Chocolate banana truffles

Sam loves pretty much anything 'chocolate banana' so I had to find something different I could make other than a chocolate covered banana!

Type in 'chocolate banana' into pinterest & you'll get a ton of nice recipes. I came across this truffle recipe but it didn't work as well as it looks in the pictures so I'll type up my version with a few things I picked up on the way. I also doubled the recipe shown in that link & used milk chocolate instead of dark chocolate for the coating to mix it up a little.

They were mindblowingly delicious! seriously! This really is a recipe to try & I know I'll be making these again for Sam. We enjoyed them after dinner one evening....and maybe even enjoyed them before dinner too....but I'm not telling...

Ingredients:

For the centres: 12 ounces dark chocolate, a cup heavy cream, a cup mashed ripe banana, a teaspoon vanilla extract. For the coating: 200g milk chocolate.

Method:

- Lay a sheet of cling film over a tin so that when you pour the mixture in it's easy to pull out.

- Crush up the dark chocolate in a food processor.

- Heat the cream in a saucepan until it's steaming but do not let it boil. Pour the cream over the chocolate & let it sit for a while then blend together in the food processor until combined.

- Add the vanilla essence & the mashed banana and process until smooth.

- Pour mixture into your tin & chill in the fridge overnight. 

I found that the mixture although firm was too soft to work with so I would pop tin into the freezer for a couple of hours before either cutting out in circles like the original recipe or rolling into balls like I did.

- Melt the milk chocolate (or dark again if you prefer) and dip truffles in until covered. 

- Place truffles onto a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper, decorate if you wish with sprinkles and chill in the fridge until solid.

- After ours were ready I dusted them with a little gold.

- TRY THESE & ENJOY!

Chocolate & cinnamon swirl loaf

I made cinnamon rolls a few weeks ago but was too afraid to document because it was my first attempt. They turned out amazingly well so I'll be making them again at some point. I thought for the time being I'd try out a cinnamon swirl loaf. I found a few recipes on pinterest  and I've taken bits of instructions from each. Here's what I did:

Ingredients:
250g plain flour, 1 teaspoon of baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 120g mini chocolate chips (I used both dark & milk), 1 egg, 150g of dark brown sugar, 50g granulated sugar, 240ml buttermilk, 80ml of veg oil, 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract.
For the cinnamon swirl: 1 tablespoon cinnamon, 65g granulated sugar

Method:
- Preheat over to 180 degrees and grease or line a non stick loaf pan. Make what will become of the cinnamon swirl but combining the granulated sugar and cinnamon then set aside.

- Whisk the egg, brown sugar and granulated sugar together until all the lumps are out. 

- Whisk in the buttermilk, oil, vanilla until well combined.

- Sieve all the dry ingredients into the wet mixture (flour, baking powder, salt) and also add the chocolate chips. Do not over mix as the loaf texture will be too tough.

- Pour half the batter into the loaf pan and then top evenly with the cinnamon sugar. Pour the remaining batter on top. Sprinkle the rest of the cinnamon sugar on top.

- Cover the pan loosely with foil and bake for 45-60 minutes. Check the loaf is cooked by inserting a cocktail stick and if it's come out clean it's done.

- Allow bread to cool before eating. We ate this on the day it was baked and then finished it off the next day. It definitely tastes better the day after because all the favours have intensified. This should keep for a good few days afterwards. ENJOY!

Homemade Nutella

Yeah, you read it! HOMEMADE nutella! Now, this was a bit of a faff to make but it made three large jars so we'll be all nutella-ed out by the time we get through it. I have to admit that it's not as smooth as shop brought nutella although I do love a bit of texture in this spread but anyway, it doesn't really matter because IT'S DELICIOUS! 

I used this link but I've changed it up a little. I doubled up on ingredients because I had three large jars to use.

Ingredients:
400g hazelnuts, 2 cans of condensed milk, 500g dark chocolate (the darker the better), water.

Method:
- Roast the hazelnuts in a pan for 10-15 minutes. Once cool put them in food processor and whizz until the hazelnuts become like butter. It should look like a runny paste. This takes a long time so just be patient and keep processing, it will eventually turn to a paste. You may need to add water little by little to encourage it to become more runny.

