Nutella Milkshakes

So I just made these for myself and the children. Oh my goodness. It is like drinking Nutella!

Very quick post, more to remind myself what I did than any thing! I don't want to forget this bad boy! Gorgeous!

I used semi skimmed milk, because that's what I have in my fridge. Full fat would also work well. I used chocolate and hazelnut ice cream, chocolate would also work well, as would vanilla. Chocolate milkshake syrup would work in place of the milk shake mix, or half cocoa powder and half sugar.

Nutella Milkshake
Makes 1 large milkshake
250ml milk
1 scoop chocolate & hazelnut ice cream
1 heaped dessert spoon of nutella
2 level dessert spoon chocolate milkshake mix

Place all ingredients into a blender, blitz until combined.

Enjoy!

Easy Chocolate Fudge Cake

Chocolate cake. Sometimes it can get a bit of a bad rap, and sometimes that bad rap justified. There are a lot of bad chocolate cakes out there, probably as many bad ones as good ones.

For me a chocolate cake should be moist and rich, but not too heavy or sickly sweet, and of course, should pack a chocolatey punch. And for me, this cake delivers! Soft moist cake with soft squidgy fudge icing.

This cake is super versatile, not only working as a large cake, but also as cupcakes. Perfect as a birthday cake, even great as a dessert, with ice cream or whipped cream (or both!!!) Doubly gorgeous if you warm a slab in the microwave first! 

I've converted chocolate cake haters with this recipe!

It also lends itself wonderfully to gluten free and/or dairy free. To go gluten free just swap out the flour for gluten free flour, and add an extra 2 tbsp of milk. To go dairy free just switch the milk for a dairy free milk of choice (I usually use unsweetened soya, but any dairy free milk will work fine as long as it can be cooked), but do bear in mind that if your milk is strongly flavoured, as some of the nut milks are, it may take on some of the flavour of the milk. Something to consider when making substitutions. Similarly, for the icing any dairy free alternatives can be used, no need to make any substitutions to make it gluten free as it already is. 

Easy Chocolate Cake:
Makes a deep 20cm round round cake.
For the cake:
285g Self Raising Flour
225g Caster Sugar
75g   Cocoa Powder
2 Tsp Bicarbonate Soda
4 Large Eggs
300 ml Whole Milk
300 ml Sunflower Oil
4 Tbsp Golden Syrup

For the Icing:
90g Butter (or soft spread)
45g Cocoa Powder
4.5 Tbsp Milk
375g Icing Sugar

Preheat the oven to 160°c (140°c Fan) grease and line a 20 cm loose bottomed, deep cake tin. Or two 20cm sandwich tins.

Mix all the dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl.

In a separate bowl, mix together the wet ingredients.

Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix thoroughly. Pour into the tin and bake in the oven. The cake will take 45 minutes to an hour, start to check after 45 minutes, the cake is cooked when a skewer, or thin bladed knife comes out clean, and the sides shrink away from the tine slightly. Depending on your oven, it may even take a little longer than an hour.
While the cake is cooling make the fudge icing.

Start by seiving the icing sugar powder. This ensures the icing stays lump free.

Melt the butter in a pan over a low heat. Add in the cocoa powder and cook for 1 minute. Mix in the milk and the icing sugar. Mix vigorously until all of the sugar is incorporated and smooth. Allow to cool and thicken.

When the cake is completely cold place on a plate and slice in half to give you two layers.

Spread a third of the icing over the bottom layer. Place the second layer of the top.

Spread the remaining two thirds of icing over the top and sides of the cake. No need to be too neat, it's easier to finish with a swirly pattern rather than a smooth finish.

Decorate with sprinkles, grated chocolate or whatever you fancy, or leave plain!

Enjoy!

Nutella Doughnuts!

Finally had a chance to sit and write up the Nutella Doughnuts recipe. I've been baking a lot in the last week or so, especially as the weather has turned colder. I seem to be baking bread on an almost daily basis, and I have been attempting to master the art of Sourdough. Which, I will admit, is not the easiest thing I have ever done!

Back to the Doughnuts, there are two types of Doughnut. The Cake Doughnut, and the Yeast Doughnut. There are various differences between the two, I would be here all day explaining them and the merits of each. To put it simply, Cake Doughnuts are much more dense and cake like (obviously, hence the name), and Yeast leavened Doughnuts tend to have a lighter fluffier texture. The Doughnuts you see at fairgrounds, and the like, where rings of batter are dropped into hot oil from a machine are cake doughnuts. They are leavened chemically with bicarbonate of soda, or baking powder. Yeast Doughnuts require a more lengthy process, through kneading the dough, and allowing them to rise. I prefer the taste of a Yeast leavened Doughnut over a cake doughnut, so the extra effort is worth it to me.

