Cherry Ripe Mud Cake

I really enjoyed making this cake. Mainly, because it made a change from to my usual fall back recipe – chocolate guinness cake.

Stupidly,  I left a bunch of my recipe books out recently, and my flatmate picked up my copy of Food We Love – a great little collection of favourite recipes from the Australian Women’s Weekly Test Kitchen. He came across an extremely mouth-watering image of a very dense chocolate cake, made with Cherry Ripe bars. Next came a request for a birthday cake. I didn’t really need any more convincing…

P.S. I really wish I had a much more exciting, colourful image to post with this recipe, but sadly that will have to wait until next time…..enjoy.

Cherry Ripe Mud Cake

• 250gm butter, chopped
• 1 tbsp instant coffee
• 400ml coconut cream
• 200gm dark cooking chocolate
• 1 cup caster sugar
• 1 cup dark brown sugar
• 3/4 cup (110gm) self raising flour
• 1 cup (150gm) plain flour
• 1/4 cup (25gm) dark cocoa
• 2/3 cup fine coconut
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 5x (50gm) Cherry Ripe Bars, chopped coarsely

Preheat oven to 150°C, grease and line 1 x 23cm springform tin. Melt butter in large pot over medium heat. Add coffee, sugars and stir in chocolate until melted. Add coconut cream, stir till combined then set aside to cool. Whisk in sifted dry ingredients then coconut, vanilla and egg. Stir in ½ the Cherry Ripes (chop coarsely). Sprinkle rest of Cherry Ripes on top of cakes. Pour mixture into the tin and bake 40-50 min until top is set and is still a bit wobbly. Stand cake  for 10 minutes then remove sides and cool on wire rack.

This recipe is also my entry for Sweet New Zealand this month – hosted by Lucy from Lucy Eats. Check out all the fancy recipes on her blog at the end of the month.

Mini Baked Chocolate Cheesecakes

Well, Happy New Year! I hope you’ve all had yourself a nice indulgent, and refreshing break. I admit I had intended to blog about this a little sooner but, you know…holidays happened. Hasn’t that sun been great?! Well, recently anyway 🙂

I found this recipe, by Donna Hay, in the New Zealand Herald last year.  Despite regularly browsing the lifestyle (namely food) pages of our online newspapers, I was instantly drawn to the rest of her equally indulgent and mouth-watering recipes. You can check them out here

The dessert itself is not heavy at all, and melted in my mouth with a slight moussy texture. I found the sliced fruit (berries, mainly) helped complete the richness and also made it perfect for someone who doesn’t have quite a sweet tooth.

I enjoyed the smaller individual-sized portions which are great if you are making them for a small group of people. There wasn’t any leftovers laying around in the fridge to taunt me in the days following!

So, welcome back to After Taste for 2013 – you can expect all sorts of exciting and tasty recipes to surface in the coming months and in the year ahead.

See you all again soon!

Mini Baked Chocolate Cheesecakes
Serves 4

• 100 grams chocolate biscuits
• 30 grams butter, melted
• 2 tbsp ground almonds
• 400 grams cream cheese
• 1/2 cup caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 150 grams milk chocolate, melted
• Small amount of extra chocolate, for flaking on top
• Berries, to serve

Preheat oven to 150 degrees. Place the biscuits, butter and ground almonds in the bowl of a small food processor and process until roughly chopped. Spoon the mixture into the base of 4 x 1 cup-capacity ovenproof dishes and press down using the back of a spoon.

Place the cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer and beat until light and creamy. Add the eggs, one at a time, and beat until smooth and thick. Fold through the chocolate and spoon over the biscuit bases.

Place the dishes on a baking tray and bake for 20-25 minutes or until firm to touch. Allow to cool completely at room temperature before placing in the fridge for 2 hours.

Dust with roughly chopped chocolate flakes and top with berries of your choice. Enjoy.

This recipe is my entry in Sweet New Zealand for February 2013! Check out all the great recipes at Greedybread at the end of the month!

