Well, I was trying to save money and thought I would make Christmas hampers for friends and relatives packed full of homemade food items that were tasty and thoughtful. Jamie’s grandparents (my ex’s parents) especially keep telling us not to buy them much as they won’t be around for much longer (!) so I thought they might appreciate a few tasty treats and they can’t tell us off for wasting our money (they do help us quite a bit - they’ve been more supportive over the years than the ex ever has). I’ve been saving jars to package cookies, granola, potted ham and so on and saving recipes from magazines and websites in preparation.
Then, Jamie’s employer (a large supermarket) offer their employees an extra staff discount this weekend starting yesterday. I am allowed to use his discount card too as I live at the same address and he was allowed to nominate one other person.
Sooooo, last night I treated myself to a Kenwood Prospero stand food mixer to help me make all these home baked goodies. I’m sure it will pay for itself in time and it will save my arm dropping off when I do my MSS Cake Breaks every year. Usually my arm muscles seize up from being stuck in one position night after night and I have to force them back into action the next day.
This week alone I have made 2 batches of cupcakes for our local MSS social for our harvest festival auction. I have a spiced apple cake with brown sugar meringue frosting to make tomorrow morning for an elderly lady’s birthday and another cake to make for Jamie’s birthday midweek for him to share with his journalist colleagues.
I’m so excited. I was too tired to get it all out of the box last night and play with it but tomorrow morning I will give it a test drive! It even came with a blender and a food processor and I know people who have had the bigger Kenwood Chef for over 20 years. The Prospero had very good reviews on the supermarket’s website so I decided to go for it as I couldn’t afford a Kitchen Aid.
Wish me luck, I think it’s going to cost me more as I’ll be forever cooking up a storm from now on. Nothing healthy of course but I still have some room in my waistbands
Good on you Tracey, that’s such a lovely and personal gift (why aren’t you in my family?!!) lol
Me and a couple of girls in the office literally lust after a Kitchen Aid and now you mention it, the mixing is one of the reasons I stopped baking (well, that and the whole MS shock and learning curve) - I agree tho, tooooo expebsivem I might have a look at the Prospero
Thanks everyone, I had great fun unpacking it - such a lot of kit for the money - it was just like Christmas lol!
I made the spiced apple cake yesterday which was a huge 4 layer cake and I was very impressed. It has a 4.3 litre mixing bowl so coped with that amount of mixture easily. The paddle beater didn’t miss out any part of the bowl so I didn’t really need to scrape the sides of the bowl down except after I added the flour as some of it splattered too high and wasn’t mixed in at first. Best of all, I could just keep adding the eggs etc while it was still running and my arms didn’t ache - yippee.
I still have to try out the food processor and plastic blender. I already have a mini chopper as onions have a habit of bouncing across the floor these days (oops!) but now I also have grating discs, julienne discs and several others. Can’t think when I will use them all but I’m sure I will find a way, ha ha ha!
Boys, you can keep your power tools - I have my own and I love it!!!
Tracey xx
PS Leora - there’s never any surplus cake in this house.
Oh, and even with my crappy hands. it was really easy to attach the paddle and the bowl etc. A doddle to clean too. The bowl is stainless steel too so I can’t break it however hard I try … I might be able to bend it at some point but I think you can buy lots of accessories so I’m sure I would be able to buy a spare.
