back to school...

Tomorrow is the day. I am going back to high school - but this time as a teacher (well a student/training teacher!). I am pretty nervous, but also incredibly excited about my first placement. I am almost certain that I made the right choice by going back to uni to change my career, and I hope that these coming few weeks cement that certainty. I can't wait for tomorrow to come so I can get started!

We've been doing a bit of cooking this weekend including these 'blondies'. I had never had a blondie before but I had a bag of butterscotch chips that my sister-in-law had bought for me in the US, and this was the first recipe I found that used them. They have a lovely chewy edge and the coconut is a great addition - but they are very sweet! Although I suspect they will be great for my school lunch box tomorrow, the perfect morning tea treat for my first day.

Chewy, Chunky Blondies

2 cups plain flour (I used wholemeal)
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt / fleur de sel
225g butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups (packed) light brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup chocolate chips
3/4 cup butterscotch chips
1 cup shredded coconut

Preheat the oven to 160 degrees C. Butter and line a 9×13-inch baking pan.

Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with a paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium speed until smooth and creamy. Add both sugars and beat for another 3 minutes, or until well incorporated.

Add the eggs one by one, beating for 1 minute after each addition, then beat in the vanilla.

Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the dry ingredients, mixing just until they disappear into the batter. Using a rubber spatula, stir in the chips, nuts and coconut.

Scrape the batter into the buttered pan and use the spatula to even the top as best you can.

Bake for about 40 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the center of the blondies comes out clean. The blondies should pull away from the sides of the pan a little and the top should be a nice honey brown. Transfer the pan to a rack and cool for about 15 minutes before turning the blondies out onto another rack. Invert onto a rack and cool the blondies to room temperature right side up, before cutting into squares or bars

Recipe from Dorie Greenspan, Baking: From My Home to Yours

Under the sea...

Some sewing over the weekend - no idea where this is going as yet, but I'll see where it takes me. I usually plan my quilts, but I thought I might just play with this one, and I am really enjoying it. I am also taking notes and photos, so perhaps it may become a tutorial in the future...or maybe I'll even get up the courage to submit it to a magazine...

I also had another go at some macarons and I really think I am getting there, although the tops weren't as smooth as last time. Same recipe, but this time I substituted 35g of almond meal for cocoa, and made a dark salted chocolate buttercream to fill them. Seriously yum!

Happy Easter!

The Easter bunny was very generous in our house this morning - you'd think there were kids living here, but this stash is for 2 (childish perhaps?) adults!

I hope you are having a wonderful long weekend!

French Macarons - take 1

Inspired by Lisa's French baking and my workmate Anita's delicious macarons of the pistachio variety - I decided to have a go at the infamous French macaron (with Tilly's help of course!).

To say I was nervous about making these is an understatement! Googling "French Macarons" reveals a multitude of pages about the intricacies of baking these gorgeous biscuits. So I read and read and read. I found many different recipes and even pages on troubleshooting. Then I decided to give it a shot - and I was pretty stoked with the result! Their 'feet' were a little splayed, and the inside a little sticky, but otherwise they were great. The troubleshooting guide tells me that my oven was probably a little too warm - file that away for next time.

I used the basic recipe from macaron extraordinaire Tartlette, with no colouring or flavouring in the biscuit. And I made a chilli chocolate butter cream with which to fill them.

FIngers crossed I can perfect them next time.

Here is the recipe - brownies with peanut butter chips!

Let me start with a warning - this has to be one of the most unhealthy treats I have EVER made! Although, my husband declared "there is no doubt that these are the best brownies in the world. You are a total baking legend".... I guess that speaks for itself!

I dare you not to make them! The recipe is a little more involved than a normal brownie recipe, but it is so worth it.

1 cup plain flour
1/2 tsp fleur de sel (normal salt is fine too)
225g butter, chopped
230g dark chocolate, chopped or broken into pieces
2 cups white sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
4 large eggs
1 cup peanut butter chips (or I would use white chocolate chips - or none at all and stick by the original recipe, Aussies - you can purchase peanut butter chips here)

preheat the oven to 180º C (160º C fan forced). Put a 9 inch square baking pan on a baking sheet and spray lightly. Line with baking paper if you wish.

