Tasty Friday!

Yes, I know it's not Thursday, but I couldn't wait until next week to share this recipe with you. I'm not sure what the weather is like where you are, but it's really sunny here, and this is the perfect recipe for this sort of weather!

Strawberry Shortcake (from Sorted Recipes - also has a video tutorial on making it!)

You will need:

• 225g unsalted butter
  
• 100g caster sugar
• drop of vanilla essence
  
• 225g self-raising flour or 225g plain flour, 1/2 tsp baking powder and a pinch of salt
• 150g white chocolate (chocolate chips are easiest)
• 300ml double or whipping cream
• 2/3 large punnet of strawberries
  
• spoonful of icing sugar to serve

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 150oC
2. Beat the butter, sugar and vanilla essence in a bowl until smooth, light and fluffy
   
3. Sieve in the flour and stir it in to form a dough
4. Chop up the chocolate (if using a bar of chocolate) and mix it into the dough
5. Push the dough into a round cake tin so it's around 2cm thick
6. Bake for 20-25 mins depending on your oven until cooked through. It shouldn't be too dark-coloured and will look quite soft, but will harden up as it cools.
7. Leave it in the tin to cool and harden up a bit before you try getting it out of the tin (we were a bit impatient, so ours broke a little down the centre!)
8. Whip the cream (either by hand or with an electric whisk) until it forms stiff peaks and spread in over the cooled shortcake base
9. Slice the strawberries and place on top of the cream
10. Dust with icing sugar
    

We had a bit of a disaster getting ours into the fridge at uni, and unfortunately it crumbled into a big mess! It still tastes amazing though and is a really great way to enjoy the summer strawberries!

Before it broke!

Blogging community

I've only been blogging for around 2 months now, but already I feel welcomed by the blogging community. Through ChronicBabe.com and their bloggers' group, and people who's blogs I've stumbled upon along the way, I've already 'met' some wonderful, inspiring bloggers who've offered me support, friendship and advice during my short time as a blogger, and for this I'm truly grateful. I started my blog during a time which has been quite emotionally difficult for me, in order for me to work through my feelings, and I think it's good for me to do this. I could've just written down my thoughts, problems and worries privately, but I'm so glad I decided to start a blog; my followers have made me realise that I'm not alone. You've also helped me take a step back and look for and write about the positive things...so thank you!


In a similar vein, a couple of weeks ago, the lovely Rosie gave me a blog award. For this, I'm supposed to:

1. Thank the person who gave you the award.
2. Write a post about it.
3. Pass it on to 12 blogs that you think really deserve it.
4. Insert the link to their blog.
5. Send them a message to tell them about it.

So a big thanks to Rosie for giving me this award! I started my blogging journey shortly after Rosie, and her blog is one of my favourite reads at the moment. She has a number of different features on the go (I don't know how she manages to keep track!) and always has something interesting and inspiring to say. She's also a really lovely person who I keep in touch with regularly, and is one of the bloggers I refer to above.

My favourite blogs at the moment are:

1. Uncommon Sense 
2. Assimilate This 
3. 2nd chance @ life? 
4. Infectiously Optimistic 
5. What Sadie Did 
6.  Chronically Creative
7. Phylor's Blog 
8. Creaky Girl 
9. Living for Lucy 
10.  Touch and Tickle
11. A Lovely Little World 
12. Welcome to my world 

How has everyone's weekend been? Unfortunately mine has been filled with a phonetics essay which is due in tomorrow. I finished it a couple of hours ago, so am just about to go back over it, do references etc. My first exam is a week tomorrow, in a weird way I'm actually looking forward to getting it out of the way!