Crumpets

I have no idea what is wrong with me at the moment but I have come over all romantic. All I listen to are love songs, I get misty at weddings on TV and I get super soppy when anyone mentions that they are seeing someone. It's ridiculous considering the state of my heart these days. I still feel so caught up in my past romances that I just can't seem to move on to a positive place of recovery. My heart (alas) is still in Noosa, and at this point there is nothing I can do about it. Soon it will be summer though, and this makes me think that maybe things will get better.

Cooking school is plodding along nicely, despite a few disaster cakes last week. Lets just say I had a bad kitchen day...which may have ended with my sobbing on the couch. Just a bad day in general when I come to think of it, but these things happen. All we can do is pick up the disarrayed pieces of our heart, throw some ugly cakes in the bin and move on, and that is exactly what I did.

We are still working on seafood dishes at the moment in one of my classes. I am loving this and so is my stomach! Today I feasted on oysters and calamari for morning tea. Such a treat! I'm finding it really easy too. It's so frustrating at times that my commercial cookery classes are coming so very easily to me but patisserie is a constant struggle when that's the one I really want to be doing. I will push on though in a hope that it will finally come together.

Earlier in the week I had a go at making some homemade crumpets, and I must say they were very delicious. I found the recipe in Gourmet Traveler and simply halved it (because it made so very much). When you cook them you need little silver rings to fry them in. I didn't have any of these so I made some out of silver foil and then lined them with baking paper. It wasn't super effective but it did the job. I think egg rings would work to make mini ones or otherwise you could go to a cooking shop and buy some cooking rings. Either way here is the recipe and it's great! Don't be intimidated to work with yeast, truly it's beautiful and quite easy to use. I served mine with yoghurt, jam and poached pears. Delicious!

Home made crumpets

You will need:

• 400ml milk
• 20g butter
• 1 tsp sugar
• 3 1/2 g dried yeast (this is half a packet)
• 250g plain flour
• 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

What to do:

1. Place milk and butter in a pot on low heat, and warm till butter melts. Let stand until it is lukewarm
2. Combine the yeast and half the milk in a small bowl. Let sit for about five minutes or until it's bubbly.
3. Combine the yeast mix, flour, a pinch of salt and the rest of the milk in a larger bowl and set aside until it is very foamy. This should take about an hour to an hour and a half.
4. Dissolve the bicarb in 25ml of water and add to the batter. Beat to combine and then set aside for another half an hour until bubbly again.
5. Heat a nonstick fry pan and add some butter. Spray rings with some oil and two thirds fill with batter. Cook until mixture bubbles. Remove the rings and turn over to cook on the other side.
6. Serve warm, and enjoy.