Dried Cranberry & Ginger Steamed pudding

It’s really been one of those weeks. Not just because of the time of the year      (Christmas always  means lots more  additions to the usual ‘to do’ list ) but getting the house prepared for another viewing ( please someone buy my house ) and travelling through to Glasgow for my first ever shoot for a TV ad! It was a very, VERY long day but for someone who spends her days isolated and indoors knitting it was both fascinating and exhausting to be involved in the process.

I’ll do a longer blog post once I’ve dowloaded some of my images, hopefully that’ll be next week.

In the meantime something sweet! I promised KnittyFred on Twitter that I’d post a recipe in exchange for his Pistachio Marzipan which he posted on his blog here. ( Ok, so it’s taken me a couple of days to do it but we got there in the end Fred ). I must admit this isn’t my recipe so I can’t take credit for it but it’s DELICIOUS, not only for people like me who think that normal Christmas Pudding is the work of the devil but it also tempts those who ‘don’t normally do puddings’. It works equally well as 1 large pudding or divided into smaller ‘mini’ puddings. It also freezes well.

Dried Cranberry & Ginger Steamed Pudding

Serves 8

Preparation: 15 mins

Cooking time: 2 1/2 hours

Calories per serving: It’s a pudding don’t bother!

Ingredients:

175 g ( 6 oz ) butter

175 g ( 6 oz ) caster sugar

Finely grated rind and juice of 2 large oranges

3 eggs, beaten

175g ( 6 oz ) self-raising flour

Pinch of salt

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp ground ginger ( if you like things particularly gingery, add more )

75g ( 3 oz ) dried cranberries

40 g ( 1   1/2 oz ) fresh white breadcrumbs

- Cream the butter and sugar with the orange rind until pale & creamy then beat in the eggs a little at a time. Sift the flour with the salt, baking powder and ginger and fold into the creamed ingredients with the orange juice, cranberries and breadcrumbs

-  Spoon the mixture into a buttered 1.8 litre ( 3 pint ) pudding basin and smooth the top. Cover with a sheet of baking parchment and then wrap the top of the basin with foil. Steam the pudding  for  2 and a half hours regularly topping up the pan with boiling water to prevent it from drying out

- When ready turn the pudding out onto a plate and serve with hot custard or creme fraich. MMMMMMmmmmmmmm!!!

Foul weather but a new design!

It’s HORRIBLE today! I don’t have a problem with Monday’s like a lot of people but today the weather is foul, so foul in fact that I’m about to decamp to the front room and work in front of the stove – solid fuel, not cooker, mmm. Hopefully this new design will help keep the chills at bay.

Tait2 is a cowl, knitted in my Chunky Baby Alpaca and SO warm you’ll soon forget the weather. 

 

It’s knitted in the round on an 80 cm long circular needle with  a cable and rib pattern travelling across it’s width. The pattern is only 6 rounds long so there isn’t a lot of pattern to remember meaning you can concentrate instead on enjoying the softness of this luxurious yarn. PLUS it’s very quick to knit so there’s still plenty of time to get a few knitted as Christmas presents.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can buy the pattern from my Ravelry Pattern Store here or keep an eye on the website here for how to buy both pattern and yarn at a very special price

Etsy finds and the Eco Gift Guide

I’ve been a bit slack about getting my head around both Ravelry and Etsy so I’ve tried to put that right this week, so much so that my eyes are a bit screen weary, think I need to do some knitting.

Anyway, I spotted the work of Edinburgh based fashion knitwear label Isobel and Cleo at a wee makers fair in the Edinburgh last Sunday. Their collection of knitwear and accessories is an interesting and exciting blend of hand and machine knitting, if you like your knitting 4ply & Fairisle this will take you out of your comfort zone. Have a look at them over at Etsy and whilst you’re there check out Going Home To Roost a hub of gorgeous home crafting run by a lady called Bonnie. As well as selling  her range of hand made aprons, cushions and home accessories on Etsy Bonnie also blogs. This month she’s included Kitglobal’s Shetland Flame Scarf kit in Organic dyed Walnut in the Eco Conscious section of her Gift Guide which brings together truly original gift ideas for tech lovers, crafters, outdoorsy types and lots more.

The combination of this, Kirsty’s Homemade Christmas and the fog that’s been sitting over Edinburgh all day makes me want to stay in, stick another smokeless briquette on the fire and knit ~ in fact that just what I’ll do.

New prices on new kits at kitglobal

As it’s Christmas and everyone is trying to make their hard earned cash go a little further we’ve decided to take the cotton ‘kit’ bags out of the Shetland Flame and Chunkywool kits just added to the collection. We thought it would be nice to offer you something that’s still gorgeous but at a really really good price. Have a look at them here

duppdupp Gift Vouchers . . .at last

I designed these weeks ago but just hadn’t got the chance to get them onto the site. I think the problem is I spent too much time tweaking with how they look (typical ) anyway they’re up at www.duppdupp.com just in time for the final push towards Christmas.

There’s a different design for each denonimation and they start at just a fiver. I can personalise them and send them to the lucky recipient ribbon tied and at no extra cost!

I’m multi-tasking at the mo working on another design for The Knitter and making more needle cases so I’m off . . . .  

PS Thanks Anne for the suggestion that I actually wear a pair of my fingerless mittens to combat the finger freeze I had last post. I think my brain must have been frozen too as it didn’t even cross my mind

By the way Christmas is coming

We had a fantastic reaction to the Kitglobal range at the Country Living Fair which ended on Sunday. I always forget how much hard work shows like that are but the positive feedback made it worth it. I’ve recently taken on Knitglobal’s designs for the Shetland Flame and Chunkywool yarns which means a broader range of kits just in time for Christmas! I’m hoping to add to them Kitglobal site this week.  Will post then it’s done

Kitglobal, Knit Today issue 38

Well the nice people over at Knit Today have said some lovely things about our kits in the October issue which should be in the shops now. Judging from the revies’s title I think it’s officially ok to mention Christmas now.

Getting jiggy on Etsy

 

 

I’ve been getting busy re jigging the Kitglobal shop on Etsy as, to be honest, it was a bit of a mess. Hopefully now it’s simpler to navigate with all the colours available listed in each kit listing AND a new shop banner.

I created an Etsy shop so that anyone wanting to spend in $ Dollars rather than £ Sterling would find it easy to do so. If you’ve not heard of it before – where’ve you been? They really champion individual designer makers and their broad range of wonderful hand made items. I almost mentioned Christmas again – now I have -  that’s two posts in a row, but it’s worth giving Etsy a look if you’re looking for gifts that you won’t find on the high street.