Doughnuts are not something I make very often, because firstly, I prefer them Fried (rather than baked), and I will only fry them when I have out fresh oil in the fryer. Secondly, because they are so good I eat so many and they are far from waistline friendly! When I made these hubby and myself ate almost the whole batch in one day... they do not keep very long though, so are best consumed on the day they're made.

Of course these Doughnuts can be filled with whatever you like, raspberry or strawberry jam is traditional. I'm not a fan of jam at all, so I have used Nutella and it worked wonderfully!

Nutella Doughnuts
Makes 8 Doughnuts
250g Strong White Flour, plus extra for kneading
25g Caster Sugar, plus extra to roll the doughnuts in after cooking
20g Softened Butter (plus an extra 25g melted if baking)
1 Large Egg
1 tsp Instant Yeast
5g Salt
75ml Milk
70ml Water

Oil for Frying

Roughly 8 dessert spoons Nutella, or filling of choice

 Start by warming the milk slightly, to take the chill off. Don't make it too hot.

Place all the ingredients except the water into a large mixing bowl. Add in approximately three quarters of the water. Mix together with your hands until the it starts to come together as a dough. Add in the remaining water and continue to mix in the bowl for 4-5 minutes. (You could also use a stand mixer for this)

Turn out on to a floured work surface and knead for a further 10 minutes, the dough will become smooth and elastic.

Shape the dough into a ball and place into a bowl, cover with cling film and leave at room temperature to prove for at least an hour.

Once proved, tip the dough out onto a lightly floured work surface and knock it back, forcing any air out by kneading it a few times. Divide the dough into 8 even sized portions and roll in to balls. place on to a baking tray, or plate to rise for an hour.

To fry the doughnuts; preheat a deep fat fryer to 180, or fill a pan with 2-3 inches of oil and heat to 180, monitor the temperature using a candy thermometer. Fry the doughnuts in batches of 2 or 3, for 3-5 minutes on each side, until a dark golden, almost mahogany colour. Remove from the oil with a slotted spoon and roll in caster sugar, this must be done while hot to allow the sugar to stick to the hot fat. Allow to cool completely.

To bake the doughnuts; preheat the oven to 200 (180 fan), bake the doughnuts for 12-15 minutes until a dark golden colour. Brush with melted butter and roll in caster sugar. Allow to cool completely.

Using a small knife make a small incision on the side of each doughnut. Fill a piping bag with your chosen filling and pipe the filling into the centre of the doughnut.

Enjoy!

Basic American Style Cookie Dough

Cookies! I love cookies, they are one of my favourite things to bake, and eat. So many wonderful flavour combinations, it's easy to never bake the same cookie twice. The recipe I give here is for my basic cookie dough. What you put in them is up to you, whether it's classic chocolate chips, your favourite sweets or chocolate bar, nuts or dried fruit. I've even done this recipe before with Oreos! (Yep, a biscuit in a biscuit, and it was awesome!) I think by far my favourite combination was choped toasted hazelnuts, chocolate chips and a massive dollop (techincal measurement) of nutella swirled through. The cookies pictured had chocolate covered peanuts in them!  Some of the flour can be substitued for cocoa powder for a chocolate base.

Although incredibly easy, these cookies taste amazing. You can even keep the dough in the freezer, and bake cookies from frozen at a moments notice. Perfect for those times you remember that you were supposed to bake something for the school bake sale at the very last minute!

I like my cookies crisp around the outside, and chewy in the middle. I know many other people prefer a softer almost fudgy cookie. Both results are easily acheived by adjusting the cooking time.

I will admit I eat quite alot of this dough raw! I will share my recipe for home made cookie dough ice cream one day, and cookie dough brownies (they are so naughty; but so good!) Do bear in mind that this will contain raw egg though, I am not bothered in the slightest by eating raw eggs. I know some people are though.

American Style Cookies:

Makes 12-15 cookies

125g Salted Butter, softened but not melted

100g Soft Light Brown Sugar

125g Caster Sugar

1 Egg

1 Tsp Vanilla Extract

225g Self Raising Flour (or 200g Self Raising Flour and 25g Cocoa powder for chocolate cookies)

200g Chocolate chips (or other sweets, nuts, fruit etc of choice, or a combination totalling 200g)

Preheat the oven to 190°c (fan 170°c)/ gas mark 4

Cream togther the butter and sugar. You want it to be well mixed, but not fluffy. Add in the egg and vanilla extract and mix thoroughly.

Mix in the flour. Once mixed add in your chocolate chips etc and fold through. 

Roll the mixture into walnut sized balls and place on a baking tray lined with baking paper. Be sure to leave a 2-3 inch gap, they will spread! I usually allow 6 to a tray to allow planty of room for expansion.

