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COOK: Low Fat Brownies
Saturday, 30 April 2011 @ 17:03 | 18 Comments
Heyhey. Did everyone enjoy having that extra day off yesterday for the royal wedding? I actually had to work in the afternoon yesterday, but i still got to watch the main ceremony yesterday so all is good! My street hosted a small party, and it even got featured on BBC news! Ohhh yeaaahh. It was such a joyous day, really felt like the whole of the UK came together and celebrated. Did anyone outside the UK watch the ceremony? I'm quite curious on how big the wedding was around the world!  Other than that, i came across this recipe for a low fat version of brownies! I have a massive sweet tooth (as most of you should know!) but eating cakes everyday really isn't any good for my waistline. So whenever i come across a low fat version of my favourite things, i immediately have to try it out! I have to say though, that some "low fat" recipes for baked goods are a little deceptive. The ingredients seem really similar to the ones usually featured in the normal versions, with all the butter and eggs. Low fat my ass. I'm not gonna lie though, they're not as indulgent as normal brownies, and has a much more light and cakey texture. I put this down to the lack of oil, which i believe is the key ingredient which makes brownies dense. My brownies are round because i decided to bake them in cupcake trays LOL. This way i know how much I'm eating and how many calories i'm consuming. You can always do it the normal person way and use a cake tray and slice them up, but i find the circular shape kinda cute :P  Low fat Brownies Makes 18 58 calories a piece 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 4 egg whites 1 cup sugar 1/4 cup plain flour 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder 1/2 teaspoon instant espresso powder (optional,doesn't add any coffee flavour) 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 1. Preheat oven to 175C. 2. Grease your cake pan/cupcake tray. 3. In a mixing bowl,mix the applesauce, vanilla, egg whites and sugar until they are well combined. 4. Stir in the rest of the ingredients and mix until well combined and no lumps remain. 5. Pour into your cake pan/cupcake tray. 6. If using a cake pan, bake for 20-22 mins. For the cupcake tray, bake for 10 mins. If they're done, a toothpick inserted through the centre should come out dry (a few crumbs are ok)  I thought that they could be much more chocolatey, so I And also if you want to cut the calories a little more, use sweetener instead of sugar. Hope everyone has another great bank holiday weekend! It depresses me that i'll be working both sunday and monday as well. Boooo. But i have one thing to look forward to however! I've just booked a fish pedicure for wednesday lunchtime with my girlies. It'll be my first time, i'm both nervous and excited! I've heard it's ticklish. Hope not too much though cos i have very ticklish feet. I feel sorry for those fishies, for me to unleash my horrid feet upon them. Has anyone else had a fish pedicure? Do tell! I'd like to prepare myself for the experience hehe. Have a lover-ly weekend lovies! x Labels: Cook, Low fat brownies Mini Bun-buns
Tuesday, 15 March 2011 @ 17:00 | 15 Comments
Rah. Heyhey. I'm currently typing this post in my tracksuit bottoms and hoody. Luckily today is my day off work but i am feeling soooo rough. I'm coming down with a cold booo! I can't breathe through my nose and my throat hurts like crazy. Not only that but my wisdom tooth is persisting on ripping through my gums. Why do humans have to grow so many teeth? Anyway, enough of the complaining. Its definitely nothing compared to whats happening in Japan. My prayers are with all the people and their families. Please donate as much as you can to the Red Cross, in order to help with the crisis. I followed this recipe according to Milly's post. Her baking posts always look so delicious and elegant and i always want to try them out straight afterwards! This recipe is so simple, yet so scruptious. It's great with the ole afternoon cuppa. They obviously don't look as good as Milly's but they tasted yummy to me! She also has a little Cupcake Corner on the blog, with photos of her baked goods, which always look so prestine like the ones you see in the shop!  Ingredients Makes 12-16 buns 8oz Self Raising Flour 4oz Butter, Softened 4oz Caster Sugar 1 Egg Oats and Brown Sugar (optional) Jam Filling (i also used Peanut Butter and Nutella fillings) 1. Whizz the flour and butter together until it becomes a breadcrumb like texture. 2. Add in the egg slowly and combine together into a soft dough. If it's a little dry, you can loosen it with a little dash of milk. 3. Take small sections of the dough and roll them into a ball between your hands. 