The last couple of months have been incredibly busy ones for me at work as we’ve been running some rather extensive community consultation (involving lots of Saturday and evening work) but that is all now over, so we celebrated with an afternoon tea! I always like to bake something to take along but wanted to keep things simple (I had been working half the weekend after all!) so a classic coconut jam slice seemed the perfect choice!
I’ve only made jam a couple of times in my life because I find the whole process a little time consuming, not to mention all the sugar it tends to use! I’d seen lots of talk of chia jam around and thought it was about time I tried some for myself, and it was so quick & easy as well as delicious! I highly recommend you giving my rhubarb & strawberry chia jam a try, you won’t regret it!
Cheesecake isn’t something I make very often, but I had my folks over for dinner recently and my dad had mentioned he wanted a lemon cheesecake so lemon cheesecake for dessert it was! It was much easier than I remembered, you just have to be prepared so you have enough time for it to cool down properly. I decided to go a little fancy and made a balsamic strawberry sauce to pour on top, but it would still be delicious with just a sprinkling of icing sugar.
I recently had a few family friends over for an afternoon tea to celebrate being in my little apartment for a year (how time flies!) and as it’s not an afternoon tea with cake I knew I had to get my bake on. I wanted to make use of the delicious summer fruits while they are still around in abundance, so an apple strawberry crumble cake was the answer!
At this time of year I really like easy, lazy dinners like grilled haloumi or veggie burger patties served with delicious side salads. I’ve always been a fan of the ol’ potato salad (because, well potato!) but this strawberry spinach salad is one of my new favourites. It’s fresh, summery and delicious and is super easy to scale up if you have a crowd to feed!