Chocolate & Peanut Butter Slice
Dear peanut butter fiends, as if you needed another reason to love peanut butter! I am going to show you something so deliciously peanut buttery and chocolatey that you just may explode!
Posts tagged ‘chocolate’
Sep 22
11 Comments
Sep 7
Lamingtons
As the story goes, the Australian lamington was created in December of 1901 in Government House in Queensland, where Lord Lamington was residing as the then-Governor of Queensland. Depending on which article you read on the internets, the lamington was either created by a maid working in the Government House kitchen who accidentally dropped a piece of sponge cake in melted chocolate, and at the suggestion of Lord Lamington, it was then sprinkled in shredded coconut to keep his fingers clean, or it was created out of a lack of ingredients by the chef at Government House when he was called upon unexpectedly to create something tasty for guests. There’s even another article that claims that whatever you read about the history of the lamington is probably a myth, as they were most likely created by Amy Shauer in a cooking class and named after Lady Lamington, who was the school’s patroness.
Whatever their true history, lamingtons are an Australian icon and you can find them in any bakery across Australia. Lamingtons are cube-shaped pieces of sponge cake, usually day-old sponge cake, that are dipped in chocolate icing and then rolled in shredded coconut. You might also see lamingtons that are filled with either jam or cream. They look very pretty (and sometimes they look very messy) and they are very yummy, especially when enjoyed alongside a hot cuppa.
Sep 3
Salted Chocolate Shortbread
It was the weekend. My mom and I were out at the mall, spending money here and there on things we didn’t necessarily need. We were tired from walking from shop to shop and carrying our shopping bags, and we were hungry. On the way home, we stopped at our then-favorite fast food restaurant, where we ordered our usual. Cheeseburgers, fries, and a Frosty – I’m sure our arteries were screaming in horror each time we stopped at this place!
Our conversations covered many topics as we calmed our hungry bellies, but there was always one topic that came up every time – my mom’s lifelong habit of dipping her French fries into her Frosty/milkshake/ice cream and then eating them. I found it appalling, yet somewhere deep inside, secretly, I knew exactly what she meant. I liked to drink a big swig of my milkshake after eating a handful of fries. But never, never, would I ever blatantly dip a French fry into my milkshake like that. The very act was offensive, to say the least.
Aug 25
Vegan Chocolate Cupcakes
My baby boy, Miles, turned 1 year old yesterday. I can hardly believe it. He’s been the sweetest, most easy-going baby I’ve dealt with so far. His only problem is that he still only has two teeth. I’ve been reluctant to try too many different foods, like the chewier or harder kinds, because of this. He doesn’t like a lot of the solid food that I give him, but so far he likes French fries (I know, worst food ever!), bread, crackers, cheese, yogurt and cucumbers. Bananas and strawberries and apples, not so much.
He doesn’t like pureed food. I believe it’s because he has to be spoon-fed to eat it properly, and when he sees his older sister and brother eating with their fingers or a fork or spoon, he wants to eat like they are. After all, spoon-feeding is for babies!
Recently I went shopping for bigger clothes for Miles with my mother-in-law and bought him a couple of outfits. You’d think that he could just wear clothes that his 3-year-old brother had grown out of, but don’t forget that we moved to the Southern Hemisphere – the summery clothes that fit his older brother when he was 1 year old will not do in winter Down Under! Our seasons are completely opposite and this has been a little annoying, as we’ve had to basically buy all new clothing for the baby. Ah well, it’s not all bad though – shopping for baby clothes is so fun (and terribly addicting)!
For Miles’ first birthday celebration I planned on making a simple batch of colorful cupcakes. I decided on chocolate-on-chocolate cupcakes with mini rainbow chocolate chip decorations.
Aug 18
Chocolate Hazelnut Meringues
I made these cupcake-like meringues earlier this year but never actually posted about them. The recipe comes from Australian Women’s Weekly magazine; it was yet another recipe I found while in the parents’ room at my daughter’s ballet lessons. I didn’t rip out the page that the recipe was printed on, and I didn’t copy it down because I didn’t have a pen. Instead, I thought that I’d surely find it on the internet. But it wasn’t listed at the AWW website and I couldn’t find any recipe like it. I really wanted to make these meringues and didn’t want to wait until the next week’s ballet lesson to copy the recipe! I asked on the forum at taste.com.au if anyone had the recipe and luckily someone typed it up for me.
Aug 6
Dark Chocolate Cookies With Pistachios And Milk Chocolate Chunks
I love food magazines. I currently have three favorite ones – MasterChef Australia, delicious., and Good Taste. A few issues of each of these are scattered on my coffee table and I find myself frequently flipping through them. It seems that different recipes appeal to me on different days – one recipe that I don’t like so much one day may be a recipe that I love on the next day.
The recipe I’m about to share with you was one of those that I didn’t like one day, but fell in love with the next day – dark chocolate cookies with pistachios and milk chocolate chunks. It comes from the August 2010 issue of delicious. magazine, and was created by Bill Granger.
I’ve never been keen on pistachios, which is why I originally skipped over the recipe. Sure, the picture of the cookies in the magazine looked droolworthy, but when I read that there were pistachios I just turned the page. But the next time I looked at the magazine, these cookies basically screamed out at me to make them immediately. I had everything on hand already, except the pistachios. I chose a bag of pistachios that were already shelled so that I wouldn’t have to waste time in shelling them myself.
Jul 6
Chocolate Malteser Cake
We celebrated my son’s 3rd birthday over the weekend. It wasn’t anything special, as I’m not that great of a party planner! We just invited nana over, had a picnic and cake outside and opened presents. I didn’t even make the cake from scratch (I can hear your sounds of disgust at that statement!). I used Green’s Really Good Chocolate Cake mix and got a lovely, dense, chocolatey cake that I decorated with crushed Maltesers (the Australian version of Whoppers in the US).
Jun 8
Chocolate Shortbread
Here’s a little scenario. You have a craving for something chocolate. A chocolate cake, or cupcakes, or brownies perhaps. You dig out your favorite chocolate recipe to make sure you have all the ingredients… you realize you’re out of eggs… you don’t have a block of chocolate… your baking powder has expired… oh great, you can’t make anything after all! But wait…
Don’t give up! I have something for you! It’s buttery, it’s tender, it’s chocolatey, it’s chocolate shortbread!
Jun 4
Chocolate Raspberry Cream Cake
My current favorite show on TV is MasterChef Australia. I watch it almost religiously each night (except Saturdays, which is the only day of the week that it isn’t on). It’s gotten to the point where, anytime I’m actually cooking or baking something from a recipe it feels like Gary Mehigan, George Calombaris and Matt Preston are looking over my shoulders, probably getting ready to play some mind games with me and ask if I think what I’m doing will turn out okay, or if I’ll finish in time.
I can’t say that watching MasterChef has made me any better in the kitchen. I have learned a couple of tricks and gained an ounce or two of knowledge about something or other. For instance, I don’t use a garlic crusher anymore; I use a knife and finely chop the garlic instead (Matt Moran is apparently disgusted with garlic crushers as they bruise the garlic). And if I need mayonnaise again, I’ll be making my own (Gary, George and Matt were obviously disgusted when one contestant used a jar of pre-made mayonnaise). Just things like that, I’ve learned. Nothing too life-changing.
My favorite parts of MasterChef are the Invention Tests (where the contestants have to make a dish based on one theme ingredient) and the Pressure Tests (where the 3 contestants of the least-liked dishes from the Invention Tests have to face off and one will be eliminated). One week, at one of these Pressure Tests, the dish they had to prepare was a black forest cake (recipe & photo here). This cake was 5 layers of sponge cake, chocolate ganache, mascarpone, hazelnut praline mousse, cherries, shaved chocolate, more cherries, it was like the black forest cake to end all black forest cakes.
Jun 1
Sweetness The Patisserie, Part 2!
Oh yes, it’s true, I went back to Sweetness The Patisserie in Epping again. There were just so many different things to try there that I couldn’t cover them all in one visit, of course, so I had to go back. I had to go back for that fudge, and more of those marshmallows.
May 18
Sweetness The Patisserie
I love being back in Sydney. There are so many amazing bakeries to explore. I’ve been back in Sydney for almost 6 months but I’ve hardly explored outside of my suburb, mostly because the most amazing bakeries are at least one hour away from me (or at least the ones I know about are!). On a recent trip to the library to borrow a back issue of delicious. magazine (November 2009) I found a photo reference to Sweetness The Patisserie at Epping. I instantly perked up because Epping is not far away from me at all. A few days later, I was standing inside of Sweetness The Patisserie with my 2-year-old son, trying to make a decision on what to buy from this beautiful shop.
The shop is indeed beautiful. I wasn’t brave enough to ask if I could take a photo inside the shop, so all you get is this sideways shot of the outside! The inside of the shop is loaded with sweet treats of all kinds, including macarons, marshmallows, fudge, toffee, truffles, or, easier yet, let’s just say that if it’s sweet, it’s in this shop!
