lemon tea cakes

yummy goodness and a cooking lesson for boys all rolled into one.

today was a good day. nor scratch that today was great. last night i have a small group of people over for a few drinks and polite conversation, a few of them chose to sleep on my lounge room floor. more than happy to supply pillows, blankets, and looks of confusion as to why they would ignore the super deluxe double air bed already pumped up in the other room... seriously?

anyhoo, this morning rolled around, i cooked franch toast for 5 very appreciative bellies, i played with my new pet rabbits - post to follow - ray ray connected my new dvd/vid player (thanx k-rudd). ray ray played with my nintendo 64 (yes, from the mid 90's). there was discussions about xbox 360's. i now own one... thanx ray ray. i mentioned that i was going to make cupcakes and ray ray was in awe - he's never made cupcakes from scratch. i think it freaked him out even a little bit more that we did the whole thing without looking in a book, and the end result is yumtastic. so ray ray and i made cupcakes (recipe below) and we played games on the tv, and me and ray ray and rose played with our two new pet bunnies. then rose and i made lasagne for dinner - i made a rocking white/cheese sauce. i was impressed with my mad cooking skills, coz i have no mad gaming skills... amped - snow board.. my average score was about 4000, the lowest "wow you made it" score is 50,000... get the idea. mad gaming skills - i don't haz them. teaching 18 yr old boys the simple joy of a good batch of cupcakes mad skills? i haz them!

Tea cakes with lemon icing

125g butter
2 cup sugar
3 eggs
3 cups SRF
1t baking powder
1t vanilla
1 1/2 cups cold strong tea (three tea bags)
1 1/2 cups sultanas

Lemon frosting
2 cups icing sugar
1/2 lemon - juiced
some butter (that's the technical measurment of course...)


OK. beat butter till fluffy-ish. add sugar, beat. add eggs one at a time, beat. add baking poweder and vanilla, add flour, tea, flour, tea, flour. add sultanas, 3/4 fill muffin sized patty cases. 15 mins @180C, rotate every which way. about another 15 mins - test with a toothpick. for icing - beat it all together. make it lemonny to taste.

my white suace...
melt the leftover butter from cupcakes and icing - about 75 - 100g at this point. whisk in flour till it becomes a paste - about 1/2 a cup i guess, i didn't measure. add milk, peppercorns, mixed herbs. keeps whisking till ur arm drops off, then chage arms. when that one drops off rope in ur partner for a bit. keep adding milk add cheese, add more milk. eventually you will have enough, the heat will thicken it and bake out the flour taste. it was simple and tasted great.