Blog Under Maintenance

Hi everybody, thanks for visiting. My blog is currently *under maintenance* whilst I make the change from blogspot to Wordpress (all will be revealed shortly). In the meantime, you can browse around my blog and check out some of my recent posts! If you do have any enquiries, please feel free to email me using 'yvette95@hotmail.co.uk' and I will respond as soon as I can.

Yvette Marie

HOW TO: Make Cake Pops!

It looks like August is the month for birthdays (in my family anyway) which means lots of birthday cake! For my sister's 30th, she threw a big birthday bash earlier in the month, and I made these sponge pop cakes for everybody to tuck into! I'm not 100% sure if this counts as a 'recipe', as the majority of ingredients are the same as any other cake! I guess I could just a call this a list of instructions? Enjoy, x 

First step, bake a sponge cake - you can use a plain sponge recipe (4oz casting sugar, butter, flour, 2 eggs and some baking powder), but I used a basic sponge mix from the supermarket which needed just 1x egg and 1 or 2 spoonfuls of water - a lot easier & probably a lot cheaper if you do not have the ingredients at home already (which I didn't)! Once the mixture has been made, spoon it into a greased container and cook into the sponge is bouncy and golden!

Step 2 - Once cooled, break up the cake with your hands until it looks like crumble; then add in a couple of tablespoons of ready-made icing mixture (enough to make the sponge stick together, without it being too wet). Grab a small handful of the mixture and roll it into 10-12 suitably small 'cake ball' sizes.

Step 3 - Poke a cake pop stick into the ready-made icing and then into each individual 'cake ball'. Once completed, freeze all cake pops for 15 minutes. This is just to ensure that all sticks are firmly set in the cake pops!

Step 4 - As the pop-sticks are freezing, melt the cooking chocolate for icing. I melted the chocolate in a glass bowl over some very warm water (not boiling) but you can also microwave it! DO NOT ADD WATER TO YOUR CHOCOLATE AS IT MELTS... (I learnt the hard way) This will make the chocolate separate and unusable. 

Step 5 - Once your chocolate has melted, dip each cake pop into a glass of melted chocolate - be careful when moving the stick around - too much swirling cake make the stick become loose. Now apply any sprinkles / decorative extras that you have on top of the melted chocolate. 

Step 6 - leave to dry by placing the sticks into a cake pop stand, and if you don't have one of these then a colander should be just as good. Once set, place the pops in a clear wrapper and tie up with ribbon to make the treats look extra special!

Wa la, you're done!! You should have 10-12 identical and tasty cake pops that have a moist sponge and are covered in chocolate :) Would I make these again? I received a lot of compliments after my first batch, which is always nice, and yes my cake pops looked very cool! I made a coffee, and double chocolate flavour, so you can mess around with the ingredients, but I probably wouldn't make these again as its A LOT of work & money!! Fairy cakes are just as cool & probably go further! 

Have you made cake pops before? Maybe you have a different recipe that you'd like to share? If so please feel free to add a comment. Alternatively, if you have an idea for another blog post id love to hear about it below.

Thanks for reading,

Yvette Marie xo

 

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The Cosy Club: Bristol

I recently ate out at The Cosy Club in Bristol on Corn Street. I had such a fun time, so I thought you should all hear about it! I'd heard some great things about this venue (and all its elegance), but I was also informed that the nightclub 'Rehab' used to be located at the property, so I was slightly confused as to what kind of restaurant this might be! Keep reading to see my full review, Enjoy! x

Venue - The building looks amazing from the outside, and from inside, Cosy Club have really made it their own. The place is flooded with natural light. We were seated on a giant tan coloured leather sofa. The menus have been placed in leather cases, there are vintage tassel(ly) lamps, wooden bench tables and (what looks like) marble flooring. Even the napkins provided match the Greece proof paper that your chips are brought out on - the feel of the place is very relaxed, friendly and 'cosy'. 

Service - I needed to change my reservation as an extra person joined me for dinner and this was no problem for the staff. My friends and I were greeted and sat at our table within a minute or arriving; And drinks (very reasonably priced drinks - £2.50 for a glass bottle of coke) were delivered quickly. The two waiters that served us for the evening were polite, easy going and super-efficient! Service was 10/10 and I still genuinely cannot believe that my food was so cheap for the style of venue; Or that I hadn't eaten there before - if anything I was slightly disappointed in myself, I pass this place almost every day so wish I'd visited sooner.

