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I was never really a fan of peanut butter until I visited the States about 10 years ago. I knew that the Americans loved their PB&J sandwiches but I had no idea how much they were part of the culture. I become hooked and now a peanut butter sandwich is one of my favourite things to eat. I think it’s the combination of sweet and salty that I really love and I’m also a huge fan of Reece’s Pieces now (which you can buy almost everywhere in the UK). I do like to chop and change the flavours though so here are some of my favourite PB combinations

• PB and banana – the old classic, brilliant on brown or white bread with the banana either sliced or mushed in to the PB with a fork. Good toasted too.
• Fried PB and banana – as above but lightly fried in butter before serving
• PB and fresh peach – ideally you need to eat soon after making as the peach will start to go brown the longer it’s left
• PB and Nutella – to die for
• PB and honey – yummy
• PB and golden syrup – really sweet but very moreish
• PB and marmite – super sweet and salty
• PB and ready salted crips – messy but soooo nice

Funnily enough, peanut butter and jam is the one combination that I really can’t stand.

It’s been so bitter cold lately I haven’t really wanted to spend an awful lot of time in the kitchen with it’s single glazed back door and always-in-use catflap letting in the cold. However, I’ve wanted to make sure we had at least one good hot meal a day to keep the chill away. I’m not a huge fan of soup and I have to really be in the mood to make one but I made one yesterday using a caluiflower and some bits of stilton left over from Christmas and it was really gorgeous. I didn’t follow a recipe as such but  I used the following in roughly these measurements:

A medium sized cauliflower
About 2 ozs of Stilton
A tsp of butter
2 onions – chopped
2 medium sized potatoes – chopped
A pinch of nutmeg
About a pint and a 1/4 of veggie stock
Salt & Pepper

I fried off the onions in the butter, added in the potato, cauliflower, nutmeg and seasonings, covered with the stock and brought to the boil. Then I let the whole lot simmer for about half and hour (until the potatoes) were soft. Left it to cool, then whizzed it up with a hand held stick thing (leaving it a bit lumpy). I served it with a blob of creme fresh, a bit of dill and some crusty brown rolls. It’s gone straight onto my ‘will make this at least once a month’ list as it was so yummy

I’m great (she says modestly) at making loaf type cakes but have also been a bit hit and miss when it comes to making cupcakes – and muffins for that matter. My cupcakes never seem to rise enough or have the right kind of frosting/icing and they never seem as appetising as the ones I see on other blogs. However, I will not be beaten and 2010 will be the year I make the perfect cupcake! In the meantime, I have put together 1o of my favorite cupcake designs as inspiration, enjoy!

Banana Split Cupcakes

I could just dive into these:

Terrier Cupcakes

Absolutely adorable – too good to eat really

Alice in Wonderland Cupcakes

So adorable

Rose Cupcake

Look at the details that has gone into this – amazing

Pink Star Cupcakes

How lovely are these – and how yummy does this icing look?

Peppermint Vegan Cupcake

Oh my….

Cupcake Burgers

How brilliant are these??

Murder Cupcakes

Creepy but inspired!

Coke Cupcakes

Love, love, love these

Monkey Cupcakes

So funny

Photo credits: Philip, Pascal, Hippie2006, Toxel, mymodernmet, cupcaketakesthecake, hellocupcake,