For a softer cookie bake for 7 minutes. The cookie will appear under baked, but it will firm up on cooling.

For a crunchier cookie bake for 9-10 minutes, until just golden around the edges.

Cool for 5 minutes on the baking tray, and then transer the cookies on the paper to a rack too cool and firm up. 

To Freeze the raw dough:

Complete all the above steps, up until the shaping. Instead roll the dough into a sausage shape with a diameter of roughly  inches. Tightly wrap in cling film, and then baking paper. To bake the cookies from frozen slice off rounds of about half an inch thick and place on a baking tray. Bake as above extending the cooking time by 1- 2 minutes. 

Note:

If using particularly soft sweets or chocolate bars, or those containing caramel, freeze them before adding to the cookie dough. This will stop them from melting too much.

Have fun! Hope you enjoy this recipe! 

First Post! Tear & Share Garlic Bread

Welcome to my shiny new blog! After being asked by lots of people on Facebook for various recipes I decided to start my own blog. Even if no one ends up reading it, it's a place for me to keep some of my recipes and for me to document my successes (and my failures!) Please do forgive me if I'm not very good at this blogging thing to start with, I will get better as I get used to it. It's all new to me.

If there's anything you want to see, please do let me know!

On to the first recipe...

Tear and Share Garlic Bread.

I love this recipe, it does takes a little time. Not really one for doing after a full day at work. It is a white bread recipe, which does mean it does require some effort, but please don't let that put you off. The only really labour intensive part is the kneading, which takes 10 minutes - the rest of the time is taken up by waiting. My tip for kneading by hand is to set a timer, either on the oven or your mobile phone and just keep going until it beeps. Once you get into a rhythm it's quite therapeutic. You could also use a stand mixer, or a food processor, but I do prefer to knead by hand, you get a much better feel for the dough. 

Ingredients

 

For the bread dough:

200g Strong White Flour (you could use plain, but the result will be slightly heavier bread)

½ tsp Instant Yeast

¼ tsp Salt

Approx 140ml water (I use water from the cold tap)

A little oil for kneading & proofing

For the Garlic Butter:

65g Salted Butter (approx quarter of a pack no need to be too precise)

1-2 cloves of garlic, depending on your tastes

1 Tsp dried mixed herbs (use whatever you have lurking in your cupboards!)

Weigh out your flour into a mixing bowl, add the yeast on one side of the bowl, and the salt the other. Make sure the salt does not touch the yeast. Add in half the water and mix with your hands. Continue to add the water a little at a time until it comes together as a rough, soft dough. You may not need all of the water, you may need a little more. It's very much dependant on the type of flour you use, the temperature, humidity, what day of the week it is, or what colour pants you're wearing. Often no two doughs are the same!

Lightly oil the work surface and your hands. Turn the dough out on to the work surface and knead for approximately 10 minutes (there are countless videos on YouTube if you need some help with your technique). The dough will change consistency to a much more silky texture. You can tell you have kneaded enough by taking a handful of dough and stretch it, it should stretch about 20cm without breaking.

Lightly oil a bowl (I tend to use the bowl I mixed the dough in, saves washing up!) place your dough in the bowl, cover with cling film. Leave for approximately 1 hour. I leave mine on the kitchen worktop. No need for a particularly warm place unless your kitchen is very cold. A slower rise improves the flavour of the bread.

While the the dough is proofing make the garlic butter. Begin by finely chopping or crushing the garlic. Melt the butter in the microwave or on the stove top. Stir in the garlic and mixed herbs. Set aside to allow the herbs to soften slightly in the butter.

After an hour your dough should have doubled in size. Turn out onto a lightly floured work surface. Knock the dough back by kneading it a few times to expel all the air. Shape into 8 even sized balls. The easiest way to get them even, is to half the dough then take one half, and cut it in half again and cut each piece in to two. Repeat on the portion of dough. Roll these between your hands to form the balls. They will appear quite small; they will get bigger though!

Take a baking sheet, or baking tin. My tin of choice in an 8inch/ 20cm round cake tin. Brush some of the garlic butter over the bottom, or use your hands if you don't have a pastry brush. Place on of the balls in the centre and the remaining 7 balls around the outside of it. Leave a small gap of approx quarter to half an inch between each ball to allow them some room to expand into each other. Loosely cover with oiled clingfilm (oil side on the dough!) and leave to proof for 45 minutes. 

Preheat your oven to 190℃ (fan 170℃) / Gas Mark 5.

After 45 minutes the dough should have doubled in size, it may still seem a little small but it will proof further in the oven. Brush over half the remaining garlic butter, bake on the bottom shelf of the oven for approx 30 minutes. Remove from the oven. place on a plate, or serving board and pour over the remaining garlic butter!

Tuck in!

I hope you give it a go. I promise it's worth the effort! Let me know if you do.