chocolate hazelnut cookies {the secret bakers club}

I love baking, but my hips don’t, so I made a compromise with them and instead of eating everything I bake myself I send them off to work with Dan.  This started some kind of cute little rivalry with one of Dan’s colleagues who gets his girlfriend to bake things and so he can bring them into work too, but then it kind of evolved into this little swapsies deal with each other.  They call it the secret bakers club (??).

Sadly, Dan’s colleague is leaving work so Dan asked me to bake something for him the other day to take into work for one last secret bakers club swap.

Ingredients

• 225g softened butter
• 140g caster sugar
• 1 egg yolk lightly beaten
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 225g plain flour
• 55g coca powder
• pinch of salt
• 55g plain chocolate chips
• 4tbsp nutella/chocolate and hazzelnut spread

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 190 degrees celsius and line 2 trays with baking paper.
2. Put the butter and sugar in a bowl and mix well with a wooden spoon then beat in the egg yolk and vanilla extract.
3. Sift together the flour, cocoa and a pinch of sale into the mixture and add the chocolate chips.  Stir until thoroughly combined.
4. Scoop out tablespoons of the mixture and shape into balls with your hands then put them on the prepared baking sheets spaced well apart,  use the dampended handle of a wooden spoon to make a hollow in the centre of each cookie.
5. Bake in the preheated oven for 12-15 minutes.  Leave to cool on the baking sheets for 5-10 minutes then using a palette knife carefully transfer the cookies to wire racks to cool completely.  When they are cold fill the hollows with the nutella!
6. I added some white chocolate dribbles just to make them even more decadent.

They are pretty good, but 55 grams of chocolate is too much.  Next time I would use much less cocoa, they were too chocolate-y and a little bit dry.  Still, pretty damn good

chocolate cookies

Dan mentioned the other day that he likes crunchy cookies – so today I baked some.

I used this recipe from allrecipes.com and just added cocoa.  All the other recipes I found, like this one at joyofbaking.com, required the dough to be placed in the fridge for a ridiculously long time, and is not really what you want during an impromptu baking session!

As it turns out, I did end up having to put the dough in the fridge for a while because it was too sticky and I wanted it to harden up a bit so that they would turn out like the joyofbaking.com ones and I could put cream in the middle…yum!  I only left it in there for about 30 minutes, but it didn’t really work.  I think my recipe was too wet and sticky to begin with, and that it should have been not-sticky and more like dough for that to work.

Making the cookies was the stickiest thing I’ve ever done! I definitely should have added more flour to the mix, but I had already cleaned up!

Basically the final recipe I used looks something like this:

Cookies

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup butter
• 1 1/2 cups white sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2-3 tablespoons of cocoa

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (180 degrees C). Mix flour, baking soda, cocoa and salt; set aside.
2. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
3. Beat in the egg, then stir in the vanilla.
4. Mix in the dry ingredients until well blended.
5. Roll the dough into a log shape, wrap in glad wrap and place in fridge for 30-60 minutes.
6. Bake for 20 to 23 minutes in the preheated oven.
7. Allow cookies to cool for a few minutes on the baking sheet before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Cream Filling:

• 1/2 cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 2 cups (230 grams) confectioners (powdered or icing) sugar, sifted
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 – 2 tablespoons milk
• cocoa

Directions

1. Beat butter until creamy and smooth.
2. Beat in vanilla extract.
3. On low speed, slowly add in the sugar.
4. Add milk and beat until filing is spreading consistency.

DELICIOUS!

Homemade Burger Patties

These are delicious!! {Some of you might have seen this post before, but I learned a new trick tonight and I had to update it!}

I make a bucket load and freeze them (there’s literally no room left in my freezer).  Every time I make them I use more and more mince, because they are such a handy back up meal when you run out of ideas, or for when you realise its 8.30pm at night and you still haven’t cooked anything for dinner.

They are so much more moist than burger patties you buy from the supermarket, and they don’t really take all that long to make.

