Blogging Holiday

Sorry there havent been any postings for some time. I have been trying to get everything done before the baby arrives (due next week). I have been keeping up with my TWD baking, but havent got round to posting yet. Please be patient with me over the next few weeks as my life changes!! I promise to keep posting, but I can't promise to be as regular as I was once was :0)

I will post a TWD catch up either later today or tomorrow

Tammy :0)

LBD of puddings

This white chocolate and hazelnut blondie is actually something I made prior to Christmas for a team lunch. Brownie/blondie is always a good thing to make when you want to make a dessert in advance and also something that you can dress up or dress down – kind of like the little black dress of puddings.

I actually prefer brownie to blondie. I do love white chocolate but it can be a bit cloying when baked into something. This blondie was a little different in that it had chopped hazelnuts in it. I served it with a berry sauce (a bought one – my sister is a school teacher and last year the seniors made and sold berry sauce as part of a young enterprise scheme. The sauce is delicious, although quite tart) which was a nice contrast to the sweetness of the white chocolate blondie. But, I must say, I would have preferred a true brownie with chunks of white chocolate in it. Still, it’s always good to try new things.

So, the dolled up version of the blondie is with the berry sauce. The everyday version is cut into wedges and put into my husband’s lunch box.

The blondie recipe was in Dish magazine and you can find it here.

TWD - Mrs Vogel's Scherben

This week’s TWD recipe is Mrs Vogel’s Scherben and was chosen by Teanna of Spork or Foon. I have to confess, looking through the whole Baking from my Home to Yours book, this recipe is probably the last recipe I would pick to make – mainly because the cookies are deep fried. And, in fact, I was very close to not making these until I read that others had brushed the dough with oil and baked in a hot oven. I decided to do that too.

I halved the recipe to make just enough scherben to taste. They are almost like strips of unsweetened shortcrust pastry, dusted with cinnamon sugar and icing sugar at the end. My husband and I ate one each, but I threw the rest out as they are the kind of thing that even though you don’t really like them, they are strangely compelling to eat. I wont be making these again, but am still happy that I didn’t decide to completely give them a miss.

See what the other TWDers thought here.

TWD - holiday catch up

Well, not only have I been a slack blogger over the Christmas break, I have also been a slack baker! It has been a busy but relaxing Christmas period and I have been doing lots of reading and resting, quite focussed on the arrival of our wee one, and not so much baking.

I did do the last two TWD recipes. I made the low and luscious chocolate cheesecake for Christmas day. It made the perfect accompaniment to the other puddings I made which were individual pavlovas, red and green jellies, strawberry trifle and lots of fresh strawberries. The cheesecake was very rich and made a rather large cheesecake, but with 11 of us for Christmas, we ate the whole thing over a couple of days. I actually made the base with arnotts rice biscuits to make it gluten free so my Mum could eat it too.



I have to confess I only made the cocoa buttemilk birthday cake yesterday afternoon and my husband and I had a small piece each as a last holiday treat. The cake was baked for the second anniversary of TWD – we could choose between the cake and tarte tatin. Tarte tatin is not one of my favourite puddings, so I opted for the cake. I actually halved the recipe and made the cake in little oval tins. Half the recipe still made a rather substantial cake.

I didn’t fill the cake with the buttercream Dorie suggested, but simply filled it with whipped cream flavoured with icing sugar and vanilla. Dorie is right, this is a great cake! It’s denser than a sponge, but still light enough to taste fabulous with whipped cream. I will definitely be making this cake again.

You can see what the other TWDers thought of this recipe here.