traditional welsh cake recipe

Hello!

If you read my last post you'd have seen my wedding favours were little heart shaped welshcakes. Love welshcakes, can't get enough of them and as I was getting married in London, I wanted a little bit of Wales included in my wedding. Plus it helped I could do them myself which kept costs down! 

For those of you that don't know what a welshcake is, it's a kind of flat scone type cake with currants, sultanas and mixed spice. They are YUMM-MEE!! 

So here it is, my lovely yummy welshcake recipe....

Ingredients 

500g plain flour

2tbsp baking powder

75g softened butter

75g lard

300g caster sugar

200g currants

1tsp mixed spice (cinnamons nice too)

3 eggs

100ml milk (won't need all this)

Method

1. Sift together the flour, baking powder and mixed spice into a bowl

2. Rub in the butter and lard

3. Stir in the sugar and currants

4. Whisk the eggs and stir into the mixture.

5. Add the milk a little at a time until it forms a soft dough that's not too sticky (if it is too sticky just add more flour until it's more like a bread dough) 

6. Refrigerate for an hour (makes it easier to work with)

7. Heat a bake stone* or heavy flat frying pan over a medium heat and brush on a little oil 

8. Roll out the dough to about 1/4 inch thick. Too thick and they won't cook in the middle 

9. Cut them out using a cookie cutter. I did hearts but the traditional shape is round and about 2 1/2 inches wide

10. Cook on a low/medium heat. They should take around 3 minutes on each side (tip-I normally do a tester one to check the temperature of the bake stone and the thickness of the welshcake) 

11. Sprinkle with caster sugar

12. Try not to eat them all at once 😁

Let me know if you try it! They go perfect with a cuppa!

* a bakestone is a big, usually round, piece of slate that sits over the gas job to heat it up. Don't heat it up too quickly as its really hard to cool it down! 

Thanks for reading, 

Love Rhi xx

my crafty wedding

Hello!

As promised, I thought I'd do a post on the DIY bits and bobs I did for our wedding.

When we got engaged we agreed on two things...the first being that we didn't want to get in debt getting married and that we'd do as much as we could ourselves.

Cue my crafty side!! I love crafting but don't have as much time as I'd like these days...maybe I will now I don't have a wedding to plan!! However, I did manage to include a few little crafty details to my day that saved us money and looked lovely on the day! 

I did all my own flowers using foam flowers from eBay including my bouquet, flower girl posies, button holes etc. I followed a few tutorials on YouTube and did a bit of trial and error but was really pleased with how they turned out!

I thought it would make a nice photo if my dress and my bridesmaids dresses were all hung on matching hangers in the hotel. So made pretty hangers for our dresses using hangers from IKEA and transfers from eBay. I then prettied them up with matching yellow ribbon.

My centrepieces were lanterns from IKEA with artificial flower wreaths wrapped around them and little plastic tea lights.

I might have mentioned before our colour theme for the wedding was white and yellow. I was hoping to include some more artificial daffodils (for the Welsh side of the family!) but they proved really difficult to get hold of!

The guest book was already so pretty but I wanted it to match the rest of the decor so added some yellow ribbon. I made a few signs with matching ribbon for around the venue. They had a few cute poems for our favours, post box and guest book on the internet so printed them and framed them in these super lovely frames from the pound shop (I have these all over my house!)

One of our favours were homemade (by me!) Welsh Cakes. I put them in some cute yellow bags and printed off some labeled with our wedding date on. A lovely friend made our sweet cone favours in our colour scheme...both went down very well!

I highly recommend looking on Pinterest and Google for little wedding poems...there were tonnes of them!

So those were a few of our details! It was so amazing to see them all come together, along with our cake and table runners, the hall looked beautiful. I'm hoping to do a few more wedding posts which will include how we manage to keep our costs down and my traditional Welsh Cake recipe! I'm still obsessed with our wedding so will be talking about it for a little while yet...lol!

I hope you've enjoyed seeing a few of our decor details!

Until next time, thanks for reading!

Rhi xxx

mini autumn shopping haul

Hello! 

I'm not sure what the weathers like across the country today, but here in South Wales the temperature seems to have dropped by about 15 degrees!! Incidentally, I can't tell you how grateful I am that I got married last week and not this week...my poor bridesmaids and I would have froze! Anyway...I digress.

Looking in my wardrobe for something suitably warm this morning left me very uninspired, so I conned/bribed the family into a quick trip to Primark to pick up a few essentials! 

 

I came back with this lovely little lot! I could have bought more (a lot more!) and probably will at some point but this is a good start I feel! 

The cable knit jumper was £10 and is super soft and cosy...who doesn't need a cable knit jumper to cosy up into on a chilly night? I must have two others already but they're longer. This ones quite short so will need a vest underneath but I thought it would look cute with a pair of ripped jeans for the autumn. 

The long sleeve top is another essential "can't go wrong with" from Primark. Think I must have about 90 of these in different colours (slight exaggeration but you get my point). Thin enough to wear underneath a cardigan or layer under another t-shirt but still covers your arms on a chilly day! Plus at £3 why would you not want one in every colour?! 

How warm and cosy do these popcorn socks look??!! Not sure how long they'll last with my sock loving puppy around but they are lovely and warm and if it's one thing I hate is having cold toes! They were so cheap too...£2 for two pairs.

The boots I bought were for my littlest princess. She doesn't wear trainers or daps or anything, it's party shoes and sandles in the summer, Lelly Kelly's and pretty boots in the winter! She's a proper princess! These were from Pep & Co which is a new shop round these parts but at £10 they were more than reasonable and will see her right through to next spring. I'm just gutted they didn't have them in my oldest's size! (or my size for that matter!)

