chocolate tiffin recipe

So I posted the wee giveaway pouch off to Kathleen today and fingers crossed she will like it!

Before I get started on any more stitching, I want to share a little recipe with you…

… there was a time when my husband and I owned a busy coffee shop and during that time I’m guessing I must have made around 8,000 slices of this Chocolate Tiffin – no kidding, it was kinda popular with the customers!

It was like our ‘signature’ bake, if you like, and people came back for it time and again.

I am, admittedly, using the word ‘bake’ here very loosely because there is no actual baking involved!  But that doesn’t stop it being the yummiest and, quite  frankly, addictive chocolatey treat ever!

Ingredients

• 400g digestive biscuits
• 125g butter
• 75g raisins or sultanas (or you can use chopped dates )
• 3 tblsp cocoa powder
• 185g of golden syrup
• 150g milk chocolate
• 30g white chocolate

Method

1. Break the biscuits into uneven size pieces and mix with the dried fruit. Now I know some people are not fans of raisins etc, in which case you can use chopped dates instead or you can leave them out altogether if you like – it will still taste yum!
2. In a saucepan, melt the butter, syrup and cocoa powder and pour this liquidy goo all over the broken biscuits. Mix well with a wooden spoon.
3. Spoon the mixture into a tray bake tin and press down well with the back of the wooden spoon (the tin I use is 11” x 7” x 1.5”)
4. Break the milk chocolate into pieces and place into a heatproof bowl. Place the white chocolate into a separate heatproof bowl. Sit the bowls over a pan of barely simmering water (a bain marie) and allow the chocolate to melt, stirring occasionally.
5. Spread the milk chocolate evenly over the biscuit base.  Drizzle the white chocolate over the top.

and drag a cocktail stick randomly through the chocolate layers to create a marbled effect.

Chill in the fridge until firm but not completely solid before cutting into slices.

The tiffin tastes best straight from the fridge, so keep it chilled until ready to eat.

Enjoy!

Natalie x

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giveaway winner …

Thank you to all who entered the giveaway and for all of your lovely comments.  I gathered all of the entries on Facebook and here on the blog, and I plopped them all onto a spreadsheet with an allocated number for each entry.

Then, in his usual helpful manner, Mr Random.org drew the winner …

and the winner is …

Kathleen Robertson … it’s you! Yay! Congratulations!!

Kathleen, please can you email me at sewingroomsecrets@gmail.com with your address so that I can send your prize to you.

Thanks again for all your entries, comments and shares ♥.

Happy weekending everyone 🙂

Natalie x

it’s a giveaway!

I promised you something a little bit lovely as a giveaway prize and I hope this wee offering fulfills that promise.

You wouldn’t believe it, but I have completely trashed my sewing room putting together that wee bit o’ nonsense. My husband entered my sewing room during my “creative phase” and gave me *that* look. You know the one; complete disbelief mixed with a slight suspicion of some kind of hidden mental illness. Mania perhaps?

“Do you really need to empty all this stuff on to the floor every time?” and “How can you find anything in all this mess?” was what he said, or words to that effect. He was genuinely perplexed, bless him.

Good questions.

Why do I do that? Every time.

Almost every other creative person I know does the same. You get a whiff of an idea and every piece of fabric, thread, button, lace, ribbon, felt etc that you own gets pulled out and examined for worthiness of inclusion in your current project. You can lose track of all earthly time and find yourself still in your jim-jams and furry slippers at 2.30 in the afternoon. Shocking!

I had gone into Hobbycraft last week looking for something or other (can’t remember what?) and I came out, not with the thing I went in for, but with some beautiful Tilda fabric.

Sound like a familiar story? Are you kidding me, I know you guys do that kinda thing too 🙂

After much fabric stroking and fretting over the actual cutting up of such a thing of beauty, I finally convinced myself that it was the right thing to do. After all, it’s what the fabric would have wanted, right?

