Chocolate-Chunk Pecan Cookies!

Just before the end of the work week, the boss trotted along and requested for some baking to be put aside for a meeting on Tuesday as we have invited a client for a talk. Hence, beside the ginger cake, I decided to bake some cookies as well as not everyone is a fan of ginger!

These are chocolatey pecan cookies that spread in the oven so a dollop of dough produced quite a cookie size. The dough consists of 200g of melted chocolate and chocolate chunks so they smell really lovely when baking in the oven.

The original dough stated 12 cookies but I managed to get 27 good-sized cookies so imagine the size if I have only made 12!

Have just tried one and have to agree with the Husband that it is not sweet enough. Brilliant if you love dark chocolate but will probably try it with milk chocolate next time.

Sticky Stem Ginger Cake with Lemon Icing!

Still on the ginger trail...The Husband managed to track down black treacle at another supermarket and bought me four tins. I read that ginger cakes taste better after a few days to rest so I decided to bake this ginger cake a couple of days before I bring it into the office on Monday. However, you can see that a quarter cake is missing as I brought it over to the parents-in-law for dessert tonight. Reviews were good tonight. :)

The most difficult bit of making this cake is grating the stem ginger balls. As each ball is quite wet and syrupy, I grated most of a ball using a fork and then chopping the rest into tiny pieces. I was also quite worried when I was melting the sugar, golden syrup, black treacle and milk as they seemed to start forming little black bits but with more heating, the bits seemed to dissolve. The cake is then beaten into the flour mixture with the grated ginger before being poured into a cake tin and baked in the oven.

I am personally not a fan of ginger but the little chunk I tried had quite a kick!

Will keep you posted about taste on Monday!

Ginger Chocolate Chip Cookies!

At a restaurant the other night, I ordered a ginger and dark chocolate mousse tart which was really tasty. One of my dining companions, a young colleague, then mentioned that he was quite fond of ginger. I was reminded that the Husband is also quite a fan of ginger, so I went in search of a ginger baking recipe during the weekend.

I found this lovely ginger cookie recipe in one of my favourite BBC cookbooks. Combining both stem ginger bits and dark chocolate chips which are two of the Husband's favourite things, I decided I was on a winner.

This cookie turned out really well and the Husband had quite a few. It has been described as 'Very good. Just the right amount of ginger.' by a taster.

Chocolate Fudge Cupcakes!

The sweetest cupcakes I have ever made!

This weekend, the Husband suggested a visit to the niece and nephew, so I thought I will bake a batch of cupcakes for them as a treat. Knowing they are quite fond of chocolcate, I found this lovely cupcake recipe online that allows the baker to use any kind of toppings to decorate the cupcakes. As I have recently bought some lovely sprinkles and elephant sugar shapes on sale, I was quite keen to use them.

These cupcakes are really easy to make by melting the butter, sugar and chocolate in a big saucepan before stirring in the eggs and vanilla extract. The chocolate mixture is then stirred into the flour before being poured into muffin cases. Although the recipe originally only indicated 12 cupcakes, I managed to get 18 round and 6 heart muffins in the end.

The fudge icing is made out of another 200g of chocolate, double cream and icing sugar which is really tasty and more than sufficient for 24 cupcakes.


The Husband has pronounced them 'ok' as I wanted him to try one before dropping off a batch for the niece and nephew. Anyway, I hope they are enjoying them right now!

Double Chocolate Loaf Cake!

I thought it might be time to bake something chocolatey this weekend after baking the orange cookies. I found this chocolate loaf cake recipe online and thought it looked quite delicious and tasty.

It was also surprisingly quick as from weighing the ingredients to freshly baked out of the oven, the loaf cake took almost 2 hours. Although it is called a double chocolate loaf, the chocolate content is actually threefold - from the cocoa powder, chocolate chips to the milk and white chocolate drizzled onto the cake.

The Husband has suggested going halves on both cake and cookies to both teams in the office, so will keep you posted on taste!

Rainbow Cookies!

Earlier this week I promised to bake something for a team at work who attempted to help me to figure out a complex excel problem. As they are new to my baking, I wanted to bake something easy to eat and hopefully tasty. I found this recipe online and thought it looked quite sweet. If it fails on taste, at least it should not fail on looks!

The cookies are made out of icing sugar, golden caster sugar, butter, flour, egg yolks and orange zest. The Husband has commented that the cookie tastes a bit dry but the icing is pretty good. I thought the dough looked a bit flaky after adding the flour so should probably add some milk or orange juice next time.The icing is made out of orange juice mixed into icing sugar so there is a tang to it.

Will keep you posted about feedback from other tasters!

Pecan, Orange and Oat Crumbles!

I found some orange dark chocolate in the cupboard and thought this recipe would allow me to bake with the bar as well as adding some plain dark chocolate. This recipe also seems vaguely healthy with its mix of oats, nuts and dark chocolate.

The original recipe called for pistachios which I do not have readily available so I substituted them with pecans instead, hopefully not affecting the overall taste.

This was an easy to make cookie recipe and I got 30 cookies in total. The Husband has described them as a bit bland right out of the oven but the next morning, I found him chomping at them in the office!

Frosted Banana Bars!

Bananas and chocolate - what better combination can one come up with?

This weekend, I wanted to bake a traybake that is like a cake but easy to slice and eat. I found this recipe in one of my new baking books and thought it looked delicious.

The banana cake base did take some time with alternating spoonfuls of egg and flour to be mixed into the creamed sugar and butter batter before mixing in the mashed bananas but the batter smelled delicious while mixing and baking in the oven.

The chocolate frosting was 'cooked' while the cake was cooling in the tin. The frosting is made out of butter, icing sugar, cocoa powder and a couple tablespoons of milk and then melted over the stove. I am not sure if I did not melt the frosting enough as it was not as smooth as the picture in the book and I was paranoid it was burning in the pan. Hence, the frosting did not spread well and seems to harden really quickly so that the star sprinkles did not get a chance to 'stick' to the frosting. I was not impressed when I tested the cake but the Husband seems to like it well enough.

Conclusion: Depending on the piece of cake you get with the thickness of frosting and number of star sprinkles, it is a real sugar rush!