Ingredients

• 2 kilos of mince
• 2 eggs
• 2 cups bread crumbs
• 1 diced onion
• 1-2 cloves of garlic, or 1 heaped tablespoon of crushed garlic
• A dash of sweet chilli sauce
• A pinch of:
• Salt
• Pepper
• Italian Herbs/Basil/any herb of your choice
• Any other spice of your choice.

1. Add the mince to a bowl;
2. Add all ingredients to the mince;
3. In summer: rinse your hands and get in there! Mix it very thoroughly.
4. In winter: because it is freezing here, I kind of delayed making these for a while because I knew the mince would be freezing.  Anyway, I dug my hands in to mix all the ingredients together but within seconds my hands were burning because it was so cold…until Dan had the EPIC idea to use some freezer bags as gloves.  He used to work in a meat department and he told me the reason my hands were so cold was because the mince was sticking to my hands, and he was right! The bags made such a difference!
5. Measure out about 100g balls on a set of scales;
6. Squash the patties out into your desired shape.  I squash them all out on sheets of baking paper.  I prefer to make my patties biggish, as I find they tend to shrink when cooking them on the BBQ.  I measure about 125g balls out, flatten them on pieces of baking paper to about 0.5-1cm thick,
7. Then wrap them individually in cling wrap, and then store in the freezer!

Yum!

Bi-carb Soda or Baking Powder?

So I just read a website that said bi-carb soda and baking powder are the same thing, but then proceeded to explain how they are quite different.

Firstly, both of these ingredients are predominantly used in baking where the recipe uses plain flour.  You can add one teaspoon of either of these ingredients {depending on the following} to every cup of plain flour to turn it into self raising flour. Alternatively, the amount of BS or BP added to plain flour varies how much your cookies/cupcakes will rise when being cooked in the oven.  The easiest example of this are Gingerbread Men, you don’t want to use self-raising flour because they will rise to high, but you don’t want to use plain flour because they won’t raise at all.  So you just add half a teaspoon of either per cup {generally BP} and voila! your gingerbread men rise perfectly!

Secondly, they do the same thing {help baked goods rise} but you just have to mix each one with different things to get the same result.

You cannot use either ingredient interchangeably {if you care over much about baking} because they each react differently.

What they both have in common

They both need to be combined with moisture to work.

What they do not have in common

Bi-Carb Soda

So bi-carb soda needs an acidic ingredient to work, such as vinegar, buttermilk, chocolate, honey or lemon juice.

It’s used for cleaning as well, which means it can be a bit tangy and sometimes it makes your baked goods have a bit of a soapy flavour.

I try not to use bi-carb soda in cooking where I can avoid it, but I always try and follow the recipe when baking!


Bi-Carb Soda starts to rise as soon as combined with the acidic ingredient.
Baking Powder


Baking powder comes already mixed with an acidic ingredient mixed in the powder {cream of tartar and sodium aluminum sulfate}.  It has a very neutral taste and I have noticed that it is used in recipes like plain chocolate where just milk, eggs and cocoa are involved.

Baking Powder rises in two stages – when first combined with moisture {cream of tartar} and secondly when baking in the oven {sodium aluminium sulfate.

Everything you need to know about Pancakes

Pancakes are by far my favourite breakfast food.  I grew up making them every weekend for my family from about the age of 12 and it’s a tradition I want to continue when I have a family of my own.

I have been a really picky eater my whole life and it was only moving out of home that my taste buds grew adventurous and I started trying other foods.  For my whole life (and to this day, I have to admit) I ate/eat Vegemite as a spread on my pancakes.  {Those who not Australian, Vegemite is an Australian spread that is quite bitter and unlike anything you will ever taste, but if you grow up on it (like I did) I can’t go more than a couple of days without a Vegemite fix!}

I have tried so, SO, so many different pancakes over the years I decided I want to share my favourites with you

Pancake Shaker Mixes

First of all, I have to say that pancakes from a shaker mix are really not that bad (at least in Australia)!  My mum always kept a few in the pantry just in case I didn’t have all the ingredients to make them from scratch on the weekend, and I quite like them.  There are lots of flavours you can try but my favourites are the Buttermilk and Original ones.  I find them to be quite processed though, and you can really taste the difference when you compare them to homemade pancakes.  When I use a Shaker Mix, my pancakes always come out golden-brown and rise perfectly, but they are quite sweet and not really all that filling.  I will eat twice as many of these kind of pancakes than if I had made them myself.

