Sophie's Bakes

Not to be out done by her little sister, the biggest girl has requested her own blog entry.

We've been enjoying watching The Great British Bake Off after school on iPlayer. It provides me with a blissful hour of calm (I always watch it the night before, so don't feel the need to pay too much attention second time round - and have occasionally been known to enjoy resting my eyes a bit whilst they snuggle round me on the sofa) and some inspiration for them. So, I give you, Sophie's Bakes.

Rhubarb Crumble and Custard made by Sophie (aged 7)

Yesterday, we celebrated the fact the autumnal chill is most definitely upon us by having a rhubarb crumble and custard, made by Sophie.

Being someone who loves cooking and in particular baking herself, I am keen for my children to get involved in the kitchen. And, now she is of an age where she can read sufficiently well enough to understand a recipe book, I set her the challenge of making the pudding on her own. With me there, on the sidelines to help where needed.

As it so happened, I had to stick to the challenge - as minutes after we'd got the ingredients out of the cupboard, baby Charlotte woke up apparently ravenously hungry (ability to go from sound asleep to desperate for milk in the space of thirty seconds being another normal newborn trait, right?). All I did was answer questions and explain things. The girl did the rest.

Making custard

And, proud as proud could be about her crumble, she wanted to make some custard to go with it. Even though she doesn't like custard. Odd, I thought.

But it turns out, she likes `home made custard', not `the custard you normally make, Mummy'.

And so, as I quietly reeled from the shock/indignation that my daughter is a custard snob and rejecting the much loved by me Bird's of my own childhood, a home made custard is what she made. I stopped short at dashing out for double cream and vanilla pods - cornflour, a splash of vanilla extract, sugar, egg yolks and milk would do, I thought.

Luckily, because this was some time later, Charlotte had finished her feed by then, meaning I could stand next to the biggest girl and give more help. She enjoyed learning to separate eggs, make a paste, boil milk, and whisk the whole lot like crazy so she didn't end up with scrambled eggs to go on top of crumble.

And so, my once grumpy school girl became transformed into a girl who was beaming with pride because she had successfully cracked an egg and not broken the yolk or got any shell into the bowl. Very, very satisfying stuff. A good day indeed.

Roll on the cold weather. We've got custard.