Making Banoffee Pies this weekend... - recipe

Ingredients

Base:

• 225g (8oz) digestive biscuits
• 85g (3oz) butter, melted

Filling:

• 397g can Carnation Caramel
• 3 small bananas
• 150ml carton whipping cream, softly whipped
• cocoa powder to finish

You will also need:

• 6 individual 9 cm (3½in) loose-bottomed flan tins
• Alternatively use a deep 18 cm (7in) spring-form cake tin, greased

Method

1. Crush the biscuits in a blender or in a double-lined bag with a rolling pin. Combine the crushed biscuits with the melted butter.
2. To make the pie bases use the back of a teaspoon to press the mixture into the base and sides of the tins. Chill for about 20 minutes.
3. Divide the Carnation Caramel between the bases.
4. Remove the pies from the tins. Slice the bananas, reserve six for the top and fold the rest into the softly whipped cream.
5. Spoon the mixture over the caramel, decorate with a banana slice and dust with the cocoa.

Tips

Turn this recipe into a sundae idea – layer the crushed biscuits (without the melted butter) and other ingredients into sundae glasses and chill until ready to serve.

I'm thinking about experimenting with the choice of biscuts and might go for chocolate biscuits instead! We'll see on Sunday! :)

Recipe from carnation.co.uk

New Ben & Jerry's!

There is a new Ben & Jerry's again! But this one is only for the Nordic Countries! Good thing I'll be in Sweden soon to buy it and try it. Sounds delicious! :)

Brownies + Cheesecake

My little sister is graduating from the equivalent of college (UK) in a few weeks and I will be baking for the occasion. I'm going to Sweden for the celebrations and am now in the process of deciding what to bake!
I'm definately making the Espresso Cheesecake Brownies (Bottom picture). My little sis loves brownies, coffee and cheesecake! So its perfect! Recipe here.

The top picture is a recipe from this week's "Baking Mad with Eric Lanlard". They are cheesecake brownies too, with a hint of coffee. I'm thinking about taking that recipe (below) and substitute the coffee for something else, probably something orange-flavoured. The thing is, one of my other sisters does not like coffee at all but loves brownies and cheesecake and I want her to have some cheesecake brownies too. She adores all things chocolate orange! :) Not sure what to use yet! Any tips?

Eric Lanlard's Cheesecake Brownies (From Channel 4's website)

Ingredients

• 150g unsalted butter
• 200g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
• 250g golden caster sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• Pinch of salt
• 3 eggs
• 100ml espresso
• 100g plain flour

For marble topping

• 150g cream cheese
• 60g caster sugar
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• rd's cheesecake brownies need no introduction

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 170°C/gas mark 3. Grease a 20cm square tin with butter and line with baking paper.

2. Melt the butter and chocolate in large heatproof bowl set over a smaller pan of just simmering water. Remove from heat once melted and leave to cool.

3. Stir the sugar, vanilla and salt into the cooled butter and chocolate mixture, then whisk in the eggs and beat until smooth. Stir in the coffee, then sieve in the flour and beat until glossy.

4. For the marbling mixture, in a bowl beat the cream cheese until smooth and then stir in the sugar and vanilla. Finally add the beaten egg.

5. Spoon the brownie mixture into the lined tin then top with the marble topping mixture, using a knife to cut through the topping mixture and create a marbled effect. Be careful not to over mix or you will lose the effect.

6. Bake for 30 minutes, covering the tin with foil for the last 10 minutes of cooking to keep the top from over browning. Remove from the oven, allow to cool in the tin then cut into squares.

Mint candy cupcakes

photos © Russian Doll

I made these mint candy cupcakes the other week. The mint flavour in the batter is from crushed mint candy and in the frosting I've used mint flavouring from the supermarket. Delicious and refreshing!