I bake so often that I am rarely tempted by my own sweet baked goods. Whenever I make a new recipe I try a piece but other than that I can take or leave cakes & things. A notable exception = brownies. I adore brownies – they are rich, gooey and not OTT in terms of sugary sweetness. Continue reading
Chocolate marsala cake, listed in the book ’50 Fabulous Chooclate Cakes’ as ‘never fail chocolate cake’ is my go recipe that I have made countless times. Each year I make it for my daughter’s birthdays, I’ve made it it for friends grieving and for friends celebrating. Continue reading
I am always amazed when I see bakeries and cafes charging outlandish prices for banana bread. There is nothing in a slice of your ordinary, run-of-the-mill banana bread that makes it worth the $4 price tag. So when I saw my elderly neighbour fork out $8 for two scrawny slices of banana bread at a local bakery yesterday I was mortified. I came home, raided my fruit bowl & pantry and set about making a loaf. She was pleasantly surprised when I lobbed at her doorstep and handed the loaf over [at this point we didn’t even know one another’s names] and I was happy I saved someone on a fixed income $8 [every cent counts, right?]. Because I couldn’t exactly cut a slice off to taste it before I handed it over I’ll go by the smell that emerged
as it was baking : super divine.I tweaked a recipe from taste.com.au, an online recipe site that never lets me down.
GATHER:
2 large over-ripe bananas, mashed
1 3/4 cups self raising flour
1/4 cup plain flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 eggs, whisked
1 tablespoon cinnamon
50g cooled, melted butter
1/2 cup milk
LET’S GET TO IT:
Preheat oven to 180C, spray a large loaf tin with cooking spray and line with baking powder.
Sift flours and cinnamon together in large bowl, add sugar.
In a jug gently mix melted butter, eggs, milk and bananas and stir into the flour mixture with a metal spoon. It will be lumpy, do not over beat.
Bake 40 ish minutes, checking with skewer. It make need another five or so depending on your oven. Remove, place on wire rack and wait until cool before slicing [if you can be that patient with such a delicious smell wafting through the kitchen…]
When in doubt, bake. And when you don’t want to faff around with lining cake tins or decorating cupcakes, bake muffins. Quick, simple and perfect size for sharing – what’s not to love? These little numbers have a surprise in the shape of fresh strawberry & custard in the centre, elevating them from morning tea fare to, ummm, exciting morning tea fare.
Makes 12
GATHER:
2 cups self-raising flour
1 cup plain flour
1 egg
1 cup of milk
90 g butter, melted
12 strawberries, hulled & halved
1/2 cup caster sugar
1/4 thick shop-bought custard
1 teaspoon cinnamon PLUS 1/2 teaspoon, extra
2 tablespoons brown sugar
LET’S DO IT:
Preheat oven to 170-ishC.
Line a muffin pan with 12 muffin wrappers.
Mix together the extra 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon with the brown sugar in small bowl, set aside.
Mix flours, sugar and cinnamon in a large bowl with a metal spoon. In a jug stir together egg, milk and butter then add to bowl with other ingredients. Stir until just combined, do not over mix.
Fill each wrapper until half full then add a generous dollop of custard and 2 strawberries. Add more mixture to cover but do not overfill.
Sprinkle with extra cinnamon and brown sugar then cook for 20-ish minutes.
It was baking o’clock on a Friday afternoon. Cruising the blogs for inspiration I was stunted by indecison – so much home-baked goodness to choose from. How to decide?
Seeing Veggie Mama’s [veggiemama.com] droolworthy recipe for raspberry & white chocolate cookies cinched it – we had raspberries, we had white choc chips – we had a winner.
This is easy enough to whip up while referring the quibbles of the under-six set, who by the way, inhaled these and happily polished off the remainder of the frozen berries. So helpful. I make fairy incy bickies as I am of the opinion that it is better to have several small rather than one large [especially in the realm of baked goods/ dark choc bars/glass of chardonnay…]. I did reduce the amount of brown sugar by a quarter of a cup for those who are keeping score…
GATHER:
125 g butter at room temp, diced
1/2 cup caster sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 egg at room temp
2 cups plain flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
dash of vanilla extract
3/4 cup-ish white choc chips
frozen raspberries
LET’S DO IT:
Preheat oven to 170-ish C and line 2 baking trays with baking paper.
Cream sugars and butter until fluffy and a pretty light sand colour.
Add egg and vanilla and continue beating [it may look ugly here but it will all even out].
Using a metal spoon stir in combined flour & baking powder until combined, then add around half the white choc chips.
Roll into a ball around the size of a wlanut and flatten gently. Decorate with raspberries and more choc bits.
Bake 12-ish minustes until they are lightly golden and remove to baking trays to cool.
Watch kidlets inhale.
Markets make me happy. Craft markets in old-fashioned CWA halls make me want to dance with excitement. Finding the charming Stanwell Park Village Market today during a Sunday drive was sheer luck. This was one of the smallest markets I’ve ever visited but it was absolutely a case of quality over quantity. Stalls were inside and out the hall proper which was complete with a 1950s-era portrait of Her Majesty and beautiful red velvet drapes on the stage.
We met the lovely Louise from Northern Illawarra Organics, who was justifably proud of her fresh crops. She does the markets circuit as well as home delivery. A selection of her glorious produce is in the large photo below. We were cashless but managed to scrape together enough coin to buy one exceptionally fresh looking corn on the cob which I can’t wait to try!
Sharing the hall were other craft stalls as well as delicious looking morsels courtesy of Katie’s Kitchen including muffins and vegetarian filo pastries.
The gals loved looking at all the lovely hand-crafted treasures and we vowed to return another day with cash.
Do you enjoy browsing markets?
Apparently dip is now included in the food pyramid as a must-eat food. How else to explain the six tubs of dip in my fridge? This isn’t in the lead-up to a party and doesn’t include the jars of olive tapenade, pesto, soft goats cheese designed [in my humble opinion] for dipping and so on. This is just standard in my fridge. And of course all six were duplicates and of course, all six were open. Hommous, tatziki and beeetroot dips are used at The Hungry Mum’s casa for spreading on sandwiches in lieu of butter [sometimes just as a sandwich filling, for the junior members], for dunking celery in [no double dipping, natch] and funnily enough, as a dip for water crackers. Whenever entertaining the under six set at our shindigs a platter of hommous and crackers is the norm and I find children who would normally turn their gorgeous little button noses up at anything remotely exotic [see hommous] can’t get enough of the nutty, creamy dip. It also packs a protein punch, so what’s not to love?
So, it has been pouring here for what seems like weeks but is actually only two days. Perfect baking day – to the recipe archive! Homemade Monte Carlos it is and away we go. I hadn’t tried this recipe before and boy was I in for a shock – two of the ingredients weren’t mentioned in the instructions, leaving me to guess where they should be added. These bickies were such a disappointment that I didn’t end up using all the mixture. Once stuck together with luscious berry jam and whipped thickened cream they were a hit with the in-house, under six years food tasters but I won’t be using this recipe again in a hurry.
I had intended to share the recipe here but I wouldn’t want to inflict it on you.
Instead, here’s a pic of the finished product:
Monte Carlos sandwiched with fresh cream & jam
Have you ever had a big baking disappointment?
the hungry mum 