Recipes

Monday, December 24, 2012

Christmas Fruit/Plum Cake

Tis the season to be jolly, tra la la la, la la la la....

My favorite time of the year is here yet again. As always, once the tree goes up at home, baking the plum cake follows suite. This time, I followed Maria's Christmas fruit cake recipe from Mariasmenu 


The cake turned out moist, soft and fluffy. A little boozy and rich too.


Merry Christmas everyone, and a very Happy New Year.

Saturday, December 8, 2012

Double Chocolate Brownies

I became an aunt for the first time to my brother and sister-in-law's cute baby boy. In my super excited mood, I baked a Double Chocolate Brownie for the little one's homecoming party! It was a big hit and all the pieces vanished before I could say 'brownie'!


This is a superb recipe I found on the Joyofbaking food blog. One cannot go wrong - very easy and quick. Plus, the use of microwave for melting only makes the entire process easier.




Ingredients
Butter – ½ 1 cup cut into pieces
Dark Chocolate – 150 gms
Instant Coffee powder – 1 tsp
Cocoa Powder – 2 tbsp
Caster sugar – 1 cup
Eggs – 3, room temperature
Vanilla extract – 1 tsp
Flour – ¾ 1 cup
Salt – ¼ tsp
Chocolate chips – ½ 1 cup
Chopped walnuts – ¼ 1 cup

Grease and line a square baking tin. Preheat oven to 190C. In a microwave safe bowl, add butter and chocolate and microwave on high for 1 minute. Stir till the chocolate is melted. Add the instant coffee powder,cocoa powder and caster sugar and beat. Break in the eggs one at a time, beating well after each
addition. Stir in the vanilla. Add flour, salt and beat well. Fold in the chocolate chips and walnuts and mix.

Pour the batter into the prepared cake tin and bake for 30-35 minutes or till a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Allow it to cool completely and cut into squares.