Fat Friday #51 Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies

Happy Friday everyone! I can't get enough of cookies! There have been so many cookie recipes lately. I can't really get enough of them, however I never thought to do a traditional cookie but make it vegan friendly. If you aren't vegan then that's ok, you can use unsalted butter and regular chocolate chips instead of margarine and dairy-free chocolate. 

Also, I have to say these cookies are very...cake-like. So they will be a nightmare to get off the baking sheet. Be patient and just make sure that you wait until the tray goes cold, then remove them.

Recipe: Makes 24 cookies (Adapted from Mom on Time Out)

Ingredients:

• 240g flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tbsp of cornflour
• Pinch of Salt
• 2 ripe bananas
• 120g golden caster sugar
• 50g caster sugar
• 180g dairy free chocolate chips* (or regular chocolate chips)
• 50g margarine (or unsalted butter)

*I couldn't find dairy free chocolate chips so I chopped up a slab of chocolate into chunky bits.

Equipment:

• Bowl x 2
• Wire rack
• Handwhisk/Wooden spoon
• Baking sheets lined with silicone paper x 4 (Or just use two and wait for each sheet to cool down)
• Fridge

1)Place all of the dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside.

2)Cream the margarine, bananas, and sugars together and super light and fluffy.

3)Stir in the dry ingredients into the creamed mixture until just combined.

4) Add the chocolate and pop in the fridge for about 30 minutes or until firm. 

5)Preheat your oven to 375f/GM 5/190C

6) Roll the dough into 1 inch little balls and place on a baking trays.

7) Bake for 10 minutes or until they turn a light brown.

8) Let the cookies cool on they tray for about 15 minutes and then transfer to a wire rack.

9)Eat like a boss. 

Happy Friday Peeps!

Fat Friday #45 Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

I've finally sorted out my recipe book and finally found an old recipe I've never tried before. A cookie recipe that I found jotted down on a sticky note was hidden in the recipe book page. If its worth writing down, then its worth a try, right? It actually worked out really well. The perfect cookie, just chewy in the middle and crispy around the edge. Great to start a weekend, or ruin a diet. 

Recipe: Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
Makes 12-15 cookies (Found in my recipe book, not sure where it came from) 

Ingredients:

• 250g plain flour
• 2g baking powder
• 170g unsalted butter
• 220g brown sugar
• 100g caster sugar
• pinch of salt
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
• 335g chocolate chips (I used a mix of white, dark and milk chips)

Equipment

• Baking sheets lined with baking parchment x 2 
• Sieve
• Bowl x 2
• Microwave
• Wooden Spoon
• Wire Rack 

1. Preheat the oven tp 325f/165c/ Gas Mark 3. Grease and line the cookie sheets. 
2. Sieve the flour, baking powder, and salt into a bowl. Set aside. 
3. In a separate bowl, melt the butter in the microwave until a liquid. 
4. Add both sugars to the melted butter and mix throughly. 
5. Beat in the egg, the egg yolk, vanilla extract until fluffy.
6. Mix into the dry ingredients into the batter until combined. 
7. Stir in the chocolate chips by hand.
8. Flour your hands a little, then roll the batter into 1 inch balls. Space them 3 inches apart on the baking sheet. 
9. Bake for 15-17 minutes in the oven or until the edges are lightly toasted. The middle should be soft but not gooey. 
10. Once you remove the baking sheets from the oven, leave the cookies to cook for a further 10 minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool. 

Happy Baking!

Rules of Baking #1

Its been a while since I've been posting and I wanted to share some rules I go by when I fancy baking!

Double check you have all your ingredients

Before you even weigh out a single gram of flour. Read the recipe all the way to the end and then re-read.

Baked things are temperamental, so if you stay calm the cake/cupcake/baked thingy will turn out just fine. 

If something doesn't work, then don't worry. It can be made again and it should be done with  more determination then before. Don't give up, just try again.

If you're using molds for sugar paste then make sure that they are safe for food. 

No matter how badly you want to check on your cake and open that oven. DONT! Wait the correct amount of time and then open your oven to check your cake/bakey thing. 

Never be discouraged when a recipe looks to complex or sounds really posh. Until you try, you'll never know.

Gluten Free cakes can be tasty so don't be put off with making them!

Have loads of patience.

Come to terms that if you bake, you will put weight on and so will all your friends and family.

Penny's Top Ten Tips: Autumn Activities:Part 2 With Friends

 Hello and welcome to the second part of the Autumn Activities post I did last week, however this week are ten fun things to do with other people while the weather is not at its best.

1. Dinner Party-
Inviting friends for a dinner party is a good way of chilling out while the weather is cold. Mulled wine is optional. 

2. Get Cooking-
Or if cooking is your thing then get your friends to cook a meal together for a dinner party instead. 

3. Book Club- 
Starting a book club with you friends is a good excuse to chill with a good book. Once a month, a group of us discuss a book over Skype and to have a general catch up. 

4. D and D night-
I have a secret to tell you... I love playing Dungeons and Dragons! It's my latest obsession and again its a great excuse to grab your party and go on an adventure, without even leaving your living room. (If your interested I'm a level 4 Gnome Sorcerer called Elphaba.) 
  5.Movie or Series Binge-
Watching a set of movies like the Alien franchise or binging on American Horror Story is a good way to spend time as a group. Just grab some blankets, pillows and plonk on the sofa.

6. Game Night-
Get some snacks ready, and grab that deck of Cards Against Humanity and Articulate set up for a night of laughs.   

7. Spa Evening-
Instead of having a pamper evening on your own, grab a couple of friends and have an old school sleepover style girly evening. 

8. Coffee Morning-
or tea morning if you're not a coffee lover or strapped for time. A quick catch up is nice on its own. 

9. Cake decorating-
Bake a batch of cupcakes, whip up a some various buttercreams or whipped creams, good some food safe colours and grab some edible decorations. Then simply decorate! You can all experiment with colours, different piping skills or go nuts with sprinkles.

10. Chill and Catch up-
This is kind of an obvious one, but invite your friends over, order a take-away and just catch up. This also works if you both don't want to go anywhere, just use a phone. (Pyjamas are optional.) 

Happy Baking!

Fat Friday #40 Chocolate Pumpkin Brownies

Its only 2 more weeks until October and already all I hear and see is pumpkin spice. Pumpkin Spice. Pumpkin. Spice. Spice with Pumpkin. EVERYWHERE! But I'm a fan of pumpkin spice, so I'm so happy with all of its sweet and spiceness in my life. 
This weeks recipe is a spiced pumpkin brownie, it takes a long while to bake as with most brownies but the result is worth it.

Recipe: Makes 30 small brownies (adapted from an old recipe I found in my recipe file.)

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Mix:

• 85g cream cheese
• 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
• 112g caster sugar
• 1 egg
• 220g pumpkin puree
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger 
• 1 tablespoon plain flour

Brownie Mix:

• 187g plain flour
• 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 168g dark chocolate, chopped
• 170g unsalted butter
• 506g caster sugar
• 4 eggs
• 60ml milk

Equipment:

• Brownie tin lined with silicone paper
• Mixing bowl x 3
• Saucepan with hot water and a heatproof bowl on top
• Spatula
• Hand held electric whisk/wooden spoon
• Large spoon
• Wire rack

1. Preheat oven 325f/160c/Gas Mark 3. Grease and line the brownie tin.

Pumpkin Cream Cheese:

2. In a mixing bowl beat the cream cheese and 1 tablespoon of butter until well combined. 

3. Add the sugar and beat again until fully incorporated. 

4. Beat in the egg, pumpkin puree and spices.   

5.Stir in the tablespoon of plain floor and set aside this cream cheese mixture for later.

Brownie Mix:
6. To melt the chocolate, place in a heatproof bowl above a saucepan of boiling water and stir it occasionally.  
7. While you wait for the chocolate to melt, in another bowl add all the dry ingredients and set aside.
8. In the final bowl, add the sugar and eggs to whisk together until it becomes pale. 
9. Once the chocolate has melted, add to the egg mixture. Beat in the milk.
10. Beat the dry ingredients to the chocolate mixture. The brownie mixture is complete.

To Finish: 
11. Spread the brownie mixture into the tin. Spoon the pumpkin cream cheese on top of the chocolate mixture and swirl through.
12. Bake for an 1 hour and 10 minutes or until the middle is just set when shaken. Its best to check it after an hour depending on your oven. 

13. Cool the whole tin on a wire rack until cool. Cut, and serve up the spiced pumpkin goodness. 

Love pumpkin so much? Check out this pumpkin list! 

Pumpkin Bakes

Need that hit of pumpkin now that autumn has hit? Check out our list right here!

1.Pumpkin Spice Syrup- Because we need this in every hot drink for the rest of autumn!

2.Horror Film Gory Cupcakes-These cupcakes are both adorable and horrific at the same time.

3.Pumpkin Pecan Bars-These always go down well at parties and are so moist. 

4. Pumpkin and Cheese Muffins- We needed a savoury one right?

Great for a snack or a super light lunch. 

Garlic Farm Goodies from The Garlic Festival 2015

Every year I go over to the Isle of Wight, about August time, to pop over to the Garlic Festival. This year I popped by and was very fortunate to see the lovely Rachel Khoo, the chef behind 'The Little Paris Kitchen' and got her autograph (!) and picture taken (!!). I was so shy, so there was no time to fangirl over her. 

Apart from seeing Rachel Khoo, I go to the festival for food and cider. I also get some beautiful liquorice from the St Valentine Liquorice Company every year, without fail. This year I got the mixed big of liquorice (I ate them all before I could take a picture). Watermelon is my absolute favourite liquorice.

But I did grab a couple of bits from the Garlic Farm Shop Tent. 
Firstly, I bought the Garlic Farm Cook Book which I intend to use frequently as I adore anything with garlic in it. It features a variety of recipes that are seasonally sectioned as well as lots of information on garlic. 

As seen on the above picture, I got lots of saucy bits. The Toasted Garlic Mayonnaise has been completely consumed. It was just perfect with everything that required dipping and especially great in sandwiches. 
The Soy Sauce with Black Garlic is sweeter on the palette then regular soy sauce. Ideal for cooking Asian dishes and I personally use it for Thai Red Curry, stir frys and as a light salad dressing. 
The Chilli and Garlic dressing is my new favourite. The dressing has a decent chilli heat with a hit of garlic. Its super versatile, I use it as a dressing for pasta, salad and even on cooked white fish. Also, I really like the bottled packaging too. 
The Oak-Smoked Garlic Butter is excellent used in frying and for making garlic bread. The BBQ sauce is a little different then normal BBQ sauce, it tastes better and more rustic.  

I'm sure that I'll be posting recipes featuring these products very soon. 

Happy Baking! (This was not a sponsored post.) 

So, I won an award!

Good Morning everyone! I know its not a Fat Friday post again this week but I have some amazing news. 

Firstly, lets get the bad news out of the way. The reason I haven't been posting very much lately, especially on Fat Fridays is that, I've been very very sick lately and haven't had the energy to bake at home. At college I have been working hard on my centrepiece, which is consuming much of my time at college, so baking time is hard to squeeze in. Also, I've been financially struggling, in terms of buying ingredients to use for JUST for Fat Fridays, rather then just baking for a special occasion. 

Moving onto good news, I've finally moved onto moving video. I've started up two Youtube channels, one of which is my personal Youtube channel for this blog and the other is for my cake business called The Pastry Girls. I'll try to upload whenever I can, much like the blog at the moment. I'm still getting used to the video editing software, so the videos aren't the best but I'm working on them to improve my skills. 

Lastly, I'm very happy to announce that myself and one of my business partners were both nominated for student achievement awards for the Institute of Hospitality (Southern Branch). I'm proud to say that I got second place in 'Hospitality services' and Chloe (business partner) won in her category of 'Food service'! (You can check out my award video submission and Chloes submission video) 

Congrats Chloe, you deserved it and all your hard work was well deserved! It was a great evening (even though I was coughing and sneezing all over the place.)

That's all the news so far and I'll keep you all posted!

Have a great weekend!

Fat Friday #38 Funfetti Cake

I wasn't really sure what a funfetti cake was, until google helped out. Its a cute confetti style cake, its super colourful and bright and makes an excellent cake. Rob asked me to whip one up for his architect studio for the end of term meeting. My suggestion is to use the large confetti dots as they won't bleed into the cake batter. Decorate with lots more confetti dots for the full rainbow effect.

Cake Ingredients (Recipe adapted from Saved by Cake by Marian Keyes) :

• 8 eggs
• 400g sugar
• 400g unsalted butter
• 3 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 600g self raising flour
• 50g Confetti Sprinkles
• A small amount of jam (we used blackberry jam to cut across the sweetness of the buttercream)

Equipment:

• 8cm Cake tins x 3
• Wire rack
• Bowl
• Wooden spoon/ Handheld whisk
• Sieve
• Turntable
• Serrated knife
• Cake board
• Cranked pallet knife

Buttercream:

• Buttercream recipe and method here
• 30g Confetti sprinkles to decorate

1.Butter and line three 8cm tins. Pre-heat the oven to 190c/375f/Gas Mark 5.
2.Cream the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Add the eggs, one by one, beating between each addition. The mix may curdle a little but add a tablespoon of flour if this happens.
3.Stir in the vanilla extract and sieve in the flour and fold through. Add the confetti and fold again.
4.Divide the mix between the 3 tins and bake for 20 minutes or until golden and well risen.

5. Place the cakes on a wire rack to cool for 5 minutes before removing from the tin to cool completely.

6. In theory, you should have some amazing crazy colour bits in your cake!

To assemble:

1. Level all the cakes off with a knife and mentally work out which cake you would like to assemble.

2. Place a little buttercream on a cake board and place the bottom tier of the cake on top of the buttercream to hold in place.

3. Spread a little jam on the top of the bottom tier and follow with the buttercream.

4. Place the next cake layer on top and repeat the last step.

5. Place the last layer on top and make sure its stacked straight.

6. Crumb coat the whole cake with the vanilla buttercream and place in the fridge for 15 minutes.

7. Using the turntable, coat the whole cake in a layer of buttercream. Then carefully sprinkle the confetti halfway up the cake or decorate like a crazy rainbow!

Have an excellent weekend!!!

 

Happy Easter 2015

Happy Easter! Lent is over, so you can go back to eating chocolate, drinking or generally whatever you promised not to do for all of Lent. But now its over, so in order to celebrate "the day of guilt free Chocolate day" try these Easter recipes to get you in the mood. Or just eat a Lindt Rabbit, your choice.

Hot Cross Buns Cupcakes

Easter Lemon and Ginger Cupcakes

Simnel Cake

Steamed Lemon Pudding

Farewell Blondies
 
Have a wonderful Easter

Fat Friday #36 Danish Pastry

So last week I had a synoptic test in which I had to prepare Florentines, Croissants, Sacher tort, Baked Alaska and classic Danish. I did very well I not only passed but I also got a... so happiness all round! It was my last pastry test but I have one more assignment left which is a centrepiece display but more on that soon. Lets get back to my favourite day of the week, its Fat Friday. This week is Danish pastry, its very similar to last weeks croissant dough, but more buttery. Again the suggestion is to weigh everything in pounds and ounces because its foolproof to make, if you weigh it this way.

 

Recipe makes about 12 small Danish (Kindly provided by my pastry tutor):

• 1 lb Strong Flour / (680.39g)
• 1oz butter/(113.40g)
• 10oz butter
• 1oz milk powder/(28.35g)
• 1 egg
• 1 oz sugar/(680.39g)- Extra sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 1 oz yeast/(680.39g)
• 1 batch of Crème patisserie
• Ground cinnamon
• Raisins that have been soaked in boiling water (so that they are plump, best to do this about 2 hours before)

Equipment:

• Sieve
• Saucepan
• Bowl x 2
• Clingfilm
• Rolling Pin
• Knife
• Pastry brush
• Baking sheet lined with silicone paper
• Palette knife

Method:
1.Sieve the flour, salt and milk powder.
2.Add 1 oz butter and rub into the dry mixture.
3.Warm the milk in a saucepan until body temperature. Add the yeast and sugar. Add the egg to form the dough.
4.Place in a clean bowl, cover with cling film and rest in the fridge for 10 minutes.
5.Roll out the dough vertically and place the larger amount of butter in the middle. Fold the dough into thirds to cover the butter. Roll out and perform 2 single turn. Place in the fridge for 20 minutes.
6.Repeat 2 more single turns.
7.Roll out the dough to about 2 ½ mm thick. Spread the crème pastisserie with a palette knife, then sprinkle the raisins and cinnamon sugar but leave about an inch.
8.Start rolling the dough up, egg wash the inch and seal firmly.
9.Place in the freezer for about 30 minutes, to make it easier to cut.
10.Cut into 1 inch circles and place into a tray and leave to prove until doubled in size.
11. Bake in the oven to 200c/400f/Gas Mark 6 until golden brown.
Have an excellent weekend

Fat Friday #34 Hot Cross Cupcakes

Its not long until Easter creeps up on us and there's a number of treats that you bake at this time at year. In this case, hot cross buns are a well known Easter time treat. This recipe was designed to put all the flavour of a hot cross bun into a cute cupcake. Its a fairly easy recipe to master as well!   

Cupcakes Makes 12 Cupcakes (Recipe Adapted from The Cake Book by Jemma Wilson):

• 12g currants
• 50ml orange juice
• 125g self raising flour
• 100g caster sugar
• 25g soft dark brown sugar 
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon mixed spice
• 20g mixed peel
• 135g unsalted butter
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 tablespoons whole milk 
• 1/4 teaspoon golden syrup
• Chocolate Buttercream recipe here or Vanilla Butter Cream recipe here

Equipment:

• Muffin tin lined with muffin cases
• Piping bag
• Bowl x 2
• Jug
• Sieve
• Wire Rack
• Whisk
• Pastry brush
• Scissors

Method: 

1.Preheat oven to 170c/375f/gas mark 5.

2.Soak the currants in the orange juice for 30 minutes, then drain.

3.Put the dry ingredients into a bowl and stir to combine. Add the currants when drained.

4.Cream the butter and sugars together. Then add the eggs and beat to combine.

5.Add the milk and golden syrup to the sugar mixture, then whisk for 20 seconds, or until well combined. Then add the dry ingredients and mix again until incorporated.

6.Fill the papercases about 2/3 full with the cupcake batter mixture. 

7.Bake for 20 minutes. Leave to cool on a wire rack.

8. Meanwhile, warm the marmalade up in a saucepan and brush the tops of the cupcakes with a pastry brush.

9.Once cooled completely, decorate with a cross of vanilla (or chocolate) buttercream, using a piping bag.

 

Have a great weekend!