Glüh-applejuice

The ultimate christmas feeling: the smell of glühwein through the whole house. Oh I love that smell so much!! If only it could be christmas all year long!
This version is alcohol-free, a nice plus for me since I'm no fan of alcohol! It still gives this heart-warming smell and it's really easy and quick to make as well!!
There's not much to say about it. I thought it was truly wonderful! Depending on whether you leave the spices in shorter or longer you get a sweeter or more tangy taste. It also depends on the amount of spices, feel free to add more or less or even more. According to the original recipe, cardemom should do well in the warm drink as well.



Ingredients:
1,5 liter applejuice
3 cinnamon sticks
5 whole star anise
10 dried cloves

1. Poor the applejuice in a small pan and add all the other ingredients. Heat the pan on a low fire. Make sure the applejuice doesnt boil!
2. Leave for about half an hour or until you think it tastes good. Serve warm!

It's real simple isn't it? I couldnt even write it down in more than two steps!! That saved me some energy I could spend in the pictures! haha!

Some more pictures of the juice! I like the sight of all the spices floating in the apple-juice! xP And dont you just love my mug? Thanks to the loveliest Shawnie for that one! ^-^

Banana & chocolate jam

I'd so much rather call this jam compote, since it is rather thick. It's a recipe I found and I HAD TO try!! It just sounded so awkward! It tastes really good though. I find it really nice with sponge-cookies I made, or with yoghurt. It was pretty simple to make, so that made it fun as well. Long live the fun but delicious recipes!
I tried finding cute little jars to put the jam in, I liked these, but later on noticed that you cant put any fabric around them with a bow. For the granny feeling, you know? And again, I ended up finishing this recipe at night, and make pictures that night. Bad lighting! I just didnt know how to get these pictures right!



Ingredients:
300 gram bananas (without peel)
80 gram (dark) chocolate
100 ml water
210 gram caster sugar

1. Start with the bananas by slicing very thinly them or chopping them into small pieces and mashing them.
2. Put the water and caster sugar in a bowl and bring it to boil. Stir until all sugar is dissolved.
3. Add the bananas as well and keep stirring while bringing to boil. Make sure the mixture keeps bubbling, but do not let it burn! Keep this up for about 4 minutes, or until the mixture becomes clearer.
4. Chop the chocolate into smaller pieces (if they’re not already) and add them to the banana-mixture. Keep stirring until the chocolate is completely dissolved.
5. Remove from heat and pour it into glass jars. Close these immediately after you poured the jam in and turn them upside down. A trick I learned from my mom – this will help ‘suck’ the jars vacuum after which you can store them longer.
6. Turn them back when they’ve cooled down and store them in a cool spot. The jam will be a bit thicker when it’s cooled down. The jam, or compote, is also quite nice when you serve it warm with cookies or yoghurt!


If the banana-mixture looks like this, you're doing ok! (dont worry if it doesnt though)

Chocolate cupcakes with buttercream

I should have called them DINOCUPCAKES!! Just because it's an awesome name, the sprinkles are called dinosaursprinkles and because the colours are kinda cool, but I thought this boring name would be more descriptive and thus better!



I would like to call these cupcakes low budget, "Ive got nothing in the house for something complicated" and easy. I think I'm actually right! Barely any ingredients are needed, then again, they're just cupcakes. And in a few steps you've got yourself some lovely chocolate mixture, which is yummy to eat by itself but you still have to bake it.
I really love these simple things from time to time. Not having to spend much time and thought on a recipe and still creating something delicious. It's wonderful! At some point I bought silicone baking cups and they give the cupcakes such a colourful effect!





Ingredients:
8 tablespoons (unsalted) butter, softened
115 gram caster sugar
2 eggs
85 gram self-rising flour
25 gram cacao

1. Mix the butter and the sugar with an electric mixer until light and creamy.
2. Beat the eggs lightly and add this two the butter-mixture in several (3-5) additions. As long as it's not in one go it'll be fine!
3. Sift the flour and cacao, adding a bit each time to the butter-mixture and mixing well between each addition.
4. Spoon the mixture into baking cups and put them in a preheated oven of 175 degrees Celius or 350 degrees Fahrenheit and leave them for about 15-20 minutes. If the cakes look dry and risen and a pin comes out dry, they're done as well.

For the photo's, apart from the basic - with very bad lighting - I tried doing some refreshing angles. I think some pictures turned out pretty cool!!





You might've been wondering how to make such a deliciously looking creme as well! Cupcakes alone are awesome, but the decorations just make it a real treat! The buttercream is also fairly easy to make.. It also stays good for quite a long while! It doesnt 'melt' like whipped cream does, but stays in the same shape for a long while and it doesn't loose any of it's taste!