- Melt the chocolate in a separate bowl either in the microwave or in a bowl on top of boiling water. Once melted pour in the condensed milk and mix well.

- Pour the chocolate into the food processor and mix well into the hazelnut butter. If your food processor is small like mine you will need to get a big bowl and use an electric hand whisker to combine the ingredients towards the end.

- Distribute the nutella into your jars and seal well. This should last a very long time!

- Try not to eat it all at once!

Sweet prune bars

It's the season to eat far too much and far too many naughty things! These colder days & evenings bring a need for something sweet to start the day. I ran out of eggs so I needed to find something for a quick sugar fix - thank the Lord for Rachel Allen's 'Bake'. I love her recipes. They are so simple & everything I've made of hers has always tasted so good. She brings the best to home baking and comforting meals!

I made these prune bars. Rachel makes them with dates but I just used what I had in my cupboard and they worked just as well. We had these hot one night for pudding but had them cold as a 'breakfast bar' the following morning.

Ingredients:
250ml water, 200g of chopped prunes (or dates), 175g plain flour, 1/2 teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda, 175g soft light brown sugar, 100g porridge oats, 175g diced butter, pinch of salt.

Use 8 x 8 square cake tin

Method:

- Preheat oven to 180 degrees (gas mark 4). Put a sheet of greaseproof paper on the bottom of the tin and butter the sides.

- Place chopped prunes and water into a saucepan and simmer. Cook until the prunes are soft and the mixture becomes thick. It looks like too much water to start with but once the fruit softens it will thicken. Just be patient. Should only take about 10 minutes.

- Sift flour & bicarb into large bowl. Add sugar, oats and salt. Mix up well. 

- Add the butter and rub between fingers to create a crumble. Press half of this mixture into the bottom of the tin to create the base. Spread the cooked prune mixture over this and sprinkle the rest of the crumble loosely on top.

- Bake in the oven for 30-40 minutes. They should be golden brown around the edges. Allow to cool & then cut into bars.

Lemon, ginger & mixed berries layer cake

This was a cake I threw together with ingredients that I had in the cupboard. I knew I wanted a lemon cake but I found I had ginger & frozen berries to use up too. This was really really delicious!

Also, I recommend using this cake release spray. I'm the sort of person who hates buttering the cake tins (mostly because I'm lazy) so I use this instead and it does a grand job!

This is the recipe for 2 layered lemon & ginger sponge cake with lemon cream & frozen berry filling!

Ingredients:
Sponge
6oz butter, 6oz sugar, 6oz self-raising flour, 3 eggs, a cup of lemon juice, a handful of stem ginger (chopped)
Lemon cream & filling
8oz soft butter, 16oz icing sugar, 5 tablespoons of lemon curd, frozen berries

Method:
- Cream the butter & sugar together until fluffy. Add flour, eggs, lemon juice and stem ginger & mix well. 

- Pour batter into 2 cake tins lined with greaseproof paper.

- Bake for 25-30 mins on 180 degrees

- Leave to cool. Mix the butter & icing sugar together until soft and add the lemon curd. You may want to keep tasting & add more sugar or lemon curd depending on your preference.

- Once the cake is cool, spread the lemon cream between the two cakes. Add the berries to the middle & then cover the rest of the cake with the remaining cream. 

I put the berries in frozen because we didn't eat it until later but if you're eating it straight away then make sure the berries aren't frozen or alternatively use fresh berries! 

Chocolate & stem ginger pie

This is one of my favourite things to make! Oh, it is beautiful! If eaten straight from the oven it is sooooo gooey and gorgeous.

This recipe is for a big pie but I just halved the ingredients to make these four individual pies. You can use as much or as little chocolate as you like & it doesn't matter what kind it always turns out good. I have used lots of different ones before.

Ingredients:

12oz plain flour, 8oz butter, 1 teaspoon baking powder, 6oz caster sugar, 1 egg, 2tsp vanilla essence, 1tsp mixed spice, 7oz milk chocolate (chopped), 4oz plain chocolate (chopped), 2 pieces of stem ginger, 2 tblsp demerara sugar (caster sugar will be fine).

