What We’ve Been Baking

We’ve been getting our bake on a fair bit lately, but unfortunately the stuffing of baked goods into our mouths took precedence over photographing our efforts on many occasions! So here is a little roundup of our bakes, I’m sure we’ll be making them again soon and we will try to be better bloggers so we can give you proper recipes.

First up for a charity Bake Sale at Bird’s work we made Raspberry & Blueberry Cheesecake Brownies and Challah. The brownies were immense – gooey, sweet, and a little bit sharp from the berries and the cream cheese. We will definitely be baking these again! We’ve got a feeling Fats’ family will be particularly fond of these…

The beautiful swirls before baking

The finished article! (sorry about the naff Instagram quality)

Challah is a Jewish enriched bread, it’s sort of like brioche, soft, light, slightly sweet and so moreish. Apparently it makes amazing french toast too but we’ve never had enough left over to make it, oops! We shaped ours into a simple 3 strand plait, simple but quite effective.

Plain Challah

Slightly wonky poppyseed Challah

Lastly, and firmly on the savoury front, some little rye and poppyseed rolls made in ramekins, not only adorable but a great way of making bread stay fresh for days as you aren’t cutting into a loaf. We simply made half the usual amount (so 250g of flour) but still followed our basic bread recipe, using around 1/3 rye flour and 2/3 strong white flour. These also made very cute little pieces of toast!

The rolls before baking

They rose more than expected!

So that’s what we’ve been baking, hopefully we can share the full recipes with you soon. What have you been baking lately?

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Raspberry, Orange and Almond Chocolate Brownies

Think of these as trans-seasonal brownies. Like a light jumper but more… gooey. That perfect snack for when there’s a bit of a chill in the air and you want some comforting chocolateyness but with a light, summery twist. These are based on a Lorraine Pascale (don’t you just want to be her best friend? We love her!) recipe which uses pieces of Oreo cookies. We tried them and were pleasantly surprised (not being massive Oreo fans) but the bit that really impressed us was the perfectly gooey, rich brownie mixture. So we have taken that and added our own flavours too it – this time we used orange zest, almond extract and fresh raspberries for a little of jam-like tart raspberry in every mouthful.

Ingredients

• 165g butter, plus extra for greasing
• 200g dark chocolate, grated or finely chopped
• zest of 1 medium orange, finely grated
• 3 free-range eggs
• 2 free-range egg yolks
• 1 tsp almond extract
• 165g soft light brown sugar
• 2 tbsp plain flour
• 1 tbsp cocoa powder
• pinch salt
• 150-200g fresh raspberries

Preheat the oven to 180°C. Grease a 20cm/8in square baking tin with butter, then line with baking paper.

Melt the butter in a pan over a medium heat. When the butter has melted, remove the pan from the heat and add the grated (or chopped) chocolate along with the orange zest.

We ended up having half grated, half chopped chocolate because grating seemed too much like hard work! So we recommend chopping (if you have a large knife) unless you have a food processor to do the grating for you.  Leave to stand for a few minutes, or until the chocolate melts, and then stir together. Resist the urge to eat this mixture, the finished mixture tastes so much better.

Whisk the eggs, egg yolks and almond together in a large bowl until the eggs begin to get light and fluffy. Add the sugar in two additions, whisking between each. Pour it around the side of the egg mix so as not to knock out the air that has been whisked in. Keep whisking until the mixture becomes stiffer. Once the egg mixture is ready, pour the chocolate into it – again around the sides so as not to knock the air out. Add the flour, cocoa powder, and salt and stir until fully combined, then pour half of the mixture into the prepared tin. Place your raspberries in an even layer over this and then pour on the other half of the mixture.

Bake on the middle shelf of the oven for 25–30 minutes.. Leave the brownies to cool in the tin – the top will sink and crack a little. Cut into small squares because they’re pretty rich and then enjoy!

Instabrownies!

These little squares of joy will likely crumble and squidge all over you as you eat them but oh god are they worth it! Nothing better than curling up with these and a cup of tea or coffee as the nights start to draw in. We’re already thinking of the next flavour combination to try, at the moment we’re thinking espresso and hazelnut… any other suggestions?