Wet, Windy and Then Sunny.

The morning was cold and often wet, truly autumnal. The afternoon was much better with no rain and longer sunny spells but still very windy. When I took the rubbish and recycling to the top of the drive the air was filled with the scent of the Himalayan Balsam. A cross between floral and plastic. 

After watching just one episode of Britain's Bake-Off my mind turned to baking some biscuits myself. A good idea but it would have been better if I had checked first to see that I had all the ingredients I needed. In my cupboards was a little strong white flour, which I used mixed with some white self-raising flour. Apart from that I had plenty of wholemeal bread flour. My first batch of chocolate chip biscuits looked more like mini buns because I forgot to flatten out the dough once it was on the cooking sheet. The second batch was flatter but  could have been sweeter as I had used dark chocolate. Then I thought I'd try something different. Only having wholemeal flour I added ginger and mixed spices and used honey instead of sugar to make some spicy honey biscuits. They came out better. This was just a practice run before I bake in earnest next week as our friends and Vytas and Sally are coming to stay. I like to try and get things done is advance as it is enough hassle trying to cook a full meal on the Rayburn without trying to bake a pudding as well.

I did a bit more work on my journal catch-up going back through the blog and then writing up the notes sitting outside in the sun. I've also been playing the piano. Today I found  sheet music for Fur Elise which I learnt to play 48 years ago. A very satisfying piece to play though I can't quite play it all without the music. That's probably what started off my fondness for using the sustain pedal when I play. A bad habit but I'm only playing for myself.