Mince Pies

One of the best bits of Christmas is all the delicious food. I love any excuse to use food for an occasion (I regularly like to cook food to match the film we are going to watch!) and Christmas has to be the ultimate food occasion. For me it normally starts in September when I make christmas cakes for both halves of our family and also mincemeat, the earlier you can make it all the longer it has to mature (e.g. have brandy liberally added to it). So I thought I would share my recipe for mince pies, once I start making these I know Christmas is almost here.

Ingredients:

Mincemeat
Plain Flour
Butter/Lard
Egg
Icing Sugar
You need double the weight of flour to butter, I normally find 8ozs flour to 4ozs butter makes around 12 mince pies.

Rub the butter and the flour together until you have a crumble like mix. Then add 3 tbsps water and work into a dough. I would then suggest chilling it for 30mins if you have the time.

Then roll out your pastry and cut out your mince pie tops and bottoms. Push the bottoms into a greased cupcake baking tin and fill each one with a generous teaspoon of mincemeat.

Then pop their lids on and brush with a beaten egg so they go nice and golden

Bake them in an oven at about 180 C for about 20-25mins until all golden. Dust them with icing sugar and serve. I love eating them when they are still warm from the oven sat by the fire with perhaps a cheeky sherry to wash them down! Enjoy

Late Nights

Sorry I haven't posted for a few days but I have a good excuse honest! Friday night Mr Owl and myself took ourselves down to the Manchester Apollo to watch I Am Kloot in concert. Kloot are a local Manchester band who we have seen several times in the last few years. We hadn't realised that they were touring again, but spotted a poster a few weeks ago and luckily just managed to get tickets. They were as good as they always have been, and I would encourage you to go and see them if you get the chance. They played a really good mix of songs from their earlier albums right through to the latest one. The night finished off in true Kloot style with Guy Garvey (yep the one from Elbow) joining them on stage for 'To You'
I was so busy having a good time that I completely failed to take any photos- I need to get better at this photos for blog thing!

Saturday night was a slight change with a trip to The Lowry theatre to see Warhorse. We had booked this a while ago as Christmas treat and took Mr Owl's family along too. I had not read the book or seen the film, but knew roughly what it was about. I would recommend going to see this just for the staging of it, the horse puppets were amazing and seemed very realistic. The actual story itself I thought was a bit weak and obvious, but the production more than made up for this.
Once again I completely failed on the photo front, so I have borrowed a photo from the Warhorse site to brighten this page up a little.

After two late nights on the trot, coupled with Christmas Tree shopping and presents etc we were exhausted. I promise to try and be more diligent with my posts..... honest!





Courtsey of the Warhorse site




Too much tartan?

I love a bit of tartan and always have, blame my scottish roots, however this year it seems to be back in style again- hurrah! A friend gave me these fabulous tartan tights for my birthday however I have been slightly struggling with a good way to wear them. My first thought was to keep the rest of the outfit simple to make a feature of the tights, so started with the standard black skirt.

Skirt: Topshop

 

 

I also tried with a longer pencil skirt to see if slightly less visible tartan was better and a different coloured skirt and a dress too

 

Skirt: New Look

Skirt: H&M

Dress H&M

 

Now I am not sure if it was too much changing in one session that made my head go funny, but I thought I would try this last outfit on just to confirm to myself that there is such a thing as too much tartan! I know clashing prints are meant to be very trendy but somehow I just don't see this myself!!

 

 

 

So how would you style these tights and which look do you prefer? Any ideas to help this Little Owl be more stylish always appreciated?



Desk to Drinks

How to dress for desk to drinks seems to have been a big topic the past week or two with various other bloggers doing posts on this, as well as emails from most major stores with suggestions on how to style their pieces for just this event. However I work in software and normal office wear involves jeans, t-shirt and cons. If I am feeling adventurous I might put a simple dress on. For our Christmas 'party' this year we are off to the local pub. I therefore face the issue of not wanting to look to overdressed in the office and oh, not looking too overdressed in the evening either, not the most exciting style dilemma but possibly a more challenging one!