Method:

- Grease the cake tin or individual tins & preheat the oven to 180oc or gas mark 4.

- Sift the flour & baking powder into a bowl and add the butter. Rub together to make a coarse crumble. 

- Stir in the caster sugar. Measure about 8oz of the crumble mix and set aside.

- With the crumble you now have, add the egg, vanilla essence, mixed spice and mix into a dough/paste - it is quite a sticky dough but don't add anymore flour.

- Press it into the base of the tin. I found putting a little oil on the back of a spoon and pushing the mixture around works great (see below)

- Scatter the milk & plain chocolate & stem ginger into the base. If you forget the stem ginger - add it to the crumble top instead like I did!

- Cover with the remaining crumble and scatter the demerara sugar on top.

- Cook individual pies for 30 mins or whole pies for 50 mins. Allow to cool for 10 mins before removing from the tin.
- Eat straight away with double cream or ice cream! YUMMY!

- If you make this beforehand you can heat the pie in the microwave for 30 seconds and it will make the chocolate gooey again. Perfect for leftovers if you have any!!

Great British Bakewell Tart

This is the first time I've made this British classic. What seemed like a complicated dessert to make turned out to be super easy. I'll be whipping this up a lot more in the future!

The pastry crust was delicious and the filling so soft. Topped with flaked almonds & lemon icing drizzle. Yum! It turned out just like the picture too - how often does that happen! I made this for Sam's parents for mother's day but it was consumed too quickly for me to take a photo of it sliced.

From 'The Great British Book of Baking'.

Ingredients:
For the sweet shortcrust pastry: 175g plain flour, pinch of salt, 2 tablespoons of caster sugar, 115g unsalted butter, 1 medium egg yoke, 3 tablespoons raspberry jam. For the topping: 60g unsalted butter (soft), 60g caster sugar, 1 medium egg, 30g self raising flour, 1/4 teaspoon baking powder, 50g ground almonds & few drops of almond essence. For the icing: 100g icing sugar, 1 teaspoon of lemon juice or flavouring, 1 tablespoon of cold water. Flaked almonds to decorated.

- To make the pastry by hand, sift the flour, salt & sugar into a mixing bowl. Add the diced butter and rub with your fingers until it resembles fine bread crumbs.
- Use a spoon to mix in the egg yolk and make into a firm dough. If the mix is too dry & crumbly stir in a little water a teaspoon at a time.
- Wrap the dough in clingfilm and leave in the fridge to chill for 20 minutes.

I used a 22cm loose-based flan tin.

- Roll out dough on a floured surface into a circle and then line the flan tin, cutting off any excess.
- Prick the base with a fork and then spread the base with the raspberry jam.
- While you make the topping heat the oven to 180c/350f/gas mark 4.
Put a baking try in the oven to heat up - you will put your tart on top of this so it cooks the pastry underneath evenly.

- For the topping, put sugar, butter, egg, sieved flour, baking powder, ground almonds and almond essence into a mixing bowl. Beat well until thoroughly combined.
- Spoon on top of the jam and spread evenly.

- Bake in heated oven for 30 minutes until pastry is light golden brown and the filling is firm to touch. Remove from oven & leave to cool.

- Mix icing sugar with lemon juice & water to make a smooth runny icing. Pipe or spoon icing over the tart in a random/zigzag pattern and then scatter with flaked almonds.

- Served gently warmed or at room temperature with single cream.

Yummy Scrummy Chocolate Brownies

Believe it or not this was the first time I've made brownies! I know, right!? It surprised me too actually, I've eaten brownies a hundred times but never actually made them. I found this recipe on the bbc good food website. They are seriously GORGEOUS, gooey and chocolatey. Serve warm with vanilla bean ice cream & squirty cream!

Ingredients:
185g unsalted butter, 185g dark chocolate, 85g plain flour, 40g cocoa powder, 100g milk chocolate, 3 large eggs, 275g golden caster sugar

- Put the butter & chocolate into a bowl and melt in the microwave for 1-2 minutes. Let it cool a little.

- Turn the oven on to fan 160C/conventional 180C/gas 4. Using a shallow 20cm square tin, cut out a square of non-stick baking parchment to line the base.

