Chocolate Snaps

This is my take on a Jamie Oliver recipe.

Ingredients

300g Milk Chocolate

2 Crunchies

Bash the Crunchie into crumbs and sprinkle evenly over grease proof paper melt your chocolate then drizzle over the Crunchie in all sorts of shapes and let cool. Once set break up into fragments and sprinkle with edible glitter if you like :-)

For a minty take

Ingredients

300g Dark Chocolate

4tbsp Demerara Sugar

2tbsp Mint Flavouring

1-2tsp Green Colouring

Mix the sugar, colouring and mint flavour, sprinkle over your greaseproof paper and leave for 30 mins so the sugar dries out again. Melt your chocolate and then drizzle as before over the sugar and then let set. Again break it up into fragments to serve.

Cocktail Time!

Ingredients

150ml Cointreau

150ml Vodka

150ml Chambord

1 Punnet Strawberries or Raspberries

Cranberry Juice

Basil (to top)

Mash your strawberries or put them in a food processor blend and then sieve them to get all the juice add all your alcohol and then top the jug with cranberry juice. When your serve place a basil leaf on top and add a couple ice cubes.

For an individual glass reduce the amounts of alcohol but keep the measures even and use about two tablespoons of the strawberry or raspberries and top again with cranberry juice.

Florentines

Makes 18-24

Ingredients

50g Butter

50g Golden Caster Sugar

2tsp Runny Honey

50g Plain Flour

50g Candied Peel

50g Dried Cranberries

30g Light Toasted Almond Flakes

100g Chocolate (of your preference)

Firstly turn your oven to 160oC. In a saucepan melt butter, sugar and honey then set aside to cool a little. Mix the rest of the ingredients (apart from the chocolate) add the butter mixture and mix. Put teaspoons of the mixture on a flat tray and flatten slightly with the back of your spoon. Bake for 7-8mins until light gold in colour.

Let the Florentines cool then melt the chocolate and drizzle over the top or spread chocolate over the backs and let cool. Enjoy :-)

Mulled Cider

Ingredients

2Litres Dry Cider

4 Cinnamon Sticks

2 Whole Nutmegs

2 Apples

Cloves

Zest of 1/2 Orange

This recipe is very simple and very quick. Stud your apples with cloves and put in a pan with the cider, nutmeg, orange zest and cinnamon sticks let simmer for 10 to 30 mins. Serve with a slice of apple and orange and enjoy. Something very simple but lovely, warm and festive :-)

Lazy Light Mince Pies

Makes 24

Ingredients

270g Ready made Filo Pastry

822g Ready made Mincemeat

1 Egg (beaten)

Icing sugar  and edible glitter to dust

This is a really simple lazy and quick mince pie to make and I think they look a little like Santa's sack. Turn your oven to 180oC. Grease a cup cake tin, then cut your pastry into even squares and set aside. Take one square and dab a little egg in the middle then place another square at an angle on top (it should look a bit like a star). Place a heaped teaspoon of mincemeat in the centre then from the top layer of pastry pull up each corner and squidge in at the top of mincemeat leaving a little frill at the top. Lightly cover the bottom layer in egg and do the same (it will make it all stick together). Put a little egg on the frills at the top. Place in the oven for 8-10 mins until the tops go golden. Dust with icing sugar and serve.

Hot Chocolate

Serves 1

Ingredients

50g Dark Chocolate 70% Cocoa at the least

250ml Milk

1tsp Cinnamon

Sugar to taste

Cream and Marshmallows (optional)

Grate your chocolate and add this to a pan of simmering milk leave a little to sprinkle on top. Slowly let it simmer (not boil!) until the chocolate melts and the mixture thickens slightly. As it is dark chocolate you will want to add some sugar to taste. Add half a tsp of Cinnamon to the mix and pour into a mug. Top with cream, marshmallows a sprinkle of remaining Cinnamon and chocolate. Sit back put a Christmas DVD on a relax! :-)

Gingerbread House

This recipe is from the BBC Good Food magazine. I halved the recipe below and managed to make two gingerbread houses, 3 large gingerbread men, and about 15 smaller biscuits. The dough can be frozen and so can the baked biscuits so if there is too much for you just now dig the rest out later!

Ingredients

1Kg Plain Flour (plus extra for dusting)

300g Cold Butter

2 tbsp Mixed Spice

2tbsp Ground Ginger

1tbsp Bicarbonate of Soda

450g Light Soft Brown Sugar

3 Large Eggs

225g Golden Syrup

300g Royal Icing Sugar

Sweets, Edible Glitter of your choice to decorate.