Anyway not wanting to miss out on all the fun I have put together two ideas.
This first one involves a fairly simple dress for during the day, with tights and nice pair of boots. For the evening swap to nude tights (or bare legs if you are feeling  brave) and add some bling and makeup. I love the bright colour of the green dress, and the longer sleeves are a bonus in the colder weather. Equally the maroon is a brilliant autumn colour and I don't think I have a maroon dress quite like this (yet!!!) As the dresses are so simple I felt the necklaces had to add the real wow factor in the evening.

The second look is based on wearing jeans and a t-shirt during the day, and then swapping your top before the evening shindig. I am seriously tempted by the green shirt, however I just know that my practical head would take over and I would never wear something sleeveless for fear of freezing. The black and gold top is not something I would normally pick, and without seeing it in the flesh I fear the leather effect may not work. However the print is beautiful and quite luxurious looking. The other two tops are simpler and more classic, but again the addition of some statement necklaces helps liven them up.

What do you think of my selections, and what would you wear in my situation? Check back later in the week to see if I managed something other than jeans and a t-shirt!

Birthday Goodies

As I mentioned in my first post, it was my birthday last weekend and I was fortunate to get some lovely goodies from family and friends. Having a wintery birthday means it is a good time to get some new cold weather gear and I was lucky enough to get a selection this year.
First up was a H&M jumper that Mr. Owl got me as a little extra. I  had been looking for something in this colour for a while and he saw this and thought of me. It is a baggy fit style with a longer hanging back and is nice and warm. I love the scooped neck, as having eczema I find anything 'wooly' hard to wear, whereas the low cut on this means it is well away from my more sensitive face and neck. This was worn on a home work day so apologies for my total lack of any glamour in the photos.

Jumper: H&M

 

 

Next up is this  pale blue cable knit jumper from Topshop. It is an angora mix which makes it lovely and soft. I had tried wearing it with a shirt underneath but it didn't seem to work, I will need to experiment with that more. I think it would also work well with a chunky necklace to dress it up a little.

Jumper: Topshop, Jeans: H&M

To go over all this,  a new coat from Fatface and fabulously warm hat from Topshop. The coat has a nice warm sheepskin style lining and is just long enough to cover your bottom. I have a thinner Barbour wax jacket and also a big thick North Face parka for when it is really cold, so this new coat sits perfectly between the two.

Coat: Fatface, Hat: Topshop

Finally it wouldn't be a birthday without some bling, and my love of owls is well known to my friends and family, resulting in this lovely long pendant and a bracelet.

Accessorize

Accessorize

So there we are, a little birthday roundup. Any tips and suggestions on how to style my new knitwear, how would you wear it?

Welcome

So this is it, my first blog post and what better way to start this whole new adventure than with a birthday night out! We had been planning this night for a few weeks, and it started on Saturday afternoon with the Christmas markets in Manchester. They seemed to be even larger and busier this year and you could smell the Glühwein and Bratwurst all around the city center. After a few failed attempts to buy a drink on the markets, we eventually retired to the Ape and Apple pub for a thirst-quenching pint! This Holt's pub has recently been done up, and while it does look smarter now, it has perhaps lost a bit of the soul that it had before. 'Rehydrated' it was on to the cocktails in Revolucion De Cuba where it was 2-4-1 Happy Hour, meaning it would be rude not to have a few rounds. I would have to recommend the Orange Spiced Mojito which managed to taste both tropical and autumnal at the same time!

Classic Daquiri and a Mai Tai

Orange Spiced Mojito and Mojito Royale

We had a table booked in Artisan, one of the new restaurants in the Manchester Spinningfields development. We had eaten here before and this second visit was just as good. To start we had Smoked Sardines and Baked Camembert and for the mains we both went for their pizzas: Duck and Orange and New York Deli. Apologies for the quality of the photos, but by this point the cocktails and wine were starting to take effect. We finished up with coffees having eaten far too much!

It was then time to stagger walk to the last train back home and our much needed beds! Sunday was a very very quiet day involving lots of glasses of water and painkillers!