Sugar, spice…nice

So yes… As the winter chill creeps ever closer, so my insatiable cravings for all things super sugary sweet start.

When the sky is filled with dark fluffy winter clouds holding promise of rain, I always feel the urge to grab the nearest thing containing sugary bliss to warm my senses.

Since this morning I have had an endless craving for some warm cinnamon pancakes… Mmmm, yum yum. To go along with it some cookies. In my search for cookies “healthy-but-oh-so-yummy” I came across the old favorite; golden oats cookies with the possibility of endless flavors as you can add whatever you want to them. BIG smile… Yip that’s definitely a winner in my book.

So after picking the girls up at school, we quickly popped in at the shop and bought a few “add-ins” consisting of bananas, chocolate with whole nuts and apples. I wanted to keep it somewhat healthy so seemed like a responsible enough shopping list.

After I got home I immediately started making a batch scanning over my freshly googled recipe. Reading the part where I was supposed to melt the butter,sugar and syrup together I realized I had already added the sugar to the oats… But oh well, carrying on I whipped (such a chef like word 😉 ) up a batch and then proceeded to divide it and add some apples with cinnamon, chocolate and banana in the three separate batches.

Wha-la, into the oven and 15 min later I had some oh-so-delicious cookies. My earlier error in forgetting to melt the sugar, resulted in it bubbling ever so slightly out and caramelizing… Like sweet sugary brittle here and there on the cookies. YUM!

Supper did of course consist of delicious pancakes with a savory filling followed by pancakes filled with cinnamon sugar gloriousness. Big smile…

In these sugary moments I briefly forget my intolerance to Winter 🙂

Chocolate meringues with nuts

There is nothing more satisfying than mouthfuls of sugary sweet delights and a hot cup of coffee. Here is a recipe for deliciously delightful meringue morsels… you will simply not get enough of them!  They have the winning combination of chocolate and nuts and are addictively yummy and very simple to make!

100g plain chocolate

3 large egg whites

Pinch of cream of tartar

125g caster sugar

50g sifted icing sugar

30g hazelnuts toasted and finely ground

142 ml double cream 

1. Preheat oven to 140°C
2. Line two baking pans with baking paper
3. Freeze chocolate for 20 min
4. Finely grate 50g of the frozen chocolate in a bowl and put back into freezer for later. Break the rest of the chocolate in a bowl and leave till later.
5. Whisk the egg whites and cream of tartar into stiff peaks, gradually add the castor sugar and whisk till thick and glossy. Sift the icing sugar over and fold into the mixture in three batches.
6. Mix the cocoa, nuts, grated chocolate. Fold into meringue mixture.
7. Place spoonful’s on baking sheets, or use a piping bag so pipe 24 spiral peaks onto baking sheet.
8. Bake for 40 min until firm and remove from oven. Leave to cool
9. Melt remaining chocolate and spread on base of meringues, leave to cool chocolate side up.
10. Whisk cream to soft peaks, sandwich meringues together and serve. You can leave the cream out if you prefer.

Make sure to make more than just one batch as they seem to disappear rather quickly!!

Cookies – greatest pleasures of life

There is no aroma like that of freshly baked cookies. It fills your nose, and it is like you almost pause to inhale slowly taking in every bit of the sweet, delectable sent.  The word ‘cookie’ is of Dutch origin and means ‘little cake’.  I absolutely love the idea of having lots of little scrumptious cakes.  The word ‘biscuit’ is of French origin and means ‘twice baked’.  When vacuum packed and fridges were still idle ideas, sailors used this technique to preserve their ‘ship cookies’.  Thank you to all those wonderful sailors and their preservation methods.  I don’t mind them too sweet and consider them ideal for every day consumption.  I love all types, but anything with chunky chocolate, or chocolate and nuts in the title will without a doubt get preference.  Here is a recipe for luscious treats.  I find them hard to share, so either make a whole lot of them, or keep them under lock and key!

Double Chocolate Cookies

115g unsalted butter

115g light muscovado sugar

1 egg

5ml vanilla essence

150g self-raising flour

75g porridge oats

115g plain chocolate, roughly chopped

115g white chocolate, roughly chopped

 

1.       Pre-heat oven to 190°C

2.       Lightly grease 2 baking sheets.  Cream butter and sugar in a bowl until pale and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla, mix well.

3.       Sift flour into mixture and fold lightly into it with a metal spoon. Add oats and chopped chocolate. Stir.

4.       Place small spoonfuls on baking sheets. Leave space for spreading.

5.       Bake for 15 – 20 min until pale golden.

6.       Cool for 2 min, transfer to wire rack.

I feel guilt free having chunks off these at a time, after all they contain oats…which is healthy… So dig in!!

Mother-In-Law Squares

As promised sooo very long ago, a super delicious recipe for gloriously moreish squares… You’ll only love it if you love licorice.

125g Butter

1/2 tin Condensed milk

375g Licorise Allsorts (mini)

1 Packet Marie biscuits (crushed)

1 Husband to crush biscuits

Melt butter and add condensed milk.  Get biscuits from hubby and add together with licorice allsorts.  Mix and press into dish 20cm x 30cm.

85g Vegetable Fat or White Marg

170g Cooking Chocolate

Melt Marg and chocolate and spoon over mixture in dish. Place in fridge, cut into fingers…. and wha la … scrumptious, drewl-at-the-thought, melt-in-the-mouth delights