Cut out a template for your house on baking paper. Make sure you get your measurements correct or google gingerbread house template to find one you like.

Pre-heat oven to 180oC. Then put half of the flour in a food processor with the butter and mix until there are no lumps. In another large bowl mix the remaining flour, spices, bicarb and a pinch of salt. Tip the butter and flour mix into this and stir in the sugar. Use your fingers or food processor to make the mixture look like bread crumbs. Whisk eggs and golden syrup together and pour into the flour mixing with a wooden spoon to combine then get your hands in to bring it all together.

Dust your worktop thoroughly then roll the dough out in sections at a time to about 1/2cm. Cut out your house shapes. Don't at this point cut out windows or doors. Bake for 8-10 mins until a lovely golden brown. When you take them out of the oven put your template back onto the shapes and cut any excess off and cut any windows doors you want. Let them cool.

Then decorate the individual pieces. A spare pair of hands is useful at this point to help hold your walls up. I recommend putting some icing on the bottom of your pieces so they will stick to the tray and help stay in place. And there you have it a gingerbread house!

Christmas Biscuits

Ingredients

100g Plain Flour

2tsp of Christmas spice (or make your own mix using ginger, Cinnamon, nutmeg)

1/2tsp Baking Powder

50g Soft Brown Sugar

1tbsp Milk

75g Butter

2tbsp Candied peel (optional)

To Decorate

Icing, Sprinkles, Edible glitter of your choice

Turn your oven to 180oC. Put all of your ingredients in a bowl and mix together using your hands. Once combined into a dough sprinkle your worktop with flour and roll out until about 1/2 a cm thick. (You may need to sprinkle your dough with flour lots to prevent it sticking) Put in the oven for 15-18 mins until golden. Let them cool on a rack.

Once cooled you can decorate however you want simply using a sprinkle of icing sugar, completely covering them in icing, or in my case lots of edible shimmer spray. It is completely up to you, have fun with them.

I used a Delicia cutter set which I found on Amazon

:-)

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Rum and Raisin Homemade Cake Pops

Makes 20

Ingredients

 4oz Caster Sugar

4oz Butter or Margarine

3oz Self Raising Flour

1oz Cocoa Powder

2 Eggs

100g Dark Chocolate

100ml Condensed Milk

2oz Raisins

2-3tbsp Rum

To Decorate

400g Milk Chocolate

100g White Chocolate (optional)

Sprinkles (optional)

This recipe is exactly the same as my other cake pop recipes but again with a few changes.

Some preparation ahead is needed. Put your raisins in a bowl with 2 tbsp of rum mix around cover with cling film and let them sit overnight and soak up the rum.

Turn oven to 180oC. Now bake your cake, cream sugar and butter together until light and fluffy then add one egg at a time. Use an electric whisk it will give you a lovely light airy sponge. Add flour and cocoa and whisk until combined. Put in a baking tray and bake for 25-35 mins depending on your oven and the size of the tin.

Once the cake is baked and cooled put in a food processor to crumb. Melt your dark chocolate and condensed milk together in a bowl over a pan of hot water. Take off the heat and pour in your cake crumbs, raisins and if you want a stronger rum flavour 1 tbsp of rum. Mix together roll into balls and then let these chill in a fridge for 1-2 hours.

Once the mixture has cooled melt your decorating chocolate. Cover in milk chocolate first then let cool. Drizzle a little white chocolate on top of each and add sprinkles. Let cool place them on cake pop sticks and then eat!

Homemade Cake Pops For Grown Ups!

Makes about 20

Ingredients

4oz Caster Sugar

4oz Butter or Margarine

3oz Self Raising Flour

1oz Cocoa Powder

2 Eggs

100g Dark Chocolate

100ml Condensed Milk

4tbsp Cointreau

To Decorate

2 Chocolate Oranges

or 200g White Chocolate with colouring and 2tsp orange essence.

This recipe is exactly the same as my other cake pop recipe but with a few changes.

Turn oven to 180oC. Firstly bake your cake, cream sugar and butter together until light and fluffy then add one egg at a time. Use an electric whisk it will give you a lovely light airy sponge. Add flour and cocoa and whisk until combined. Put in a baking tray and bake for 25-35 mins depending on your oven and the size of the tin.

Once the cake is baked and cooled put in a food processor to crumb. Melt your dark chocolate and condensed milk together in a bowl over a pan of hot water then add the cointreau. Pour in your cake crumbs and mix together put heaped spoonfuls on to a plate then let these chill in a fridge for 1-2 hours.

Once the mixture has cooled roll the spooned out mixture into balls. Melt your decorating chocolate, decorate and add whatever sprinkles you want. Let them set and you are done!

