Showing posts with label Chocolate Courgette Cake.. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chocolate Courgette Cake.. Show all posts

Friday, 18 September 2026

A Scary Day and an Update

 I decided I would try and get an appointment with my Optician yesterday, as the soreness from the stye I had 6 weeks ago still hadn't totally gone away.  She was very thorough and used a dye and checked it with her opthalmic machine.  I had two options - ignore it, and wait for it to heal, or I could spend £10 on a heating mask that you put in the microwave.  I chose the latter.



As I was driving home, my phone went.  It was the Optician.  I pulled over and phoned back.  She was writing up my notes she said, and she went to check her Big Book of Eyes . . . she was going to get an emergency appointment for me at the Hospital at Hereford, as she just wanted them to thoroughly check my eyelid just in case it was Squamous Cell Cancer.  She said she was 95% sure that I had just had a stye, because of the pus it had produced, but clearly she wanted to do due diligence . . .


Tiny catkins on the Hazel bushes.  A sign of hope . . . there will be a spring after all.


Needless to say, this hit me like a brick and I spent the evening trying not to think about it.  95% chance it wasn't, but still a teensy chance it was . . . We all take our health so much for granted.  Problems with limbs I can deal with, but anything to do with internal giblets or eyes/mouth etc, not so easy to think about . . . 

Much sewing today I think, to take my mind off it . . .  


A helpful little Pippi Cat . . .  I have to move from my place on the sofa so she can snuggle down beside or behind me!

Update:  I have an appt. to go to Outpatients early in October for an eye check with a consultant.  Not long to wait and not as far to go as Hereford, as it will be in Llandod.  That doesn't sound so worrying.

I have guests tomorrow - part-time neighbour and good friend Sam is bringing his girlfriend up to meet me.  I have galloped round with the vacuum, deep cleaned the bathroom, and baked two Chocolate Courgette Cakes (BBC Good Food recipe).  I have had a still warm slice and it is GOOD.  My friend Ann will get a slice on Sunday when I go to Malvern.

Postal deliveries too - a new (half price) sweat shirt from Cotton Traders, and my two yellow fabrics from The Cotton Patch.  A little brighter than yellows used but one is virtually the same pattern (which is like a little darker shadow) and I think they will tie in nicely.  

I have had my dehumidifier on this week as Tam was telling me last weekend I needed to as it had been so humid, and I had to empty it this morning. A container full of water.  So she was right . . .

My walk today was up to my horsey neighbour and my back/hip coped with the steady slope up there.  I was fed up with the same flat walk along the old railway line.

Now it's time to sit down with a cup of Earl Grey, my new library book (Agatha Christie's Evil Under the Sun) and an ice pack on my lower back.  

Saturday, 11 September 2010

Chocolate Courgette cake


This is scrummy - lovely and moist. I made mine with mostly plain chocolate (as I'd gotten very low on cooking choc) so it wasn't too sweet and believe it or not, OH even likes it. I haven't told him there are courgettes in it or he would then never touch it again. . . . Sigh. I have, ahem, sent middle daughter off to work with a slice today - she's another one who wouldn't touch it if she thought it had "things" in!!!

175g/6 oz plain chocolate
2 large eggs
175ml/6 fl oz vegetable oil
200g/7 oz S-R Flour
1/2 tspn salt
115g/4 oz caster sugar
225g/8 oz peeled weight courgettes, grated
55g/2 oz walnuts, chopped

Preheat the oven to 180 deg. C/350 deg. F/Gas 4. Grease and flour a 20cm/8 inch round cake tin.

Melt the chocolate in a bowl set over a pan of barely simmering water or in a microwave and set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs and oil.

Measure the flour, salt and sugar into another bowl, and mix together. Gradually add this mixture to the whisked egg and oil, and beat well together.

Stir in the melted chocolate, then the grated courgettes and nuts (I left out the nuts). Mix well and pour into the prepared cake tin. bake for 1 hour or until the cake is well risen, and is firm and springy to the touch in the centre. Allow to cool in the tin for 10 mins before turning out on to a wire rack.

This is even better the next day - if it lasts that long!