The Recipe

This week was a dear friend's birthday and she requested her usual indulgence which is a batch of my infamous Caramel, Macadamia and Hazlenut slice. A completely delicious and gooey concoction that is only really for special occasions but last week some of us got together and had some morning tea and I said I was going to be making this so making more was not really a problem.
So I made it and took it in today and several people wanted the recipe which is the purpose of this particular post.

The photo above is by Marina Oliphant from The Age when they published my recipe last year in an article by Matt Preston - actually they published two of my recipes *blush* NO I dont spend much time making naughty sweeties - only some of it and only for special folks

This is the recipe - Enjoy

Caramel, Macadamia and Hazelnut slice

INGREDIENTS
Base:
150g (1 cup) plain flour
1¿2 tsp cinnamon
60g (1/2 cup) hazelnut meal
90g (1/2 cup) brown sugar
90g dark chocolate
80g unsalted butter
1 egg, lightly beaten
Topping:
100g hazelnuts
395g tin condensed milk
2 tbsp golden syrup
50g butter
100g macadamia nuts
100g dark chocolate,melted
METHOD
· To make the base: Sift flour and cinnamon into a bowl. Stir in hazelnut meal and sugar.
· Melt chocolate and butter together and cool. Add to dry ingredients when cooled. Add egg and mix well.
· Press mixture into lined and greased tin (a standard 18x28- centimetre tray or similar) and bake for 15 minutes at 180C.
· While the slice is baking, toast hazelnuts in the oven for eight minutes.
Remove and de-skin by placing in a brown paper bag and rubbing furiously.
- Remove base from oven. Have a cup of tea and bit of a sit with the paper while it cools to room temperature in the tin.
· To make the topping: Mix condensed milk, golden syrup and butter in saucepan and heat, stirring until it almost boils.
· Pour mixture over the base and top with nuts.Bake for 15 minutes and leave to cool.
· Drizzle lines of the melted chocolate over the top until covered with a lacy coating of chocolate.Cut with a bread knife.

Three cheers

for my drawing/painting tutor Paul. I could have kissed him yesterday when he said I could turn a collage assignment into a stitch piece. I have been hanging out SO badly for something like this.
The assignment was to make a collage of a still life set out for the class and I was using my hand coloured papers and enjoying it and then talking with Paul about it he said go ahead and stitch

Well it will be different for this school
/R

mucking about and moving forward

Weird few days, but with some judicious self medication and some gradual work the worst is over. Although waking up with a mouth like a bottom of a bird cage is not fun but it was only TWO glasses of wine- on an empty stomach albeit *blush*
Seriously it has left my temper rather short so I am being a bit of a hermit because I am not really suitable for polite company at the moment.
Spent yesterday working on a little bag to keep my essentials in for classes- phone, wallet, keys, specs etc because I have decided with the total lack of storage space I am suffering from at present it is easier to set up two back packs for classes- one with my painting gear and another with my printmaking and drawing stuff. I did some discharge dyeing by putting some black homespun into a 1:1 bleach and water bath and experimented with my new water brush on the fabric too which was fun. I used the samples up to make the little back and when I get the dig cam batteries charged up will take a pic of it- very satisfying to just do something creative and also practical for myself for a change.
Onward and upward
/R

Yesterday

This time yesterday life was good! I had spoken to my tutor about applying for Recognition of Prior Learning for Media and Studio Studies and he had agreed that it was probably a good idea. Which means no more colour exercises which is definitely a good thing for me because I was going slowly out of my mind doing that again. I have done very little homework in that class because I had done that all before and motivation for that was NIL.

I dont have problems doing the theory based work at all and homework for drawing and printmaking is fun with a capital F, only slightly less so for painting. I am NEVER going to be a great painter. but yesterday I was feeling unshackled at last and could actually feel my creative self as a physical being for the first time in a while which was pretty exciting.

Then the axis of the earth shifted after a phone call and now I have a couple of choices. Let it get me down and disappear into the despair again or I use it. Bit numb at the moment and cant really describe what it is and I think I am only writing this to try and put it all into perspective for myself.

Oh god give me a couple of days the the Gothic humour will reassert itself! But today I think it is a good day to curl up on the sofa with some chockies and the fire. :-) well there is some compensation for feeling this way after all.

Next assignment

The next assignment is 'Drapery" drawing draped fabric. This is another phone cam shot of the charcoal and conte part of the assignment. The brief calls for this one -on grey paper- and another in greylead pencil on white paper. I think I may be getting it .
What's the verdict?

I am a nerd after all

I did it Soph!!
Never having worked in HTML before was freaky but I managed to load up some links and even add a counter/location thingy on the side. It took a few goes and I had to change the main appearance of the blog so I could find the right bits so I could insert the bits of HTML to make the super links. I might change it all again to another design for the page that I like. THis one is okay but lime green? eeeck that lime green is yuk.

Sophie is a textile artist and very very talented so visit her page. Wolfy is a photography nut, well he DOES work in the industry so he gets lots of new toys to play with and the results end up on his page.

Working proof

Talk about frustration! I have so many ideas bubbling in my head at present for textiles but I am still swamped with painting and drawing tasks to complete. Printmaking is keeping me sane though because I can see SO many possibilities for my textiles in that much more so than I can with painting and studio studies is driving me around the twist.
I am so over painting colour scales and exercises.
GRRRRR lol

oh well we soldier on
this is a piece I am working on at present taken on my wonderful new phone. (Thank you for that Anders you wonderful devil now I dont have any excuse for not working on an idea lol)


Thank heavens for the resources from working on my stuff at Box Hill, I dont have to do much to think of ideas for work.