Perfect Sunday

I've been meaning to blog for a few weeks now about what I consider to be perfect Sundays. I don't get all that many Sundays off work but when I do this is how I like to spend them: sleep in till we wake up which isn't usually that late, maybe 8.30ish, then I go to the papershop and Ben makes breakfast. Usually croissants and tea for breakfast but every now and again we go the whole hog and have a cooked breakfast. We eat breakfast in bed and read the paper - Ben reads the serious bits and I read the magazines ;) Around 11ish we get showered and ready and then, if its good weather, head out for a walk or a little trip somewhere. Then its home for some food in the evening and Sunday night TV (which is great at the moment: Dancing on Ice then Lost, Desperate Housewives and Dirty Sexy Money). Bliss! Maybe I'm getting old because reading the paper in bed and going for walks doesn't sound like what I would have said a few years ago but its true.

Domestic goddess?

Anyone who knows me well will say that I'm not really into all that domestic goddess business of cooking and cleaning. Especially Ben who cooks about 99.9% of nights, maybe even more. This year I'm trying to be a bit better and pull my weight in the kitchen more (although to be fair its March now and this is my only effort so far!). With that in mind I thought I'd make Ben a yummy birthday treat back in January. I wanted to do his favourite cake which I found out after some subtle probing ('what's your favourite type of cake Ben?') was black forest gateau!! Black forest gateau!! That sounded hard to me so I called in the big guns - my friend Sian and Mrs Beeton.

After an assault on Tesco's for ingredients we set to work. For good measure we also did a batch of chocolate muffins to take to the pub with us later that evening. Although I'm not all that comfortable in the kitchen we had a really fun day and the results were, if I do say so myself, really tasty. Ben seemed chuffed with his cake aswell which made it all worthwhile :) Here is photographic evidence of me and Sian elbow deep in cake mix.

and here is the finished product. Not bad hey?