Whisk flour and salt together in a bowl.

Set a heat proof bowl over a saucepan of gently simmering water, put the butter and chocolate in. Stir frequently until the ingredients are just melted-you don’t want them to get so hot that the butter separates. Add 1 cup of the sugar and whisk gently just to incorporate it, then remove the bowl from the pan of water. Stir in the vanilla and transfer to a large bowl.

Lightly whisk together the remaining cup of sugar and the 4 eggs. Then add half of this sugar-egg mixture to the warm chocolate, stirring very gently, but without stopping so that you don't end up with scrambled eggs in your chocolate!

Beat the reaming sugar and egg mixture on medium-high for about 3 minutes, or until it doubles in volume and is nice and fluffy. Using a spatula, gently fold the whipped eggs into the chocolate, stopping just short of blending them in completely.

Sprinkle the flour/salt mix and the peanut butter or chocolate chips over the batter and delicately fold them in, working only until they disappear. Scrape the batter into your prepared pan.

Bake for 30 minutes, or until the top looks dry (warning - I cooked mine for 40 mins and the centre pieces were still gooey and quite uncooked - similar to this, which I am assured is actually ok, but you might want to cook it a little longer)

Allow the brownies to cool in the pan and refrigerate before cutting.

Makes 16-20

Recipe from Baking from my home to yours, Dorie Greenspan (Rick Katz's brownies for Julia)

Enjoy (and don't blame me when you can't stop eating them - I warned you!)

apologies for the not so great photos - we couldn't wait to tuck in!

Fresh Ginger and Chocolate Gingerbread

mmm...ginger and chocolate! My husband and I often nibble on uncrystallised ginger along with a piece of dark chocolate, so the thought of combining the two in a cake sounded fantastic.


This is my favourite of all the new recipes I have tried lately and will definitely get another run in our house. Soon!

Fresh Ginger and Chocolate Gingerbread

For the Cake
2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh ginger
1 tablespoon sugar
2 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons ground ginger
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
160g unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup (packed) brown sugar
3 large eggs
1/2 cup treacle
150g dark chocolate – 50g melted and cooled and 100g chopped
1 cup buttermilk (or 1 cup milk soured with 1 tablespoon of white vinegar)
1 tablespoon finely chopped stem ginger in syrup (available in Asian supermarkets - although I only found this after I made the cake, so I chopped up some uncrystallised naked ginger and threw that in instead)

For the Icing
75g dark chocolate, coarsely chopped
1 tablespoon strong coffee
45g unsalted butter, at room temperature
3 tablespoons icing sugar
Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter a 9-inch square baking pan and put it on a baking sheet (I made half the recipe and it was the perfect amount for a loaf tin).

Put the fresh ginger and sugar in a small bowl, stir and set aside.Sift the flour, baking soda and spices together.

Beat the butter and brown sugar and butter together until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating for 1 minute after each egg goes in. Pour in the treacle and beat until smooth. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the melted chocolate, along with the sugared ginger. Still on low speed, add the dry ingredients, alternating with the buttermilk (begin and end with the dry ingredients), mixing the batter only as much as needed to blend the ingredients. Fold in the chopped chocolate and the ginger in syrup.
Spread the batter into the prepared pan.

Bake for about 40 minutes, or until the cake starts to pull away from the sides of the pan and a thin knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Transfer the cake to a rack and cool for 10 minutes, then remove from pan. Cool to room temperature before icing the cake.

To Make the Icing: Set a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, put the chocolate and coffee in the bowl, and stir occasionally until the chocolate is melted. Remove the bowl and, using a small whisk, stir in the butter one tablespoon at a time. Sift the confectioners' sugar over the chocolate and stir in. Transfer the bowl to a counter and let the icing sit for about 10 minutes.

Put the gingerbread, still on the rack, on a piece of baking paper or foil. Pour the icing onto the centre of the cake and spread it evenly over the top. Allow the icing to set for 30 minutes before cutting the cake.

recipe from Baking, From my home to Yours. By Dorie Greenspan.

Enjoy!

Very Chocolatey Ovaltine and Malteser Biscuits

This week it was my turn to bring morning tea for our meeting at work. Knowing that a number of my workmates are chocoholics, I thought it was a good time to try out these biscuits.

