Sitting down with a hot cup of coffee, a piece of cake and a glossy magazine is one of my favourite weekend treats, and discovering a new title that is fresh and innovative is just the bees knees.

In all honesty I stopped buying tattoo magazines a few years ago, partly because they all seemed to start out so well and then become a bit samey but also because I had started discovering new artists via Tumblr and Instagram far more often than in print.

Things & Ink bills itself as "a new style of tattoo magazine that embraces female tattoo culture, for artists, collectors and those yet to go under the needle. Each issue is filled with beautiful images, real-life stories, tattoos, opinion pieces, fashion, inspiration, art, artists, history, beauty and much more" and it doesn't disappoint.

I love that the magazine reads a lot like a good blog, perhaps because a lot of the contributors are bloggers themselves. The layouts are really pretty and the actual quality of the magazine is great. I think the main thing that drew me in was that so many respected artists have been getting involved with the publication. So far they have chosen two great lady tattooers to grace the cover - below is a little behind the scenes video from the second cover shoot with the beautiful Cassandra Frances.


Full of great interviews, thought provoking articles about what it means to be a tattooed woman, great little product round ups, tattoo history and lovely artwork produced specially for the magazine by some of the UK's best artists it really is a great read and a must for any tattoo collector that appreciates the culture and lifestyle that comes with it. You can order issue 2 here or if you want to start your collection properly you can get a discounted bundle of issues 1 & 2 here.

And now onto the cake! Every year I get Pete to pick out a birthday cake from my collection of recipe books, then I mess around with it and give it the Nancy factor. This year he chose the espresso brazil nut cake from Short and Sweet by Dan Lepard - you can find the original recipe here.

As Dan says one of the problems with a coffee and walnut cake is that quite often you get a few bitter walnuts in your batch and that taints the whole cake. Brazil nuts are buttery and delicious and so I figured why not amp up the richness with some sweet and silky salted caramel. Holy wow did it work. Cream cheese in the icing was the obvious way to counteract the sweetness and using golden caster sugar in the cake layers worked perfectly with the ground brazils to give a super moist and tender crumb.

Basically, you must try this cake!

Caramelised Coffee and Brazil Nut Cake
Serves 10-12

Cake Ingredients
125g golden caster sugar
100g caster sugar
225g butter
4 eggs (preferably large)
1 tsp vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
225g self raising flour
100g brazil nuts, ground or finely chopped
20g fine ground instant coffee (or normal instant ground to a powder)
40ml double cream (or milk)

Salted Caramel Sauce Ingredients
75g good quality unsalted butter
50g golden caster sugar
50g caster sugar
50g golden syrup
125ml double cream
1 tsp sea salt

Icing Recipe
200g full fat cream cheese
1 tsp vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
100-200g icing sugar
salted caramel sauce

Cake Method
Preheat the oven to 170C and butter and line two 8" cake tins.
Cream the sugars and butter together until they are really pale and fluffy -about 3-5 minutes. Now add the eggs one at a time beating well after each addition and the stir in the vanilla. Sift together the self raising flour, ground nuts and coffee and add to the butter mixture and stir until just combined. Add the cream (or milk) and stir until smooth and add a nice droppin consistency.
Divide between the two tins and smooth over, then tap the tins a few times on the work surface to knock out any air bubbles. Bake for 20-25 minutes, remove from the oven and let sit for 5 minutes before removing from their tins to cool completely. While the cakes are cooling make the salted caramel sauce.

Caramel Sauce Method
Melt the butter, sugars and golden syrup together over a medium heat and simmer for 3 minutes swirling occasionally - don't stir or the sugars will crysallise and the caramel world will end. Remove from the heat and whisk in the cream and 1/2 tsp salt - taste a little (careful it's hot!) to check if the salt levels are ok, I usually add the full tsp or sometimes more but its completely up to you. When its just right set it to one side to cool.

Icing Method
Whip the cream cheese, vanilla paste and 100g of icing sugar together until smooth and creamy, then add the salted caramel sauce a few tablespoons at a time until you have the flavour you want. If it gets too runny add a little more icing sugar.

Cake Construction
Take your first cake layer and trim off the top so its flat. Pour over a few tablespoons of the caramel suace and smooth it over so it soaks into the sponge. Spread on a nice thick layer of the cream cheese icing and top with the second cake layer - I don't bother trimming this one down as I like the dome but you can if you want. Smooth over another thick layer of icing and drizzle with some more caramel sauce - it looks great if you let it drizzle down the sides onto your cake plate!

Enjoy with a big mug of coffee, or with a cocktail like I did last night. Perfection!

Since putting up a photo on Instagram a week or so ago showing the results of a new pin curl pattern I have been using I have had several requests for a tutorial, and being the nice accommodating lady that I am I have produced one!

The photo above shows the final product after I have slept in my pin curls (and a few rollers), brushed them out and given it a good set with some hairspray. As you can see I like to brush my curls towards my face to give a nice curl under, but if you prefer you can brush them outwards so you get a nice Kathy Kirby style flick! But I'm getting ahead of myself...

This is the pattern I use - or at least a poor attempt at drawing it out. Believe me its nothing revolutionary, just your standard one row coiled to the front and the next row coiled to the back and repeated over the entire head. The tools you will need are as follows -

- An empty bottle with a spray/misting attachment (I use an empty hair shine spray bottle and re-fill)
- Some setting lotion such as this one that I get from Boots although it doesn't seem to be on their website, or you could try this one or this one if you're feeling fancy
- A big bunch of hair clips / bobby pins or some pin curl clips
- A few foam rollers (I use four of these)
- Some hair spray
- A head scarf preferably in satin or silk
- A bristle hair brush (I have this Denman one)

Deer in the headlights or what?!?!

