Mermaid Kitchen: Review of The Mermaid Cookbook

A couple weeks ago, I went to Oswestry with my mum and found some goodies. One of which was The Mermaid Cookbook by Alix Carey, aka @mykitchendrawer on Instagram. After having found the mermaid/whale tail cookie cutter, it seemed like the planets were aligning. Also, it was only a couple quid from The Works. Clearly I had to buy it!

The book itself

So, as the perfect excuse to try out a couple of the recipes I thought I would give it a review! My usual trick with cookbooks is to buy them, put them on the shelf and the only ever use them once. All these cakes look too beautiful for me to not give them a go. Also, it's a mermaid cookbook. What sort of mermaid would I be, if I ignored this book?

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

My first impression, there and then in the shop, was that it was beautiful. Just a quick flick through the pages showed a colourful variety of cakes and treats with a fun nautical theme. Upon further perusing over coffee, I found how fun the book is. Turtle shaped waffles, shark teeth fruit kebabs, pearl macarons... Every recipe offers a mermaid-y take on familiar recipes and foods, whether it follows the blue/purple colour scheme or emulates a sea critter. Plus, the front features a mermaid name generator (as well as some really useful information on the more technical side of things.) I am Jewel Twilight Star, if you're interested.

Dylan's would be Aquatic Aqua Angel (ha - Moon Moon, much?)
Addy's would be Moonshine Sea Glider

On the flick through, I did find some of the recipes to be quite technical and decoration heavy. My baking style is more blob it on and pray it tastes better than it looks. Which works, for my lunchbox. But sometimes, there is need for something more grand. With the mix of simple and advanced, here's hoping I can grow my skill set and feel confident enough to tackle the fancier treats.

THE RECIPES

I decided to trial two recipes. Ideally, I would have liked to try more for this, but life gets in the way sometimes. I went for something which could go in my lunchbox and a breakfast recipe. For my lunchbox I tried:

How they are supposed to look

I love ginger biscuits. I love strawberries. And these guys look so cute! What was not to love?

For the breakfast recipe I decided to try:

Easy to follow format

I am a massive pancake fan and always on the lookout for good pancake recipes. Having an early March birthday, pancake day even falls on my birthday sometimes. One of the many reasons why it is the best non-holiday holiday on the British calendar. It next falls on my 34th birthday, so my birthday cake will be a stack of 34 pancakes to be consumed in one sitting. Maybe with the addition of grapefruit syrup?

HERMIT CRABS

Those are some good looking biscuits

+ This recipe was very easy to follow. It was well written with enough detail to be sure each step was completed properly. Having the difficulty, time taken, and amount made across the top is also a good feature because it can help narrow down what to make if time is more of an issue than ingredients. This is the first ginger biscuit recipe I've tried which uses the breadcrumb method, so I was excited to see how that affected the final product.

+ The final product was a very tasty biscuit. A nice combination of gooey and ginger (although that might have been because I always double the ginger content of any recipe!). It also made more than fifteen, which is always a bonus!

+ Having a predominantly vegetarian and vegan family, I am always on the look out for ways to adapt my baking and cooking to cater for them. With this recipe I could instantly see how I could make these vegan. They already have no egg in them, the baking marge I use is vegan friendly, I only need to sub out the milk for soya and switch to butter icing. My sisters never were that fond of cream cheese anyway!

Almost hermit crab-like

- While I like a good, gooey biscuit, these were much gooier than the picture would suggest. Which was problematic when it came to decorating. Now, this could just be down to me rushing to get it done before leaving the house and decorating them before they'd cooled enough. I am very guilty of always decorating too soon. Maybe when I make them again, I will use less golden syrup or forgo the milk entirely to try and make them a little drier.

- The icing being just cream cheese did not appeal to me. Cream cheese icing, however, I am a fan of, so I winged it and added icing sugar into the mix. However, I did not have very much icing sugar left so I ballsed this bit up completely. And that is very much on me. The icing was very runny and just added to the sogginess. Would this have happened had I just put red philly on it? Who knows.

- The strawberries also destroyed the last remaining integrity of the biscuit. They reverted back to batter! Still delicious, but not very hermit crab-like. Also, the lack of eyes makes all the difference too but I was never going to include them for lunchboxes.

Not much to it

Will I make these again? Definitely. But not for my lunchbox. These are very much a party food and need to be consumed in one sitting. Now, while I would love to eat fifteen+ biscuits to myself, I'd probably better share. My sister and her husband are having a joint birthday party later this month, so I will be trying these again for that and utilising the lessons learned. 1) Let the biscuits set. 2) Have enough icing sugar. 3) Assemble at the last possible minute.

STARFISH PANCAKES

Makes plenty for more pancake breakfasts!

+ We make pancakes a lot, so the real test of this recipe was making the syrup. It was surprisingly easy. Most time consuming bit was letting the sugar soak up the zest flavours. Also, why stop at grapefruit? I'm sure this would work with any citrus fruit.

+ It's a good pancake recipe. We didn't have quite enough milk, but the ingredients still combined nicely and we had thick pancakes. I tend to prefer thick pancakes, especially with syrups because there is maximum soaking then. Thin pancakes are great for lemon and sugar, but they don't soak syrup quite like a thick one. And they weren't heavy either, nice and fluffy. 

+ The syrup makes nearly a whole jam jar-ful, so I have plenty for the next time I crave pancakes! And it is very tasty too. I am one of those weirdos who actually really likes grapefruit. I always make a beeline for it at the breakfast buffet and enjoy drinking grapefruit juice; so really, this recipe was made with me in mind, clearly!

Zesting is made easy with a silicone brush.

- This is not a quick, decide to do on the spur of the moment breakfast. Well, the pancakes are. If you are making the syrup fresh, I would advise doing it the night before otherwise you end up with a really late breakfast like we did! Though, once the syrup is made the pancakes are really quick to make.

- The syrup was a little runny. Now this may be because it was still a little warm (see aforementioned lack of planning for the why) but it could also be because I did not boil it long enough. The recipe recommends three minutes. I might try it at for a slightly longer time. Or on a higher heat. Or a combination. The runny syrup isn't a bad thing, I was just expecting something thicker.

- I honestly could not think of a third!

Excuse me while I re-live this breakfast

Will I make these again? Hell yes. This is like my dream breakfast. I want to make all the citrus syrup and douse my pancakes in them. I didn't bother colouring them or cutting them into starfish shapes (I want to eat all my pancake, dammit!), but if it was a party breakfast I would certainly give it a go.

CONCLUSION

This is a fun book. I am very much 😍😍 over it. It may not be suitable for everyday cooking, but it has great party potential. It's well written, has an easy to follow format, and the sections are well organised. And I very much hope that it will help with my decorating game. I can see great potential with this book and I recommend giving it a go if you spot it in The Works - well worth it!

Brb, choosing the next one to try!

What's your favourite cookbook? Anything to recommend? Have you tried the Unicorn Cookbook by the same author? Lemme know below!

Listening to: Marina (& The Diamonds)