The Fairy / Cup cakes were a great success....

...in terms of them being light and delicious to taste. I clearly put too much cake mix in each baking case as they flowed over like mad, hence the irregular shape. I might have been a bit heavy handed on the baking powder as well as the recipe I had was for 12, I halved the quantity as I only had the six baking cases, only I forgot to halve the baking powder amount.
You will notice that there are only four in the picture. The other two got snaffled by a certain someone whilst enjoying a cup of coffee and before I thought to take a snap. We decided not to complete the buns with icing as the quantities of butter and icing sugar involved seemed like a recipe for a heart attack never mind fairy cake topping. This concludes the foray into baking for this holiday at least.

Planning a trip?

Well here's a thing, Lonely Planet (online) has a list of 31 Things to do in La Rochelle, quite a few to go yet...
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/france/southwestern-france/la-rochelle/things-to-do

It is a cool and damp start to the day and rain is promised for most of the day although it could get to 20/21c by mid afternoon. We lit a fire last night as it got relatively chilly. The big domestic chore this morning is cleaning the oven door so that we can (at least) see what's cooking in there. I  know, hold back the gasps of excitement and joy. Perhaps when the job is done we will celebrate by doing some baking and slow cooking a stew for tonight?
Sheila baked an apple tart a la Raymond Blanc's mother's recipe(did you follow that) last night - sorry no photo as it all went. So instead here is a photo of a homemade pork pie - homemade in Yorkshire by Jeanne Breen.
Cheers