- Chop up the 100g milk chocolate into good sized chunks. 

- Break 3 large eggs into a large bowl and tip in the golden caster sugar. With an electric mixer on maximum speed, whisk the eggs and sugar until they look thick and creamy. The mixture should look pale and double in volume by the time you've whisked enough. 

- Pour the cooled melted chocolate over the egg mixture, then gently fold together with a rubber spatula being careful not to knock all the air out.

- Sieve the flour & cocoa powder into the bowl with all the liquid and mix in the chocolate chunks.

- Poor the mixture into the prepared tin and put into the oven for 25 minutes. Leave to cool until it's ready to cut into squares.
They can keep in an airtight container for up to two weeks or in the freezer for a month. You'll have to make a big batch to freeze because you'll want these to be ready at any time for a quick cheeky chocolate pudding!

Enjoy!

Day 6, 7, 8, 9 & 10

Ooops, got a little behind.
The beginning of the month always looks empty and then all the dates come flooding in at once. We have a few different calenders. I prefer paper; to be able to see everything written down in front of me, it's easier to plan and see all at once. So, yes, I have a filofax that I carry with me everywhere. I've had it for a few years now and I'm still very fond of it. We also have a calender that we hang in the house that we can both see everyday, that always looks messy. A clean calender with blank spaces at the beginning of the month and then full of black splodges, crossing out & overlapping. When we first got married and had our wall calender I didn't let Sam write on it (because he's not very neat), now I can't even make it neat the amount of things that get written on it! He's allowed to write on it now. Hah.
THEN Sam has now set up both our iPhones so our calenders are synced. With busy lives now and being in separate places more often it's just easier to see what each other are doing without needing to ring/text to find out. I'm getting used to the electronic version but I'm still not a fan. Sam functions much better seeing it all on his phone. Anyway, my point being I have not blogged as our evenings are so full and then it's bedtime!

Day 6 was me. It was a milk and cookie date night. I did a cookie night with a few friends on the fifth where eight of us got together. We had to make a batch of cookies for each person so eight batches altogether including one for yourself. We went to one person's home, drank mulled wine and nibbles then sat around and took it in turns to share about how our year has been. It is such a special time. We try to do it every year. It's just a wonderful way to reflect on the year and share everything with the people around us. Then we share cookies to take home!
So we were going to have a cookie night and cuddle with a hot milky drink but then we had a ton of friends over Thursday night and they all got inhaled! But now I have a great excuse to bake something and find a night for that date. (I'll share my recipe below).

Day 7 was Sam. His promise of a date was a breakfast of my choice in bed! He always gets me an orange juice and cup of tea in the morning before I've even woke up. I'm a lucky girl.
Again we both had the same idea because day 8 was a breakfast for him, a heart-shaped breakfast which I've always wanted to do for him at some point.

Day 9 was a tea date at the mac and a wander around to see whats going on whenever we decide to go. We want to try and go to a few more local places and this is one of them. It has beautiful grounds to walk around too. Hoping when the weather gets warmer to remember to picnic there a bit more often.

Finally, day 10. This was an 'orange & clove' date. To make our christmas pomanders to sit on the radiators to fill our home with christmassy scrumminess! I made them last year on one of my days off and Sam said he wants to do them together this year.

Wow! I think one of my longest blog posts. Thanks for lasting till the end! Here is the recipe for my 'cookies' although I cheated and made christmas flapjacks instead!

Preparation: 20 minutes. Cooking time: 30 minutes. Serves 24

100g (4oz) butter, 75g (30z) golden syrup, 75g (3oz) soft brown sugar, 225g (8oz) rolled oats, few handfuls of pecan nuts and a few of dried cranberries, 2 big bars of dark chocolate and edible gold dust to finish.

Put butter, syrup and sugar into a saucepan and melt over a low heat.
Stir in oats, pecans & cranberries and mix well.
Spread into a greased square tin.
Bake at 180 oC (350 oF), gas mark 4 for 30 minutes.
When out of the oven melt dark chocolate, pour and spread all over the top.
Leave to cool & set then dust with edible gold dust which you can get from most supermarkets.

ENJOY! They were the best I've ever made.

x