When I told Miss5 that I was baking a Mexican chocolate cake she asked if it had tacos and beans in it. No, it doesn’t, but it does have one helluva kick. This comes courtesy of some spice that transform the sometimes overly sweet flavour of chocolate cake into a cake for grown-ups. I found the recipe on food.com and tweaked it. Continue reading
Firstly – an apology for the lack of photos with this post. I’ve been baking like a mad woman in the last few weeks for various Christmas-related events and even though I intend to photograph as I go for my blog it hasn’t turned out this way.
Sigh.
First up, a super easy Christmas ice cream pudding that I’ve been making for many, many years. I have no idea where the original recipe comes from but it is embarrassingly easy.
This is so simple and a perfect dessert for Christmas Day in Sydney, which is, without fail, a squillion degrees. I made nine desserts for my mother-in-law’s Christmas lunch on the weekend and this was the first thing to vanish.
GATHER:
2 litres best quality vanilla ice cream, softened
1 cup mixture of sultanas, currants and raisins
Good splash of rum
¼ cup glace cherries, chopped
2 tablespoons cinnamon
LET’S GET TO IT:
Soak the dried fruit [but not the glace cherries] in rum and leave overnight.
Line a 2-litre pudding basin with cling wrap, leaving overhang.
Working quickly tip the softened ice cream into a large bowl and stir in rum-soaked fruit, cinnamon and cherries.
If desired place some home-made chocolates [see below] in the base of the pudding basin, then add ice cream. Smooth the top then fold over the overhanging cling wrap. Wrap in foil and freeze overnight.
Home made Christmas chocolates
I found a similar idea for these little chocs online and Christmas-afied them using red and green Christmas sprinkles from a baking store. Simply line two mini muffin pans with mini liners. Place 150g your choice of chocolate with a splash of canola oil in a bowl over a pan of simmering water. Stir until melted and glossy. Pour chocolate into mini pans until bottom is covered and then a bit more. Sprinkle over Christmas sprinkles and place in fridge for a few hours until firm. Remove and discard wrappers.
Miss 7 and I made these for her to hand out to her class. We bundled a few up in cellophane bags for all of her classmates. I should have taken a photo…
Chocolate and peanut butter is always a winning combo and makes a perfect foil to all that fruit cake’n’pud traditionally offered around the Christmas table.
This easy-peasy brownie would also make a fab addition to any Christmas parties or festive barbecues. You’ve probably got all six ingredients in your kitchen so why not make a pan of this right now? You will thank me later…
The recipe was found on BBC Good Food’s site, a fabulous place to while away the hours. I added some roasted, salted peanuts on top and boy did it make this sweet sing.
GATHER:
225g crunchy peanut butter
200g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
280g soft light brown sugar
3 medium eggs
100g self-raising flour
handful roasted, salted peanuts
handful dark chocolate drops
LET’S GET TO IT:
Preheat oven to 180C and grease and line a 20cm pan with non-stick baking paper.
Melt peanut butter, chocolate and sugar in a pan over low heat, stirring occasionally, until the sugar has just about melted.
Turn off heat and use a wooden spoon to beat in the eggs one by one then stir in the flour.
When everything is mixed in pour into tin, then dot the peanuts and dark chocolate drops on top.
Bake 25-30 minutes, until top is firm but inside still fudgy.
Cool and cut into squares.
A little while back I blogged about Oreo cupcakes and it went OFF! Obvs everyone is fond of a cupcake that is drenched in chocolate, more chocolate and a swirl of decadent cream cheese. I know I am, and I’m not even a cupcake fiend.
Growing up in Australia we kids were made aware of Oreos due to the fact that every sitcom on TV here was American. In these shows kids come from school, drank milk and had an Oreo. They attained mythical status even though we had just a vague idea of what kind of biscuit, or cookie, they were.
Then, a year or so ago, supermarkets were awash with Oreos. And they were so cheap. I bought them, I tried, them, I was underwhelmed. Never fear, thought I, for they can be turned into a swoon-worthy treat – the Oreo cupcake. Continue reading
If you are trying to watch your waistline or worried about the soaring costs of dental care avert your eyes. For this treat be both fat-and-sugar laden *but* it is super delicious and a cinch to make. Continue reading
I was sent a copy of ‘After Toast – Recipes for Aspiring Cooks’ by Kate Gibbs to review in my day job as a journalist at The Leader newspaper. I brought it home to test some recipes and the first one to get the Hungry Mum treatment was her recipe called All About The Chocolate Loaf. I adore chocolate cakes that actually use chocolate, rather than cocoa, and this delivers that intense choc hit I was after. Ms Gibbs said the cake improves over a day or two but I served mine that evening. She suggests sesame & almond praline as an accompaniment but I lathered mine with dark chocolate ganache and walnut pieces.
GATHER:
1 1/3 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon bicarb soda
130g dark choc melted
200 g butter, diced, at room temperature
1 ¼ cups brown sugar
2 large eggs
splash vanilla
1 cup boiling water
LET’S GET TO IT:
Preheat oven to 190C and grease and line a 23cmx 13cm loaf pan.
Sift flour with bicarb, set aside.
Cream butter and sugar in bowl of electric mixer until pale, then add eggs one at a time, then vanilla.
Fold in melted chocolate. Add one heaped spoon of flour at a time and boiling water alternately, stirring after each addition [I didn’t end up using all the water]. Batter will be runny. Make sure there are no lumps.
Pour into pan and bake for 30 minutes. Reduce heat to 170C and cook for another 15 minutes.
Remove and allow to cool for about two hours before turning on a wire rack. When cold dress with choc ganache or icing sugar.
Yes, it is muffin mania at the Hungry Mum! What’s not to love about a portable sweet treat that requires no icing and no cutting?
Pumpkin has long been my favourite vegetable but it is only recently that I have been attracted to the idea of adding it to sweet dishes. In Australia it is served roasted or sometimes mashed but always savoury. Thanks to international baking blogs I am becoming somewhat obsessed with plonking pumpkin into my baking repertoire. Unlike the US we don’t have canned pumpkin here so it requires a fair bit of effort to chop/boil/mash the pumpkin but it is so worth it. Continue reading
I blame By The (Cook) Book blog for my fall into planet s’mores. As an Australian I have heard so much about this sweet American treat but have never tried them. Part of the reason is the lack of graham crackers here but after the Hungry Dad explained they were similar to digestive biscuits I was ready to make me some s’mores! Continue reading
I was going to start this post by writing everyone loves banana cake but that’s so not true. My mum abhors bananas in any way, shape or form. The poor woman often peers hopefully into my cake tin when she comes over, only to firmly replace the lid when she discovers the baked good is banana cake/bread/muffin. Continue reading
the hungry mum 