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The Humble Pitta Bread
The Humble Pitta Bread
Pitta bread is one of my all time favourite staples to accompany food. I assumed that it would be a lengthy and complicated process to make some at home. There are a ton of recipes on the internet that differ in time and ease of preparation.
I found a recipe on BBC Good Food. This was quick and easy to make the only thing I did differently was, I didn’t add Onion seeds.
Ingredients
250g/9oz str…
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One egg cupcakes.
We all have days when we really fancy a quick treat, but don’t want to have loads of it left over. Mine is cupcakes, as much as I enjoy baking and having them with my coffee, I don’t always want to have loads left over.
On a bright and sunny Doha afternoon, my daughter and I decided amongst ourselves that we wanted to have some cupcakes, warm straight from the oven… and that is when I found this…
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Classic Victoria Sandwich Cake.
A few weeks ago my Daughter had International Day at school, where the parents were encouraged to bring in a dish native to them, for a class of four year olds, as you can imagine it was a tough audience to cater to.
But my biggest dilemma was choosing a dish! As a family of East African Asians we have both East African and British roots, with both sets of grand parents having been born and…
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#baking made easy#classic english cake#Classic Victoria sandwich cake#easy baking#easy Victoria sandwich cake#summer cake
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Take a Coffee Break today...
Take a Coffee Break today…
Daily life has become a bit of race against time for most of us, be it work, family life or social commitments. We are constantly bombarded with demands on our time from all angles that we forget to slow down and appreciate the simpler pleasures that surround us.
A cool breeze on a hot summers day. The joy in the laughter of a child, or the lovely imagination in their story telling. The smell…
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Farmhouse Loaf, a basic white bread loaf.
Farmhouse Loaf, a basic white bread loaf.
There is nothing that I enjoy more then the smell of freshly baked goodies, especially bread! The next best thing is to break off a piece of freshly baked bread….add lashings of butter and some jam, its pretty close to heavenly as heavenly gets!
In quest to replicate this feeling in my own home, I decided to bake a loaf of bread for the very first time! Having never baked bread of any sort. I…
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Banana Muffins... A healthy treat.
Banana Muffins… A healthy treat.
Bananas are an all time favourite fruit in my household, but the hot and humid climate of the country is not very kind to them. They tend to get over ripe in a very short span of time if not eaten within a few days, as often is the case.
As was the case again not too long ago, when I had bananas that were perfectly eatable but had ripen a little more then any one of likes them to be…..so I did…
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In the past when I’ve had friends over we have always enjoyed a good mug of coffee with a slice of cake or some yummy cookies. It’s no different when we are having a catch on FaceTime or Skype, we each have a mug of coffee and whatever treat we have laying around the house.
A recent catch up with a lovely friend inspired me to make these Oaty nutty chocolate chip cookies.I have been wanting to experiment baking with Oats for a while now and I found a recipe from a BBC Good Food book, it’s called Oaty Cherry Cookies.
I added my twist to the recipe as I had half the original ingredients, and was craving cookies with a nutty chocolate taste to them.
Stored in a air tight container in a cool room these will easily last you over a week, while maintaining their crunch.
Ingredients
250g/9oz butter softened.
50g/2oz caster sugar
100g/3 1/2 oz muscovado sugar
150g/5 1/2oz self-raising flour
225g/8oz any muesli mix. ( mine had nuts, raisins and mixed dried fruit)
50g/2oz flaked almonds
200g/7oz chocolate chips( I used half milk chocolate and half white chocolate)
1.Preheat the oven to 180c/Gas 4/Fan oven 160C. Line two to three trays with baking parchment.
2. Mix the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Stir in the flour and the muesli and mix well. Stir in the rest of the ingredients until well incorporated.
3. Using a medium sized ice cream scope, scope the mixture on to the prepared trays, ensuring there is enough space between each dough ball as the cookies spread while they bake. Lightly flatten each biscuit with your fingertips, keeping the mixture rough looking.
4. Bake for 15-2o minutes until the cookies are pale golden around the edges, but still feel soft in the centre. Cool on the baking sheets for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool.
Happy baking xx
Chocolate chip cookies with a twist In the past when I've had friends over we have always enjoyed a good mug of coffee with a slice of cake or some yummy cookies.
#almond cookies#baking#baking made easy#chocolate chip#chocolate chip cookies#coffe break#cookies#easy baking#Homemade#oatmeal
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Naked or Iced?
Naked or Iced cakes? Which one rocks your boat?
Imagine a world where there is no icing on cakes!!!! I can’t even begin to think of a Chocolate cake or a Red Velvet Cake without any Buttercream or Cream Cheese frosting!
But when does the icing stop being that extra oomph of goodness that only enhances the taste of the cake to being too much and sickly sweet??
Is there anything as too much icing? I enjoy my dollop of icing as much as the next…
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#baking#baking made easy#buttercream icing#chocolate buttercream frosting#Classic Victoria sandwich cake#cream cheese frosting#easy baking#Homemade#naked cake
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The combination of walnuts and coffee is a personal favourite of mine! Nothing beats a slice of coffee and walnut cake with a steaming hot mug coffee. Lets just say that I tend to be a very happy person with all that caffeine rushing through my bloodstream.
I’ve tried a few recipes of this combination, but my personal favourite’s is by Nigella Lawson.
It’s a simple and fast recipe to follow, she makes her’s in a food processor. I’ve tried this recipe with a hand mixer, a stand alone mixer and a food processor and the results have always been the same. The only difference is how you chop the nuts, with a food processor you can blitz them quite quickly; with both hand mixer and a stand alone mixer you need to chop or blitz them separately.
I decided to make cupcakes instead of baking sandwich cakes to layer and ice.
This cake mix made 24 medium sized cupcakes. To ensure that I have an equal amount of cake mix in all cupcake cases, I used a ice cream scope.
A small tip to ensure that the cake mix does not stick to the scope is to rub some butter all over the scope with a kitchen roll.
Please do share your thoughts and comments with us.
Happy Baking xx
Coffee and Walnut Cupcakes The combination of walnuts and coffee is a personal favourite of mine! Nothing beats a slice of coffee and walnut cake with a steaming hot mug coffee.
#baking#baking made easy#coffe break#easy baking#Homemade#naked cakes#naked cupcakes#walnut and coffee cake#walnut and coffee cupcakes#walnut cake#walnut cupcake
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The Joy of Baking
The Joy of Baking
Everyone that bakes does it for different reasons. Some for the joy of creating a new recipe or they simply enjoy the process of creating some thing and sharing it with others.
I started baking when my sister gently nudged me to try new recipes and shared her baked goodies. And I was hocked! And just like my mom and sister I love to share my baked goods with family and friends. Nothing beats a…
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Time again when I start planing my daughter’s birthday party. This year’s requested flavour was chocolate with chocolate frosting! This was after she changed her mind about twice
The chocolate cake bit was easy, as I had made this cake from Marry Berry’s 100 Cakes and Bakes before, and it is my all time favourite cake.
It is the simplest, easiest and tastiest chocolate cake ever!!
I made a two tier cake, the bottom one had three layers. For this I repeated the recipe three times in three 9inch tins. For the top tier I used two 7inch tins for this I just divided the cake mixture into the tins.
CAKE
2 oz (50g) cocoa
6 tablespoons boiling water
3 eggs
2 tablespoons milk
6 oz (175g) self raising flour
1 rounded teaspoon baking powder
4oz (100g) baking spread especially for cakes or soft butter
10 oz (300g) caster sugar
ICING AND FILLING
5oz (150g) Bournville chocolate broken into small pieces
5 floz (150ml) pouring double cream
3 tablespoons apricot jam
1 small bar white chocolate (optional)
INSTRUCTIONS
Pre-heat the oven to 180ºC/160fan/Gas 4
Grease 2 x 20cm (8”) push sandwich tins.
First measure the cocoa and boiling water into a large bowl, and mix well to make a paste. Add the remaining ingredients and beat again until combined. Divide the cake mixture between the prepared tins. Bake in the pre-heated oven for about 30 minutes until well risen and shrinking away from the sides of the tin. Cool for ten minutes. To turn out loosen the sides of the tin with a palette knife if needs be, then stand the tin on a mug or baked bean tin, hold the sides firmly and press down to release.
For the icing and filling, pour the double cream into a saucepan and place over a medium heat until just simmering, remove from the heat, then add the chocolate and stir well until the chocolate is melted and the mixture smooth. Set aside and allow to become cold and almost set.
Spread the tops of each cake with apricot jam. Sandwich the cakes with half the icing and spread the remainder on top. Take a small palette knife and draw large “S” shapes to give a swirl effect. Shave the white chocolate into curls with a potato peeler and arrange over the top of the cake if liked to decorate.
This cake is amazing with or without the icing. I didn’t use the above mentioned icing, instead I used a Chocolate buttercream icing. Ill share that in the next post. To keep this moist for over a week place it in a air tight container if keep in cool dry place.
Chocolate birthday cake
The Very Best Chocolate Fudge Cake Time again when I start planing my daughter's birthday party. This year's requested flavour was chocolate with chocolate frosting!
#Birthday cake#chocolate buttercream frosting#chocolate cake#Mary Berry very best chocolate fudge cake
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Finger licking Chocolate Buttercream Frosting.
Finger licking Chocolate Buttercream Frosting.
I love a good tasting chocolate frosting, having searched high and low for the perfect chocolate buttercream frosting, finally found one that I thought would work and gave it my own twist.
I have been making my own Vanilla buttercream frosting for years now…but never a chocolate one.
It was amazing easy to make and passed the finger licking goodness test with flying colours.
This icing was enough…
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Buttercream Icing.
As far cake decorating is concerned, buttercream icing is the holy grail. It’s extremly versatile, It can be used for sandwiching cakes, cram-coating a cake before the fondant goes on. And it can be used for decorating cupcakes and cakes with all the different icing nozzles and pipping bags.
Not only is it really easy to make, but it can also be stored in a airtight container in the fridge for a…
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The one thing that I have always struggled to bake well has been the chocolate chip cookie!! Up till today I have never managed to bake a good cookie! They would either be hard as rocks or just melt into a massive sheet of crunchy dry cookie!
Given my past failures with these cookies, you can imagine the horror I felt when my daughter requested I bake these for a play date!! Her “butter would not melt in my mouth” look made it very hard to say no!
So I did what I do best. I trolled the internet to look for a recipe that I had not yet tried and failed at! And trust me I’ve tried and tested a fair few!
Until I came across this recipe from the Nigella Lawson website. It is a very simple and straight forward recipe to make. And best of all it made amazing cookies!
They turned out with just the right about of crunch to accompany a lovely cup of tea or coffee. I kept mine in the oven for a bit longer as I like my cookies to have a bit of a crunch. If you like them to have a soft middle reduce the baking time. I also use a medium sized ice cream scope, to scope the dough on to the baking trays. I like to do so as to ensure that I have evenly shaped and sized cookies, I got 19. You can hand shape them to the size you like.
If you feel that the dough is too sticky, refrigerate it for 10 to 15minutes, this will help you hand shape them without the dough being too sticky.
Please do share you pictures and thoughts. Did it work for? Taste right?
Happy Baking xx
Chocolate Chip Cookies. The one thing that I have always struggled to bake well has been the chocolate chip cookie!!
#baking#baking made easy#chocolate chip cookies#easy baking#easy chocolate chip cookies#Homemade#nigella lawson
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Delicious, Finger Licking Red Velvet Cupcakes.
Delicious, Finger Licking Red Velvet Cupcakes.
I had been craving a Red velvet cupcake for absolutely ages! Having been disappointed time and time again by the bakeries in Doha and coffee houses, that either made them too sweet or too dry! I decided to try my hand at making them. For some reason I’ve always assumed that they were difficult and time-consuming to bake, I could have not been more wrong.
I did what I always do when looking for a…
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#cream cheese frosting#cupcake Jemma#cupcakes#easy baking#Homemade#joy of baking#quick recipes.#red velvet cupcakes#simple pleasures
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The academic year at my daughter’s school is winding up, and as usual before the end of the term they are having a party day! It’s one of the few days in a year that the kids are allowed to bring in unhealthy treats to share with their friends.
As usual the request was chocolate cupcakes! There was only one recipe that come to mind ….and that is the Iced Chocolate Tray bake by Marry Berry. I have tried this recipe loads of times and it has never failed me. It works just as well as a tray bake as it does with cupcakes.
This recipe makes 28 medium sized cupcakes.
4 level tbsp cocoa powder
4tbsp hot water
225g butter softened
225g caster sugar
275g self raising flour
2 level tsp baking powder
4 large eggs
4tbsp milk
For the icing and decoration.
4tbsp apricot jam
150gram plain chocolate ( 39 plain cocoa solids, chocolate chips would work just as well)
6tbsp water
350g sifted icing sugar ( I used 300g and it turned out lovely)
1 tsp sunflower oil
preheat the oven to 180c/Fan 160c/gas 4. Prepare the cupcake trays with the cupcake cases.
Blend the cocoa with the hot water and allow to cool slightly, measure all the cake ingredients into a large bowl and mix until well blended. Scope the mixture into the prepared cupcake tray. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes. Place on a cooling rack to cool.
For the icing warm the apricot jam in the microwave and brush the tops of the cupcakes. This gives a lovely flavour. This is a good trick to ensure that the crumbs from the cake do not get mixed with the icing.
Break the chocolate into pieces into a microwave prof bowl with the water and heat for 30 seconds or until the chocolate is melted. Leave to cool slightly then beat the icing sugar and oil until smooth. Pour over the cooled cupcakes and smooth over gently with the back of a teaspoon.
These should be stored in a air tight container, and they will keep up to 5 days.
Please do let us know your thoughts and comments.
Happy Baking xx
Iced Chocolate cupcakes The academic year at my daughter's school is winding up, and as usual before the end of the term they are having a party day!
#baking#baking made easy#chocolate cupcakes#cupcakes#easy baking#easy quick cupcakes#Homemade#iced chocolate traybake#marry Berry#simple pleasures
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Fluffy, Yummy American Pancakes
Fluffy, Yummy American Pancakes
Pancakes are a sure breakfast hit in my household, especially with my daughter. And up till a couple of months ago I thought I had the perfect recipe, for the perfect American Pancakes.
Up till the point that I made some for my nieces, and this was when my lovely niece introduced me to this simple but amazing recipe by James Martin. ( BBC food to the rescue as always) She bet me that it would…
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