4. (optional step) Roll them into brown sugar and oats to give it a lovely outer coating. 5. Arrange them on a well floured baking tray, leaving enough room between the buns to spread. 6. Indent a little hole, halfway down, in the centre of each ball (with the back end of a wooden spoon or a chopstick) 7. Carefully add in the filling. 8. Bake the buns for 10-12 minutes on 180C.    Sorry, I'm going to have to keep this short and sweet! I'm going to crawl back into my bed with some honey and lemon, and settle down and watch some movies. I've already watched Dear John. The beginning was sweet, but it just went all downhill from there. I swear, Chick flicks are getting worse and worse. Its a shame, because they're my favourites for days in! Love you all! x
COOK: Almost No Fat Banana Bread
Saturday, 5 March 2011 @ 11:45 | 15 Comments
Hello all! Hows everyone weekend going so far? Not much is happening for me at the moment. I'm currently babysitting my ickle sister and watching The Little Mermaid. Ahh. Disney classics are the best. I actually made this cake/bread last weekend. Been meaning to post it earlier but haven't had the time till now. I went the Daventry the other day with the boy where we went to attend his graduation ceremony. But not your typical university one. He works for the car company Volvo, and has recently passed his appreticeship so they held an event to award all the new volvo service technicans. They served an ah-mazing three course lunch btw! But yush, i was so proud of him! He even took away with him the award for appretice of the year. It was so funny, as he wasn't expecting it and when they called out his name, he jumped frantically in his seat, haha!  I've tried other recipes for Banana cakes/bread, but this one is by far the best one. Its also apparently low fat, so i don't feel so bad scoffing it all. I think this is probably down to the use of just egg whites, and doesn't contain the usual ingredient of butter. Even though it's low in fat, it really doesn't taste like it! The cake went down a treat with my family, as they're usually quite calorie conscious. Anywho, this works best with really ripe bananas. Overripe ones are often sweeter in taste and softer in texture so you can easily mash it up. I usally like to be a little experimental with baking so i've adapted this recipe from the original here.  Ready in 1 hour 5 mins. Serves 12. Ingredients: 200g (7 oz) plain flour 140g (5 oz) caster sugar 1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder 1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon 2 egg whites 4 bananas, mashed 2 tablespoons of Nutella Two handfuls of dessicated coconut A handful of raisins 1. Preheat oven to 180 C / Gas mark 4. Lightly grease a 20x10cm (8x4 in) loaf tin. 2. In a large bowl, stir together flour, sugar, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and cinnamon. Make a small well in the middle then add egg whites, mashed bananas, raisins and nutella; stir just until combined. Pour batter into prepared tin. (the batter doesn't have to be smooth, i prefer having little bits of whole banana in my cake) 3. Bake in preheated oven for 50 to 55 minutes, until a skewer inserted into centre of loaf comes out clean. Turn out onto wire rack and allow to cool before slicing. Optional: I sprinkled brown sugar on top to make the top edge crispy.  Look at all that bananary goodness! ;) Cor, I'm such a fatty. I'm eating wayyy too many cakes at the moment. I eat healthily on a daily basis but i have such a sweet tooth, cakes, cookies and all that marlarky is my downfall. I think i need to invest more in low fat recipes to satisfy my cravings! Does anybody know any good recipe books? Currently reading: Lets Kill Uncle by Rohan O'Grady (I actually just finished it this morning. I really enjoyed it, they even have a film based on it which i'd like to check out) Have a wonderful weekend lovies! Labels: Baking, Banana Bread, Cook COOK: Gooey Chocolate Cherry Cookies
Saturday, 12 February 2011 @ 12:30 | 6 Comments