Food - I'm quite a (known) fussy eater so I'm always wary about eating out at a new place! I tend to study the menu for at least 10 minutes, if I haven't already done so online prior to arriving! Nobody likes having 'food envy', especially at a restaurant, but at the same time, I'm not one for venturing out to taste new foods and flavours. I ordered the 'Chicken Caesar Burger' - which was a Herb-marinated chicken breast, streaky bacon, Parmesan, cos lettuce, Caesar dressing and anchovies in a sourdough bun with fries. The waiter was very polite and kindly accepted my request to replace Parmesan cheese, and Caesar dressing (mixed with anchovies) for a free flat giant mushroom. When the burger arrived to the table, it looked huge, the sourdough bread was really fresh and my chips were neatly coned into a china mug. I really didn't expect this amount of effort for £9.50, (certainly
not like something you're brought Harvesters...Don't get me wrong, I love harvesters).

Desserts - Desserts are my most favorited foods! It's one of the things that I really look forward to most when eating out (how exciting do I make myself come across?!). HOWEVER, the dessert menu at The Cosy Club was slightly disappointing; There was no mention of any chocolate, or a fruit crumble/pie - and it was £3.95 for frozen ice (sorbet). This doesn't mean to say that the desserts didn't look nice, but sometimes, I just want a little more variety!

I would definitely recommend food at The Cosy Club again. In comparison to restaurants around that area, you can actually receive a very good service / food for not a lot of money. Have you 'wined & dined' here? If so, please feel free to comment in the section box below! Alternatively, if you have a recommendation for another tasty food place, I'd love to hear about it!

Thanks for reading, 

Yvette Marie xo

 

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Bristol Animal Zoo!

Every couple of months, my partner Jordan & I plan surprise dates for each other. We most recently visited Bristol History Museum & Art Gallery (to which he'd never been) and it was actually really fun. Yesterday I was asked to get dressed and ready for 12 o'clock with absolutely no clues whatsoever! Hopefully, you'll like this post as much as liked the day! Enjoy, x

After catching several buses, we arrived at Bristol Zoo! I genuinely could not believe that 1) Jordan had actually come up with such a cool date idea; 2) How much he paid for the tickets. There is currently a deal on Groupon offering 50% off full price adult tickets, which meant that he paid a total of £14 as oppose to £28, a complete bargain!

The weather played a big part in the day; it wouldn't have been a total flop, but it would have definitely changed the mood if it was rainy. There were plenty of things to do (even for adults) which was why I enjoyed the date so much! I haven't visited the zoo in a while, and a couple of displays / installations had been update so it was nice to see all of the changes from the past 5 years! I would have loved to of seen a bigger range of animals (elephant, giraffes, or zebra) as similar attractions, which aren't the zoo, have these facilities!!

My favourite part of the day was a sea lion / seal talk. Throughout the day, the zoo put on talks & fees for each of the animals. I would definitely recommend to everybody that they attend at least one talk (I would have loved to of seen more, but we missed a couple when walking around). By attending a talk, you actually learn a lot more about the animal's welfare & dietary requirements; Plus, we were also able to watch a sea lion perform some amazing tricks! Whilst the sea lion puts on a show, the zoo keep is actually able to check if there are any problems / medical issues so no harm is caused to the animals!

I'm not 100% sure if any other zoo has an underground facility, but at Bristol you can walk under the giant sea life tanks to see the animals from underneath, which really gives you an insight to their behaviour (if they were in their natural habitat).

I didn't bring any lunch because I wasn't sure where we were going, and purchasing food at the zoo ended up costing RIDICULOUSLY amounts! I paid £4.20 for a sandwich, and it was £6 for a 'meal deal'. If we did buy the tickets full price and 2x meal deals, we would have spent a total of £40!! (Whilst we were on site). I noticed a lot of families had brought packed lunches to eat on the giant lawn area; this seems like a great way to save money, and it's probably easier to bring little snack foods to enjoy throughout the day.

I would recommend Bristol Zoo to everybody (I'm not biased, honest!). I think it's a fun place for anybody who is new to Bristol, a great day out for families, or for us, it made an awesome surprise date day!

If you've been to Bristol Zoo before, please feel free to comment how you found your experience. Alternatively, if you have a suggestion for a fun day out, i'd love to hear it!

Yvette Marie xo

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