This ones for all the grown ups to enjoy. :-)

Edinburgh German Christmas Market

I'm feeling very festive at the moment (if you hadn't already worked it out from the Christmas re-vamp to the page) So today I went to have a look at the German market on Princes Street and found these sweet treats :-). There are lots of savoury nibbles there too! If your looking for something to do over the festive season and are in the Edinburgh vicinity then I recommend having a look around.

Keep an eye out from the 1st of December there will be lots of festive sweet treats. Some perfect for gifts, some traditional treats and some to keep you warm on these cold Winter nights. 

Cookies and Cream Fudge Brownies

Cookies and cream on the left. Chocolate orange on the right.

The cookies and cream brownies come from a Lorraine Pascale recipe, the chocolate orange is a variation I like.


Ingredients

165g butter, plus extra for greasing

200g dark chocolate, broken up

3 free-range eggs

2 free-range egg yolks

1 vanilla pod, Scrape out the seeds (or 2 tsp vanilla extract)

165g soft light brown sugar

2 tbsp plain flour

1 tbsp cocoa powder

pinch of salt

155g Oreos, broken up (or chocolate orange)

(tsp orange essence for chocolate orange fudge brownies)

icing sugar, for dusting

Pre-heat your oven to 180oC. Melt the butter in a saucepan then remove from heat and add chocolate. (the heat from the butter will melt it). In another bowl whisk the eggs and egg yolks until fluffy. Add the sugar gradually in instalments so that you keep the air in your mixture. Pour the chocolate around the edge of the bowl so that you keep as much air in as possible. Add the flour, cocoa, salt and 2/3 of the biscuits. Mix it all together and then pour it into a baking tray. Scatter the remaining biscuits on top. Bake for 25-30 minutes again depending on your oven. The middle will be slightly gooey once cooked. Allow to cool and then sprinkle some icing sugar on top.

An alternative is to replace the oreos with chocolate orange and add a tsp of orange essence to make a chocolate orange fudge brownie.

Enjoy. 

Coconut Macaroons

Makes about 20

Ingredients

45g Plain Flour

1/2 tsp Salt

225g Desiccated Coconut

170ml Condensed Milk

1tsp Vanilla Essence

Pre-heat your oven to 180oC. Mix flour, coconut and salt in a bowl. Pour in the condensed milk and vanilla and stir. It will make a thick sticky mixture. Spoon heaped tablespoons on a baking tray and bake for 15-20 mins until golden. Baking time will depend on your oven.

Place them on a rack to cool. I like to sprinkle them with a little Icing Sugar to serve but that's optional.

Meringues

Makes 24

Ingredients

4 Egg Whites

1/8tsp Salt

285g Caster Sugar

1/2 tsp Vanilla Essence

Pre-heat your oven to 110oC and line a baking tray with grease proof paper. With an electric whisk beat the egg whites and salt. When they start to form soft peaks add half of the sugar keep whisking and add the vanilla and remaining sugar. After a while the mixture will hold stiff peaks. Pipe the meringue onto the baking tray and bake for 2 hours. Leave sitting in the oven to cool.

Serving suggestion

Ingredients

Strawberries

Greek Yogurt

Honey

Icing Sugar

Break up a meringue and place in the bottom of a glass. Mash some strawberries up and add a table spoon of icing sugar to them and top the meringue with this. Mix a spoonful of honey into the Greek yogurt and pour this over the strawberries. Top with some halved strawberries and a meringue.

Beetroot Chocolate Fudge Cake

This recipe comes from Cook Yourself Thin.

Ingredients

250g Dark Chocolate

3 Eggs

250g Light Muscovado Sugar

1 Vanilla Pod. (cut in half length ways and seeds scraped out)

2 tbsp Maple Syrup

2 tbsp Honey

40g Self-raising Flour

40g Plain Flour

1/4 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda

1/4 tsp Salt

25g Cocoa Powder

50g Ground Almonds

250g Raw Beetroot (peeled and grated)

100ml Strong Black Coffee

30ml Sunflower Oil

To decorate

150g  Dark Chocolate. (I use 2/3 milk 1/3 dark)

3 tbsp Strong Black Coffee

1tsp Vanilla Essence

3 tbsp Honey

Preheat your oven to 150oC. Melt your chocolate in a bowl over a pan of hot water and set aside to cool a little. In a large bowl beat the eggs, sugar, vanilla, mayple syrup and honey together for about three minutes. Gently fold in the flours, bicarbonate of soda, salt, cocoa and ground almonds. Mix until all combined.

