Friday night baking!!

I quite often bake on a friday night! If I go out, its usually on a Saturday night, so I like to relax the night before! I have work this weekend and wanted to make something yummy to keep the pilots going! Tonight I made NZ chocolate chip biscuits from the good ol Edmonds cookbook (NZ classic) and a caramel chocolate slice I found on foodlovers.co.nz.  I find the chocolate chip biscuits from the edmonds book the best, with the little bit of condensed milk, they are always delish! The slice was also quite good, getting the thumbs up from the two male judges! I was worried the topping would all blob together whilst cooking, but it held its shape well. It was super easy to make!!

Caramel Chocolate Slice:

Ingredients

• 175g butter
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 2 tablespoons cocoa
• topping
• 100g butter
• 1/4 cup golden syrup
• 1 cup sweetened condensed milk

Method

Preheat oven to 180 C.
Beat butter and sugaruntil pale and creamy. Add vanilla and combined flour, baking powder and cocoa and mix well. Press 2/3 of the mixture into a slice pan and allow to chill.
Melt together the butter and golden syrup, stir through the sweetened condensed milk and set aside to cool. Pour cooled topping over the base and then crumble remaining base over the top. Bake for 25 minutes until caramel is golden. Cool and cut into squares or fingers

Edmonds Chocolate Chip Cookies (sante biscuits):

Ingredients:

125g butter, softened
1/4 cup sugar
3 tbsp sweetened condensed milk
few drops of vanilla essence
1 1/2 cups plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C. Cream butter, sugar, condensed milk and vanilla essence until light and fluffy. Sift flour and baking powder together and mix into creamed mixture. Add chocolate chips. Roll tablespoons of the mix into balls and place on a greased oven tray. Use a a fork dipped in flour to flatten each ball. Bake for 20 minutes, but keep an eye on them and pull them out as soon as the bottoms go golden.
Makes about 25 cookies.

Plane cookie pops for workmates!!

I made some cookie pops for my workmates today. I decided on planes, seeing we work at an airport! I found that it was best to secure the popsicle sticks with a little extra dough, the unsecured ones, just came off. I used a basic gingerbread cookie recipe and a basic royal icing recipe. I also made a couple animals for a friends kid. Hope you like em!!

                                          Ready to go in the oven:

                                         Cooling:

                                          Unsecured sticks come away!:

                                          Icing drying:

                                          All packaged:

                                         Animal friends:

Obessed with all things Cookies and Cream.........Fudge!

This fudge was amazing!!! Its totally bad for you, but man is it worth the calories!! If you make it, make sure you have somewhere to take it and quickly...otherwise you're screwed!! And might eat all of it!! I had a jar of marshmallow creme from when I went to the States in April, there are other variations of this recipe you can find without the creme if you live in a marshmallow creme free zone like I do!! One word of advice is to work QUICKLY and have everything ready!!
Found the recipe on verybestbaking.com:

Ingredients

• 3 cups granulated sugar
• 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter or margarine
• 2/3 cup (5 fl.-oz. can) NESTLÉ® CARNATION® Evaporated Milk
• 2 cups (12-oz. pkg.) NESTLÉ® TOLL HOUSE® Premier White Morsels
• 1 jar (7 oz.) marshmallow crème
• 1/2 cup finely crushed cream-filled chocolate sandwich cookies
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (optional)
• 1 cup crumbled cream-filled chocolate sandwich cookies

Directions

LINE 9-inch-square baking pan with foil.

COMBINE sugar, butter and evaporated milk in medium, heavy-duty saucepan. Bring to a full rolling boil, stirring constantly. Boil, stirring constantly, for 3 minutes. Remove from heat.

STIR in morsels, marshmallow crème, finely crushed cookies and vanilla extract. Pour into prepared pan. Sprinkle crumbled cookies on top. Gently swirl cookies into fudge using a knife without touching bottom of pan. Refrigerate for 1 hour or until firm. Lift from pan; remove foil. Cut into 48 pieces. Store in airtight container in refrigerator

Gulab Jaman!!!!