Jamie Oliver Pancakes

Ingredients

• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup SR flour (122 grams)
• 1 egg
• A few knobs of butter
• Pinch salt

Method

1. Pour eggs, milk , salt and flour into a bowl and whisk until smooth.
2. Heat a non-stick pan on a medium heat.
3. Add a knob of butter to the pan.
4. Pour some of your batter into the pan and fry for a couple of minutes until it starts to look golden and firm.
5. Continue frying until both sides are golden.

These pancakes are pretty good, cooking them butter makes really yummy and buttery, but it’s not really very healthy!  I don’t cook these ones very often, only if I’m missing some ingredients, or only have 1 egg {side note: I don’t put fruit or anything in my pancakes}.

Ingredients

• 3 large eggs
• 115g/4oz plain flour
• 1 heaped teaspoon baking powder
• 140ml/5fl oz milk
• a pinch of salt

1. Separate egg yolk and egg white into separate bowls.
2. Add the flour, baking powder and milk to the yolks and mix to a smooth thick batter.
3. Beat egg whites and some salt until stiff peaks formed.
4. Beat sugar and egg yolk together.
5. Add milk to sugar and egg yolk. When combined, beat in flour and baking powder.
6. When combined, add egg whites and fold (do not stir, beat – FOLD gently in only) until mixture is combined. The egg whites are what makes the pancakes so fluffy.
7. Cook in a non stick pan until golden brown.

I found these pancakes to be kind of dry and lacking in flavour.  Next time I made them I added a few teaspoons of sugar, which made them much more tastier, as well as a little bit softer and not quite so dry.

Grandma’s Recipe

When I feel lazy and don’t feel like beating egg whites, I just revert to Grandma’s recipe.  I’ve been making this for about ten years now, and is one of those recipes I know in the very depths of my soul.  Grandma’s pancakes are soft and smooth, not overly fluffy, but have a lovely flavour to them.

Ingredients

• 6 tbsp self raising flour
• 1 egg 2 tbspoon sugar
• 1 cup milk
• 2-3 drops vanilla essence
• pinch of salt
• generous dose of my Grandma’s secret ingredient.

Directions

1. Beat egg and sugar
2. Add milk
3. Add flour
4. Add remining ingredients

Original Pancakes from my kitchen

So my pancake recipe is a bit of a mix and mash of the two Jamie Oliver recipes, plus my Grandma’s recipe.

 

Ingredients

• 2 eggs
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 6 tbsp SR flour
• 3/4 – 1 cup milk
• 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
• dash of vanilla essence
• 1/2 tbsp mixed herbs/spices
• pinch of salt

 

Method

1. Separate egg yolk and egg white into separate bowls.
2. Add the flour, baking powder and milk to the yolks and mix to a smooth thick batter.
3. Beat egg whites and some salt until stiff peaks formed.
4. Beat sugar and egg yolk together.
5. Add milk to sugar and egg yolk.
6. Add some vanilla essence and mixed spices.
7. When combined, beat in flour and baking powder.
8. When combined, add egg whites and fold (do not stir, beat – FOLD gently in only) until mixture is combined. The egg whites are what makes the pancakes so fluffy.
9. Cook in a non stick pan until golden brown. 

These pancakes are amazing!!!  They were thick, fluffy, soft and buttery.  So filling.  My mouth is watering just thinking of them /sigh.  So delicious!!!!!!!!!!!!