And with my Facebook page reaching a wee personal milestone of 2000 followers (I know! can you catch your breath!), I thought it timely to host a little giveaway to say ‘thanks’ for keeping me company all this time ♥

So, here it is … a pretty wee pouch for one lucky reader. Well worth getting my sewing room all messed up for 🙂

The pouch is padded with cotton wadding for extra softness. A wee bit of lace and a few other carefully chosen embellishments help to create a delicate, feminine look that I just love!

The little suffolk puff has a brooch pin sewn on to the back of it, which allows you to detach it from the pouch, so you can pin it on to something else if you like. Nifty!

And whilst I was on a roll, I made a wee lavender sachet to match which I’ll include in the prize

For a chance to win, here’s all you need to do:

• be a follower of this blog by subscribing to email (click the box in the top right of the home page) or Bloglovin (or some other means!) and leave a comment below telling me which way you are following along. If you are a no-reply blogger, be sure to leave me an email address so I can contact you if you win 🙂
• for a second chance to win pop over to my Facebook page and follow the instructions on the giveaway post pinned to the top of the page

That’s it!  The giveaway is open until 24th October 2013 at midnight, GMT, after which time a winner will be picked at random from all entries here and on Facebook. The winner will be announced on Friday 25th October 2013.

Good luck everyone and thank you for entering!

Natalie x

Edit: This giveaway is now closed, but you can purchase the pattern for the little zippered purse featured in this giveaway here.

giveaway … coming soon

Just gathering together a few wee whispers of inspiration and planning to stitch up something a little bit lovely for a giveaway coming soon … ♥

… if I can bear to take my scissors to this gorgeous Tilda fabric!

 

Natalie x

zakka inspired gift set

With Christmas just around the corner, I have been putting some thought into what little fabric gifts I can make for friends and family this year.

Every year, I make Christmas cookies for the girls at work and last year I made some wee fabric gift bags to put them in

Gift bag template can be found here

This Christmas I want to give the girls a little something to go with the usual cookies and I have been wondering what it might be. Every time I think of an idea, I have been jotting it down on a yellow sticky note and pinning it to the notice board in my sewing room.

Sticky notes are great when you need to jot something down real quick; I use them all the time! And I certainly wouldn’t be without them at work (along with the humble highlighter pen!)

Which got me thinkin’! Wouldn’t it be nice to have something pretty to keep them in?

Dangerous thing, thinkin’ … cos now my sewing room is all messed up again!  There are fabric scraps everywhere, I’ve completely forgotten to leave anything out of the freezer for tea, the housework is untouched and I have no idea where the time has gone! But I don’t care … not really

… cos now I have a whole bunch of these wee cuties! 🙂

This little sticky note keeper fits two sizes of stickies – 7.5cm square and 9.5cm square

And the really cool part is that they happen to go great with the little twisted hexagon coasters that I made a couple of weeks ago!

I added in a little Sarubobo keyring and Bob’s your Uncle! … a cute little Zakka inspired gift set was born! Don’t you just love it when a plan comes together 🙂

These little Zakka style gift sets will be perfect to accompany the Christmas cookies this year!  I just need to make another half a dozen sets and that’s Christmas 2013 all ‘sewn up’ … (pun intended folks 🙂 )

If you would like to make a sticky note keeper of your own, here’s how:

In the main fabric cut:

• Four 5” x 1¼” strips (for the borders around the pinwheel centre)
• Two 4½” x 5½” rectangles (for the back and the inside pocket)
• One 4½” x 9½” rectangle (for the lining) 

You will also need:

• Two 3” squares of fabric – one light, one dark – for the pinwheel
• 5½” x 10½” piece of cotton wadding
• One 3½” square and one 3¾” square of stiff card

First make the patchwork pinwheel …

*Use a ¼” seam throughout (unless otherwise stated)

Place the two 3” squares right sides together and sew a continuous ¼” seam all the way around the edge

Cut the sewn squares in half diagonally.   Then cut again diagonally in the opposite direction

Press the patches open towards the darker fabric

Lay the four patches in the formation of a pinwheel.  It’s easy to mix the patches up and sew the wrong edges together, so I lay the pinwheel out right next to my machine and that keeps me on the right track 🙂

Place patches 1 and 2 right sides together and sew together with 1/4″ seam. Join pieces 3 and 4 in the same way. Press the seams towards the dark side.

