A Cocoa Carrot Cake

Firstly, sorry for the woeful lack of posts this past week. I have an excuse though: some sort of throat virus that attacks anonymously but leaves its trace for several long, protracted days. Moving from the bed, much less blogging, was completely out of the question for the past few days but the good news [...]

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Stomach Pleasing Cookies!

There is nothing that aggrieves me more than being out of biscuits (or cookies, if you will), particularly on a holiday. Instead of having my usual tea and biscuits for breakfast, I have to revert to (gasp!) toast or cereal!
I know it sounds unhealthy but I have an agreement with my stomach: he won’t hurt, [...]

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And Is There Such a Thing as a Healthy Chocolate Cake?

“What’s that? A healthy Chocolate Cake?” I hear you gasp. Well, yes and no. It has no butter in it, so you’re already losing the fat element. It has banana, of course, which we all know is really good for you (high in potassium which is great for regulating blood pressure and the function of [...]

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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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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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Chocolate Week Day 1 – The Cookie

Today marks the official start of Chocolate Week, an auspicious observation of all things chocolately. You may ask “why devote a whole week to chocolate”? I would quickly answer:  a week is not long enough to explore every facet of the world’s favourite confectionary. There a literally hundreds of brands of chocolate bars, some candy, [...]

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ChocoMasterclass No.1 – Sachertorte

The first in an erstwhile series of classic recipes, designed to be simple, quick and – hopefully – foolproof.  The use of the word “Masterclass” is tongue in cheek as many of these recipes will be made for the first time by myself too and any comments or suggestions are gratefully received.
All recipes, of course, [...]

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