Christmas preparations

I had to go out into the garden during the week and noticed how many apples were lying on the ground.  My next door neighbours have an apple tree with three types of apple grafted onto one rootstock and the branch that hangs over my garden is a Bramley cooking apple that I love.  There were some that were easy to reach and so I picked three and had one of them baked in the oven with mincemeat - and that gave me an idea.

So out came the trusty Delia cookery book to find her Mincemeat recipe:-

and within about 30 minutes all the ingredients were in the bowl.  I gave it a good stir -

and left it overnight.  Next morning early, I popped the bowl into a very low oven which melts the suet and coats the ingredients with the fat thus preserving it.

I think the warmth 'fogged' the lens!

When cold I packed this lovely smelling mixture into 6 jars ready for baking.

Yummy!

At the same time I decided to make my Christmas cake and give it time to mature before icing it.  Most of it is given to my son who always says "Christmas is cancelled" if I don't make one!!  The recipe is well over 50 years old as the state of it shows.

It was one that I used when I first started working and was given to me by a colleague and I have used it every year since.  I halve the ingredients as you can see from the pencilled margin!!  I have absolutely no idea what these are in cups or grams as I cannot do the conversions!!!!

Higham Piecemakers have an 'all day' group meeting on the third Monday of the month and though I don't always make what the Monday ladies do this month there has been a big take up from the Wednesday  evening Ladies. It is a fabric Christmas wreath and I have started to make it.

First of all cut out 64 x 3⅛" squares and 32 wedges -

The squares are folded into prairie points and inserted into the wedges that have been folded in half -

and that is all I am going to show you for the moment as I am being taken out to a posh lunch and I have to get ready!! 

I will show more later in the week.