whites with 1 teaspoon of lemon juice to soft peaks. Gradually add 6 tablespoons of sugar, beating until stiff peaks form. Spread over filling, sealing to edges  of the pastry shell. Bake in oven at 200 degrees for 12 to 15 minutes. Cool before serving. 
Click here for a handy cooking calculator, should you prefer to measure in cups, mls, oz etc.

Om nom nom nom om nom nom.