Al fresco painting - the next Banksy?

What a beautiful day it was yesterday. Isobel refused to wear trousers, wanting to sport her new red tights instead so was quite a sight! I decided it was time to share some savoury coking with her so she doesn't think its all about cake (though that would be ideal). Being a toddler, she decided to ignore mummy saying 'don't eat the raw garlic' and proceeded to put the who clove in her mouth.....mmmh.

With it being such a nice day, Isobel did some outdoor painting - I thought it might keep her busy for 15 mins or so but no - 2 hours! She didn't quite get the concept of rinsing the brushes in water, instead pouring water into paint, back into the water pot then all over her tights! She ended up wanting to 'paint the ground' so we now have some lovely multicoloured grade and paths! Quite the next little Banksy!

Ended up with a mass more greengages and cooking apples yesterday, so after Isobel had gone to bed, Peter and I set about making greengage jam. We followed the lovely Marguerite Pattern's recipe which basically has 450g of fruit to same amount of sugar with up to 5 tablespoons of water.

Two questions were raised:

• what is the difference between jam sugar and preserving sugar? Mmmh, well, one has bigger granules that's for sure (the preserving one) but what else? Well, a few minutes investigating on the silver spoon website and it seems that preserving sugar is best for fruits with high pectin levels naturally whilst jam sugar has pectin added so is good for fruits like strawberries and peaches. So there you go - learn something every day! 
• why is marmalade called marmalade and not orange jam? Mmmh, good question. No idea I thought. Well, another quick search (love google) and we find that marmalade as a word has evolved from the Portuguese (who made 'marmelada' of quinces and sugar and apparently gave some to Henry VIII) and then the French..... 

Anyway, our jam ended up rock solid as we obviously got too excited watching it boil.....

 
Peter reckons you could use it to fill walls! Oh well.

Watched the great British bake off again. I don't know why I enjoy this show. I love Janet and Mary Anne. They just seem to enjoy the cooking so much in a kind of relaxed and having fun kind of way. Bring on the choux pastry towers.