Recipe: Quick Chocolate Mug Cake

2014 is a year of great change in our house, and the biggest change will hit in September when number one son goes off to University.  It’s going to be strange, and there’s going to be a hole in the household (which I’m hoping Skype can fill), but for him it’s all part of becoming an adult and I’ll just have to get used to it.  I thought it would be a great idea to start blogging some quick and simple recipes that he (and others out there) might find useful, so I’ve been looking for ideas in my recipe books and on the web.  I came across this recipe on YouTube for a Simple 5 Minute Mug Cake from the Simple Cooking Channel, which fits the bill, and it tastes great.  I’ve done my usual thing and cut down the sugar quantity, but you can stick to the original if you like.  I just prefer things not so sweet!  Here’s how to make it:

Recipe: Lovely Lemon Drizzle Cake

There are so many wonderful cake recipes to try, and I've tried a few, but I keep getting requests from my family for this really simple, but deliciously zingy Lemon Drizzle cake.  It's taken from a little book called 'Teatime Recipes' by Carole Gregory, and I've done my usual thing - I've reduced the amount of sugar by a third, as I don't like overly-sweet cake.  If you do, just increase the sugar amount back to the original 6 ounces.  For me, with less sugar it tastes better and the lemon flavour really comes through.  So, without further ado, we'll get on with it!

Recipe: Best Banana and Chocolate Muffins

Oh, bananas!  A fruit that people either love or hate.  A bit like Marmite.  I buy them because I like them, just when the green goes over to light yellow, and before they turn ‘pappy’ and are dappled with brown spots.  I’d rather eat them when they’re on the green side, than the ripe, dark yellow.  But another family member likes them when they’re just starting to spot, and another has a one day window when he’ll eat them.  Bananas seem to tread a fine line, and if I don’t whizz them up as smoothies in the blender with some milk, oats and cinnamon, they end up in cakes.  Usually in banana and chocolate muffins!

This is a recipe a friend passed on to me, from another friend of hers.  Now, I’m not a lover of over-sweet things, and find shop-bought cakes and cookies are usually so sweet they burn my throat, so I usually make adjustments to recipes.  The first time I made these I followed the original recipe, which contained 250g sugar (over twice what I use) and 200g chocolate (again, double the amount I use...but sometimes I’m indulgent and do double the chocolate measure).  I found it was too sweet, bearing in mind there is so much naturally sweet banana already in the recipe.  The second time I made them, I cut the sugar and the chocolate right down without telling my family, and nobody noticed a lack of sweetness!  There was no effect on the rise or bake of the muffins, so I’ve stayed with this slightly healthier option, and everyone loves it.

Recipe: Mushroom and Bread Soup with Parsley

Today I'd like to share a recipe for a soup that I made recently. You know how it is when you've run out of things to make...you start searching for inspiration. Well it was a day such as this when I remembered that I had a cook book with nothing but soup recipes in it. Since we're in the depths of winter, a bowl of hot soup is always welcome. So I thumbed through and found one soup recipe in particular that didn't take too many ingredients. It looked simple enough so I gave it a go.

It's called mushroom and bread soup with parsley. It's thickened with bread and it's a rich mushroom soup that's very satisfying. Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:

75g /3oz /6 tablespoons of unsalted butter
900g/ 2 pounds of portobello mushrooms, sliced
2 onions, roughly chopped
600ml/ 1 pint/ 2 and a half cups milk
8 slices of white bread
60ml/ 4 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
300ml/ half pint/ 1 and a quarter cups double (heavy) cream
salt and black pepper

Recipe: Apple Sharlotka

                                                                                            

Last autumn, we had a bumper crop of apples in England.  I remember seeing the branches of the apple trees in the neighbouring gardens where my mum lives in London absolutely weighed down with masses of red fruit.  Even the pathetic specimen that lives on the boundary of my property looked pleased with itself for displaying a few somewhat sour apples.  This bounty must have had an effect on prices, because since the autumn, apples have been cheaper.  I was looking at them in the supermarket last week whilst wondering what I could bake for this week’s Labyrinthus recipe, and I picked up three bags of three different varieties, thinking, ‘I’ll make something with apples.  Everyone keeps saying it’s good to cook with things that are in season.’  So here I am, and after a little online research, I decided to make an ‘Apple Sharlotka’.  It’s a fatless Russian apple cake, and I sourced the recipe from Smitten Kitten.  Here’s what happened...

T. Bird's Ginger Cookies

You may or may not agree, but it seems to me that January is the gloomiest month of the year, and not just because of the weather. It may be cold or wet, and some days might be so dark it’s as if the sun hasn’t bothered to rise, but there’s also the come-down after the Christmas and New Year holidays, plus the fact that we’re all getting back into everyday work and facing those dreaded New Year Resolutions. Well, to counter the ‘gloom’ and the never-ending dampness from the constant rain we’ve had here in England, we decided to bake some warm, comforting ginger cookies and even managed to take some photos in a rare patch of sunshine. T. Bird’s Ginger Cookies are relished in our house, and, as a result, never last long in the biscuit tin!  Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:

350g self-raising flour
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1 tablespoon ground ginger
175g caster sugar
125g butter
85g golden syrup
1 egg, beaten




Method:


1. Line 3 large baking trays with baking parchment and preheat the oven to 150̊C/300̊F/Gas Mark 2.
2. Sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda and ground ginger into a mixing bowl.
3. Cream the butter and sugar together in a large mixing bowl. Gradually mix in the golden syrup and the beaten egg.
4. Fold the dry ingredients into the butter/sugar/egg mix, and mix well.
5. Roll the dough into small 2cm balls and place them on the baking trays, roughly 10cm/4 inches apart. Bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes.
6. Cool the cookies on their baking sheets for a couple of minutes, and then transfer them onto a wire rack. When the cookies are completely cool, transfer them to a biscuit tin, and make sure you eat at least one before they all disappear!

Note: They probably won’t all make it to the biscuit tin anyway...


Result:

These ginger cookies taste as delicious as they look, and the family vote for these is always

ten out of ten. We think they should enter the recipe Hall of Fame, but why don’t you give

this recipe a try and let us know how yours turned out? I’m off to dunk mine in a hot cup of tea!