It looked a bit like icing at this stage!

With Ovaltine and Maltesers as well as chopped dark chocolate, these biscuits had a rich chocolate flavour with a malt undertone. The original recipe called for malted milk powder, suggesting Ovaltine as a substitute. If I was to make these again, I would probably use malted milk powder to tone down the chocolate a little and increase the malt flavour which was a little overwhelmed in my biscuits.

mmm...

However, while I thought they were perhaps a little too chocolately, my workmates loved them and I came home with an empty container!

Ovaltine and Malteser biscuits

makes ~30 biscuits

1 3/4 cups plain flour
1 cup Ovaltine
1/4 cup cocoa
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 teaspoon table salt
150g unsalted butter at room temp.
2/3 cup white sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence
1/4 cup milk
2 cups Maltesers, halved
160g dark chocolate, chopped

Line two baking trays with baking paper. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F.

Sift together the flour, Ovaltine, cocoa, baking powder, and salt.

Beat the butter and sugar together on medium speed for about 3 minutes, until very smooth. Add the eggs one at a time, beating for about a minute after each addition. Beat in the vanilla. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add half the dry ingredients, mixing until they just disappear into the batter. Then mix in the milk followed by the remaining dry ingredients, taking care not to overmix the batter. Fold in the halved Maltesers and chopped chocolate by hand

Using a tablespoon as a guide, drop batter in mounds onto the baking sheets, leaving room for the biscuits to spread. Bake for 11 to 13 minutes, rotating the sheets from top to bottom and front to back after 6 minutes.

When done, the cookies will be puffed and set slightly, but still soft to the touch. Let them rest for 2 minutes before using a wide metal spatula to transfer them to wire racks to cool (if you can wait that long!)

Recipe from Baking, from my home to yours, by Dorie Greenspan (Chocolate malted whopper drops)

I hope everyone has a wonderful Easter break!

in need of a caffeine hit...

Last week I got a new cookbook - "Baking, From My Home To Yours" By Dorie Greenspan. It was a gift from my sister - Thanks Annie! I've made some of the recipes from this book before, usually after finding the recipe on other blogs. However I could never quite understand how so many bloggers have committed to cooking one recipe from this book every single week (see Tuesdays with Dorie). That is, until now.

It is a wonderful book, much better than I anticipated. It is filled with lots of yummy looking recipes, however the downside is that it uses the imperial system of measurement. Thankfully all the Australian Women's Weekly cookbooks have conversion tables in them, so as long as I have one handy all will be good.

The dilemma came when trying to decide which recipe to try first. I really wanted to make the Caramel Crunch Bars after seeing them here. However the recipe asked for "Heath Toffee Bits" - something I discovered is made by Hershey's and is not sold readily in Australia. Bummer! I am going to look for some plain toffee soon and simply pummel it with a rolling pin to use as a substitute!

Instead, I made "Coffee Break Muffins" at my husbands request. This recipe uses black coffee instead of milk to moisten the batter. I also swapped the 1 tablespoon of instant coffee powder the recipe called for for 125g dark chocolate chunks. It probably wasn't really a fair substitute (!) - but I am so glad I did it! The resulting muffins were beautiful!

Coffee Break Muffins

From "Baking, From My Home To Yours" by Dorie Greenspan

2 cups plain flour

1/3 cup white sugar

1 tablespoon of instant coffee powder AND/OR 125g dark chocolate, chopped

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/8 teaspoon table salt

1/3 cup (packed) brown sugar

1 cup strong black coffee, cooled

113g (or 1 stick) of butter, melted and cooled

1 large egg

1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 200C (180C fan forced). Line a 12 cup muffin tray with liners.

In a large bowl, sift together the flour, whitew sugar, instant coffee powder (if using), baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Stir in the brown sugar and dark chocolate chunks (if using).

In another bowl, whisk together the black coffee, melted butter, egg and vanilla. Pour over the dry mixture and mix. Divide the batter evenly among the muffin pans and bake for 20mins or until cooked through (test with a skewer). Leave to stand for 5 mins before turning onto a wire rack to cool.

cupcake bites

Bakerella - a super blogger who has even showcased her talents on the Martha Stewart show in the US - makes the most gorgeous cupcake pops.

