Squidgy chocolate brownies

One of my favourite, most popular, and most frequent things to bake is chocolate brownies. I love them, Steve loves them, and everyone else who tries them loves them. These chocolate brownies are rich and squidgy, with an excellent crack on the top, plenty of moistness, and real chocolateyness.

I added white chocolate chunks to this batch, to make them a bit special. I made them for our recent day out at Rockingham, to watch the British Touring Car Championship, with Steve, his brother, and my brother. They went down a treat! I love to people watch, and I was amazed by the amount of burgers, pizzas, hot dogs, and other meat-related things were being scoffed at the event - at 9am! Nothing could beat these brownies.

200g dark chocolate - I use a 75% cocoa bar
175g butter
325g caster sugar
130g plain flour
3 eggs, beaten
100g white chocolate (I used good ol' Milkybar)

Preheat the oven to 170C (160C fan oven).
Melt the chocolate and butter over a pan of simmering water until all melted and smooth. Remove from the heat and allow to cool a little.
Add the chocolate and butter mix to the sugar, and mix, but don't overwork.
Sift in the flour and stir, but again don't overwork.
Add the beaten eggs and mix, but be careful - if you mix for too long, it will start to look a bit weird and may separate a bit. Be gentle.
Chop the white chocolate into chunks - I found half a square to be a good size chunk - any smaller and they melt a little while being cooked, while half a chunk stays chunky. Stir into the mix.
Pour into a prepared baking tray. Bake for about 35 minutes. The top needs to feel hard and crisp, but don't use a skewer, as it will seem undone - but you want it to be squidgy.

Allow to cool in the tin. To serve, slice into squares, and dust with icing sugar.

For Christmas, I'm planning to try orange-flavoured chocolate with dried cranberries :) 

Stamford Clandestine Cake Club goes Black Tie

The second meeting of the Stamford Clandestine Cake Club on December 3 was a glamorous event, full of decadent delicious cakes.

With Christmas just around the corner, we wanted to shun all those sleek and sassy festive parties that we'd been invited to, and instead to meet at a cosy pub in our comfy clothes and let the cakes bringing the glamour. The theme was Black Tie, although all bakers ended up baking a variety of chocolate cakes. It was a testament to everyone's imagination and baking skills that each cake was different in taste, texture, colour, and look. Well done everyone!

Two nervous-looking bakers!

We had a few cancellations due to sickness, and indeed I nearly cancelled myself as I'm still recovering from surgery, slowly. But, nothing stops for cake, and eight of us got together to eat cake, talk about cake, and take cake home.

We met in the All Saints Brewery, aka Melbourne Brothers Brewery, in Stamford. This pub was another brilliant venue, full of ancient beams, comfy and characterful furniture, and lovely owners who really looked after us. We all commented on what a great pub it was and how we would all be returning. Maybe the CCC will make a return journey in the future!

The range of cakes included:
Red velvet cake
Three chocolate sponges, one with silver balls, one with chocolate sprinkles, and one with glitter, silver balls, and mini champagne bottles
Chocolate and caramel layer cake
French chocolate orange cake, decorated with a black tie silhouetted in icing sugar
Chocolate cloud cake with Cointreau cream 

Red velvet cake with white Malteasers

I decided on my own cake, the red velvet decorated with white Malteasers, thinking one might wear a red velvet dress accessorised with pearls (the Malteasers) to a black tie event. In the end, however, the food colouring didn't quite work and it was a brown velvet cake instead - but I still maintain that you may wear a brown velvet dress to a black tie event!!

It was good to see two male bakers at the event this time, although one was a guest and didn't bring a cake on this occasion, I'm hopeful he will bring one next time. The other male baker, Simon, showed off with his cloud cake, topped with Cointreau cream, and informed us that he certainly is a dedicated caker as his lunch was cake batter.

Chocolate caramel layer cake

The chocolate and caramel layer cake, by Anthea, was a real star, although we ignored the fact that it has about 12,000 calories in each slice! 

Thanks to everyone who made it and for all the effort everyone put in with their lovely cakes. I'm loving our Stamford cake club and long may it continue. Hopefully in the New Year all the nasty bugs that kept some members away will be gone and we can kick 2013 off with a big cakey bang. 

Spooky spiderweb fudge muffins

Happy Halloween! To celebrate the witching hour, and, more importantly, October's Calendar Cakes challenge from Dolly Bakes and Laura Loves Cakes, I made some scrumptious chocolate fudge spiderweb muffins. Don't get too scared, they're only cakes...

Spiderweb muffins in a witch's cauldron

The recipe is from BBC Good Food.