Now join section A and B with ¼” seam, making sure that  the centre seams are nested together

Press the seam open to reduce bulk

Trim the pinwheel – it should measure 3” square

Stitch a 5” border strip to two opposite sides of the pinwheel patch and press the seams out towards the border

Trim the borders flush with the sides of the pinwheel patch

Stitch the other two border strips to the remaining sides of the pinwheel patch and press seams out towards the border

You now have a framed pinwheel block – yay!

Stitch a 4½” x 5½” rectangle to the framed pinwheel block and press the seam away from the block.  Place the piece right side up on the wadding

Quilt the two layers together by stitching around the pinwheel square and inside the light coloured triangles, about ⅛” from the seam lines.  I did a mixture of hand stitching and machine stitching on mine and I also added a little bead to the centre.

Trim the wadding flush with the sides of your work

Take another 4½” x 5½” rectangle and fold it in half, matching up the short sides. Press.  This will form a pocket on the inside.

Lay the lining fabric on your work table right side up. Line up the raw edges of the folded pocket piece with the raw edges on one of the short sides of the lining fabric and pin in place

Next, lay the pinwheel panel right side down on top of the pocket panel, matching up all raw edges and pin. (The pinwheel should be at the opposite end to where you have pinned the pocket). Sew all the layers together, leaving the short edge nearest the pinwheel open

Trim away some of the wadding to reduce bulk and clip the corners

Turn right side out. *Tip – when turning things right side out,  I use a Phillips (star head) screw driver to push out the corners, as I find the little ‘star head’ helps to grip the fabric and is less likely to pierce it than a knitting needle or scissors would. Try it yourself and see what you think!

Insert a 3¾” square of stiff card through the opening and push it to the bottom. It’s a fairly snug fit, so you may have to give it a wiggle. *I used card that was 1/8″ thick for the first couple that I made, but then I used two thicknesses of cereal packet stuck together and that worked just fine.  I used a simple glue stick to stick the card together.

Starting from the seam line of the pinwheel block, sew two lines of stitching ¾” apart.  These two lines create a sort of ‘spine’ and encase the cardboard at the same time

Place a 3½” square of stiff card into the opening up to the sewn line

Last bit! Fold in the raw edges of the opening by about ¼” and pin

Stitch the opening closed with a line of stitching very close to the edge. Continue to stitch all around the edge of the square very close to the edge, wiggling the cardboard out of the way as you go. I sewed along to the first corner and then, keeping the needle in the down position, I was able to wiggle the cardboard out of the way and pivot my work and sew to next corner and so on.

If you prefer not to sew a line all around the outside, you can just slip stitch the opening closed by hand.

That’s it, you’re done!

All you need to do now is insert the back few pages of a sticky note pad into the little pocket and you have a pretty little home for your stickies (oh the simple things that please us eh?) 🙂

You don’t have to have a pinwheel as your centre block.  Depending on how you sew your half triangle patches together, you will get a different pattern. For example, I put the patches together as a ‘broken dishes’ block in the centre of this one

… and this one

Or you could perhaps keep the whole piece plain and embroider a little design on the front – I think some redwork on linen would look fab! A nine patch block would do the trick too – you do whatever takes your fancy.

I’m a wee bit fond of the little red set, so I might have to keep it for myself (maker’s perk an’ all:) )

I hope you have enjoyed this little project and feel inspired to make some of your own wee Zakka-style sitcky note keepers – if you do, I’d love to see some pics of your creations! 

Happy stitching and creating everyone

Natalie x