'Cupcake what?' I hear you ask! Cupcake pops are chocolate covered balls of cake stuck on the end of a lolly stick - a cross between a cupcake and a lolly pop! She has made some seriously impressive Christmas themed ones including reindeer and trees, some turkeys, some for the US election, and halloween ones - just to name a few! Make sure you check out her versions - they are Seriously impressive!

However when I decided to have a go, I decided to stick with her cupcake bites - similar to cupcake pops, but they don't go on a stick! These took a fair bit of time to make - so don't start them thinking they'll be something quick you can whip up!

Cupcake Bites

1 baked cake
1 container of betty crocker icing (or you could use some thick buttercream icing that you had made yourself - but I am lazy!)
1 pack of milk chocolate melts
1 pack of white chocolate melts
Sprinkles and mini m&ms to decorate
1 flower shaped cookie cutter (approx 1.25" wide X .75" tall)

Bake a cake from a mix or from scratch and allow it to cool completely. Crumble the cake into a large bowl.

Add a couple of spoonfulls of icing at a time and mix it into the cake crumbs thoroughly until it is a sticky mix that will form balls when pressed together. Roll mixture into balls about 1.25" - 1.5" in size and place on a tray lined with baking paper. Place the tray in the freezer for about 10 mins (or the fridge for a couple of hours).

Remove the cake balls from the freezer. Take each chilled ball and roll it into more of an oval shape and then slide it into cookie cutter. Push it into cutter until about half fills the cutter and the rest sticks out of the top in the shape of a mound. Then push the shaped cupcake carefully out of the cookie cutter from the bottom. Set right side up on your baking paper covered tray. There is a video and step by step photos of this step here on Bakerella's website which might make this a little clearer. Continue with remaining balls.

Once shaped, cover and return the balls to the freezer for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, melt your chocolate melts according to the instructions on the pack. I used milk chocolate for the bottoms, and white chocolate (which I coloured with red food colouring) for the tops.

Remove the cakes from the freezer and set up another baking paper covered tray. Take the cupcake shaped mixture and dip the bottoms into the melted chocolate - just to the point where the mounded shape starts. Remove from the chocolate, turn upside down and lay them on the paper upside down.

Once the milk chocolate has set dip the tops of the cupcakes into the pink or white chocolate being careful to cover all the exposed areas (I found this not only the most fiddly step - but the messiest! Now I can see the attraction of having them on sticks!).

Turn the cupcake right side up and place it on the tray. Decorate with m&m's and sprinkles while the chocolate is still wet.

Enjoy!

The Ultimate Chocolate Cake Challenge

Last month Lorraine of Not Quite Nigella announced her Ultimate Chocolate Cake Challenge! I entered her Banana Bread Bake-off earlier this year (see my entry here), so I thought I'd better put an entry in for this one too. Plus it was a chocolate challenge - how could I resist?


Chocolate cake is not something I make often. I feel it is more of a dessert than a morning or afternoon tea snack, and with only the two of us, we would be eating chocolate cake for dessert for a week! I have chosen this recipe as my entry for multiple reasons:

1) It is one of the easiest cake recipes I know. There is no creaming of butter, and there is only 2 steps - firstly, whisking together all the ingredients except the chocolate chips and secondly, folding through the chocolate - too too easy!

2) It is not so fudgey that it must be eaten with a spoon - making it more of a traditional cake than a dessert

and

3) It tastes great! A chocolate cake, with the addition of shredded coconut and studded with dark chocolate chunks - what more could a girl want? (ok, maybe a glass of red wine on a Friday night!)

Chocolate Coconut Cake

250g butter, melted
3/4 cup good quality cocoa, sifted
1 1/3 cups caster sugar
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups shredded coconut
1 1/2 cups plain flour, sifted
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 cup milk
100 - 150g dark chocolate (I like Lindt 70%), broken into chunks OR 1 cup dark chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 180C (160C fan forced). Grease and line a 24cm round cake tin with baking paper.

Combine all ingredients in a bowl (except chocolate chunks/chips) and whisk until smooth. Fold through the chocolate. Pour mixture into prepared pan and bake for 50mins. Cool in tin for 1omins then turn onto a wire rack.

