"Lemon Cheesecake"

Why the quotation marks? Because this lemon "cheesecake" doesn't actually have cheese in it.

I love lemon cheesecake. It's my favourite dessert, and sorry chocolate lovers, but lemon tart / cheesecake / drizzle cake over chocolate anytime, hands down.

It also happens that one finds every possible way one can when exam times roll round. In my case, I've taken to Instagram and taking pictures of everything I eat and plan excessively for each meal.

I was craving clotted cream, so that's precisely what I got among my happy alone-shopping time at Fortnum and Masons, along with a whole lot of biscuits / shortbread...did manage to stop myself from getting even more tea when I have about 10 different teas at home despite the fact that I'm leaving London in a month. I don't think I'd be able to finish them unless I drank about five cups of tea a day (I am amounting to that number soon).

Oh I do love this place. And yes I do realise I've gone off a tangent on this cheeseless cheesecake.

I was inspired by Yeo Valley's Lemon Curd Yoghurt and Gu's Lemon Cheesecake Puds, and the clotted cream I bought today (see? All the rant above was relevant after all.) Most my aim of cooking is that it has to be FAST and non-messy. And finding digestives, butter, lemon curd and yoghurt at home, I managed to recreate one of my favourite desserts - in a matter of 7-9 minutes.

Lemon I-Don't-Know-What-It-Is

You know when something just goes wrong with your baking and you can't stop poking at it, tasting it, chopping off bits to taste it, eat a whole chunk to see if that makes any difference, add stuff to it, pop it back in the oven, then keep opening and closing the oven door and still not be able make it better?

That's what happened to me today.

I don't really know what went wrong. If I did it wouldn't have done would it. The only reason could be that I forgot to add in eggs and poured the batter back out to add the eggs before putting it back in. But I don't know, surely it wouldn't have made that much of a difference.

Brown sugar and butter creamed together is heaven. The taste, the smell, the sight of it. If you heat this and add condensed milk you get toffee.

Batter. Oh gosh I hate my crappy camera, I wish wish wish I hadn't left my G10 at home in Hong Kong. I'll be back in less than a month. In less than a month it will be Christmas eve. In 6 months I will be done with University. #scarythoughts

Have been cooking to destress. I made a Salmon Quiche / Pie the day before yesterday which luckily had better results than this. And for dinner today: N, who used to never be able to cook anything in his life except a cheese omelete, made a huge pot of Japanese curry. I stole some, poached an egg and added some celery (I was originally going to have "ants on sticks", that plan went out of the window).

So no recipe since "Lemon and Honey Bread" turned into "Lemon Whatever", but instead here are two HIMYM Season 7 Episode 10 lines which have been looping in my head: Just because something has to be said, doesn't mean something has to be heard. Just because you did bad things, doesn't mean you're a bad person. I wonder how many hearts these two lines have touched.

Made with Love, Lemon Meringue Cupcakes

JH's girlfriend is interning in Guangzhou, and JH, over lunch, was pondering what to get her as a present when he went up to see her over the weekend.

JH: "I actually really want to make her something. Bake something. A cake. Cookies. I dunno," said JH. "Tiramisu? It means 'pick me up' literally...but it's what wives used to make for their husbands went off to the war..." I said.
"I don't think it'd survive the three hour train journey it's too hot in China," he said.
...

"You could look through my Hummingbird Cake Days recipe book and see what there is? There's a cupcake version of a tiramisu maybe that would last longer," I offered.

So that's what we did, and as we were deliberating betweenTiramisu Cupcakes and Lemon Meringue Cupcakes, my phone buzzed.

D: "I'm walking past by your house!"
"Come in! I'm there! Do you want to make cupcakes for your girlfriend too?" JH had already called him the minute I showed him the text.

And that's how I ended up giving two love-struck boys a cookery lesson, Lemon Meringue Cupcakes 101.

Trust guys with grocery shopping. They forgot baking powder. So we had to trek out in the rain to get baking powder since I'd run out at home. Oh well I guess turning up at mine at 11 in the morning with all ingredients except the baking powder was enough of an achievement for them.

Work of the boys, and they kept bickering over who had spilt the most batter. Children nowadays...watching them slowly spoon the batter into each muffin tin was a teeny bit painful. I know I could have done that in half the time they did, yet at the same time it was so sweet to see the look of concentration on their face as they tried not to drip anything over the table or the edge of the muffin tin. Their girlfriends are so lucky to have them.

I tell them one tablespoon of baking powder, they put a heaped tablespoon instead of a level tablespoon (I guess to them it did not really make a difference) and cupcake batter kind of exploded out forming 'growths' onto these cupcakes...

Meet Ellie the Elephant. I found it really amusing that a cupcake would turn out with a trunk and proceeded to give her ears. Some people were less impressed. But I liked her.

JH even found cupcake boxes. They do look good enough to sell, and credits to the boys because all I did was just to instruct them what to do, plus boil the sugar to reach the soft boil stage when making the meringue. Oh and putting them into the mini-oven we have at home.

I later had tea with mum, one Lemon Meringue Cupcake each, with Fortnum and Mason Smoky Earl Grey. She loved it.

I'd never have thought Lemon Meringue Cupcakes would bring about so much love.