Posts made by 200577

More Colin Wayne:

@cannonmc:

You make a point for me. They are lovely pictures and it's a very pretty part of the world and I thank you for them. But I would have preferred thumbs to click.

This post takes a huge section in the 'recent posts' thread which I use as a first call every time I sign in. So I have to scroll through them to find out what other recent posts there have been.

If you make your text sufficiently enticing I will go to your thread and then see the pictures. See what I mean by different strokes…?

Oh don't be ridiculous. There are four pictures and one thumbnail. That's not going to kill you or anyone else. The world hasn't ended. The sky hasn't fallen in. A minor inconvenience at worst. Besides, the forum isn't run just for you and your needs. We are none of us here to serve you. And why are you so obsessed with thumbnails? Not everyone likes to have to click to see an image. Had that occured to you or do other people not count at all in your self-obsessed little world? Does your mania for having a say on all things know no bounds? Do you sit there waiting to pounce on every post? Was it absolutely impossible for you to have simply passed along without making a comment? Or have you no ability to stop yourself?

Sidmouth, Devon. South West England:

Went to school in Exeter:

Panorama pic attached as a thumb - wasn't sure if it would display properly otherwise.

Some more pics:

I liked his scene with Caesar in Sprung and the orgy scene with Bryce London and Clint Cooper (same vid, I think)

Easy chocolate muffins.

You'll need accurate scales, a small saucepan, a mixing bowl and a fork. Pre-heat oven to 180-190c (conventional/non-fan). Get two six-hole muffin tins or a twelve-hole tin and pop paper cases in each hole. The cases need support or the mix will spread out as it bakes. This recipe makes exactly 12 muffins in the Sainsbury's cases I use (shown in pic).

Dry ingredients in a mixing bowl:

250g Self Raising flour
1 teaspoon of baking powder
150g sugar
Scant half teaspoon of salt
Two heaped tablespoons of cocoa sifted into the rest of the dry ingredients
Mix together with a fork.

Wet ingredients:

Pop a saucepan on your scales and weigh in 90g of unsalted butter. Melt it over a very low heat. Let it cool enough for you to put the pan back on the scales. Add 150g cold milk. Stir. Add one medium egg and one teaspoon of vanilla extract. Whisk it all together with the fork.

Pour the wet ingredients straight over the dry ingredients in the mixing bowl and start mixing with your fork. Don't overmix. It should take you less than a minute. If there are small lumps, that's fine. If there are huge islands of raw flour, that's not fine. Divide equally between the paper cases and put straight in the oven. They'll take about 10-12 minutes. Take the paper cases out of the tin as soon as you can and let the muffins cool on a wire rack.

Gone. Thanks popper.  :cheers:

@Popper:

That is something I've no idea how it works and how it can be changed. Very strange functioning and NOT reputation power related. Reputation is voted by the heart symbol bottom left in the posts side panel. These smilies are voted bottom right of a forum post, but how that exactly influences the smiley attached to the side panel isn't very clear to me.

Popper, it was suggested I might have added the sad emoticon in the post title by mistake. I'm quite sure I didn't. I use emoticons only rarely and never in titles. I have an idea what might have happened and, perhaps why.

Regardless, it's sad that rather than simply pass on, one person out of the 160+ who viewed the gif might have decided to get a little snide. One bad comment from 70 posts and a quite prominent 'sad' face suddenly appears under my rep bar. Who knew that could happen? Not the end of the world. No-one got killed. But it bloody annoyed me.

@raphjd:

I haven't used lard in many, many years.  I guess I'll give it a go.

My parents led me to believe that lard was the work of the devil, but it's reputation is being restored. It makes a fantastic shortcrust. I can't make shortcrust by hand - I don't have the skill or delicacy needed - so I use a processor and a stand mixer. 500g+ made in about two minutes. That's fine by me.

If you do make the English muffins (and they are well worth making because they taste far better than shop-bought), please tell me how the ones you make from the reformed and re-rolled dough turn out.

Could someone explain to me why one person disliking a GIF I posted in the wrestling section, was able to hobble my rep to the point where I was saddled with a sad/disapproving face (now turned 'cheesy' by a helpful mod)? That can't be regarded as fair, surely?

It's not my recipe, raphjd. I got it from about.com:

http://britishfood.about.com/od/recipeindex/r/englishmuffins.htm

I think the recipe meant to use the lard to fry the muffins in. I didn't. I added the lard to the dough. I've kept on doing that. Lard horrifies some people, but it's thought to be healthier than using heavily processed spreads.  I now use 2 parts butter to one part lard my shortcrust pastry too. I don't buy baking spreads any more.

I get seven-eight rounds from the first rolling out of the dough. I end up with enough leftover dough to make 3-4-5 more muffins. But those end up looking like crap. No matter how carefully I reform the leftovers, those baked from the first rolling out of the dough look like classic, perfect, English muffins while the next batch simply don't.

Edit: I should have said that I don't use dried yeast. I use a 7g sachet of instant yeast or 15g of fresh yeast when I can get it. The fresh yeast has to be dissolved in a little of the milk - heated to lukewarm - with the teaspoon of sugar mixed in. Leave it until it bubbles and you can hear it hissing. Fresh yeast is lovely to work with, but I can only get it from Sainsbury's and only when certain people are at the bakery counter. No idea why they make buying it so difficult.

Just wanted to share this: