More from the mixer ...

The mixer manual has a setting for creaming potatoes so I thought I would cream the potatoes for these shepherds pies. I used red-fleshed Highland Burgundy Red potatoes that go very mushy when boiled (I bought these because they were red-labelled with a 75% reduction!). To make up the quantity I added a parsnip.

Individual Shepherds Pies

The mixer did not cream as well as I had hoped and I had to finish the creaming by hand. I then grated cheese on top of the potato for a nice finish. 
Lesson No 4: refer to Lesson number 1.









Having learned from Lesson No. 2 that the mixer is great for whisking I attempted a lemon meringue pie from scratch. I used a James Martin recipe, but only used half the quantity because my dish was smaller than his.

Lemon Meringue Pie

The result was great, and as you can see from the photo the mixer produced an enormous amount of meringue from just three egg whites. Next time I will try piping the meringue to give a better finish.

Kitchenaid Ice-cream maker attachment

There was big excitement this week. Kitchenaid's special Christmas offer was a free ice-cream maker and when it arrived on Tuesday I was eager to try it out. Disappointingly the first requirement is to place it in the freezer for a minimum of 15 hours before it can be used. I also need to buy some whole milk, cream and more eggs before I can make the recipes in the manual. In the meantime I have been surfing for ice-cream recipes and found lots that have less fattening ingredients so I will experiment with various milks and alternatives to cream and let you know how they compare. I have never used an ice-cream maker before so I am really keen to experiment.