The Lil(le) Black Dress

Now that winter is well and truly on it's way, why not do a post about a really hot summery daytrip in July, eh? The occasion was The Manbacon's 35th birthday, and I'd spent the previous two weeks frantically arranging tickets to Lille, and making sure that he'd booked that day off, while keeping the trip a surprise from him. I also managed to make myself a little black dress for the trip, in between everything else. 

It's difficult to make out many details on this dress, but it's made with black jersey (from the op-shop, of course), to a bodice pattern by Sew Vera Venus. The pattern itself is only available in one size, for busts between 35 to 37 inches, and is meant for woven fabrics. Since I usually wear a 34" bust, I simply 'cheated' and made the seam allowances slightly larger, instead of faffing about with grading it down. I figured that since my fabric had quite a bit of stretch to it, it wouldn't really matter too much if I accidentally took too much in.  

Once the bodice came together, it took no time at all to make a skirt from the rest of the fabric (simply two rectangles joined at the side seams) and attach it to the top. I also cut a long strip of fabric and sewed it into a tube, to make the spaghetti straps for my dress. Probably not the best idea to use a flimsy strip of stretchy jersey to hold up your dress - I spent many minutes throughout the day tugging at the bodice and tying and retying the straps and as they had a tendency to stretch and head south as the day progressed. 

Other than that little problem (which seems to have finally sorted itself out - the straps seem to have stopped stretching), the dress itself was a dream to wear, especially on a filthy hot, humid summer day. I've since worn that dress several times, putting it to the test by cycling and even getting tangled in blackberry bushes while wearing it, and it's held up wonderfully. 

As I mentioned above, it was a pretty disgustingly sweaty type of day, so we passed the worst of it in the seemingly under-hyped treasure that is the Lille Natural History Museum (Musee d'Histoire Naturelle). There was almost no one else there except for us and the staff, so we explored the collections in peace. There's plenty of wonderful taxidermy animals in it, including the rather magnificent Ron Swanson-like snow leopard above, as well as a little tableau showing how they mount the animals for display. 

The twitchers among you might also be interested to know that the museum has a vast collection of stuffed birds, all displayed in beautiful old vitrines, including hundreds of jewel-toned hummingbirds. These were breathtaking, I spent ages staring at them trying to memorise every single detail. There are a few displays of dinosaur fossils, although nowhere near as spectacular as the displays at the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences. And, almost forgotten in a hidden corner upstairs, is a rather lonely little axolotl. It's quite a small musuem, but it's got such a still, old-fashioned air about it that it's easy to lose hours in there enjoying the various exhibits. 

Dress - self made, pattern from Sew Vera Venus, handbag - vintage, belt - Sainsburys, sunglasses - vintage

Musée d’Histoire Naturelle

19, rue de Bruxelles
59000 Lille

France

Rocks and Bones

You don't expect me to miss out on dinosaurs, do you? Even though I'd already been there on my first trip to Brussels, I had to revisit my favourite Belgian museum again. There's something pleasantly old-fashioned about this place - the beautiful wrought iron stairs, awkwardly posed models, and the glass-fronted cases in the geology section. Having lots of big dinosaur skeletons around don't hurt either. 

Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences 

Rue Vautier 29

1000 Brussels

Belgium

Revisiting Kelvingrove

Reliving our visit to Kelvingrove last year. I can hardly believe it's been a whole year since I was there! Manbacon and I were toying with the idea of moving to Glasgow, mainly due to that gorgeous Georgian (I think) flat in Shallow Grave, which we watched again recently. I think that flat is probably as important a character as the three friends. 

For the eagle-eyed readers out there - yes, that is a bottle of Famous Grouse in the bottom left corner of the diorama. Because...what else would you display under a couple of rutting stags? 

Prehistoric

For a long time, I've wanted to have my own darkroom at home. Earlier this year, after finally losing patience with a rather inept young man at the Boots counter, I decided to try and make that a reality - the money I saved by not getting my film processed at the shops would go towards home darkroom equipment. Over the last six or so months, Manbacon and I slowly gathered most of the items we would need - tanks, reels, measuring jugs, and perhaps most costly of all, a fancypants scanner. We finally got around to buying some colour chemicals about two weeks ago, and then I showed Manbacon how to process his first two rolls of film. An exciting time in our household!

These pictures were from the first roll we did - taken in Brussels earlier this summer. A rather apt series of images, don't you think? Prehistoric creatures for an almost extinct method of picture-making. 

Why Dinosaurs Became Extinct

Because I ate them all!

And you know what? They were fucking delicious!

I've been achin' to do some bakin' the last couple of weeks, and finally got down to it on Saturday night, churning out a batch of Russian tea cakes. They're also known as Mexican wedding cookies, but I think I much prefer the other name, as I'm not much a fan of weddings.

Anyway, these shortbread-like biscuits are so simple to make, and so simple to scoff down too! They're pleasantly crumbly (or 'friable', if you prefer wanky foodblog terminology), and are a heartstoppingly delightful combination of butter and sugar. I looked around for a few recipes, but as usual, just decided to go by instinct, and do it my own way. It takes hardly any time to mix together, and you'll have a satisfying large batch of them in about an hour or less.


Ingredients:

250 gm butter

100 gm white sugar

10 ml vanilla/almond extract (optional)
10 ml water

250 gm plain flour

100gm ground almonds/ pecans

icing sugar (for dusting)

Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

Cream the butter and sugar together till smooth. I found it easier just to rub the butter and sugar together with my hands, but you can use whichever method suits you best.

Mix in the vanilla or almond extract - I left this out as both the supermarkets near me had completely sold out of vanilla extract and I didn't want to use almond extract as it might've got too 'almondy'. All I can say is, someone somewhere better be making the world's largest vanilla sponge cake, with all that vanilla!

Add flour, and water, then rub the mixture together till they look like giant crumbs. Add ground almonds, and work everything together till the dough is just smooth. There's no need to work it too much.

Line a baking tray with greaseproof paper. Pinch off bite-sized pieces (about 1 inch wide) and roll them into balls, then, just before you put them on the baking tray, flatten them slightly with your thumb. If you're using cutters, make sure your shapes aren't too thin, as they tend to burn at the edges.

Pop them into the oven for 10 - 12 mins, they're done when they're slightly browned on the edges and pale gold on top.

The biscuits can be eaten like that, or you can dust them with icing sugar for more sweetness. They'll make great bites for a Christmas party - you can simply cut them out with tree-shaped cutters, and dust some sugar on top to look like snow!

I'd love to hear from you if you make these biscuits.