Jaffa Muffins

April 8th, 2011 Comments Off

These muffins are the first variation on the muffin recipe that I posted earlier this week, the Pear & White Chocolate Chip Muffins.  The recipe once again uses oil instead of butter, comes together so quickly and gives you delicious muffins with generous muffintop (the best part!).

These muffins are Jaffa Muffins! If you don’t know what Jaffa cakes are, you’re missing out.  They’re a UK cookie/cake covered with a layer of orange jelly and topped off by a coating of chocolate.  Whether or not they’re a cake or a biscuit is a source of great debate, but these are without a doubt muffins. :)

» Read the rest of this entry «

Pear & White Chocolate Chip Muffins

April 4th, 2011 Comments Off

Pear + White Chocolate = Delicious Muffins

It’s the Easter break here in St Andrews and most students are off cavorting away somewhere on the Continent. Alas, for medics, the 2 week break finds us at home or still in the Bubble looking longingly outside as we get our first days of spring.  Such is the lot of people who have midterms the first day back from the “break”.

But I still found some time to make these muffins.  A few months back, I made a Glazed Pear & White Chocolate Bundt cake.  I loved the combination of pear and white chocolate, two soft sweet complementary flavours.  So this past weekend, I was running low on a few ingredients and was looking for a recipe to use up a couple of pears that I had sitting around.  See I was butter-less, which pretty much rules out 75% of cake and cookie recipes.  So I decided to go looking for a muffin recipe and I found a great basic buttermilk muffin recipe.  The recipe originally called for berries, but I substituted the same volume of chopped up pear and white chocolate chips.

» Read the rest of this entry «

Triple Lemon Bundt Cake

March 27th, 2011 Comments Off

Triple lemon, triple threat (to your waistline...)

Now I can’t claim this recipe to be of my own creation, however I did pick and choose bits and pieces from other recipes to come up with this: The Triple Lemon Bundt Cake.  It’s called the Triple Lemon Bundt Cake because a generous amount of lemon zest is added to the cake batter, then when the cake is still warm, a lemon sugar syrup is slowly poured all over its surface, and lastly a glaze with a lot of lemony zip is drizzled over the cooled cake.  So. Wow. Lots of lemon! I had 4 lemons leftover that needed using up and this cake was the perfect use for it.  I have to confess that I had to top up my fresh lemon juice with a bit of the bottled stuff (boohiss) but no one called me out on it, so I guess it’s okay. :)  But knowing that, I would make sure I had 5-6 lemons next time just to be sure I wouldn’t be caught short.

» Read the rest of this entry «

Chocolate Baking Class Photos

March 25th, 2011 Comments Off

Making all those wee white chocolate raspberry mousses. NOM.

A few weeks back, I taught a Chocolate Baking Class for the Fine Chocolate Society.  The amazingly talented Frank George, Sarah Wilford, and Verena Walsh were such a great help! Luckily, Verena had the foresite to bring her camera and she has just passed on the photos to me.  If you’re interested in some of the recipes, I’ve made the Zebra cake and White Chocolate Mousse before.  You can find the Zebra Cake here and the White Chocolate Mousse here.

» Read the rest of this entry «

Coconut Macaroons

March 19th, 2011 Comments Off

macaroons!

People sometimes get confused when I talk about macaroons.  They come in all different shapes and sizes, some chocolate coated others pure coconut.  It’s even easy to confuse macaroons, the sweet soft coconut confection, with macarons, the French confection made with eggwhite, icing sugar, and ground almonds.  Macarons come in a rainbow of colours and flavours, vs macaroons are mostly coconut with a hint of almond extract. Wikipedia tells me that the Australians like to hide a dab of jam in the centre of their macaroons prior to cooking.  What a delicious surprise!

» Read the rest of this entry «

Traditional Bakewell Tart

March 14th, 2011 § 1

bakewell tart. :)

Today is quite a special day for two reasons.  Firstly, one of my very close friends is turning 20 today! Woo! So it’s time to say goodbye to using your teenage years as an excuse for ridiculous antics.  Unfortunately, I have also left my teen years behind and I have yet to come up with an adequate explanation for my own antics. O well. :)  I made this tart for her birthday as what’s a birthday without some sort of treat? Normally I’d opt for a cake, but I heard her talk about how much she liked bakewell tarts (albeit the ones with icing and cherries!) and I had some ground almonds which were itching to be used.

Secondly, today is also pi today! The day we celebrate that irrational number that we’re taught about in school and how those decimals just NEVER END.  Mind boggling stuff for an 11 year old.  Anyways, in honour of this mystic number, I made a pie! er. well technically it’s a tart, but they’re practically the same thing. So please, just work with me. lol.

» Read the rest of this entry «

Raspberry White Chocolate Mousse

March 3rd, 2011 § 1

Omg. This mousse is divine!  And I think it’s most defining feature is that it’s eggless — so no consuming raw eggs (although I confess to regularly trying the cookie dough) or any fiddling about with beating until “soft peaks” form.  The secret to this mousse is that it uses cream cheese and whipped cream to achieve it’s smooth creaminess and lightness.  This recipe was adapted from a version I found on one of my favourite blogs, Closet Cooking.  Kevin there adapted it from a recipe from the Dairy Farmers of Canada — which explains the prominent use of dairy products in the recipe.

» Read the rest of this entry «

Miniature Chocolate Cake

February 27th, 2011 § 2

tada! proof that size matters not!

This recipe proves that bigger doesn’t necessarily mean better! I made this cake a few weeks back for my Valentine’s Day dinner with my dear other half.  We decided to have a relaxed night in rather than a sappy and overpriced night out. :)

My dear other half was in charge of the main meal whilst I was given the task of procuring dessert.  Giving my obsession with all things chocolate, I was not terribly troubled by this.  However, I still had to find a cute dessert that be sufficient for the two of us. :)

» Read the rest of this entry «

Peanut Butter-Filled Chocolate Cookies & 2010 Recap

December 21st, 2010 § 3

Possibly my favourite cookie recipe of 2010.

Possibly my favourite cookie recipe of 2010.

I’m home for the holidays! And I’m lucky to have made it out of the UK, judging by what I hear from my friends back in Scotland.  Apparently Heathrow resembles a refugee camp and the queue for the Eurostar stretches 1km back! Eek.  Indeed I hope all of this will have calmed down before it’s time to go back to the Bubble.

As usual I have a long droughts with no posting followed by a flash flood of recipes and photos.  I do bake in between posts! Lots! It’s just hard to get a good photo and even harder for me to motivate myself to post when most people who read this probably already sampled the baked goods. Ah well. It’s the end of 2010, so I thought I’d include some pictures of my favourite cakes and other sweets from this year.  If you’d like any of the recipes, just let me know!

» Read the rest of this entry «

Glazed Pear and White Chocolate Bundt Cake

October 5th, 2010 § 2

DSC_8577

Almost halfway through Week 2, my studies are definitely well underway… and I’m already well behind on notes! ;_; But nothing says procrastination productive distraction like baking and I’ve already brought in treats for my classmates a few times! :) This cake is from my Golden Book of Chocolate, one of the most amazing chocolate cookbooks every published.  I was surprised and impressed by its comprehensive introduction, packed full of information about the history of chocolate, it’s production, and it’s role in the economic world of today.  The language is a bit grandiose, but it was informative nonetheless.

However, what really sets this book apart is the variety and quantity of recipes.  There are over 300 of them! And every single recipe is accompanied by a mouthwatering, foodgasm inducing photo.  It’s a pleasure simply to sit down with a cup of tea and slowly leaf through it’s golden pages. » Read the rest of this entry «

« Older Entries

Newer Entries »