Monthly Archives: July 2013

Macadamia Shortbread with Lemon Sorbet, Strawberries and Syrup

macadamia-lemon-strawberry

This creation has three parts:

My friend Abdul Aziz and I first started with the Lemon Ice Cream the night before.

Lemon Ice Cream
Lemon Ice Cream Pre-Serving

We slightly deviated from the reciepe by stopping heating when the mixture had become silky smooth rather than a custard texture, the result; an ice cream with a similar consistency as a thick sorbet.

The next day we prepared the shortbread, preparing it an hour before we baked it. We made a small addition to the reciepe by adding about 100g more of butter to the shortbread mix.

Pre-Oven Shortbread
Pre-Oven Shortbread

Leaving it in the oven for about 25 mins, we prepared the strawberries and syrup while we waited. To make the syrup red, instead of dipping the strawberries in the syrup mixture to glaze them, we put the strawberries back in the saucepan and heated the sauce pan for a few minitues.

Strawberries and Syrup
Strawberries and Syrup

Plating was done first with a slice of the shortbread, then a slice of the lemon ice-cream with the syrup poured round it and strawberries for a decorative touch.

The result.

macadamia-lemon-strawberry-2

Enjoy!

So what do you think? Please let me know in the comments below!

Spider Queen and Company

Here’s an painting project I did several years back when I was playing Games Workshop Lord of the Rings table top board game. The models are the Spider Queen (without her swarms) and four Giant Spiders.

Spider Queen and Company

To paint these models I followed the Fall of The Necromancer Sourcebook painting guide on page 25, so a big thanks to Games Workshop for such a great book. Unfortunately it’s no longer available, but there are of course still ways to get a copy…

Continue reading Spider Queen and Company

League of Legends

League of Legends is described by some as the equivalent of electronic basket ball, by others like AngryJoe as “crack”. I agree. This Multiplayer Online Battle Arena (MOBA), where team work is essential to success has players take control of a single unit in a multi-player match up, with the goal of destroying the opposing teams ‘Nexus’.

Nexus
The Nexus

A Short History

League of Legends or LOL (though well executed) is not an original idea. In fact it was originally conceived as Defense of the Ancients (DOTA). Based on a mission from Starcraft, DOTA was a custom game created by Eul on the popular Real Time Strategy game Warcraft 3: Reign of Chaos. Unfortunately Eul did not update his map, and so others created spin-offs; it was Steve ‘Guinsoo’ Freak who got it right.

Guinsoo created a variant of DOTA calling it DOTA: Allstars. He then put in an enormous amount of work in to adding new champions, items and game features. He later handed it over to Abdul ‘Icefrog’ Ismail who continued his work. At present IceFrog has gone onto become a lead designer at Valve working on the sequel DOTA 2.

DOTA: Allstars

Continue reading League of Legends