Yolk Hero - Giveaway

I love baking...well who doesn't?! And now, with the return of the Great British Bake Off it seems like the perfect time to run a giveaway for something which makes baking just that little bit easier...

The Yolk Hero is the solution for those of us who always seem to end up with a bit of shell in our cake mixes when separating eggs, or whose yolks just seem to drop into those carefully separated egg whites.

It's a fun little fellow, perfect for brightening up your kitchen gadget drawer. So enter the competition below for a fun, mess free way to separate your yolks.

Don't worry if you don't win...you can always buy one, like I did here:

http://www.lakeland.co.uk/18094/Yolk-Hero src=gpute&gclid=CMP1kq20pbkCFcfJtAodjAoAkw



a Rafflecopter giveaway

White Chocolate Mud Cake

It was my sister's birthday this weekend, which meant I was in charge of making a decadent birthday cake to celebrate.  As it was sunny outside, I thought I'd forget the traditional chocolate cake and go for a white chocolate mud cake with strawberries.  I followed this recipe from the Pink Whisk: http://www.thepinkwhisk.co.uk/2013/06/white-chocolate-mud-cake.html

A great recipe, very indulgent and delicious. I didn't use any chocolate in the icing, as felt it was already pretty packed full of white chocolate, and I don't think you'd notice the difference...but apart from that I followed it exactly.

I'll definitely be making this one again - for a special occasion. Note the ice blocks in the image below (I don't recommend making a white chocolate collar for a cake when it's really hot outside!)

Slutty Brownies

Warning and disclaimer - These are the most droolworthy brownies in the world. You'll become obsessed.

Thanks to the lovely Rosie at The Londoner http://www.thelondoner.me/ I found myself making her fantastically decadent recipe for slutty brownies.

It's a ridiculously good combination of oreos, chocolate brownie and cookie dough.

As i'm a foodie blogger and don't like cutting corners too much I followed her recipe but used a homemade recipe for chocolate brownie and cookie dough, rather than using a box mix.

You simply make a cookie dough, add oreos on top and then finish off with the chocolate fudge cake.

Absolutely immense when served warm with ice cream.



Here's the cookie dough with oreos on the top!



Delicious brownie when cooked

Just before I tucked into it!

Scandalicious Baking

It's been a while since I last posted. So apologies - it's been incredibly busy (but that's not an excuse!)

I was sent the new book, Scandalicious Baking by the lovely Signe Johansen to review a couple of months ago and I wasn't disappointed. Take a look here for more info: http://www.signejohansen.com/

Nordic is big business in the UK at the moment, thanks to the likes of the Nordic Bakery and Signe's books, Brits are beginning to realise there's more than meets the eye to Scandinavian cooking, including baking.

Scandalicious Baking is a fantastic book which gives you plenty of recipes to get stuck into which give you a taste for baking these delights without being too intimidating. From Chocolate and Orange Marmalade Loaf cake, through to Queen Maud muffins and Grilled Cheese with mushroom and hazlenut, there are plenty of recipes to satisfy a sweet or savoury tooth.

The photography in the book is a good enough reason to buy this book alone. Beautiful images that conjure up ideas of being the domestic goddess I'd always imagined I could be.

The first recipe i've had a go at from the book was the Cinnamon Bun Sharing Cake. Absolutely stunning. I'm always a little intimidated by any recipes which involve yeast, but this really wasn't a tough one to do...and the results were so impressive.

My lovely cinnamon bun!

 

I'll be using this one regularly - especially when I want to impress guests.

Pick up a copy from your local bookshop or on Amazon.co.uk

Bread Making

Just a very quick post on BREAD!

 

I love the smell of fresh bread baking and have always wanted a bread maker - so was excited that I finally had a few pounds put away to buy one. There's plenty of different ones to go for - all with different selling points so I won't go into that!

 

But below are a couple of recent efforts - getting used to the machine now...

 

However, I planned pretty badly and have started a Paleo diet, so the bread maker is fast becoming my hubby's favourite toy instead...

 

 

A classic white loaf

Sun dried tomato loaf

Low calorie baking experiments

So, i'm trying to lose weight at the moment but have a big baking addiction, which really isn't helping. So this weekend I experimented with a few low calorie recipes....which weren't a huge success.

Experiment 1: The sugar free chocolate bundt cake
As you can see from the picture below, I tried a chunk of this...but that was it.  I replaced the sugar in the recipe with a Stevia powder.

Not recommended. Horrible bitter taste, cake didn't rise properly and left a funny after taste in my mouth

 

Think i need to spend some more time experimenting with these sugar replacements in baking to make sure the quantities i'm using are correct.



 

Experiment 2: Rosemary Conley Chocolate brownie recipe

 

This was a recipe i'd pulled from a magazine a while ago and decided now was the time to try it. This one wasn't such a failure - it looked like chocolate brownie and when kept in the fridge for a few hours it tasted like a brownie. It just had an unusual sticky consistency. You'd definitely have figured it was low calorie. (sorry for really bad picture - it actually looked pretty good in real life)

 



 

I don't think i'll be trying either of these again unfortunately.

 

So, please help me find some more alternative low calorie recipes!



'Healthy' Oat bran muffins

Looking for a 'healthy' alternative to my usual baking treats, I stumbled across Nic Nutrition's recipe for Oat Bran muffins and whipped up a batch at the weekend.

Great as a snack with only 100 calories and with a low GI, it means they keep you fuller for longer. Sometimes baking can be healthy :-)

If you want to try out the recipe, follow this link:

http://nicsnutrition.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/cholesterol-lowering-muffins.html

Nic has some great healthy recipe ideas on her blog. Definitely worth a look!

Cookie Girl

Have you heard of Cookie Girl www.cookiegirl.co.uk? A regular supplier of cupcakes and sweet snacks to the stars, she's a pretty well known figure around the Kensal Rise way - back when i was living there, we used to receive a free magazine where she would have a column every publication.

So when an opportunity arose to spend 2 hours learning to improve my cupcake decorating piping skills for a mere £20 each via Time Out vouchers I jumped at the chance.

Held in the upstairs area of Idlewild http://www.idlewildmaidavale.co.uk/ (where we incidently had our dinner - sausages, squid, chips and other munchies - highly recommended), around 20 of us gathered round tight tables, sharing decorations and passing around coloured icing.

We learnt 4 techniques and took away a decent 8 cupcakes to share with friends and family (or to scoff on the way home).  Some of them were incredibly basic, and I was a little disappointed not to have learnt more detailed decorating technique (but then again, we had booked onto the 2 hour slot) and i'm sure some of the other classes were more detailed.

My friend and I had a fantastic time and the recipe for the icing was amazing, and i've been using it since on all my cupcakes.

I would definitely recommend a team bonding/friend outing/hen do event with cookie girl.

Book it!

My Kitchen Mess

Here's a quick picture just to show how incredibly messy I am when I bake. Note the complete chaos and mess which is my kitchen!