Sweet As Pi

I am back from my holiday to Poland (more on that to follow) and am enjoying the weekend with these cookies and watching movies before Jon starts his grad job on Monday!

I brought some fresh home grown mint back from Poland, thanks to Natalie’s mum, and decided to use it to make these cookies. Mint choc chip is one of my favourite flavours, and is usually my first choice when choosing ice-cream.

I followed my go-to Chewy ‘Millie’s Cookie Style’ Cookies recipe, but replaced the 225g flourwith 185g self-raising flour and 40g cocoa powder. I added the chopped mint, which was around 2.5 tbsp, at the end along with 200g dark chocolate chips.

The dough made 14 regular cookies and I used the left overs (which would make 6 regular cookies) to make a giant cookie which I baked in a cake tin. I flattened it down in the pan with my knuckles to speed up the cooking time.

Then cook for around 8mins, adding a couple more minutes for the larger one, and they’re done. They are super chewy and so tasty. I love the fresh taste of the mint with the dark chocolate, half of them have already been eaten..

S. xo

On the weekend I fancied something sweet and spotted a baked doughnut recipe from Krissy’s Creations on Pinterest. Since I already had all the ingredients I went ahead and baked them. I’ve never made any type of doughnut before, but these were pretty easy to make and a lot healthier than fried ones. The doughnut holes remind me of mini iced buns!

I don’t think they’re that much like fried doughnuts in taste and texture, but they’re tasty regardless! And I think they look pretty cute too :)

S. xo

p.s. I used a 2 inch and 3.5 inch round cutter to make the doughnut shapes and kept to the recipe.

I thank Jon for these cookies. We went to Lidl yesterday to grab some pizza, and whenever we’re in Lidl a pack of toffee waffles (also called caramel wafers) always seem to end up in our shopping. They are so good and the added cinnamon flavour in these ones make them even better.

So I’ve been wanting to make chocolate and toffee cookies for a while now, and Jon suggested using the toffee waffles. Today I made them, and oh are they good! They are sooo chewy and I love how the caramel oozes out from the waffles, and with the dairy milk, well they’re certainly full of sugar! I halved my Chewy ‘Millie’s Cookie Style’ Cookies recipe to make the cookie dough, and used 2 broken up waffles and around 15 blocks of dairy milk (I cut each block in half), and managed to make 12 cookies.

They are seriously good warm when they’re still a bit gooey… Enjoy!

S. xo

Last week whilst at university, there was a lady outside the student shop with a table filled with plates of cookies, flapjacks and muffins. She was giving them away for free to promote some new products they were launching in the shop. So I picked up a muffin, I had no idea what it was but it looked good. It turned out to be a lemon and poppy seed muffin and it was delicious! So I wanted to recreate that flavour, but instead of muffins I chose to make cupcakes with lemon buttercream icing.

I followed the BBC GoodFood’s lemon and poppyseed cupcakes recipe to make 12 cupcakes, although I halved the icing quantity (so glad I did!) but still used the juice of one lemon. I also didn’t bother toasting the poppy seeds, I’m not really sure what difference that would make? The end result is yummy nevertheless! I love the texture with the poppy seeds and the zing of lemon is so good.

I think they would still be tasty without the icing if you’re looking for something with less sugar (and butter!) or maybe instead of buttercream making a lemon drizzle topping instead.

S. xo

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I’ve never baked a treacle tart before. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever baked any kind of tart. I received a loose base fluted tin for Christmas that I’d been wishing for, and so I’ve been eager to make any kind of tart, flan, or quiche since.

Which brings me to this week and my first attempt – Treacle Tart from Lorraine Pascal’s Baking Made Easy. Treacle Tart is something me and Jon both really enjoy, it’s old-fashioned and super easy to make. It’s great straight from the oven with vanilla ice-cream, and I love how the top came out a little bit chewy.

• 500 g sweet shortcrust pastry (I made mine from scratch or you can use shop-bought)
• 450 g golden syrup
• Zest and juice of 1 lemon
• 60 g butter
• 1 tsp ground ginger
• 250 g breadcrumbs

Enjoy!

S. xo

p.s. Happy St. David’s Day to all you welshies!

On Sunday I baked myself a birthday cake. I was really in the mood to bake something and it was my birthday the next day so I thought why not! It’s oh so chocolatey and delicious, just the way I like :)

I did cheat and buy a box mix (Betty Crocker’s Devil’s Food Cake) because I wanted to give it a go and be a bit lazy. But I did make the frosting from scratch and it’s amazing! I followed the recipe for nutella cloud frosting from Sweetapolita, and it really does have an airy cloud-like texture.

Now let’s see how long this cake will last…

S. xo

Bread 8/15: Big Fat Salt & Pepper Breadsticks from Lorraine Pascale’s Baking Made Easy

Notes: I made 12 breadsticks as stated in the recipe, each 25cm long. I shaped half of them into twists and used chilli salt, black pepper, poppy seeds and sea salt as toppings.

Review: They’re great for dipping, but I found them quite chewy on their own. I also would have preferred them to be thinner, perhaps by dividing the dough into more sticks or making extra long ones. The chilli salt ones were my favourite.

S. xo

Bread 7/15: Cuban Bread from Pepper & Sherry

Notes: So I didn’t manage to bake 15 loaves by 2013 but I’m going to continue on anyway! I halved the recipe to make one loaf and added poppy seeds on top, everything else I kept to the recipe.

Review: One of my favourites so far. It only needs 15mins to rise in a warm place, and then goes straight in the oven (not preheated) with a tray of water underneath, simple. Oh and it tastes delicious too!

Thanks for the comment that shared this lovely recipe, and if you have any more recommendations of breads please leave a comment :)

S. xo