Chocolate of the World – Finland

For most of us, chocolate is a comforting food. We turn to it when we’re feeling low, we eat it during periods of celebration. A simple candy bar (as can any food. My husband is transported to Fridays in 1970s LaCrosse when he eats McDonalds Filet o’Fish) can transport us back to our childhood, a [...]

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Chocolate Brownie Cake

So I’m cooking lunch for my mum and, at 10.30am the same morning she asks me what we’re having:
Mum: “Meat?”
Me: “No.”
Mum: {pleading voice} “Not vegetarian?!”
Me: “No.”
Mum: “So…it must be fish?”
Me: “Yes, yes it’s fish”
Mum: “Oh. So have you made a big dessert then?”
Me: “No. Did you want dessert?”
Mum: “Well, fish isn’t very filling and if [...]

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Sweet Dreams Traditional Sweet Shop

It seems that the days of the corner shop are fading into obscurity. Supermarkets can supply the time-pushed shopper with everything, all under one roof.
However, is this a smart way to shop? The days of my childhood were mostly spent reading but I did look forward to a visit to the local sweet shop where [...]

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SUGAR HIGH FRIDAY!

Sugar High Friday. Perhaps the most famous food blogging event, certainly the one with the greatest longevity. Is it because we all have a sweet tooth at heart? Or perhaps food blogging events encourage the experimentalist in us all, ushering us on to cook that recipe that you’ve always looked longingly at but skipped the [...]

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NEWSFLASH – FAT FREE CHOCOLATE!!

We’re all looking for a guilt-free way to indulge ourselves in heaps of chocolate, right? I think I may have the solution.
For all Chocoholic Gaming Afficionados, it was recently brought to my attention that there are three (yes, three!) games out there devoted to Theobroma Cacao.  Since then I have played all three games (not [...]

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Chocolate Week Day 7 – The Diet

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Chocolate Week Day 6 – The Cake

Well, if you’re going to make a chocolate cake, you may as well push the boat out right? Wrong. At heart I love truly simple things: choc-chip cookies, chocolate with no nuts, no caramel, no nougat, chocolate sponge cake with buttercream icing or maybe just whipped cream. My favourite pizza is even plain ol’ cheese [...]

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Chocolate Week Day 5 – The Muffins

Winter is drawing rapidly closer – the clocks are due to fall back and it will soon be dark when I leave work – my desire to cook good wholesome food seems to be an all time high. I am so excited about the impending winter events, Halloween (celebrated by the ancient Celts as part [...]

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Chocolate Week Day 4 – The Orangettes

You didn’t really see that one coming, did you?
OK, so whilst Orangettes are not one of the first recipes that spring to mind when you think chocolate, they are charmingly pretty with their orange stained glass peel and their dipped velvet chocolate peplums…I couldn’t resist them.
Orangettes, whilst time consuming to produce, are a simple [...]

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Chocolate Week Day 3 – The Brownie

Chocolate Brownies. Possibly the most perfect of all the ways to indulge in Theobroma Cacao. The chocolate hit in a well made brownie is so strong it can feel like you’ve just downed three double espressos in less than 10 seconds flat.
And there’s the non-prep side of things. It takes no time at all to [...]

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