I should really iron my bedding before putting it on my bed. I've always been of the thinking that life's too short to iron bedding! This is from Primark too and I was shocked that my husband picked it out! Good taste Mr B. and it's so pretty for £11. It's called Vintage Rose and you can't really see in the picture, but there's tiny little sequins and embroidered flowers on it too.

Lastly I picked up these memory foam slippers on my way to the till! I'm so bad for doing that and have been known to spend and extra tenner just whilst queing up to pay! Clever Primark - haha! I bought them more for the lovely pastel pink colour than the fact they were memory foam. They are super warm and comfortable though. Again, not sure how long they'll last with my puppy around but at £2 I could afford to give them a go!

And that's it...my lovely little haul for the autumn and I'm sure the first of many! 

Until next time, thanks for reading!!

Rhi xx

our perfect wedding day

Hello!

Well....we did it!  After months of planning, stress, tears and one or two tantrums, my wonderful fiancé and I stood up in front of 50 of our closest family and friends, said our vows and became husband and wife.  At the risk of sounding a bit clique, our day was perfect...it couldn't have gone any better.  However, I nearly had a breakdown the 24 hours previous so I kind of felt all my bad luck was out of the way (traffic on the M25, 3 hour journey taking 7 hours, cutting my finger and blood on my dress were just a few of the disasters the day before!!)

It took Glen six and half years to propose to me and on our first day as husband and wife, we had been together eight years.  So...no rushing in our house!  Some people might say that after having two beautiful kids, house, joint bank account etc. etc. marriage would be just a formality and a little unnecessary.  I guess that is partly true, on the face of it nothing has changed (we even had the same surname already, how crazy is that!?) However, I feel different.  I feel closer to Glen than ever, I feel that our family unit is complete and that we're a team that have each others back.  

We decided to get married in Enfield, North London where Glen is from.  The reason for this was, basically, he has approximately 4,000,000 members of his family and I have about 20 close family and friends.  Everyone travelled up from Wales (where we live and I'm from) so I'm so lucky I had everyone there I could have wanted.  My mum was there helping me get ready, my dad was there to give me away and my beautiful children and my little niece were my bridesmaids.

Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue

 

Glen had left for London on the Wednesday morning to spend some time with his best man who'd travelled all the way from Canada, which made our wedding day!  They've been friends since they were born (three days apart) so I'm not sure we'd have done it without him, it meant so much to have him and his family there. 

 

Glen and his groomsmen, his best friend, two brothers, dad and stepdad

 

I'd travelled up the day before with my mum and dad and my girls...what should have been a three hour journey turned into a seven hour test of my nerves!!  For those of you that don't know the M25 it is the motorway from hell on a good day!  I had things I needed to collect from Glen that he had to drop to my lovely friend at my hotel, plus I hadnt seen him since Wednesday and the girls really missed him.  By the time I got to my hotel it was too late to meet up as we wanted to keep the tradition of not seeing each other before the wedding.  So me and my girls, who were in my room, settled down for the night in our hotel.  I think I managed four hours sleep!!

 

So happy my lovely daddy was there to give me away!  He scrubbed up ok too!



The morning of the wedding went by in a blur!! We didn't have to leave for the registry office until 3.30pm but it seemed to go so quickly!  Girls getting their hair done, my make up being done, photographer turning up to take photos of little bits I wanted before the wedding like my dress and my something old etc.  The car turned up (I wanted a traditional London Cab which one of Glens friends drives and kindly did as a wedding gift) and we had a few photos of me and my dad taken before leaving for the Registry Office.  People must have seen me in the back and the ribbons on the car because all the way there people were beeping and waving and shouting congratulations....made me feel so special!

 

 

By now I'd spent the whole morning an emotional mess after the stress from the day before, missing Glen like mad (ahhhh!), tired after only four hours sleep and I just wanted it to be time to leave already!  Walking down the aisle and seeing all my family and friends is a moment I'll never forget...all the nerves went, all the tears dried up and I was just beaming!  That Cheshire cat grin lasted for the rest of the day too!!

 

We did it!  See those smiles....they are part happiness, part relief!

I got through my vows without a single tear (something I was terrified about...I really thought I'd blub the whole way through!) Glen did amazingly too although couldnt look me in the eye incase he burst into tears.  Then it was over...our lovely registrar announced us as husband and wife.  A moment I'd been waiting for my whole life and even more so for the last eight years.

Our first dance and husband and wife

 

From there the day just got better and better.  Lots and lots of amazing photos (some of which are on my Instagram if you follow me!)lots of dancing, speeches, our first dance as husband and wife, good friends, well wishes and maybe one or two glasses of something bubbly!! Glen's best man did him proud with a speech that made us both laugh and cry and everyone danced the night away!

 

Our first dance was "All of Me" covered by Jasmine Thompson.  If you get a chance, look her up on YouTube she has the voice of an angel.  I walked down the aisle to her version of "A Thousand Years" and there wasn't a dry eye in the place. 

 

There's always a worry at any event that people won't enjoy themselves, or something will go wrong, made worse for me by the fact that I'd asked a lot of people to travel across the country just for me!  I was worried that as we paid for everything ourselves our wedding would come across as "budget" and people wouldn't enjoy it but it literally couldn't have been any better if we'd had £20,000 to spend.  Everybody has said what an amazing time they had and everyone got along amazingly which considering England played Wales in the Rugby World Cup during my reception, I'm very grateful for!! (Incidentally, Wales won and we were very gracious about it too....not!!!)

I hope you've enjoyed a little glimpse into our perfect day.  I'll be doing a blog post on a few of the DIY bits I did for our day too, so check back for that.

Until next time, thanks for reading!