 

Sour Cream Berry Cupcakes

Meet Ming. Ming makes cupcakes. Infact she makes cupcakes, cookies and savouries. I don’t know a lot else about Ming expect she is just an ordinary homebaker like you and I, who likes taking pictures of her baking.

What I do know is that I haven’t quite come across another baking site like hers that makes me drool quite as much as I do when I’m scrolling through this one. Her website is a documentation of a project to test, experiment and create new flavours of cupcakes and other delicious treats. Sounds like a perfect little life to me.

Although I discovered this wee beauty a while ago, I have only made this one so far and it sure is delicious! I definitely recommend.

On a side note, I finally got myself one of these! I can now decorate to my heart’s content and not worry about the little wee things getting squashed!

Sour Cream Berry Cupcakes
Makes 10

For the cupcakes:

• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• pinch of salt
• 115 grams butter
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/4 tsp vanilla essence
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1 1/2 cups berries (fresh or frozen)

For the icing:

• 2 tbsp butter, softened
• 1/4 cup cream cheese
• 1 cup icing sugar
• 1 tsp lemon rind, grated
• 1 tsp vanilla essence

Mix together the flour, baking soda, and salt. In a separate bowl, cream butter and sugar on medium until light and fluffy. Reduce speed to low and add vanilla and egg. Stir in the sour cream.  Add flour mixture.  Stir in the berries.  Bake at 180 degrees for approximately 20 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean.

To make the icing, beat the butter and cream cheese together until it goes nice and smooth and creamy. Slowly mix in the icing sugar and blend it till it’s really well combined and then throw in the lemon rind and the vanilla essence and give it another couple of stirs. Ice the cupcakes once cooled and if you like, you can top with additional berries or decorate with some white chocolate.

Rhubarb and Apple Crumble

Fruit crumble is such a comfort food and what a fantastic dessert to eat on a cold, Wellington night. To be honest I didn’t think I’d be reaching for those ‘cold night’ recipes this early in the year, let alone March! Crikey. Although I’m not too fond of the on-going southelies it definitely gives me an excuse to eat things liiiiike….crumble!

Last year was the first time Wellington got snow in 30 years! Lets hope 2012 isn’t a repeat. Enjoy this toasty treat with some vanilla ice cream and some delicious custard.

Rhubarb and Apple Crumble

• 3 cooking apples, peeled, quartered and cored
• 1/2 cup water
• 10 sticks rhubarb
• ½ cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon finely grated orange rind
• 100g butter, chopped
• ½ cup self raising flour
• ½ cup lightly packed brown sugar
• ¼ cup dessicated coconut
• ½ cup rolled oats

Preheat oven to 180 C. Cut apples into thick slices and place in a saucepan with water. Simmer for 10 minutes. Meanwhile wash rhubarb and chop into 5 cm lengths. Add rhubarb, sugar and orange rind to apple, return to the boil and simmer for 3 minutes. Pour mixture into a shallow oven proof dish.

Make the crumble by rubbing the butter into the flour, mix in brown sugar, coconut and rolled oats. Sprinkle crumble evenly over the apple and rhubarb and bake for 30 minutes.
Serve with icecream, cream or custard.

I’ve chosen to enter this recipe into Sweet New Zealand for March hosted by Emma at My Darling Lemon Thyme! Go and check out some delicious entries.

Mini Lemon Meringue Pies

Lemon Meringue Pie is actually a pretty stunning dessert. Mini lemon meringue pies are even better! I can’t remember ever having had lemon meringue pie because I usually always choose cheesecake over other desserts. There is something about cheesecake, I am never left dissatisfied. Amen.

I borrowed this recipe from New Zealand Woman’s Weekly and it was relatively easy to follow. Last Sunday night I was feeling a little bit creative and decided to make mini lemon meringue pies. I was really reeeeeally happy with the way these turned out – the serving size was just perfect and paired with a spoonful of natural yoghurt or a scoop of vanilla ice cream….you have yourself a dessert made in heaven!

