Lunch with Caroline Mi Li Artiss

MIAMI members will know that we have often featured the videos of Caroline Mi Li Artiss, the delightful chef who has a very successful cookery demo channel on YouTube.

Caroline is an ex colleague of mine and has been commissioned to write her first cookery book. Can't wait to read it. She invited me and and Sally another ex colleague, to lunch in her garden to have a bit of a brainstorm for the book. I won't give away what we concluded (some cracking ideas) as you'll just have to wait till the book's out - but I do want to share a couple of pics from the lunch.

Caroline specialises in South East Asian cuisine, particularly Malaysian and served us a couple of absolutely delicious curries she'd conjured up in her kitchen that morning. She's promised to let me have the recipes - so once she does I'll share them with you. (now done see link below)

To top it off she'd made a load of absolutely scrummylicious cupcakes and gave us each a box to take home. I'm now going to have to go to the gym every day for a month!

Check out Caroline's videos on her YouTube channel or on our website - here's some very sexy Twilight-style vampire  cupcakes

Here are the two curry recipes on our website

Clare F

My first quilt is finished

Making my first ever block sampler quilt didn't take very long at all - but getting round to finishing it off took for ever!

This weekend I finally added the binding. I sewed the final stitches while watching the American version of the Killing (Forbrydelsen) - and reflected that a lot of the quilting had been done while watching the original Danish version. As it was all subtitled it's amazing I managed to get any sewing done at all.

I'll be posting tips on doing the binding on the website, as well as instructions for the other blocks I used - but meanwhile I'm getting ready for my next quilting venture. I want to make a quilt to use as a bed throw - so will be doing a long narrow one. Here are the fabrics I've chosen. I haven't decided yet what design to go for - but it will likely be one repeating block. Any suggestions?

Clare F

The WI ponders launch of a food label

Flipping through my copy of Marketing Week this morning, I came across a piece on the Women's Institute who are considering whether or not to launch a range of food products - baked goods and jams - to cash in on their reputation for home baking.

This strikes me as a bit odd. The WI, 96 years young, has a slogan - "Inspiring women" and has always existed to promote and share their passion for all things home made. I've no problem at all with the local WI flogging their own members' produce and adding a bit to the coffers that way - but to launch a range of foods to cash in on the home baked reputation, when they will presumably be made in a big factory somewhere, seems to be a bit of a sell-out, not to mention pushing the marketing spin a bit far. The positioning for the brand will be "an alternative to home baking." Shouldn't they be promoting "an alternative to supermarket buying"? Selling a range of jam-making kit, pots and pans, aprons and wooden spoons is one thing but cashing in on the home made reputation to sell ready made food is quite another. They have not done the deal yet - the WI's Board of Trustees is still discussing.

What do you think? Smart move or sell out?

Here at MIAMI we remain dedicated to encouraging you to get those pans and jam jars out and fill your kitchens with the delicious aroma of fruit and sugar and home-baked bread and cakes.
Check out the food pages on our main website. Headlining at the moment are dandelion jam, courgette relish and strawberry jams and cheesecakes. >> Here

Clare F