Ingredients:
5 eggs
175 gram sugar
250 gram butter
vanilla essence (or any other food flavouring or -colouring)

1. Beat the eggs with an electric mixer until very stiff. About 1-2 minutes.
2. Add a few spoons of sugar and mix again. Add the sugar in multiple additions and mix well in between every addition, or gradually add the sugar while mixing.
3. Double-boil the mixture and mix again every once in a while, until the mixture is thick and creamy. (I left this out on my first try and while it went fine, I wouldn't recommend it!)
4. In a separate bowl mix the butter until thick and creamy. Then add the vanilla essence, or anything else you've chosen, and mix this in well.
5. Add the egg-mixture to the butter in a few additions, starting with a few spoons, and mix this in well. When everything is fully mixed, you have your own colourful buttercream!

I coloured my buttercream in the colours my sprinkles were, to give it a better effect. Although everyone initially thought they were awkward colours. The buttercream was gone in no time! Some of it never reached the cakes!

Mini meringue cupcakes

I changed my blog title/picture some time ago, and never actually bothered to post the recipe for cute little cupcakes on it! It was one of my experimental recipes. Every single colour is a different taste and with every taste I also experimented in adding something. In the end, every colour and every colour baking cup is a different taste! I added cranberries, sprinkles, banana flavour, vanilla flavour, nougatine and coconut and what ever I could find to all the different meringues! The idea for the meringues came from the coconut delight I made. Later on I decided I could also make lollipops of them and so I put them on sticks. Then I thought dipping these in chocolate would be way more fun and so I did! Also decorating some of the meringue cupcakes with chocolate. It was really fun to experiment with all of this!







Ingredients:
3 eggwhites
210 gram confectioners/powdered sugar
Experimental needs (food colourings, flavouring, sprinkles, coconut, cranberries etc.)
Chocolate

1. Mix the eggwhites very stiff with an electric mixer. Add the confecionars sugar spoon by spoon and mix well after each addition. Both of these take a while! Make sure to not add the confectioners sugar all in one go! The egg whites will collapse under the weight and the recipe just won't work anymore.
2. Add everything you want to the egg&sugar-mixture now! From colourings to flavours to sprinkles, be creative!





3. Preheat the oven to 150 degrees Celsius or 300 degrees Fahrenheit. In the meanwhile line mini baking cups on an oventray and use a spoon to fill them with the creative mixture. For lollipops line the oven tray with a baking sheet and use a spoon to make little circles.
4. Bake the meringues for 15-20 minutes and done!! Double-boil the chocolate if you want some decoration or for the lollipops. Put the meringues for the lollipops on sticks and and dip them in the melted chocolate. Tap a few times to the side of the pan to get the unneeded chocolate off and leave them somewhere to dry. I stuck the sticks into an egg-box for this! Put sprinkles on them before they're dry and in no time: done! You have your own lollipop-meringue and cupcake-meringue set!











Ah, some pictures for inspiration :) I like making pictures! Even though they're not the best!

Simple vanilla fudge

This must've been one of the easiest recipes I've ever made. There wasn't much about it really. So it was quickly done as well! These little fudgies are quite rich though! Practically it's just chocolate and cream, so you can imagine why.
I found that eating one filled me like a whole dinner would. I was quite astonished when I saw my sister easily eat three after eachother.
I made these fudge as simple as you can get: just fudge. I'm thinking of adding some nuts of fruits into it next time. Or perhaps some flavour, and if I do it with white chocolate I can even add some wicked colour! That reminds me - it might be a good idea for the upcoming halloween! What do you think: "Green fudge with cranberries"? Sounds like a halloween thing!





Ingredients:
2/3 cup evaporated milk
1 3/4 cup sugar
a pinch of salt
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
2 cups milk chocolate

1. Grease a brownie tin (or other), or line it with plastic wrap. I found the last one easier.
2. Add the milkd sugar and salt together in a pan and bring it to boil. Keep stirring! When it boils, lower the heat and let it simmer for a few minutes (5 or so) while stirring constantly.
3. Take the pan off the heat and add the chocolate. Stir until all the chocolate has melted in.
4. Add the vanilla essence and stir again.
5. Poor the mixture in the brownie tin and put it in the fridge. Leave it there until the chocolate has hardened and take it out. Cut the fudge into little pieces and we're done!

I found a brownie tin to be easiest for this work. Since it is a low tin and quite big so everything would fit in!
If you want to add hazelnuts or anything else to it, add them right before the chocolate. Use about a 1/2 cup for this. In stead of vanilla essence you can also add hazelnut liqeuer if you are using hazelnuts. Or any other liqeuer or essence you find to fit with your recipe.
Such easy recipes make it very easy to vary with them too! You simply cant go wrong with this!
Make sure you keep the brownies in a closed container though. They tend to dry out a bit fast if you leave them in the open for too long.
This must've been one of the worst things to photograph! Somehow I couldn't get them to look nice at all. Maybe it was just a bad timing or bad weather again. But personally I blame my own skills xP

Rice bread

It's been very long since I've posted something on this blog! That is, if you don't count the post I wrote a few minutes ago. That doesn't mean I haven't been busy baking though! It simply means my homework is catching up with me now and I don't have time to write things on my blog. A pitty really, not because of the blog, but because it means I have serious work to do! I never really liked homework all too much..
Back to the baking! When you're busy, but you still want to make something nice: bread machines! They were quite an invention, weren't they? I saw the words "rice bread" in one of my books and couldn't help but try it. It seemed a bit odd. I mean, who puts rice in bread? I did! and it tasted really good too! I liked this bread with chocolate paste a lot! They only thing I ate for the few days after I baked this bread!





It's very easy to make, but you do have to make rice before you start this recipe. Some left over rice from the dinner the day before will do pretty well. Since we hadn't eaten any rice, I just made some more. Put everything in the bread machine and wait! An easy recipe for busy days!

Ingredients:
¾ cup water (180 ml)
1 egg
3 cups white flour (350 gram)
1 cup cooked (long grain white) rice (115 gram)
1 tablespoon milk powder
1 tablespoon salt
1 ½ teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon butter
1 teaspoon dried yeast

1. Pour the water in the breadpan and add the egg.
2. Sift the flour over the water, covering up all the water. Add the rice and milk powder.
3. Add the salt, suar and butter in seperate corners of the pan.
4. Make a well in the middle of the flour and add the yeast.
5. Now start the breadmachine at a normal setting, medium curst and press start.

If you still have to cook the rice, here's a tip: Take half a cup of rice and cook it. Don't take a full cup and cook it, like I did! You'll end up with over two cups and you just dont need that much!
We don't have milk powder at home, so I always use the coffee milk powder my parents use. I don't know if it's a good substitute, but the bread still tasted just fine!
I keep wondering why you have to put salt and sugar in different corners of the pan. Does anyone know this? It seems quite odd to me, since they will mix in together anyway!





I love the structure of this bread! Really, it turned out great! I wonder where the rice has gone though. You don't really see it back in the bread all too much.
This bread was really easy to cut as well. You know the breads that totally splat under your hands when you try to cut a slice off of it? This bread did NOT have that! I say that's worth a pluspoint already!
A picture with my wonderful breadmachine! I love it! Pretty old, but works just fine!

Chocolate nougatine pralines

To start off with the name - yes, I just couldn't think of anything better! If I would translate the name it said in my recipe book it would become crispies and that just wasn't going to be right. So the recipe now has a boring name! :D Doesn't affect the way they taste though!
The last few weeks I've been looking into pralines, or other little confectionery, a lot and sometimes you just find recipes you HAVE TO try! This was one of those. I really love the taste of nougatine and when I saw the pictures of these little chocolates I think I melted myself. It's a good thing I tried them, because they turned out GREAT!
I had some trouble making them as the 'inside' of these chocolates turned out a bit soft. But after I put them in the fridge they were hard enough to work with and the chocolate coating around it prevented them from melting too much after.
(Un)forunately I left them a bit long in the fridge to cool and my father thought they looked nice and ate quite a lot before I ever got to finish them. That reminds me I have to put a little sign "DO NOT TOUCH!" on it next time.





Ingredients:
100 ml cream
100 gram milk chocolate
100 gram dark chocolate
(2 teaspoons of nut or almond liqueur)
200 gram nougatine
150 gram milk chocolate

1. Bring the cream to boil while stirrying constantly.
2. As soon as the cream is boiling take it off of the fire and add a bit of the chocolate. Stir the chocolate in until it's melted and add more chocolate. Add 100 gram milk and dark chocolate like this. Repeat this until all the chocolate is melted and well mixed in.
3. Add the liqueur now, if you want. If you want children to eat it too it's not advisable. I just left it out.
4. Add 150 gram nougatine to the mixture and mix it in well too.
5. Line a brownie tin (or other tin) with plastic wrap and poor the mixture over it. By now the mixture should be cool enough to not melt the plastic wrap. If it’s not cool enough leave it to cool for a bit first. Put the tin in the fridge and leave it to cool for about an hour.
6. Take the hardened mixture out of the tin and cut it into triangles.
7. I found it handy to put the triangles back in the tin and in the freezer after this. It makes working with them easier later on. You can also skip this and start dubbelboiling (au bain-marie) the remaining 150 gram chocolate. Keep stirring while the chocolate melts.
8. Take the pan with chocolate off the fire. Use a fork to fully dip the triangles in the chocolate. Put the triangle on a plate covered in plastic wrap. Sprinkle a bit of the remaining nougatine over it. Repeat this until all the triangles are done. (You might have to cover a few more plates in plastic wrap :P)
9. Put the plates in the fridge and leave it until the chocolate has hardened and they’re ready to eat!