The lemon filling is very similar to lemon curd so you could just as easily pre-make lemon curd and use when needed. Time saving tips for busy December…

Have fun with these little bundles of lemony sweet joy!

Mini Lemon Meringue Pies

• 300g sweet short pastry
• 4 eggs, separated
• 1 cup water
• Finely grated zest and juice of 3 lemons
• 1 cup sugar
• 15g butter
• 1/4 cup cornflour
• 1/2 cup caster sugar
• Icing sugar, to dust

Roll out pastry to 3mm thick and use to line a 12-hole muffin pan. Prick the base of each pastry shell with a fork and then chill for at least 30 minutes.

Heat the oven to 200°C. Line each pastry case with baking paper or foil and fill with baking beans (or rice like me!) to blind bake for 15 minutes, then remove paper and beans/rice and return pastry cases to the oven for a further five minutes to dry out. Remove to cool.

Place the egg yolks, water, lemon juice and zest, sugar, butter and cornflour into a saucepan. Cook over a gentle heat for 5 to 10 minutes, stirring continuously until mixture thickens like custard. Remove to cool.

Spread lemon custard mixture into cooked pastry case. Place egg whites in a bowl and with an electric mixer, beat until stiff. Slowly add caster sugar a little at a time, beating well until thick meringue is formed.

Spread meringue over custard to cover completely. Bake at 200°C for 10 to 15 minutes, just until tips of meringue are lightly browned. Dust with icing sugar and slice to serve.

Kahlua and Mars Bar Cheesecake

My favourite dessert is Cheesecake. Hands down.

 In fact, there are several key (or so I’m told) desserts I haven’t ever tried because cheesecake, if an option, is my dessert of choice.

The hoarding of this recipe all started with a delightful slice of Kahlua and Mars Bar Cheesecake at Lone Star one evening. I have wanted to recreate it ever since, it was that good! After a google or three I couldn’t find a similar recipe anywhere. I did however come across a recipe for a Crunchie Bar Cheesecake. I used this recipe and swapped the Crunchies Bar for a lot of Mars Bar and a dash (or more) of Kahlua! I have been making my own Kahlua and Mars Bar Cheesecake for years now and have passed this recipe on time and time again.

There isn’t too much more to be said about this recipe except that it is absolutely mindblowingly DELICIOUS and you should all try it!

Kahlua and Mars Bar Cheesecake

• 1 x 250 gram packet plain sweet biscuits
• 150 grams of butter, melted
• 3 teaspoons of gelatine
• 1/4 cup water
• 375 grams of cream cheese, softened
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence
• 1/2 cup of caster sugar
• 1 x 300 ml thickened cream
• 3 x 60 gram mars bars, chopped
• 4-5 capfuls of Kahlua

Grease a 24 cm springform tin (the deeper the tin the better!) and set aside. Process biscuits until crushed, add butter, process until just combined. Before you press biscuit mixture over the base I like to add 1/2 a cup of chocolate chips to the mix just to give the base a bit of flavour and texture. This is entirely optional! Press the base over the tin evenly, cover and refridgerate for approximately one hour.

Sprinkle gelatine over water in a cup. Stand cup in a pan of simmer water, stir until dissolved. Cool. Beat cream cheese, vanilla essence and sugar in a small bowl with an electric mixer until smooth. Beat cream in a seperate bowl until soft peaks form
Stir in gelatine mixture into cheese mixture with Mars Bars, fold in cream and Kahlua.
Pour mixture over base in tin, Cover and refridgerate until set.

This cheesecake stands pretty great on its own but if you like, you could serve with a spoonful of natural yoghurt and a small handful of berries. I often crumble a Cadbury Flake bar (or similar) over the top just before serving. Enjoy!

I have decided to enter this into Sweet New Zealand. This month is hosted by Mairi at Toast. Head along to her blog and check out all the entries for November! Well worth it.