Hey! Hows everyone's weekend going so far? The weekends are never long enough! Is anyone romanticising away for Valentines weekend? So far, i got my boy a silly card customised by Moonpig. It was my first time using them, the card came in the day after i ordered them, so that was pretty good. I haven't bought him anything though (well actually i did, but he went off and bought it for himself when i told him beforehand not to buy anything just in case i've already bought it for him *sigh, never listens lol). Theres so much crap in the shops for valentines day, who really need that many teddies and chocolates? I've never been a fan of flowers either, mainly cos they die pretty quick, so in my eyes, they're a bit useless. And for £1 a rose, thats wayyy too much to spend. My uncle once bought his girlfriend 99 roses for v day O___O. £99 on flowers? wtf moment! I sound like such a pessimist lol. Anyway! Back to the point of this post! I stayed round my bestie's yesterday, and we thought it would be nice to bake something for our boys for Valentines. My bf is not a cakey person, so once again, I resorted to baking him some cookies! We were naughty and nibbled on them, but refrained ourselves from eating the rest :P This recipe is from the bbcgoodfood website, one of my favourite recipe sites to use. They're so yummy, and i just love soft, chewy cookies. Hopefully my bf will appreciate the gesture! You can alter the recipe to your taste, we used two types of galaxy chocolate =) nomnom.  Ingredients:
1. Heat oven to 190C/fan 170C/gas 5. Beat the butter, sugars and egg until smooth, then mix in the flour, chocolates and cherry pieces and ½ tsp salt. Spoon onto non-stick baking sheets in large rough blobs - you'll get 20 out of this mix. Make sure they are well spaced as the cookies grow substantially as they bake. The raw dough can be frozen. 2. Bake for 12-14 mins until just golden, but still quite pale and soft in the middle. If baking from frozen, give them a few mins more. Cool on the sheets for 5 mins, then lift onto racks with a fish slice and leave to cool completely. If you want to make it a little more lovely, you can use a heart shape cookie cutter and use it after you take it out of the oven. Just make sure you do it before they harden too much!   I'm hoping to buy some lush bath bombs, they suggest that you should be economical and share a bath with someone else ;). Haven't got too much planned to be honest, apart from me and friends are planning to go Nandos for some chickeennn. Mainly because some of them have never tried it! It shocks me. They have not lived. Haha! I Joke I Joke. OH. And i've reach 50 followers! Thank you so much guys! *tear* Love you all! Have a wonderful weekend! lovelove. Labels: Chocolate Cherry Cookies, Cook COOK: The Hummingbird Bakery's Peanut Butter Cookies
Monday, 10 January 2011 @ 19:47 | 9 Comments
 Ahh. Sorry! My posting is getting worst >_<. I've been busy seeing everyone before they leave me for uni :(. I'm also interning this week, so by the time i get home, it's all dark and cold and all i want to do is get into bed and snuggle down with a book. I'm going to try and read as many books as possible this year. I thought it would help me for when i go back to education. Taking a gap year seriously leads you to get a little lazy! At the moment, I'm reading The Baker's Apprentice by Judith Hendricks. I've only read the first chapter, but so far so good. Over the weekend, i decided to finally whip out my new electric whisk, and try out a recipe from The Hummingbird Bakery's Cookbook. I prefer cakes myself, but my family doesn't really eat cakes, so i always feel like it's a bit of a waste. So i wanted to try one of their cookie recipes, because my boy is very fond of cookies [and he's not a cake lover either :(] They were sooo goood. I only used half the dough, because the recipe makes 24 cookies in total! I would had cut half the ingredients in the recipe, but i've heard that by doing that, it ruins the results? Iunno. It doesn't really matter, because you can freeze the dough that you don't use, and pull it out another time. Anyways! Down to the recipe... Peanut Butter Cookies Taken from The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook. Ingredients: 225g Unsalter Butter, Room Temp 200g Caster Sugar 200g Soft Light Brown Sugar 2 Eggs 1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract 240g Crunchy Peanut Butter 340g Plain Flour 2 1/2 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda 1/2 tsp Salt 75g Dark Chocolate, Chopped 4 Baking Trays, lined with greaseproof paper. 1. Preheat oven to 170C, Gas 3. Fan assisted ovens lower the temp by 10-20C. 2. Mix the butter and sugars together until light and fluffy with a handheld electric whisk, or an electric mixer with the paddle attachment. 3. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well and scraping any unmixed ingredients from the side of the bowl. 4. Turn the mixer down to a slow speed and beat in the vanilla and peanut butter. 5. Add the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt gradually. Mix well until a smooth dough is formed. 6. Stir in the chocolate until evenly dispersed. 7. Arrange 6 equal amounts of cookie dough on each prepared baking tray. Spread them apart to allow the cookies to spread whilst baking. 