For mothers day this year, I made an indian feast for my mother, my boyfriend's mother and of course the dads! We had balti beef curry, fish masala curry, butter chicken, naan, eggplant sambal, mint raita, rice, indian spiced potatoes, mango lassi, tomato and onion salad and off course, gulab jaman!! I have loved gulab jaman since I was a kid, but had never made it before! Much to my surprise it turned out really good!! And was pretty easy to make!! The hardest thing was finding rosewater!! But after 4 shops, I finally did! Can't wait to use it in other recipes too :)

Dough balls waiting for the fryer:

                                          Getting sizzled:

                                          Draining

                                          Into the syrup:

                                          Syrup waiting for the delicious balls:

The great thing about gulab jaman is that it can be made a day ahead, which was super handy!!

All the recipes I used for this mothers day feast can be found on taste.co.nz.

Ingredients

• 2 cups (440g) caster sugar
• 2 cups (500ml) water
• 8 cardamom pods
• 2 cinnamon sticks
• 3 star anise
• 1 teaspoon rosewater
• ½ cup (75g) self-raising flour
• ¼ cup (25g) full-cream milk powder
• 100g spreadable cream cheese
• 1 tablespoon water
• 24 raisins
• vegetable oil for deep-frying
• NOTE: This recipe can be made a day ahead.

Method

Combine the sugar and water in a medium saucepan, add the cardamom pods, cinnamon sticks and star anise. Stir over heat, without boiling, until sugar dissolves. Bring to the boil, then simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat, add the rosewater; cool.

Combine the flour and milk powder in a medium bowl, stir in the cream cheese and water, and mix to a soft dough. Turn dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth.

Divide the dough into 24 pieces. Hold a piece of dough in one hand and flatten slightly. Place a raisin in the centre and roll into a ball. Repeat with remaining dough and raisins.

Deep-fry the balls in hot oil until golden brown and cooked through; drain on absorbent paper.

Add balls to syrup and stand for at least 1 hour before serving.

Not suitable to freeze. Not suitable to microwave.

Mocha Cheesecake Slice, nom nom nom!!

I decided to do some baking last night and had some cream cheese to use up. I found this great recipe on cookiemadness.net (a great site with heaps of AMAZING recipes). The only thing I would change, is that I would definitly up the coffee! From being in the USA 7 times, I know we kiwi's definitly drink stronger coffee!! So the slice wasn't very intense at all...maybe I'd double the coffee amount next time :)

Mocha Cheesecake Squares
1-1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup powdered sugar (sifted if you have time – I didn’t)
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt plus an extra pinch
12 tablespoons cold unsalted butter
1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened
1 (14-ounce) can (1-1/4 cups) sweetened condensed milk
1 tablespoon instant coffee crystals dissolved in 1 tablespoon hot water
2 large eggs
1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Line a 13×9 inch metal baking pan with Release foil or line with regular foil and spray foil with cooking spray.
Combine flour, powdered sugar, cocoa, baking soda and salt in bowl of food processor. Add butter and pulse until coarse and mealy. Alternatively, you may mix dry ingredients in a bowl and cut in butter with a pastry cutter. Press into bottom of pan and bake for 15 minutes.
Rinse out food processor bowl – no need to use soap. Add cream cheese and condensed milk and process until smooth. Add coffee and process; add eggs and process just until eggs are mixed in. Alternatively, you may beat the ingredients together in a mixing bowl. Pour over crust. Bake for 20 minutes or until set.
Cool completely on a wire rack then refrigerate. When firm, cut into squares. Melt chocolate chips in the top of a double boiler or in a heat proof bowl set over simmering water. Transfer melted chocolate to a resealable plastic bag and with a scissors, snip off a tiny corner of the bag.
Drizzle melted chocolate over squares.
Note: I actually did the drizzling before cutting the squares and things worked out fine.
Makes 24

Cookie Pop Flower Bouquets!!

My friend Heather turned 27 the other day and had a great big byo dinner at a delicious japanese restaurant in Wellington. I wanted to take her something that she wouldnt have to lug around (as we were probably going to go out clubbing after dinner!). So I decided on a cookie bouquet, and she could dish them out for dessert if she wanted! I used a sugar cookie mix that I brought back from America in April. Just pressed the popsicle sticks onto the cookies before baking, and placed a bit of dough over top, to try and secure them a bit more. I ended up having so many cookies that I made a second bouquet for my partner's father who was in hospital following heart surgery.