My first bake off in our new kitchen!
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For months and months and months, in fact probably since we bought the house 16 months ago, I have been day dreaming about baking in our freshly renovated new kitchen! I'd even go as far to say that we designed the worktop space specially, to allow for big bake-a-thons and ample space to serve up food! It feels so good after 3 long months of dust and rubble to have completed our 1930s kitchen diner renovation just in time for Christmas.
I just feel so happy and grateful <3
What's more, me and Neil have taken a bit of a different "all in" approach to December which has kept excitement in the house running high. We made our own DIY Advent Calendar to really make the most of our new home and our lives together.
Every day we've been opening a door on the calendar and behind it is a Christmassy, festive, creative project for us to do together – taking us away from screens and in some cases trying new things or keeping loved traditions.
Behind door 10 last weekend, our challenge was to make Christmas biscuits! A Fifi tradition. Around this time every year I always try to make a special effort with a bake that puts my (very shoddy) piping skills to the test and there's no better bake to get creative with than a classic gingerbread.
In previous years I've made mini gingerbread houses, which take FOREVER, so this year I dialled it back a tad and went for some standard gingerbread biscuits, houses, stars and candy canes (with the leftover dough!)
I'm so thrilled with how they ended up looking and tasting, and as expected it was a total joy baking in our new kitchen for the first time. I don't think I looked at my phone once in all the 3 hours mixing and piping because I took the recipe from an old Christmas Classics recipe book and winged the icing part.
I find baking the most therapeutic way to spend an evening, so I'm going to try and make a real effort in the new year to do more bake-offs, and even invite my friends over to bake together.