Depending on what weather it is and where you live - I'd leave the chocolates in the fridge. They tend to melt a bit easy!! But they're defenitely worth it!
Very nice to make for a party too. My mom already orderd some for the coming party!

Bread with sun-dried tomatoes

One of the italian savoury breads. MY mom really loves these breads! And after making this one, I have to say I couldn't really stop eating it myself either. With a bit of cheese on it, it makes a wonderful lunch! Of course you can also use it when you barbecue, eat italian or just random or for any other occasion when you feel like eating this bread.
I can't really comment much on this recipe or the way it went. It was nice to eat. It was a bread-machine recipe, which makes it so much easier and everything all went fine just in the first go!





Ingredients:
1/3 cup sun-dried tomatoes (25 gram)
1/2 cup + 1 tablespoon water (130 ml)
1/4 cup + 1 tablespoon milk (70 ml)
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil (or any other)
3 cups white bread flour (325 gram)
1/2 cup whole-wheat bread flour (50 gram)
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese (40 gram) (or a bit more xP)
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
3/4 tablespoon dried yeast

1. Put the dun-dried tomatoes in a small bowl and add some water. Leave them to well for about 15 minutes.
2. Chop the tomatoes finely and put them aside. Use the water in the bowl to make the 1/2 cup + 1 tablespoon water you need. Add more water if needed.
3. Pour the water with the milkd and pol in the bread pan.
4. Sift the flour over the breadpan until all the flour is gone and the water is completely covered. Sprinkle over the Parmesan and then the salt and sugar.
5. Make a small well in the middle of the flour and add the yeast. Do not let the yeast touch the water yet.
6. Start the breadmachine in normal setting, small bread, medium crust. If your bread machine makes a sound when you can add anything, then add the sun-dried tomatoes. Otherwise just add the tomatoes during the last 5 minutes of kneading, or when you're unsure, when the dough has already formed a ball and the machine is still kneading.
7. Wait for the bread cycle to end and take the bread out of the pan and put it on a rack to cool.

Tip: Check the dough a few times during the first kneading cycle. You might want to add some more water or flour according to how wet or dry the dough is.



And oh I hate my pictures! I couldnt get the lighting right for this one! It was a bit late in the evening already and the sun was going down and I simply cant wait until the next day to make some pictures of a bread. I want to eat it then! You'll have to bear with me for now! As soon as I have the money and time I want to take a little course on how to make pictures right. But it takes time. It might also take some time finding a place that can teach me that as well actually...

Coconut Delight

You know when you really like to eat or snack something and you suddenly find the recipe and you just HAVE TO make it? That's what I had with these. I found a recipe of fudge too, all in a recipe book that my grandmother gave me. I haven't been able to make fudge yet. I'm simply too lazy to buy the ingredients, and I actually forgot to buy them when I was doing the groceries as wel!
But make to the delicious coconut delights! Yes, I made that name up myself. In dutch they are called 'kokos makronen', but I simply couldn't find a translation anywhere. They're kind of small like pralines, but these have a fresh coconut taste and they're sweet at the same time! It exited me that I could actually make something like this too! It turned out to be a real succes for me ^^
The recipe was very simple and you simple cant go wrong on this one! But if you only have a handmixer, you're going to get a very sore arm of this! I know I did with my electric mixer!
I can't wait to try more little pralines or bonbons and maybe make my own little high tea tower with all these little delights! But that will take some more time, for now, just the coconut recipe it is!





Ingredients:
3 eggwhites
210 gram confectioners/powdered sugar
zest and 1 tablespoon juice from 1 lemon
250 gram desiccated coconut
100 gram chocolate

1. With an electric mixer mix the eggwhites until very stiff (or just until they don't get any stiffer).
2. Add the confectioners sugar spoon by spoon and mix well after each addition. Do NOT add all the confectioners sugar in one go, cuz this will cause the stiffy egg to collapse under the weight and the result won't be very pleasing anymore.
3. Add the lemon juice and mix again. Then add the lemon zest and mix AGAIN.
4. Now add the coconut, bit by bit, and mix well every time. You can do more than a spoon at a time this time though!
5. Preheat the oven at 150 degrees Celsius or 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Line an oventray with a baking sheet or silicone sheets and form little balls of the mixture and put them on the tray. Using two spoons is the handiest; the mixture really sticks to your fingers. (Then again, it gives you a good reason to lick it off! ^^)
6. Leave the coconut delight in the oven for about 15-20 minutes or until the top becomes a bit golden brown.
7. Melt the chocolate au bain marie (double boil). Take it off the fire and use a pastry bag, fork or anything you can think of to trace thin lines across the coconut delights. Leave to cool and done!



They're ready for eating now! It does really well with christmas or as a little sweet at a party! People will love them! :)