At the end of the winter holiday we were ill. Not all together, because then we would have had a problem. Fortunately, at least one of us was always fit. Today is the last day of my illness. I hope so anyway, because I don't know how to be ill. I'm not be able to stay in bed, and getting stronger tires me out terribly.

I couldn't stand the laziness any longer, so I prepared a small carrot-nut torte. I recommend baking the carrot cake a day before, so that you can cut it easily. A hint of lemon and salty pistachios go really well with the sweet chocolate-nut carrot cake. The torte doesn't have to look perfect. Everybody - even those who could burn water - can prepare it.

Ingredients (22-cm cake tin)
cake
1 egg
2 tablespoons of peanut butter
125ml of oil
150g of flour
100ml of milk
100g of grated carrot
150g of sugar
1 teaspoon of cinnamon
1 teaspoon of baking soda
1 teaspoon of baking powder
100g of chocolate drops

When baking cookies and cakes I like the aroma the most. I like the fruity aroma when I make plum cake or apple pie, the caramel aroma when I have cookies in the oven, but most of all I like the chocolatey aroma of brownies. Such an intoxicating aroma filled my home when I recently baked chocolate cookies. The delightful smell even lured my book-loving daughter from her room.

Small and light cookies were the ingredients of home-made cookie sandwiches with chocolate-nut cream and pistachios. I didn't manage to fill all the cookies with cream. Some of them were eaten just after baking. To tell the truth I wasn't surprised – they were really excellent.

Ingredients:
cookies
60g of butter
1 tin of aquafaba
150g of dark chocolate
100g of caster sugar
120g of flour
½ teaspoon of baking powder
50g of chocolate dots
creme
100g of white chocolate
120g of peanut butter
a pinch of salt

I have made rustic tarts with pears, apples and plums. Every time they were excellent. The combination of the crunchy, vanilla-almond tart with fruit is always a good idea. You have to remember to use hard fruit, or you will have an unappetizing sad layer instead of an attractive cake.

This time instead of Polish fruit I used pineapple slices to make mini rustic tarts. The hot cake with vanilla ice cream was delicious and everybody had their own cake. It prevented an argument about who got the biggest part of the cake.

Ingredients:
1 pineapple
8 tablespoons of brown sugar
2 teaspoons of cinnamon
2 tablespoons of milk
vanilla ice cream
dough
130g of wheat flour
3 tablespoons of wheat meal
4 tablespoons of minced almonds
2 tablespoons of caster sugar
2 tablespoons of cream
120g of butter

I recently came across a cookery book from 1903. There are a lot of interesting recipes with unusual ingredients. I have the impression that many ingredients which now seem to be new have once again come back into fashion. They were used many years ago.

A few recipes intrigued me. I will try to use them and bring them up to date. Today I used the first one – cream kissel. It is such a simple dessert that it is strange that I haven't made it already. I served the dessert with orange and tangerine mousse. Light and slightly sour, it was excellent with sweet vanilla kissel.

Ingredients
500ml of 30% sweet cream
2 tablespoons of sugar
1 teaspoon of vanilla essence
100ml of milk
3 teaspoons of potato flour
3 oranges
6 tangerines
½ teaspoon of gelatine
2 tablespoons of maple syrup

My mum prepared chocolate brick when in Poland there was no chocolate in the shops and we needed something sweet. In my brother's home chocolate brick is a traditional Christmas dessert. My children were jealous of their cousins so they asked me to prepare this dessert. I rarely prepare it because it is so sweet and when I tried to add a bit less sugar it wasn't so yummy. I stick with my mum's old recipe, and from time to time I make this sweet dessert. The chocolate brick has, as well as the taste, another asset. It really is difficult to eat too much and you have to drink hot, strong tea with it or coffee without sugar.

Ingredients:
200g of butter
160g of brown sugar
60ml of water
3 tablespoons of cocoa
250g of powdered milk
120g of crushed biscuits
3 fistfuls of dried fruit and nuts