Playing things by ear is a life motto that many seem to be naturally born with, along with a lovely chilled out, spontaneous, let's just go with the flow personality. Sadly, this is not me. I like having a plan and I certainly don't like that plan being ruined. 

Since we were blessed with the delightful global pandemic and all the restrictions that came with it, one of the best things I've learnt is to really, really try to chill the hell out and take things as they come. It's much easier said than done and believe you me I still struggle with the complete lack of future planning, but learning to be more flexible has really helped me.

When you're a forward planner it almost feels like a safety blanket. Feeling down? Take control, plan something with a friend, book a holiday, go for drinks after work. Unmotivated? Book some annual leave, spend weeks deciding what to do with it. The reality of now is that many, like me, have to take a certain amount of days of annual leave before the end of March and are thinking, quite literally, what the hell am I gonna do to pass 5 whole days.

Without this option, without the reward of all those days hard at work, it's left all of us unsure of how to move forwards with things, how to be motivated. 

Now onto the good stuff. How do I convince myself that I can be like this? How do I locate that part that's deep, deep inside of me and try to care less about my complete lack of plans?

1. We reframe what we can look forward to, like making a lame heart shape with foam in my coffee that morning, or getting excited about a plant looking a little greener than the day before.

2. We make the most of what we have, I call my Mum, chat to my sister, read a book, watch a film.

3. We dream instead of plan, I still think about being on a boat in the middle of Lake Garda, but I don't book anything in ('cause Covid).

4. We focus on the day ahead, not the years ahead, I can control my mindset for today, but not for the year.

5. We do relaxing things, like take baths, walks and make hot chocolates. 

And if none of the above works, just order a takeaway and put Netflix on, and do that for the foreseeable future.

Imi x

I've come across far too many people in this world who claim to dislike chocolate orange. Terry's Chocolate Oranges, the chocolate orange quality street, chocolate orange cookies, you name it and they hate it. 

All very bizarre, but it won't stop me baking with my favourite flavours.. one of the things being this chocolate orange cake! It's very easy and looks amazing with the chocolate orange segments on top. Please let me know if you've given it a go!

Add your cocoa powder to the boiling water and mix until a smooth paste is formed, then add this to the mixture.

Step 4:

Pour into two sandwich cake tins and bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes.

Step 5:

Make the ganache by heating up your cream to almost boiling and then pour over the chocolate chunks. Stir until all the chocolate has melted and combined. You can use it for the middle of the cake as well, or do what I did and mix up a quick buttercream with more orange zest, butter and icing sugar.

These miniature treats are classy, elegant and dainty. They make a great dinner party dessert, you can be adventurous with your colours and flavours and once you get the hang of them they’re much simpler to make than you’d imagine. Their lightness screams temptation, so you may find yourself and your taste testers going overboard with these.

Ingredients:

• 4 egg whites
• 75g caster sugar
• 225g icing sugar
• 115g ground almonds
• 1 tbsp instant coffee (for macarons)
• 1 tbsp instant coffee (for filling)
• a pinch of salt
• 150g dark chocolate
• 125ml double/whipping cream

Equipment:

• Electric whisk
• Large mixing bowl
• Spatula
• Baking sheet
• Piping bag/pastry bag
• Round Icing nozzle

Step 1:

Preheat your oven to 150 Celsius. Carefully separate your egg whites into one large mixing bowl, add the caster sugar and whisk with an electric mixer/whisk until stiff peaks form. You should be able to tip the bowl upside down without the mixture moving at all.

Tip: Be patient, it could take as long as 10 minutes for stiff peaks to form but do not over whisk.

Sift the icing sugar, ground almonds, one tablespoon of instant coffee and a pinch of salt into a separate bowl. Do this twice (or pulse in a food processor), and make sure that there are absolutely no clumps or your mixture will not be smooth enough.

Step 3:

Carefully and gently fold your dry ingredients into the egg whites and sugar mixture until everything is fully combined. This should take approximately 40 folds and the mixture should be almost smooth.

Tip: Don’t be tempted to go overboard with mixing. If your mixture consistency is too smooth, then your macarons will flatten.

Step 4:

Line two baking sheets with non-stick paper. Then, using a piping bag and a round nozzle, pipe circles onto the tray. Once complete, firmly rap your baking tray on a hard surface a few times. Place into the oven at 150 Celsius for approximately 20-25 minutes. They should come off the tray easily when ready, and you should leave them to cool on a cooling rack.

Tip: Place your piping bag inside a tall drinking glass and roll the edges over as this will make spooning the mixture into it easier.

Tip: If your macarons end up cracked, you haven’t rapped them on the table firmly enough, or you haven’t rapped them enough times.

Step 5:

Break your chocolate up into small pieces and leave in a small bowl. Heat your cream in a saucepan and once boiling, stir in your remaining tablespoon of instant coffee and pour over your chocolate. Stir until the mixture has thickened and all the chocolate has melted. If the mixture is too runny then you will need to leave it to stand until it thickens. Once finished, spoon as much ganache as you like onto half your macaron shells and sandwich other halves on top. Be careful not to squash them!

Good luck, and remember that practice makes perfect!

For those of you thinking 'what the heck is Speculoos?!', it's a delicious biscuit spread that tastes somewhere between gingerbread and digestives and it is heaven. Some people even have it straight on toast (not me, that's too far.) It was super popular in France when I lived there but seems to be more readily available in the UK now.

This recipe uses a base of vanilla cupcake with a Speculoos surprise in the middle, along with a fancy piped buttercream. The fun speculoos/vanilla combination in the buttercream is the trickiest part to master but even that only requires a piping bag, the right nozzle and a little bit of precision.

Ingredients

Cupcakes

150g butter
150g caster sugar
150g self-raising flour
1 tsp baking powder
3 eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence
Speculoos/Biscoff spread

Buttercream

125g butter
250g icing sugar
a few tsp water

Cream the butter and sugar together.

Step 2:

Beat in the eggs and the vanilla essence.

Step 3:

Stir in the sifted flour, baking powder, and a pinch of salt.

Step 4:

Fill one third of your cupcakes cases with cake mixture. Add a dollop of speculoos spread in the centre and cover with more mixture.

Step 5: 

Bake in a preheated oven at 180c for 10-15 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.

Step 6: 

Beat your butter in a bowl and add the sifted icing sugar. Mix until combined and smooth, adding drops of water as and when needed.

Step 7:

Add streaks of speculoos spread to the inside of your piping bag, followed by the icing mixture. Using a large star nozzle, decorate your completely cooled cupcakes.

The method is pretty straight-forward so I wouldn't say you need baking superpowers for this one - just give it a go and see how it turns out!

Ingredients: