Banana Chocolate Chunk Muffins

I apologise for the delay in this post.  With the wedding being less than a week away now I've been caught up in all the last minute preparations, including baking 480 mini shortbread biscuits.  If you've seen the updates on twitter or facebook, you know I'm still not finished yet.  And of course there is still the cake to do as the absolute last minute thing to guarantee freshness on the day.  But there will be more about that in the wedding post when it comes.  For now, let's focus on delicious muffins!

As you may be aware I went to Glasgow a little over a week ago to see the lovely Rainbow Rowell.  All the gushing detail of said visit can be seen in the Pumpkin Mocha Brownie blog post.  I was not alone on said visit though.  I invited my very best friend Jess to accompany me.  Our last jaunt together had been just after I finished my final school placement back in May and just before the awful week I spent working on my e-portfolio.  She had then run off on holiday for 3 weeks so by the time the Rainbow Rowell trip rolled around we were well overdue for seeing one another.

Now that I am temporarily free of academic commitments I was actually able to find the time to bake her a gift, something I was unable to do last time and can feel awful about because she always gives me the cutest presents.  Last time it was a pig she had made and it is so adorable!  But I was devastated I had nothing to give in return.  I just had no time.  So this time around I was determined to bring something (other than that one birthday present that had escaped the package I sent).

The idea to use bananas is down to Facebook.  I'm still getting the hang of Facebook and have only recently started using my personal page (as opposed to the blog's page) for things.  Hence it needed some decoration and I used a picture of my banana cupcakes from last year for a header image, since it is nice and yellow.  Upon seeing it, Jess had remarked that she liked banana cake and thus I knew I would need to include it in whatever I chose to make.

I decided on muffins because it has been ages since I last attempted muffins, it was a bit different from making cakes and because I found a nice, easy looking recipe from Nigella to try out.  I added the chocolate chunks myself though to give it a little something extra.

Now, banana recipes often require really ripe bananas as they give a stronger flavour.  However, I don't keep bananas in my house because neither the fiancé or I eat them and I did not acquire bananas until the day I was needing them.  So of course they were not ripe enough.  So I ripened them myself!  A trick I learnt a while ago is that you can ripen bananas in the oven.  I put the oven on its lowest setting, put the bananas in a ceramic dish and 'cooked' them for about 20 minutes.  They turned completely black on the outside and beautifully soft inside, which made mashing them up very easy.  I would do this in advance of baking so they can cool down again before you use them.

And the final result? Delicious apparently!  They can be a little sticky around the edges after coming out the oven but all in all they are a good muffin.  Jess really liked them and so did the fiancé, and he's not really a fan of the chocolate and banana combination.

Recipe - adapted from How To Be A Domestic Goddess
Makes 12 

• 30g/1oz unsalted butter
• 60g/2oz honey
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 very ripe bananas 
• 150g/5oz plain flour
• 1 heaped tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
• Pinch of salt
• 100g/3.5oz chocolate chunks

1. Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F/Gas Mark 5 and line a 12 hole muffin tin with muffin cases.
2. Put the butter, honey and vanilla extract into a small pan and then place over a low heat to melt.
3. Stir together, remove from heat and set aside for a few minutes to cool slightly.
4. Mash the banana in a small bowl.
5. In a medium bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, cinnamon and salt.
6. Mix the honey butter mixture into the mashed bananas and then add it to the dry ingredients.
7. Mix until just incorporated (try not to overmix). 
8. Reserve some of the chocolate chunks to sprinkle on top and then add the rest to the batter, folding in gently.
9. Distribute the batter between the cases, filling them about two thirds full.
10. Add a few of the saved chunks to the top of each muffin.
11. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
12. Allow to rest in the tin for 5 minutes before removing and transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Vanilla Bean Chocolate Chunk Cookies

 

Why yes this is another chocolate chip cookie recipe.  There have been a few of late haven't there?  But I like them and I like trying out new recipes for them because there are so many out there!  Besides, these were to take in to share with a group during a project meeting and I figured most people would like this sort of cookie.  And if not then I could happily eat them myself.

The original recipe looked very tempting, especially as it used vanilla bean paste.  However, I don't have any of that. What I do have though, is 9 vanilla beans, so I thought I'd make use of one of those instead.  Then decided to add just a smidgen of extract too, just for an extra boost.  It worked out lovely.  I also used chunks instead of chips because that is all the local shop had but that was for the best.  There was so much chocolately goodness in each cookie as a result.  The only other thing I changed was the cooking time.  I kept them in just a bit longer than the original because I prefer some crunch to my biscuits.  They still had a slightly soft middle but not too much.

They were amazing cookies!  So so yummy.  Quite a good size and the amount of chunks in them was great.  Plus, since there was no chilling, they were made and baked rather quick (or as quick as I can go with one tray of 6 in the oven at a time).  Everyone who had one really liked them.  I will say though, I thought they tasted better the day after they were made.  They had firmed up just a little more by then and it was really hard not to keep eating them.  I had to be really restrained around my group.  Not so much after I got the leftovers home!

Recipe - adapted from The Domestic Rebel
Makes about 30

• 340g/12oz plain flour
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 2 tsp cornflour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 170g/6oz butter
• 125g/4.5oz light brown sugar
• 45g/1.5oz granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 vanilla bean
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 200g/7oz milk chocolate chunks

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line baking trays with greaseproof paper.
2. Mix the flour, salt, bicarbonate of soda and cornflour together in a medium bowl and set aside.
3. Beat the granulated and brown sugars together with the butter in a large bowl until smooth and creamy.
4. Remove the seeds from the vanilla bean and add to the sugar butter along with the egg and the vanilla extract.  Beat until well mixed.
5. Add the flour gradually, beating in after each addition.
6. Stir in the chocolate chunks.
7. Roll heaped tablespoons of the mixture into balls and place on the trays spaced 5cm/2inches apart.  Flatten slightly.
8. Bake for about 10-15 minutes or until the edges of the cookies are starting to turn golden brown.  Rotate halfway through to ensure even baking.
9. Allow to rest on the trays for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Chocolate Chip and Chunk Cookies

I was desiring cookies last week.  Chocolate filled cookies.  Lots of chocolate but without being an entirely chocolate cookie because I don't like those very much.  I could have made one of my other chocolate chips cookie recipes (I do have three others on here already) but where's the fun in that?  And it never hurts to have yet another recipe for such things.  They are all somewhat different so I can pick and choose based on what I'm in the mood for and how much waiting I can stand to do.

I wanted to try this recipe after seeing the photos.  Seriously, the photos from the original post are so gorgeous and the cookies look so inviting.  The oozy chocolate makes your mouth water.  Maybe they were shot straight from the oven, though after the required cooling period of course?  They are delicious right after said period, by the way.  Extra soft too.

So yes, this is a soft cookie recipe.  Very soft.  But oh so good, especially considering there was 340g/12oz of chocolate spread between 18 cookies in the form of chips and chunks.  Good quality chocolate too as I used Cadbury's Dairy Milk for my chunks.  I honestly recommend you choose your favourite chocolate for these cookies, which is why I did not specify a type in the recipe write up.  They are a fabulous cookie.  Both the fiancé and I have been enjoying them immensely.

Recipe - adapted from Averie Cooks
Makes about 18

• 170g/6oz butter
• 115g/4oz light brown sugar
• 40g/1.5oz caster sugar
• 1 egg
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 225g/8oz plain flour
• 2 tsp cornflour
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 170g/6oz chocolate chips
• 170g/6oz chocolate

1. Beat the butter in a large bowl until it is smooth.
2. Add the brown sugar and caster sugar to the butter and beat until creamy and pale.
3. Mix in the egg and the vanilla extract.
4. Add the flour, salt, cornflour and bicarbonate of soda to the mix and stir together until just incorporated.
5. Cut the chocolate into bite size chunks and add it and the chocolate chips to the dough.  Fold in.
6. Scoop out 60g/2oz amounts of dough and place on a plate or two.
7. Cover the plate with clingfilm and chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours (mine were chilling for about 4).
8. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line 2-3 baking trays with greaseproof paper.
9. Transfer the scoops of dough to the trays, spacing them about 5cm/2inches apart.  (I got 4 on a tray but I have small trays for a small oven).
10. Bake until the edges of the cookies are just starting to turn gold.  This will range from 8-15 minutes.  (The original recipe said 8-10 minutes but mine took longer).  The centres will still be very soft and will be pale.
11. Allow to sit on the tray for 5 minutes after removing from the oven before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies

So Christmas has come and gone.  It was a good one.  I got some fabulous things, including a number of new additions for my kitchen (which I now need to find space for) and some photo editing software that I have been coveting for a while.  There was also great food and lots of rushing about visiting people.  Admittedly I did end up feeling a bit homesick.  It's been three years since I was home for Christmas.  It is one of the downsides to living so far away with erratic circumstances: planning anything is nearly impossible.  But maybe I'll get to go down next year.

Anyway, since me being at university means there is only one source of income at the moment, plus the fact that we are planning and paying for a wedding next year, funds are a bit low.  There was money for buying presents for immediate family but extended family that we would be seeing on Christmas and Boxing Day, not so much.  But I love giving presents to people so I decided I would make the presents!  Or bake as the case actually is.  So December 23rd and 24th were spent baking over 200 biscuits!  I've never made so many before.  It was exhausting but worth it!  The majority were my favourite chocolate dipped orange shortbread (cut into stars), which were for the grandparents, aunts, uncles and older cousins.  The younger cousins got chewy chocolate chip cookies.  I didn't think either of those would suit the last giftee though, since he is only 3.  So I made something new just for him: banana chocolate chip cookies.

Unfortunately, I cannot provide his verdict on the cookies.  However, the fiancé got to eat the spares and he says they are very banana-ry and there's lots of chocolate chips to compliment it.  They're also slightly crunchy.  Yum yum!

Recipe - adapted from Biscuit via Baking Heaven volume 2

Makes about 24

• 100g/3.5oz butter
• 100g/3.5oz golden caster sugar
• 100g/3.5oz banana (about 1 banana)
• 200g/7oz plain flour
• 100g/3.5oz milk chocolate chips

1. Mash the banana in a large bowl with a fork.
2. Add the butter and sugar and beat together until smooth and creamy.  If it starts to curdle, add a spoonful of the flour.
3. Add the remaining flour and the chocolate chips to the mixture.  Beat together until a soft, sticky dough forms.
4. Form dough into a rough ball and wrap in clingfilm.  Chill in the fridge for 2-3 hours.
5. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line 2 baking trays with greaseproof paper.
6. Shape the dough into balls about the size of a walnut, place on the trays spaced about 3cm/1.5inches apart and then flatten them with a wet fork.
7. Bake for about 15-20 minutes or until the edges of the biscuits are golden brown.  The centres will still be a little soft.
8. Allow to rest on the trays for 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling. 

Cookie in Cookie Cookies

Oooooh, I've only been on placement for one day, after a lovely two week holiday, and am already exhausted!  And it's not like I've even started teaching yet!  This is an observation week with some group work thrown in.  The real hard work doesn't start until next week!  I do not know how I will cope.

Anyway, I knew it was going to be a lot of work so I made the most of my holiday and did practically nothing school related.  The fiancé and I did get the registrar booked for my wedding, and talk to hotel about the menu for the wedding breakfast.  We also took some pictures so we can get save the date cards made up and sent out (though that's still in process) and spent an entire week playing lots of Pokémon.  And then last Saturday I took a merry jaunt up to Perth to have lunch and go shopping with my best friend Jess!  Yay!

So, as has become the tradition, I baked her something.  Cookies!  Cookie within cookie cookies!  They are part chocolate chip cookie and part chocolate sugar cookie.  They are of the soft variety of cookie and ever so delicious.

The chocolate chip cookie part is adapted from one of my previous cookie recipes.  I swapped out the icing sugar for golden caster sugar and upped the amount of vanilla used.  The chocolate sugar cookies come from Smitten Kitchen, and are a very popular recipe indeed as they have cropped up on many a food blog.  It's not hard to see why though.  It is a fabulous recipe.  I did substitute in golden caster sugar for the brown sugar and due to only having large UK eggs (which are bigger than large US) meant my dough probably ended up stickier than it should have been, despite me adding a little extra flour.  However, they still turned out really well.  I did make sure to alter the recipe in the write-up to specify a medium egg though.

I was really pleased with the final result.  They looked rather cool and they are very, very yummy!  Jess definitely seems to like them, which is obviously the best thing for me to hear because I made them especially for her. 

Recipe - makes about 30

Chocolate Chip Cookie:

• 1 egg yolk
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 tbsp water
• 75g/2.5oz butter
• 45g/1.5oz golden caster sugar
• 155g/5.5oz plain flour
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• Pinch of salt
• 60g/2oz chocolate chips

1. Mix the egg yolk, vanilla extract and water together in a jug.
2. In a large bowl, blend together the sugar and butter until it is pale and fluffy.
3. Add the egg mixture to the sugar butter a little at a time, mixing in after each addition.
4. Sift in the flour, salt and baking powder, add the chocolate chips and stir together until just incorporated.  You should end up with a somewhat soft and sticky dough.
5. Roll into a ball, wrap in clingfilm and chill in the fridge for at least an hour (mine was in there for about 6 hours).

Chocolate Cookie - adapted from Smitten Kitchen:

• 115g/4oz butter
• 155g/5.5oz golden caster sugar
• 1 medium egg
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 30g/1oz cocoa powder
• 185g/6.5oz plain flour
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp baking powder

1. Mix the butter, sugar, vanilla extract and cocoa powder together in a bowl until well combined.
2. In a separate bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder and salt.
3. Add the flour to the batter a little at a time and beat in until you end up with a smooth and sticky dough.
4. Wrap in clingfilm and chill in the fridge for at least an hour (this one was also chilled for 6 hours when I did it).

Assembly:

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line 2-3 baking trays with greaseproof paper.
2. Lightly flour a clean surface and rolling pin. 
3. Remove one of the doughs from the fridge and roll it out to 1cm/0.25inch thick and cut out circles using a 5.5cm/2inch.  Wrap leftover dough back in the clingfilm and put back in the fridge.
4. Remove the other dough and repeat step 3.
5. Now use a 4cm/1.5inch cutter to cut circles out of the centre of each of the bigger circles.  Now you should have a set of rings and a set of circles in both types of dough.
6. Press the centres of one dough inside the rings of the other dough, and vice versa.
7. Place on prepared baking trays, spaced about 2.5cm/1inch apart as they do puff out.
8. Repeat steps 3 to 7 until all the dough is used.
9. Bake for 10-11 minutes, until the edges are firm but the centres are still soft.
10. Remove from the oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool.

Cookie Dough Ice Cream

 
 

So it seems that a truly miserable spring has indeed resulted in a bright and sunny summer.  Unlike last year where spring was gorgeous and then it rained in the summer.  I remember being stuck on a bus trying to leave Edinburgh airport in early July because the roundabout had been completely submerged in water and was thus causing the traffic to slow down to a snail's pace.  Not this year.  This year we've had beautiful blue skies and sunshine and a bit of a breeze, which I have been taking advantage of and washing every single thing I can get my hands on.  I've had to buy more hangers, since apparently we didn't have enough for when all the clothes have been washed!

Anyway, it's summer and it's hot.  Too hot.  I am not the biggest fan of hot weather.  It makes me itchy; it makes me feel ill; my hayfever starts up so my eyes sting like mad; there are bugs everywhere; my chocolate cakes melt; I burn no matter how much sun cream I put on; and it makes me drowsy.  As much as I can dislike the cold, I much prefer it over being too hot.  I do love the sunshine though, so as long as I stay indoors I'm generally happy.  And what else makes me happy?  Ice cream!

Feels like ages since I've made ice cream but this was one I've been wanting to do for a while.  In fact, the main reason I've not really done so until now is due to lack of space in my freezer.  The bowl for my ice cream maker is quite chunky and has to be kept in the freezer for at least 12 hours before it can be used.  Not having much in the way of space means I don't get the luxury of having it in there very often.  But last week, after the shopping arrived, I did have space so in it went.  And then stayed for most of the week because I was busy until Friday.

It was a pretty easy recipe.  The only mistake I made was I initially put in the wrong sugar.  Despite the fact that I had bought brown sugar, I automatically grabbed the caster and tipped it in with my egg yolks.  Oops.  I was able to salvage the yolks though by tipping it into a sieve.  Sugar went through, eggs, mostly, stayed in the sieve.  A little yolk did escape but it was fine.  I also decided to use my sugar thermometer to check when my custard was ready, rather than relying on the spoon trick, namely because the mixture already seemed thick enough to leave a coating.  I'm thinking it's because the custard was made with cream, rather than milk like I'm used to.

It is so yummy!  It's kind of hard to describe.  My experience with raw cookie dough is that it always has a bit of a taste of flour, which I'm not keen on.  This recipe obviously doesn't contain flour so doesn't have that taste.  Initially I thought it tasted more like vanilla but there's a slightly more caramel taste to it. The chocolate chips are also a nice addition.  It is quite delicious so I'll be eating all of it up myself.  Cookie dough doesn't appeal to the fiancé.  Good thing I've got something different planned for him. 

Recipe - adapted from Take A Megabite
Makes 1 Litre
 

• 45g/1.5oz butter
• 500ml/17.5fl.oz double cream
• 4 egg yolks
• 100g/3.5oz dark brown sugar
• Pinch of salt
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 375ml/13fl.oz whole milk

1. Put the egg yolks and brown sugar in a medium bowl and beat until pale and fluffy.
2. Melt the butter in a saucepan until it is golden brown in colour.
3. Add the cream to the butter and heat until it is almost boiling.
4. Add half the heated cream to the egg mixture a little at a time, stirring it the whole time.
5. Add the salt and mix.
6. Put the mixture back in the saucepan and add the vanilla.
7. Gently heat the mixture, stirring all the time to prevent burning, until it reaches 75°C/170°F, or the mixture is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon.
8. Transfer the custard to a clean bowl and then chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
9. Add the milk to the custard and whisk in.
10. Pour into ice cream maker and freeze according to manufacturer's instructions until the ice cream is churned but still soft.
11. Remove ice cream to a bowl and mix in the chocolate chips, trying to spread them fairly evenly through it.
12. Put the ice cream in a lidded freezer safe container and allow to chill in the freezer overnight before serving.

Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Today was the last day of school at Markinch Primary.  It was therefore also my last day working there since I'm going back to university at the end of the summer holidays to study for my PGDE in Primary Education so I can be a teacher myself!  Feeling like you're making progress in your life is quite satisfying really.  Anyway, before I got official supply work there at the start of June I was just a volunteer classroom assistant and spent pretty much all my time there between January and June with P1b, who are a completely lovely bunch of children and I adore them (the two horrors included).  So I wanted to make them an end of year present, even though I'd not been working in their class for the last month, and I settled on chocolate chip cookies since they are easy to make in bulk and were more likely to be enjoyed by everyone.  I was determined to make fairly large ones though, because they would only be getting one each, and ideally a chewy one because as much as I like crunchy biscuits, I think chocolate chip cookies are delicious when they are soft.  Plus it'd be easy on the kids' teeth.

The other two cookie recipes I have made previously produce small and firmer cookies, rather than chewy.  Of course, I've learnt since the last time I attempted (and failed) to make chewy cookies that the chewiness comes from undercooking them slightly.  I still went looking for a different recipe from my other ones though, because I wanted one that produced bigger cookies.  However, I sort of ended up with something I could almost call my own but is heavily influenced by Baker Bettie.  Now she has lots of cookie recipes on her site (and I really want to try out her recipe for World's Best Chocolate Chip Cookies at some point to see if they live up to their title) but the one I ended up working with was one for making cookies from just five ingredients.  What I liked about it was that you could use any variation on the ingredients: so whatever flour and sugar and egg and butter you had on hand.  This was a fantastic base point because it meant I could work with what I had or what I knew produced yummy results and this would be my guide for ratios.  

My cookies didn't end up with only five ingredients though.  Mine have seven, since I used two types of sugar (and three in my second batch since I didn't have quite as much brown sugar as I thought and had to make up the rest with muscavado) and I added some vanilla because I like putting vanilla in biscuits.  Since I was making slightly bigger cookies than the original recipe I was very weary with spacing on the trays and started with four, one in each corner, so I could see how much they spread.  This also meant I had to monitor the first batch in terms of cooking time since they would need a bit longer than the original 7-9 minutes.  Turns out only a couple of minutes extra were needed.  And it took me a couple of tries to get the amount in the scoops right to get evenly sized cookies but I got into the swing of it eventually.  I made two batches of the cookies, since there were 25 in the class.

These cookies are delicious!  Lovely and chewy and there were so many chocolate chips that they were amazing!  I was so pleased.  I decided to dress them up for the kids and made little presentation envelopes from greaseproof paper, with homemade labels that say 'you're one smart cookie!' on them.  The end result was really quite cute, if I say so myself.  The kids were all super excited when I handed them out so yay!  I don't know if they liked them since they got them just as they were leaving.  Hopefully they will.  I know I did and I'm picky, as you know.

And I got presents too!  Which was a lovely surprise.  I got a huge bunch of flowers, which is now sitting on my dinner table, and a book full of photos of the kids doing various things across the time I've been there (and a few of me taken on the rare occasion I was not in charge of the camera) as well as individual drawings and messages from each one.  It's so lovely!  There's also spare pages at the back which I've decided I can stick all the pictures they given me over the last few months onto.  Plus the fiancé's Mum (who is their teacher) says she's got photos of me baking with them (we did bread and cake pops) which she didn't get developed in time so they can go in there too.  I'm seriously going to miss them.

Recipe - inspired by Baker Bettie

Makes 15 large-ish cookies 

• 115g/4oz butter
• 115g/4oz caster sugar
• 115g/4oz dark brown sugar (or 60g/2oz dark brown sugar and 60g/2oz dark muscavado sugar)
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 egg
• 155g/5.5oz plain flour
• 170g/6oz milk chocolate chips 

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line 2-3 baking sheets with greaseproof paper.
2. Beat the butter and sugars together in a bowl until smooth and creamy.
3. Add the vanilla and egg and beat until fully incorporated.
4. Stir in the flour until combined.
5. Stir in the chocolate chips until evenly mixed throughout the batter. 
6. Scoop heaped tablespoonfuls of mixture (I actually used an ice cream scoop) and place on the trays, spacing them well apart since they spread a lot. (I got 5-6 cookies per tray).
7. Bake for about 10 minutes.  The cookies should have spread, have golden edges but still look underdone in the centre.
8. Remove and allow them to rest on the tray for 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

That's an A4 book, just so you know and can compare the cookie's size to it.

Raspberry and Chocolate Chip Banana Bread Cupcakes

Due to the the new sports institute in town finally being ready to open, the fiancé will no longer be being sent off to other places for work with erratic shift patterns and will be settling in to a set schedule.  Unfortunately, this schedule has him working mainly in the evenings or late afternoon, which means he will no longer be able to make his weekly jaunt to Dundee (though hopefully they'll still be able to run their game over the Internet and he might be able to go up on the occasional Saturday).  Last night was meant to be his last night so I was determined to dish out one last batch of cakes to take with him.  Turns out his shifts are still going to be erratic for the next couple of weeks so he will at least be able to go next week.  After that it's all a bit nebulous really.

As has been the case lately, I did not think about what I wanted to do until after I'd gotten the weekly shop.  I really need to stop doing that.  My base idea came about on Saturday when the fiance had popped out to town and I was flicking through an old issue of one of my cake magazines.  The cakes that caught my eye were banana and chocolate fudge.  I was dubious about the fudge but decided that since I'd wanted to try baking with banana for ages why not do it now?  Besides, the local shop was bound to have bananas.  After some thinking I was originally planning to pair it with toffee and make banoffee cakes, but then discovered that I did not have any condensed milk in my cupboard like I thought I did.  I also knew that was something the local shop didn't sell.  So I had to rethink.  Then I remembered way back in February when I was looking for ideas for Valentine's Day that I had seen a recipe for a banana bread loaf that had raspberries and chocolate chips in it too.  I'd made a note to try doing it at some point since I know the fiancé loves banana bread and he also likes raspberries.  Plus I had a bag of frozen raspberries in the freezer, which was handy since the shop doesn't sell them either.  I thought a raspberry buttercream would make a nice finish and it was a great excuse to make more buttercream with jelly powder.

When I explained my idea to fiancé he pulled a bit of a face.  See, he's a little adverse to change.  If he really likes something, he's reluctant to alter it in any way.  That's not to say he doesn't like trying new things, he does.  He's just less keen on changing an established thing.  I pointed out though that part of the reason I make cakes for him to take is to experiment so I get to go wild with what I make.  He also didn't have any suggestions for what I could do instead.  So banana bread cupcakes it was!

Since I was working off a recipe for a loaf, I wasn't entirely sure how many cakes I would get.  My guess was 12 because there were two eggs but obviously the banana adds extra moisture and there was a lot of flour and turns out I got 18 instead.  Ah well, one can never have too much cake.  I was bound to find someone else to foist them off on since my carry case can't hold more than 14 at most.  I really need to get a bigger one sometime in the future.  I also had to alter the cooking time, since obviously smaller cakes take less time to cook.  Part of me is really glad I've gotten the hang of this.  I barely have to rely on recipe book times any more, which is great when something doesn't end up taking the time it should to bake for some reason.  Everything I bake out of Cake Days for example often needs about 5 minutes longer in my oven even though it's the right temperature (according to the oven thermometer).

I was really quite pleased with these when they were finished.  I've had a few bakes recently that feel sub par.  Plus there's been a complete disaster in trying to make baked doughnuts again.  Since they never made it to the blog you can probably guess they were bad.  Oh well, got to keep trying there.  But these were good!  I was happy.

Due to the face he'd given me when I mentioned the idea to him, I watched anxiously when the fiancé took his first bite.  It feels like ages since I heard that really satisfied 'Mmmmmm!' noise (but that's more likely to be down to not having baked a lot recently).  He approved, though he did say he could take or leave the chocolate chips.  Banana and raspberry goes really nicely together though apparently, and once again the jelly powder enhanced buttercream went down a treat!  His friends really enjoyed them too and actually jumped the fiancé when he arrived with them and ate some before dinner (according to him: they might just have been starving?).  So hurrah!  I'll definitely be baking with banana again in future.  I still want to make banoffee cupcakes.

Recipe - makes 18

Cakes - adapted from Sally's Baking Addiction

• 280g/10oz plain flour
• 3/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 170g/6oz caster sugar
• 55g/2oz butter
• 2 large eggs
• 3-4 medium sized bananas
• 80ml/3fl.oz low fat natural yoghurt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 100g/3.5oz milk chocolate chips
• 115g/4oz raspberries (you can use frozen ones that have been thawed)

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line 18 holes of two 12 hole muffin tins with muffin cases.
2. In a medium sized bowl, sift together the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt.
3. In a separate, larger bowl beat together the butter and sugar until it is smooth and creamy.
4. Add the eggs one at a time, beating in after each addition until the mixture is smooth.
5. Mash the bananas into a pulp with a fork and then add to the batter, along with the yoghurt and vanilla extract.  Beat until well incorporated.
6. Fold in the flour mix into the rest of the batter until just combined, being careful not to over mix.
7. Fold in the chocolate chips.
8. Halve the raspberries and toss them in a little bit of plain flour (if you're using thawed and they a bit mushy, don't worry too much.  Just dry them off as much as you can and don't bother trying to cut them.  That's what I did).  Add them to the batter and carefully mix them into the batter until they are fairly evenly distributed.
9. Spoon the batter into the cases, filling about three quarters full.
10. Bake for 25-30 minutes until risen and the tops are springy.  A skewer inserted into the centre should come out clean.
11. Allow to sit in their tins for 15 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Raspberry Buttercream:

• 225g/8oz butter
• 450g/1lb icing sugar
• 1 x 23g packet of raspberry jelly powder
• 1-2 bananas
• 2 tbsp lemon juice

1. Beat the butter until smooth and creamy.
2. Sift in the icing sugar and beat until smooth.
3. Mix in the raspberry jelly powder fully incorporated.
4. Slice the bananas into 18 slices and use a pastry brush to cover each side in lemon juice to stop them browning.
5. Put the buttercream into a piping bag fitted with a large star nozzle and pipe a swirl on top of each cake.
6. Push a slice of banana into each buttercream swirl. 

Eggless Chocolate Chip Cookies

So last week there was a knock at the door mid afternoon.  The fiancé goes to answer it and comes back with a box addressed to me.  Me getting parcels is not strange.  I do a lot of my shopping online.  However I hadn't ordered anything recently, and certainly not something that warranted a box of this size or shape.  Confused but curious I opened it.  Turns out my lovely sister had sent me and the fiancé an Easter gift in the form of a box full of different Lindor truffles, which was quite wonderful.  However, this got me wanting to send something back to her but since I'm trying to be more careful with my money I didn't really want to buy expensive Easter chocolate.  I did however have a cupboard full of baking ingredients and we had recently discussed biscuits on our last Skype chat.  But if I'm sending her biscuits then I obviously have to send biscuits to my brothers and Dad and his partner too.  Otherwise it wouldn't be fair.  So I spent all of Tuesday evening baking four different types of biscuits.  My sister had mentioned Vienesse Fingers in our chat, so I mad her some of those though I piped them into egg shapes.  For my Dad and his partner, I made orange shortbread covered in chocolate.

My two brothers though...I wasn't really sure about them.  The elder eats pretty much anything and in the end I settled on a chocolate biscuit (which I will post soon) but the younger is picky.  Ridiculously so.  Even about sweet things.  He doesn't like ice cream or cake or anything like that.  Did he even like biscuits?  It was a while before I remembered that he had mentioned there was one type of biscuit he likes: Maryland Chocolate Chip Cookies.  They are rather scrumptious cookies.  There has been many an occasion where I have eaten a whole pack of them in one sitting without realising.  So I went looking for a copy-cat recipe, which found one.  Or at least one that claimed to be one.  I figured it was worth a shot.

Well, the final result didn't taste like Maryland Cookies.  They were still nice though.  My honest analysis of the taste is that they are like gingerbread but without the ginger.  The fiancé agrees with this.  I think it's the golden syrup in the recipe.  You can taste it.  They are not a particularly crunchy biscuit either.  I'm glad I flattened them before baking because otherwise they wouldn't have been flat and would have been even softer.  Not that they were that soft.  Just not as crunchy and crumbly as I would have liked.  We enjoyed them though.  Quite a lovely biscuit.  And no eggs in this one either.

Recipe - adapted from Allrecipes
Makes about 30

• 165g/6oz vegetable shortening or margarine (not butter, I used Stork)
  
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 75g/3oz caster sugar
• 4 tbsp golden syrup
• 2 tsp milk
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 260g/9oz plain flour
• 1.5 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 100g/3.5oz milk chocolate chips

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line 2-3 baking trays with greaseproof paper.
2. In a large bowl mix the shortening/margarine with the salt and sugar until pale and fluffy.
3. Add in the golden syrup, milk and vanilla extract and mix in.
4. Add the flour, bicarbonate of soda and chocolate chips and mix until just combined.
5. Shape teaspoonfuls of mixture into balls and then flatten and place on the trays.
6. Bake for 10-15 minutes until the edges of the biscuits start to turn golden.
7. Remove and let sit on the tray for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to finish cooling.

Milk and Cookies Cupcakes

I've been trying to remember what inspired these and I honestly cannot remember.  For all I know it was a random idea which has steadily developed as I worked out all the component parts.  I am aware it is not an original idea.  'Milk and cookies' or 'cookies and cream' has been done before, but I try to avoid looking at recipes for things that I have ideas for because it's more fun to figure it all out myself.  Then I can be extra pleased when the final result is a success.  Obviously I look at recipes for individual parts but the combined thing is never from one place.

So, anyway, somewhere along the way I decided I wanted to do a cupcake inspired by the idea of 'milk and cookies'.  Now originally, I was going to base the cake part on the recipe I used for the hot-chocolate and strawberry milkshake cupcakes, where a lot of milk went into the actual batter before it was baked.  I would just obviously leave out the hot-chocolate/strawberry milkshake powder.  But then I was looking about for other milk cupcakes, to see if there was any other ways of doing it, and re-discovered the Tres Leches cake.  This is something I've seen before, usually accompanied by Dulce de Leche buttercream (which I've made before to go with toffee cupcakes).  I've never made it though but after reading several recipes I knew this would be a much better cake for the milk part of my 'milk and cookies' cupcakes.  I settled on a recipe I found on Allrecipes which was really well rated, but did something you're really not meant to do unless you're a really good baker and altered the recipe a little bit.

The changes I made were based on some of the reviewer comments which made sense to me.  The biggest was that I separated the eggs and whisked the egg whites before adding them in.  This was to get a better rise and a lighter cake.  Since this has often been the result when I've used it in my standard vanilla sponge cake, I thought this was a good idea.  I also added bicarbonate of soda alongside the baking powder, to get a little extra rise.  Well I certainly did end up with a much lighter cake.  These things were practically weightless when they came out the oven, prior to drowning in the milk.  It was rather amazing.  Another change I made was that I reduced the number of eggs from 5 to 4.  This is because the sizing of eggs is different in America compared to here in the UK.  Again, there were reviews mentioning poor results with so many eggs, so I thought I would use fewer eggs, because the UK sizes are bigger than the US.  And it worked out brilliant so hoorah!  Finally, I didn't use anywhere near the amount of milk recommended.  I originally made half a batch of the milk mixture but only ended up using half of that because I did not want my cakes to turn to mush.  Also turned out to be a good decision.  The cakes were still milk sodden all the way through, but were not mushy or goopy and everyone that ate them thought the balance of milk to cake was perfect.  So in the write up, it'll be a quarter batch of the original recipe.

The decoration for the cake ended up being a no-brainer, since the cake was the 'milk' the topping had to be the 'cookie'.  I knew from the get-go that I was going to decorate with a chocolate chip cookie and so obviously it made sense to make the buttercream cookie dough flavoured.  I've made it before and it was so delicious!

The final result was a complete success.  As I said, everyone thought the balance of cake to milk was perfect.  Lovely and wet and sweet but not goopy.  The cake stayed completely intact.  The buttercream was deliciously sweet too, and went splendidly with the cake and the biscuit was a nice little bonus.  My testers removed the cookie, scooped up some of the buttercream from the cake and ate it that way.  They said it was amazing. 

Recipe - makes about 14 cakes
 

Cookies

• 50g/1.7oz butter
• 65g/2.3oz caster sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 75g/2.5oz plain flour
• 1/2 tbsp milk
• 50g/1.7oz chocolate chips

1. Preheat the oven to 190°C/375°F/Gas Mark 5 and line two baking trays with greaseproof paper.
2. Combine all the ingredients together in a bowl and mix until you get a nice dough.  You may have to form the dough with your hands after the initial mixing.
3. Shape into small half tablespoon size balls and flatten slightly, placing onto the trays, spaced well apart as they spread.  Make sure you've got at least 14 but you should end up with spares, just in case.
4. Bake until the edges are nice and golden, about 10-15 minutes.
5. Remove and leave to cool on the tray for about 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack.

Cake - adapted from Allrecipes.com

• 190g/6.5oz plain flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 115g/4oz butter
• 200g/7oz caster sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 115ml/4fl.oz whole milk
• 100g/3.5oz condensed milk
• 85g/3oz evaporated milk

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4 and line a 12 hole and a 6 hole muffin tin with 14 muffin cases. 
2. Sift the flour, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda into a bowl and set aside.
3. In a separate bowl, cream together the butter, sugar and vanilla until smooth and creamy.
4. Separate the eggs and add the yolks one at a time to the sugar butter, beating in after each addition.
5. Add the flour mixture to the batter two tablespoons at a time, and mix.
6. Whisk the eggs into soft peaks.  Add a spoonful to the cake batter and fold in.
7. Add the rest of the egg whites and fold in until you have no white streaks visible in your mixture.
8. Divide the mixture between the cases, filling them about two thirds full.
9. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until they are well risen and the tops are springy. 
10. Remove to a wire rack and use a skewer to poke about 10 holes into each cake.  Leave to cool.
11. Once cool, combine the whole milk, condensed milk and evaporated milk in a bowl.
12. Dip the top of the cakes into the milk one at a time, repeating several times until all the milk is used up. (This is less messy than pouring it over each cake and still soaks the cake through.)
13. Put in the fridge for about 30 minutes before icing.

Buttercream - adapted from What's Cooking on Planet Byn (as sited when used previously)

• 170g/6oz butter
• 90g/3oz brown sugar
• 225g/8oz icing sugar
• 65g/2.2oz plain flour
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1.5 tbsp milk
• 1.5 tsp vanilla extract
• 40g/1.5oz chocolate chips

1. Mix together the butter and the brown sugar until creamy.
2. Beat in the icing sugar until it is smooth.
3. Add flour and salt and beat in.
4. Finally add milk and vanilla and keep mixing until everything is combined and you have a reasonable smooth mixture.
5. Put in a piping bag with a large star nozzle and pipe a swirl of buttercream on top of each cake.
6. Decorate with chocolate chips then put in the fridge to set for about an hour.
7. Push a cookie into each buttercream swirl, keeping the weight leaning towards the centre of the cake so it does not fall over.