Entries tagged with chocolate on I'm glad it burnt

Sweet and spicy cupcakes

Sat, 27 Jun 2009 14:14:25 +0100

Last Thursday, as usual, I got the urge to bake when I didn’t really have enough time! I had a look in the ever well-stocked cupboard and decided I fancied something sweet and spicy. I adapted this recipe from a basic one found on cupcakeblog.com - if you have a sweet tooth, definitely check that blog out! Anyway, I ended up cooking a large batch of mocha cupcakes and the family meal at the same time, and of course then I didn’t manage to get to my tap class on time…

This recipe uses one of my favourite storecupboard ingredients: instant espresso. As a coffee lover, I always found coffee cakes and desserts very unsatisfying until I happened upon this wonderful product, which I believe is available in most supermarkets. I made the cupcakes with soy milk and vegan margarine so they were lactose-free, however, they would be equally delicious with cows' milk and butter.

The frosting on the cupcakes really makes them special, so make sure you put plenty on!

For the cupcakes:

3/4 cup margarine
2 cups dark brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1/4 cup instant espresso
1+1/2 cups soya milk
1 tablespoon vanilla essence (get natural extract if you can)

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F)
Beat margarine and sugar together (in a medium sized mixing bowl) until light and fluffy.
Add eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition.
Stir in the soya milk, followed by the vanilla essence.
Sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt, cocoa powder, and instant espresso into a large bowl and stir to combine.
Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients a little at a time, beating after each addition. Stir the mixture until the ingredients are thoroughly combined.
Divide the mixture between paper cupcake cases and bake for 15 minutes or until the tops of the cupcakes spring back when gently pressed.
Leave the cupcakes to cool on wire racks before frosting them.

For the frosting:

½ cup margarine
2 cups icing sugar
3tbsp cinnamon
3tbsp allspice
1tbsp ground ginger

Beat the margarine to soften it. Sift the icing sugar onto the margarine and beat until soft and creamy.
Add the spices and stir them in thoroughly.
Use a piping bag with a large nozzle to pipe swirls on top of each cupcake.

If you don’t have a piping bag, feel free to just slap icing on top of the cupcakes in any manner you choose, I’m sure they’ll taste just as good! Now, sit down with a cup of coffee and enjoy…

How to make chocolate go further

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 23:00:14 +0100

I bought some bargain, better-than-half-price cherries from the Co-op, but disapointed they weren't as tasty as glace cherries I decided to add them to a chocolatey concoction.

After a quick trip back to the Co-op I had myself 150g of fruit and nut chocolate, 150g of dark chocolate and some condensed milk, with the intention of mixing them all together...

This is a little trick I learnt from one of those student cookbooks whilst at uni - to help make chocolate go that little bit further, but frankly it's cheaper and less effort to just buy more chocolate!

Break the chocolate up into pieces and place in a Pyrex bowl
Make a bain marie with the bowl and a pan of water
Add the condensed milk and a big dollop of unsalted butter if you have any
Melt. Stirring as you go...
Add the cherries - or honeycomb toffee or whatever else you fancy!
Pour into a shallow container, then when it's cool put it in the fridge.
If you are lacking in the area of shallow containers like me, instead use a glass lid from an oven dish as a substitute (see pic).

Mocha Tart, a good start to a new blog

Fri, 22 May 2009 18:47:19 +0100

Hi, welcome to our fabulous new food blog. So that we get off to a good start, we thought we'd write about this delicious dessert!

We've modified this mocha tart recipe to use a strange but tasty & seemingly limited edition Chocolate Cappuccino Cereal that we found in B&M Bargains. You don't have to use this, but if you can get your hands on it - we thoroughly recommend you do! If not for this recipe, then for the fact that it contains chocolate made to look like coffee beans.

Here's what you'll need...

300g of double choc chip cookies
alternatively, use the aforementioned Kellogs Chocolate Cappuccino Cereal
100g butter
300ml whipping cream
Instant espresso powder
300g dark chocolate

Measure out the cereal, and shake from side to side to bring the larger particles to the surface, then extract as many 'coffee beans' as you'd like - used to later decorate the top.

Crush whatever you are using as the base by any means nessecary.

To save washing up, just whack the butter straight in with this and pop it in the microwave to melt the butter. Stir these two ingredients together and press into a loose bottomed cake tin. Pop it in the fridge.

Make yourself a brew, catch up on your favourite blogs and eat 100g of the chocolate.

Melt the remaining 200g of chocolate. Add 2 tablespoons of espresso powder to two tablespoons of boiling water, leave to cool (We put this in the freezer to speed things up).

Whip the cream until light and frothy, then stir in the melted chocolate and espresso. Whip again until stiff. Retrieve the base from the fridge and spoon your mixture onto it. Now all you have to do is put it back in the fridge until its set - this doesn't take long, about an hour at the most.

Decorate however you wish, perhaps with chocolate curls. We used the coffee beans procured from the cereal: