Smooth, creamy custard swirled with crunchy nuggets of brown bread
Fact: Britains throw away over four million tons of edible food every year.
Do you know what’s number one on the list of wasted products? Bread. Approximately one third of this beautiful crunchy-crusted, tender-crumbed, breakfast, brunch, lunch and dinner staple purchased is binned by households on an annual basis, at a cost to the country of over a billion pounds.
Spiced biscuit spread soufflé studded with milk chocolate chunks
Did you know each 15 gram portion of Nutella contains two whole hazelnuts, some skimmed milk and cocoa?
Two whole hazelnuts? I’m not sure which marketing mogul thought up the line above for Nutella’s latest TV campaign, but to me two hazelnuts doesn’t sound like the biggest step towards a healthy, wholesome breakfast.
When I was little we were only allowed Nutella on very special occasions. To be more specific, we were only ever allowed it on holiday in Italy, which my Mum somehow managed to convince my brother and I was the only place you could buy the stuff. And while my littler loaf self looking forward to the future would chastise me for being such a boring old grown up, I’m glad my Mum limited our intake: for all the Ferrero company might dress it up with nutritional advice and fancy ad campaigns, Nutella on toast is essentially eating chocolate for breakfast. And sugar. Lots of sugar. Continue reading
Cupcakes rich with dates & walnuts with a sticky caramel core
When was the last time you saw something on your plate and said it looked ‘too good to eat’?
Usually intended as the highest form of praise, this kind of comment makes me ever so slightly uneasy. As a bit of a baking perfectionist, I like my food to look beautiful, but it should also be inviting – I want people to see a dish and immediately lick their lips, grab their spoon and dive right in. That’s not to say I don’t have a lot of time for food that looks like an incredible work of art, but it really has to deliver on taste too. Continue reading
Rich, dark & full of chocolaty mint flavour – perfect served with cold ice cream
One of the most seductive qualities of chocolate is that it melts at precisely body temperature. Pop a square of the good stuff in your mouth and, as your brain’s pleasure centre floods with dopamine, a textural experience unlike that imparted by any other food takes place on your tongue. Rich, smooth and creamy, melting chocolate lingers long after flatter flavours have died away, creating a mouthfeel that is utterly unique.
Hands up if you’ve ever been disappointed by a slice of chocolate cake? Eating with your eyes, a cake can appear utterly irresistible, the dark sponge promising deep chocolate flavour, only to deliver an experience that is dry and at best, underwhelming. Icing can help, adding some textural contrast to the layers, but if a chocolate cake hasn’t been made well, the buttery icing can sometimes simply add a cloying sweetness which you really don’t want. Continue reading
Creamy semifreddo studded with milk chocolate chunks & crumbled honeycomb
Bourbon biscuits . . . with a hint of the strong stuff
When it comes to biscuits (of the British variety, not their soft, scone-like American counterpart), some brands do exactly what they say on the tin, while others are a little more elusive with their identity. Custard Creams are sandwiched together with – you guessed it – a layer of custardy cream, Jammy Dodgers filled with jam, and while their abilities to aid the breakdown of food may not be proven scientific fact, there is something soothingly simple about a plain Digestive biscuit that more than justifies its name.
Chewy brown butter cookies packed with thick milk chocolate chunks
Brown butter is a baker’s best friend. If I had a pound for every recipe I’d read extolling the virtues of this simple ingredient since I’ve been blogging, I’d be a very rich little loaf. Until fairly recently I’d always thought of it as a savoury thing, the foaming beurre noisette surrounding a piece of white fish or flavoured with sage and poured over pasta; I’m only just starting to understand the joy of stirring it into biscuits, cakes, cookies and muffins to ramp up the flavour and add to their intensity.
Dark chocolate & peanut sponges layered with caramel
Back in 2006, Anthony Worrall Thompson‘s ‘Snickers Pie‘ was labelled ‘one of the unhealthiest recipes ever published’ by the Food Commission. At a whopping 1,250 calories per serving and with no less than five super sweet chocolate bars chopped into it, this puff pastry crusted creation was cited as an example of chefs’ irresponsibility with regards to calorie control and our increasingly unhealthy attitude to what constitutes home baking.
Fellow food blogger Jamie Schler recently wrote this interesting piece for the Huffington Post bemoaning the wave of boxed brownie mix, chopped up chocolate bars and cans of frosting masquerading on blogs around the world as home baked treats. While I’m not averse to the odd Oreo crumbled into a blondie or topping a cupcake with fizzy cola bottles, I absolutely agree with her that baking should be about creating things from scratch. It may not make them calorie-free, but using real butter, free range eggs, seasonal fresh fruit and natural colourings in all my recipes is important to me and feels a world away from the oleaginous Worrall-Thompson’s sickly sweet idea of dessert. Continue reading
Fresh, bright & full of flavour – the perfect spring dessert
When was the last time someone responded badly to something you’d made?
In the kitchen, I tend to be my own worst critic. Although I enjoy cooking all sorts of savoury dishes, I definitely get the most joy out of baking and making desserts. And one major bonus that comes with being a baker is that your creations are almost always met with a rapturous response. While I’ll worry that something hasn’t turned out quite perfect, that the top is too brown or the middle less moist than I’d hoped, most of the time people have nothing but praise to impart when handed something sweet.
Maybe it’s an inherent insecurity which means I thrive on this praise, or perhaps conversely it’s some sort of overblown ego which makes me enjoy the eager eyes, nods of appreciation, squeals of pleasure and silent smiles of satisfaction, but the reaction of my friends and family to the treats I make brings me at least as much happiness as the actual processes of both baking and eating. Continue reading
A thin slice of this dark chocolate tart is all you need (though you might want more)
This Saturday morning, the sun shining bright despite patches of cloud hanging heavy in the sky, I rolled myself out of bed and headed down to the farmer’s market. Although I love a lazy Saturday morning as much as the next person, there’s something so invigorating about the bustle of an early morning market and so satisfying about bringing home the freshest food to be eaten on the day it was bought that I just couldn’t resist.