Its very hard to explain the method of pin curling using just photos so I will link you to a few videos that I used to learn the technique. They also explain about brushing out the hair once it has set which is key as when you first uncoil the curls you will have a bit of a panic when you resemble a clown. Don't worry, it will calm down! Give them all a watch and you will have a really good basic knowledge of how to pin curl that you can them play around with and adapt as you wish - 

Two things that should be noted that I do a bit differently are that I take a good U shaped section of hair right at the front and put that into four foam rollers rather than pin curling it. You will see from the videos that some people just do a little roll with their fingers, but I find this very difficult and if I sleep with it like that they flatten. I like a big swooshy wave at the front of my hair so I use the rollers as they keep the shape while I sleep and help get better elevation without having to back-comb. 

It is also worth noting that sleeping with a satiny scarf over the curls as you can see above give several benefits. A - it helps stop the frizz that your pillow can cause when you move around in your sleep. B - It stops your hair pins stabbing your significant others chest to bits if you sleep that way as I do. C - It looks pretty cute and is great if you do your cleaning in the morning as it keeps it out of the way.  I use a couple of snap clips to hold it in place at the front and back.

 

This is what I have when I take my scarf off in the morning. You can see better here how many rows I use and how I cross the pins over (and how uneven my blonde is, eek). The back of my hair goes pretty much halfway down my back, and the longer the hair the smaller sections you should curl. Smaller sections means a tighter curl that will hold much stronger. The image below shows you how I section the front fringey part into four rollers that roll down towards my face.

 So once again here are the key points to pin curling (or at least how I do it anyway) -

- The longer the hair the smaller the sections of hair you should curl.
- Using rollers in the front helps elevate the fringe and give a high swoopy wave.
- To keep this fringe wave nice and high after brushing you can brush up from the front and give it a good hairspray, then hold the handle of your hairbrush against it at the height you want the hair to curl down and let the hair fall forwards over it. Keep your brush held there for a minute while the spray sets and then slide it out and you should have a good firm swoosh!
- A silky or satiny scarf helps stop frizz.
- If you are using ultra hold setting lotion like me you only need to use about a one in ten ratio of lotion to water or else that curl is never settling down!
- Your brushing out method if key and lets you shape into different looks so have a play around and see what you conjure up.
- Some ladies only need to set once a week because their style will hold up for seven days, but I am not lucky enough for that. I properly pin the first night just after washing my hair, then I do a much less neat and much lazier pin the second night without any more lotion just to keep the shape for the next day.
- Have fun! I am so glad that I taught myself how to do this as I haven't used heated stylers for months now which has made my already bleach ravaged hair stay in much better condition. You also get an amazing shine from setting lotion so its a win-win situation!

I hope this has helped out anyone who was curious and if you have any questions just let me know!

Pete and I are off to Brighton in March to see the lovely Caro Emerald and her band play the Brighton Dome. We are lucky enough to have very good seats just a few rows back from the stage and pretty much dead centre, and as Miss Emerald always looks terribly glamorous I thought I'd also like to dress up for the occasion and therefore needed a new hat! I had a browse online and was a bit put out that I couldn't find anything I fancied for less than £40 which I thought was a little too much for me to spend on an on the whim decision.

The Loughborough Vintage Fair happened to be in town last weekend which I thought may provide a pretty little hat at a more sensible price, so I headed to the town hall and almost immediately came cross this lovely berry red number priced at a much more appropriate £10. It's not terribly old (I suspect maybe 1980's) but I loved the colour and size and I am a real sucker for petrol blue feathers! I've been eyeing up this lovely Biba feather cape for some time now...

I also spotted this lovely little set of aperitif glasses in their original box which I managed to buy along with the black velvety gloves you can see above for a good bit off their seperate asking price, and found a pale pink chiffon head scarf for £2.50 too so it was a morning well spent!

I thought I'd also take this opportunity to show you a few of the marvellous presents I received at Christmas including this delightful little cake platter, little shiny diamante ring and fabulous deco style ring cuff! It's surprisingly comfortable and adds an interesting bit of glitz to a side swept hair do!

My little sister Laura had this gorgeous little mermaid custom made for me! I believe the lady that makes them usually does them in a Day of The Dead style but lil sis asked her to do one in an Angelique Houtkamp style for me - didn't it turn out splendidly?! I'm still trying to decide which wall to put her on... I automatically thought bathroom but then I wouldn't see her as often as I'd like to may go for kitchen instead!

One of my treats from Pete was this luxurious little book on entertaining by the Laduree team. I have their other books 'Sale' and 'Sucre' already which are also packaged this beautifully boxed in tissue paper with gilt edges and padded binding - although these are in French as I was too impatient to wait for the English versions to come out!

I'm yet to try any of the recipes but I am sure they won't disappoint if the other books are anything to go on. It's just a shame that some of the loveliest looking things in the photographs don't have recipes, they just state that you should order them from your nearest Laduree store. You can find some similar recipes to them in the 'Sucre' book though which you could adapt, so not all is lost!

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and start to the New Year! Good luck for 2013! xxxxx