Rocky Road Cupcakes

 

Rocky Road is a mixture of delicious things that I enjoy! So those cupcakes are perfect! The recipe intrigued me! Devil’s food cake and a unique condensed milk frosting containing marshmallows, more chocolate and almonds! Total delicious chocolate overload! The original recipe made 24 so I quartered it to make my usual amount of 6 cuppycakes! I pretty much followed the exact recipe from there except my lack of buttermilk and my inability to find it at my local shops (a fact I was none too surprised about!) so with a bit of research I found a recipe that states a tablespoon of acid added to a cup of milk made a buttermilk substitute. I used some white wine vinegar I had hanging about and left it for 5-10 minutes. I didn’t notice a huge change, I think I was expecting solid milk or something! But the recipe worked just fine so that's a trick to keep in the back of my mind!

The cakes were easy to whip together and the batter was thick and delicious!

So, scooped, baked and cooled. Frosting time! I’m usually rubbish at different frostings! Anything other than buttercream I mean! My only attempt at Swiss Meringue Buttercream was a nightmare and I ended up with a soupy mess that was no good for anything except the bin! So I was a bit concerned but actually this frosting was easy! And came together super easy with not much whisking involved! I think that it was essentially a fudge and the texture when chilled kinda confirmed that to me. But mixed with all the extras, it was gorgeous and I really struggled to save some in the bowl for the cakes! Could’ve eaten the lot! Easily! But I managed and on the cakes it went. The cakes were moist and soft and sooo good! Easily the best cupcake I’ve made in a while! And the frosting was tasty and surprisingly easy!

L x                                                                  

Chocolate Bread Pudding Cupcakes with toasted walnuts, homemade toffee and whipped cream.

So, I’ve become kinda lax about posting stuff on here. Who knew it’d take me so few posts! But here I am again! I baked these a long long time ago! But they were goooooood! That many o’s good! They were essentially just mini chocolate bread and puddings, but who doesn’t love anything that comes mini sized and in cupcake cases?!

The original recipe is here and I shan’t bother rewriting the whole recipe cos it’s fairly long! Which put me off somewhat to start with and I did, at first, dismiss it as too long winded and complicated. The thought of homemade toffee freaked me out and I did fear that me + boiling sugar = blackened ruined pan. But after a read through and a drool at the delicious looking photos, I figured what the hey, I’d risk it! And boy, was I glad I did!

The recipe makes 27. So I quartered it to supposedly give 6.75 cupcakes! I actually ended up with 8 but I was glad of that cos I got to eat more! The inaccuracy may have been down to me fiddling with the recipe and trying to quarter things and having to round up/down to get a measureable amount. Anyway… ingredients!

 

And onto the toffee… I decided that rather than panic about boiling sugar I would just stay calm, follow the recipe and if a pan got ruined then so be it! I will not be scared of molten sugar! So cream, golden syrup and sugar in a pan, basically boil until nutty brown and dissolved. The recipe stated 20 mins. Mine took maybe 5. Maybe I had the heat too high, I dunno. But it worked! Poured onto a heavily greased and papered baking sheet and left to cool for a couple of hours and it was perfect yummy crunchy toffee!

Notice the heavy greasing! I wasn’t letting that baby stick! Next… yummy chocolate custard! Actually this bit is pretty straight forward, the hardest thing is all the waiting! I did want to just drink the finished custard. It looked so deliciously chocolaty!

Yum! So that goes over the chopped brioche loaf already in the cupcake cases. The recipe states that the loaf cubes go in the custard then are scooped into the cases but the blurb above states that this is stupidly hard and suggests the method I followed which is cubes in the cases, custard in a jug and poured over then left to soak. I did forget to mix the broken up toffee and toasted walnuts in with the custard to allow them to mix in with the pudding but I sprinkled them on top and while I could see that inside the pudding would be better, it def still worked!

Resting puddings! So they get baked till the custard is set and the tops are brown and crispy on the edges. After cooling, they get topped with whipped cream that I sweetened with icing sugar and vanilla and the remaining broken up toffee and toasted walnuts.

And there we have it! Yummy yummy chocolate bread puddings that I’m dying to make again and I didn’t ruin a single pan! Score!

L x

Chocolate Chunk Cookies With Almonds And Marshmallows

Cookies are my arch nemesis! I've never managed to bake a cookie I was happy with. Too dry, too wet, too gross! But I decided to swallow my cookie fears and so i walked into the (brand spanking new) kitchen with a recipe and a small amount of hope in my heart! And it was not misplaced! These cookies are yummy! Maybe I overcooked them a tad but otherwise, delicious! The original recipe is from here, my notes in blue!

Chewy Chocolate Chunk Cookies with Salty Almonds and Gooey Marshmallows 

2 1/2 cups flour (1 1/4 c)

1/2 tsp baking soda (1/4 tsp)

1/4 tsp baking powder (1/8 tsp)

1/2 tsp salt (1/4 tsp)

1 cup packed brown sugar (1/2 c)

1/2 cup butter (1/4 c)

1/4 cup light corn syrup (1/8 c or 2 tbsp, much easier to measure, golden syrup which is the closest thing to light corn syrup available in the UK!)

2 eggs (1)

2 tsp vanilla (1 tsp)

1 cup chocolate, chopped (1/2 c chocolate chips)

1/2 cup salted, roasted almonds, chopped (1/4 almonds, apparently salted, roasted almonds are impossible to find! So I toasted and salted my own!)

1 cup marshmallows (1/2 c of yummy yummy marshmallows!)

 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. 

2. In a large bowl, beat together sugar, butter and corn syrup (golden syrup!) on medium speed of an electric mixture until light and fluffy. 

      

   Beat in eggs and vanilla. Reduce speed to low and beat in flour mixture.

   Fold in chocolate chunks (chips), chopped almonds and marshmallows.

 

 

3. Drop by tablespoons onto baking sheets. (I found that the cookie dough was firm enough to roll into balls) 

  Bake 10 minutes, just until no longer shiny. Let cool for 2 minutes on pans before transferring to wire racks. Store in an airtight container. 

There they are in all their glory! They tasted good! Maybe not quite sweet enough and the texture was a bit off but i figure thats just an excuse to keep baking cookies!

A few notes on various things, the best way to measure golden syrup, i've found, is to heat the measuring spoon on the gas flame of the hob (or in a glass of hot water), cuts through the syrup like butter! I got 12 cookies out of the halved recipe but i could have got a few more if I hadn't eaten so much cookie dough! Mmm cookie dough!

L x