8. Bake for about 10 minutes, or until golden brown around the edges and quite flat. 9. Leave the cookies to cool slightly on the trays before turning out onto a wire cooling rack to cool completely. The cookies should be nicely soft and chewy. Off course, you can alter this to suit your taste. I thought the cookies could had been a bit more crunchy. So next time, i might add in peanuts (and up the amount of choccy!) for some ompppff. I found the cookies tasted much better when they're bigger, so be generous when you arrange them on the baking tray!  These taste great with a glass of milk, hot or cold! But being the tea lover that i am, i opted to dip my cookies in my usual cuppa tea. (Lmao, you can see my tea marks on the side of my mug, obviously couldn't wait to drink it!) So much for eating healthy! Such a failll. >__<. Thank you for all the comments on my blog posts! Much Love! xx Ps:  LOL. Naassttyyy. Labels: Cook, Peanut Butter Cookies, The Hummingbird Bakery COOK: OREO TRUFFLES
Wednesday, 29 December 2010 @ 17:30 | 14 Comments
[O] Hello all! I hope everyone had a lovely christmas break! I spent christmas day opening presents and filming my little sister's second ever christmas. She's so spoilt. All the presents under the tree were basically for her, but i guess christmas is really for children. My sister loves books, so i bought her a load of learning ones from The Works. If you're looking for cheap books, definitely have a look at their store (I bought like 6 books for £15). I'll probably regret getting her books because she would most likely make me read each and every one to her, back to back. I then went up to my uncle's house and had hotpot and watched christmas movies and played games with my cousins. [O] The rest of the christmas break i spent with my boyfriend. The boxing day morning, we went to see the new Gulliver's Travels movie at my local cinema, for free i might add. If you register to showfilmfirst, they will send you emails where you get the opportunity to get free tickets to previews of up and coming movies. You pick cinemas that are near to you, and whenever there are any screenings, showfilmfirst will email you with a code where you can claim your free tickets. You have to be quite quick though, because they go really fast. If you have twitter, you can follow them, where they update it regularly. [O] I stayed at my boyfriend's for the last few days, so have been neglecting my regular blog reading. I need to catch up >__<, i apparently have 172 blog posts to read. I've been naughty and gave into COD, and am starting to get a little addicted. I'm no way good at it though. My kills are still far less than my deaths haha! Before christmas, i learnt how to make these amazingly simple Oreo Truffles. It's so simple that even I was able to make these, and my baking etc, never ever comes out right...but these did! And they taste soooo goood, and i'm not really a big fan on chocolate! These would be nice to make as a present, and you could even bring them to the New Year's party this year!   Recipe from allrecipes.com Ingredients
Instuctions 1. Crush 9 of the cookies to fine crumbs in food processor; reserve for later use. (Cookies can also be finely crushed in a resealable plastic bag using a rolling pin.) Crush remaining 36 cookies to fine crumbs; place in medium bowl. Add cream cheese; mix until well blended. Roll cookie mixture into 42 balls, about 1-inch in diameter. 2. Refridgerate for approximately an hour, so that the balls are easier to handle when dipping in the chocolate. 3. Dip balls in chocolate in a shallow bowl (using two forks, roll the ball around); place on wax paper-covered baking sheet. (Any leftover chocolate can be stored at room temperature for another use.) Sprinkle with reserved cookie crumbs. 4. Refrigerate until firm, about 1 hour. Store leftover truffles, covered, in refrigerator. I altered the recipe a little from reading the comments. Refridgerating it before dipping it in the chocolate will prevent the ball from crumbling. I added a few drops of vanilla extract to the cookie mixture. You can experiment by maybe adding mint, almond, orange etc. You could even try it with chilli flavoured chocolate. The possibilities are endless! I used leftover chocolate from each and dripped them on top of the truffles to make them a little prettier. I also used some dessicated coconut as a topping.   NOMNOM!  I got the Hummingbird Bakery Book as a present. I've been wanting it for ages, and now i can try the recipes out for myself! And i finally bought myself a handheld electric whisk. I think this will make a big difference to my not so good baking...hopefully. =P Lovelove, x ps. Thank you all for following! Labels: Cook, Hummingbird, Oreo, Truffles |
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