Dab the beetroot with kitchen roll to remove excess liquid. Mix the beetroot, cooled chocolate, coffee and oil into the mixture. Put the mixture in a tin and place on the middle shelf of your oven for 1 hour 30 mins. After this put tin foil over your cake and bake for another 30 mins. Your can check your cake is ready by inserting a skewer. (This being a moist recipe might not come out completely clean so use your own judgement on wether you think it's too runny.) Leave the cake to cool.

For the icing melt the chocolate and mix in the coffee and vanilla. This will make your chocolate seize up a bit but then add your honey and it will relax agian. Allow to cool slightly (5mins) then spread over your cake. Add any decoration you want.

I'll let you decide if you think it's a healthier option ;-)

Homemade Cake Pops

Makes 15

Ingredients

4oz Caster Sugar

4oz Butter or Margarine

3oz Self Raising Flour

1oz Cocoa Powder

2 Eggs

100g Good Chocolate

100ml Condensed Milk

To decorate

200g Chocolate (of your choice)

Any decoration you want

Pre-heat your oven to 180oC. To make your cake whisk sugar and butter together, whisk in the eggs and then sift in your cocoa and flour. Once all mixed put in a cake tin and bake for 25-30 minutes depending on your oven. Insert a skewer once cooked and if it comes out clean it is cooked.

Once your cake has cooled place it in a food processor to make crumbs. In a bowl break up your chocolate and pour in your condensed milk.  Put this bowl over a pan of hot water and melt. Once melted pour in your cake crumbs. With a wooden spoon mix together until it combines. Roll into balls about ping pong ball size and then put them in the fridge for about an hour to firm up.

Once your cake balls have cooled insert cake pop stick and melt more chocolate to decorate. How you decorate is up to you. Have fun with them and sprinkle them with whatever you want.

Chocolate dipped melt in the mouths...

Makes 10-14

Ingredients

70g Butter

30g Caster Sugar

100g Self Raising Flour

25g Custard Powder

2tsp Vanilla Essence

1 Egg

100g Good Chocolate

Firstly turn your oven to 180oC. Whisk together the butter, sugar, egg and vanilla essence. When they are combined sift in the flour and custard powder and mix with a wooden spoon. Roll into small balls and place on baking tray, flatten them slightly. They will take 15-18 minutes depending on your oven and will be a lovely golden colour when cooked.

Once they are cooked let them cool. Now melt your chocolate in a bowl over a pan of hot water and simply dip half in the chocolate...

Now all you need to do is eat!

Oaty cookies

makes 9-12

Ingredients

100g Self Raising Flour

100g Porridge Oats

1/2 tsp Baking Powder

100g Butter

100g Caster Sugar

1tbsp Honey

100g Chocolate Chips

Firstly pre-heat your oven to 180oC. Melt the butter, caster sugar, honey and half of the chocolate chips in a pan. Whilst they are melting mix the flour, porridge oats and baking powder. Once the mixture in the pan is all melted pour over the flour mixture and combine, using a wooden spoon is best. Spoon table spoons of the mixture onto a flat baking tray leaving lots of space these will grow LOTS! you may want to use two oven trays.

You now have two options either sprinkle the rest of the chocolate chips on the cookies or leave them until the cookies are out of the oven and melt and drizzle like I have above.

The cookies will take 13-15 mins in the oven. They will go a lovely golden colour and may seem soft but will crisp up when cooled .

enjoy!

There not Terry's there my chocolate orange cupcakes

Makes 12

Ingredients for the sponge

4oz Caster Sugar

4oz Butter or Margarine

3.5oz Self Raising Flour

0.5 oz Cocoa Powder

2 eggs

Ingredients for the icing

2oz Butter

6oz Icing sugar

Orange food colouring

Orange flavouring

Chocolate orange to decorate

Firstly turn your oven onto 180oC, Whilst your oven is heating cream the butter and sugar together. I prefer to use an electric whisk I find it speeds up the process and makes a lighter mixture. Once the sugar and butter are creamed together beat in the eggs one at a time. The flour and cocoa powder can now be sieved and mixed in. The mixture will now be ready to spoon into individual cases. These will take 18-22 minutes depending on your oven so keep an eye on them and when they are spongy to touch they will be ready or insert a metal skewer into the centre it should come out clean.

Once your cakes are cooked and cooled you can begin the icing. Whisk the butter and icing sugar together. Then add orange colouring usually a drop will do but you can make the colour however strong you want the same goes for the orange essence add as much or as little as you want. Pipe the icing onto the cool cakes and then top with a slice of chocolate orange....

 et voila! delicious chocolate orange cupcakes.