This cake tastes great both warm or cold and I think it is fantastic with double cream and mixed berries.

Double Chocolate Cupcakes

I love chocolate. What woman doesn’t? I like dark chocolate especially and my all time favourite food is chocolate ice-cream studded with chocolate pieces. Strangely I don’t tend to make a lot of chocolate desserts as all too often I find them overly rich and sickly sweet. But these cupcakes were lovely!

I made them for the RSPCA cupcake day earlier this year and they went down a treat with my work colleagues. I used the recipe posted here by Kel at Sweet Treats and added chocolate chunks for a little bit of decadence!

Double Chocolate Cupcakes
90g butter, melted
1 cup SR flour, sifted
1 cup sugar
3 tablespoons cocoa
100g chopped dark chocolate (I used Lindt 70%)
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 180C (160 fan forced).
Sift the flour and cocoa together. Add all other ingredients and mix until just combined (don't overmix or they will be tough). Spoon into cupcake papers and bake for approximately 15 mins

Chocolate Buttercream Icing
55g softened butter
240g sifted icing sugar
2 tbs cocoa
1 ½ tbs milk

Beat butter until light and creamy. Gradually beat in half the icing sugar and cocoa, then add the milk. Beat in the remaining icing sugar and cocoa. (Add extra milk if necessary to make a smoother consistency). This icing is good for piping, but I simply smeared it on!

I simply rolled the edges in 100s &1000s or carefully dipped the top to decorate them.
My bike obsessed husband has signed up for the Sydney to the Gong bike ride this weekend so I again have a day to myself - hopefully this time I will get my Leanne's house quilt basted together. Fingers crossed! And then there is Christmas pressies to start thinking about too...maybe next week!

Chunky Peanut Butter and Oatmeal Chocolate Chipsters

From the name of these biscuits you can probably tell where they come from. Yep, they are from the USA - Dorie Greenspan in fact. We Aussie’s tend not to use the word oatmeal, but I figured I had to be true to the original recipe. Dorie Greenspan has one mighty following in the blog-o-sphere. Each Tuesday many food bloggers all post the same recipe from her book “Baking, From My Home to Yours” as part of the group “Tuesdays with Dorie”. I don’t know if I have ever found a book I love so much that I would work my way through it one recipe at a time. Although Karen Martini’s first cookbook “Where the Heart is” would come very very close!

I read about these biscuits on A Whisk and a Spoon and I thought they looked pretty damn good. However I am not the biggest peanut butter fan, but I have this fascination at the moment with the idea of mixing salt and sugar, so the idea of a slightly salty peanut butter, mixed with sugar and chocolate got me a bit excited. The biscuits turned out very good – I was pleasantly surprised. The nutmeg was an inspired addition and gave them an extra kick that made these biscuits that extra bit special. I definitely think this recipe is a keeper. Perhaps next time though, I will add some salted chopped peanuts – just to enhance the salty/sweet playoff.

My sister made these biscuits and got around 45, but I ended up with something more around the 80 mark! Next time I will definitely be halving the recipe, but my husbands work colleagues definitely enjoyed the overflow of biscuits.

Chunky Peanut Butter and Oatmeal Chocolate Chipsters
From “Baking, From My Home to Yours” by Dorie Greenspan
Makes about 80 cookies (in my hands anyway!!)

3 cups rolled oats
1 cup plain flour
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp salt
225g unsalted butter, softened
1 cup chunky peanut butter
1 cup white sugar
1 cup (packed) brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 180ºC (or 160ºC for fan forced). Line two baking trays with baking paper.

Mix together the oats, flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda and salt.

Beat together the softened butter, peanut butter, white sugar and brown sugar until smooth and creamy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating after each addition, then beat in the vanilla.

Stir in the rolled oat mix and the chocolate chips. The recipe suggests refrigerating the mixture for 2 hours or overnight to give a more even shaped biscuit – but I didn’t do this and I think mine turned out ok!

Drop rounded tablespoonfuls of the mixture 2 inches apart onto the baking trays.

Bake for 13 minutes or until golden and just firm around the edges. The biscuits will firm up as they cool. Cooking for 13 mins gave slightly crunchy biscuits, so if you like your biscuits more soft reduce the cooking time a little.

Enjoy!