50g dark chocolate
85g butter
1 tbsp coffee (you can use milk or just water if you prefer, I used espresso coffee)
200g self-raising flour
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda
85g light muscovado sugar
50g golden caster sugar
1 egg
142ml soured cream

For the decorating:
100g dark chocolate
100g white chocolate

Don't be too scared of these fudge muffins

Melt the chocolate, butter, and coffee (or other liquid) in a glass bowl over simmering water. Allow to cool.
Mix together the dry ingredients and sieve.
Beat the egg and mix with the sour cream. Add this to the dry mix, then pour in the chocolate mix. Stir together carefully and don't over-mix.
Pour into muffin cases and bake at 190C (170C fan) for about 20 minutes.
 To decorate, melt the white and dark chocolate separately. Pour a little of each into separate piping bags. Spoon dark chocolate on to a muffin, quickly pipe circles of white chocolate on to the muffin, then use a small skewer to draw through the chocolate to make the spider web design. Do the same with the opposite design.

I found the decorating quick tricky as my kitchen was cold, and so the chocolate was hardening quickly. I would suggest melting half the chocolate at a time, and doing half a batch before melting the rest. Whatever you do, don't re-melt the chocolate if it hardens, as it will just turn into a glumpy mess. If the chocolate hardens inside the piping bags, I dipped them into the warm water over which I had melted the choc, which helped loosen it up a bit. Working quickly is KEY for them to look right. Mine are a bit hit and miss!

Summery white choc strawberry cake

It's July. It might be peeing it down with rain outside, with a rumble of thunder and flash of lightning every few minutes; I might be wearing a jumper and socks; I might be contemplating a hot chocolate later....but dammit, I will make summer come into the kitchen, with a slice of this delicious White Chocolate and Strawberry Cake. This fits very nicely into the Alphabakes 'W' challenge for July, and also into the Tea Time Treats summer cake stall challenge. There's nothing like a fabulous cake and a couple of cakey challenges to make you forget about how pants this UK summer is turning out to be.

White Chocolate and Stawberry cake

I made this cake for a friend's 30th birthday. We got him a couple of nice gifts, but these days I love to give a cake too. It's such a personal touch, and really cheers people up - everyone loves that extra bit of effort and care that a cake takes, and it's great to share it out amongst friends and family too. A bunch of cupcakes were made for the party too, with elaborate pink frosting, but I only had half. The frosting made me feel a bit sick, and I think a whole bottle of red food colouring was used to try to get a real red colour - it turned out pink anyway, and there are supposed to be limits to how much of that liquid colouring you use!! Sometimes only a cake will do.

I haven't made a cake with melted chocolate incorporated into the batter before - sure, I've used cocoa powder a million and one times, but this recipe was a bit different and I didn't know how it would turn out. It was delicious - sweet and chocolatey without being overpowering, allowing the sweetness of the fresh strawberries to really sing on their own.

Happy birthday cake!

I did whip the cream too much. I set it off in my Kitchenaid mixer, and was busy arranging the strawbs on the base of the cake when I heard the sound change - I didn't reach it quickly enough and it was overwhipped a little. But no one noticed apart from me.

I scoffed two pieces. One at the alloted cake eating time, and another at about midnight, after a few glasses of vino. It seemed like a good idea at the time, and I credit late-night cake to my lack of hangover the next day. I'd recommend it.

This recipe comes from 'The Great British Bake Off - How to Bake' that accompanied series 2. 

150g white choc
200g marg
3 eggs
150g caster sugar
zest of 1/2 orange
200g self-raising flour

Preheat oven to 180C (160 fan).
Melt the chocolate. This has to be done very delicately, as too much heat and the choc will go lumpy. I stopped just as it started to melt, and stirred manically for a while, until the residual heat melted it all.
Add the marg and stir until melted. 
Whisk eggs until frothy. Add the sugar and orange zest and whisk until very thick and mousse-like.
Add the chocolate mix to the egg mix and stir briefly.
Sift flour in and fold with a metal spoon.
Divide mixture between two 20.5cm tins (As usual, my tins are too small - 18cm - so I also made some fairy cakes with the mixture).
Bake for about 20 - 25 minutes.

For the filling and topping, whip 200ml double cream.
Slice 2/3 of a 400g tub of strawberries, and mix with zest and juice of half and orange and a tablespoon of caster sugar. Leave for about 10 minutes to marinade.
Spoon the sliced strawbs on to the bottom cake layer. Top with half of the whipped cream. Place the other cake half on top. Spread rest of cream over the top, and decorate with the remaining whole strawberries.
To finish, grate some white chocolate over the top.
Eat. Eat some more. Maybe have another slice. Enjoy.

Tea Time Treats is hosted in alternative months by Karen at Lavender & Lovage (this month's host) and Kate at What Kate Baked. The Alphabakes challenge is hosted in alternative months by Caroline Makes (this month's host) and Ros at The More Than Occasional Baker. 

Fairy cakes too