Lil Ms Squirrel's Fully Loaded Brownies

Today Miss A and I are off to the Love Food Festival at Dyrham Park.  I've been wanting to go to one of these events for ages, but haven't been able to convince the hubby to come with me.  They're normally held in Bristol or Bath at an open market place and this worries me with my wayward toddler on the loose with only one parent supervising (ie I won't be able to look at anything because I'll be making sure she doesn't accidentally run out into the road or something).  Whereas the Dyrham Park event is at a big old stately home so there'll be plenty of space for her to race around before I pop her in the buggy and push her round for a bit while I browse the gorgeous wares on offer.

Made by my beautiful assistant

Sunday is also running and swimming day, things were a bit mental this morning as we prepared for the off.  On Friday, the husband asked Miss A to make him brownies and she's been pestering me ever since to let her do this so I figured we'd fit it in between getting back from swimming and going out to the food festival.  For once I was uber-prepared with all the ingredients weighed out ready in little bowls so we just had to mix, bake and then go.

I wanted to do something a bit different with these brownies.  As nice as my favourite recipe is, I wanted something a little more adventurous.  Rooting through the cupboards, I realised I didn't really have enough of any one ingredient or even two different ingredients so I decided I'd just weigh out 200g of random things and throw it into the mix.  Hence fully loaded.  I went for marshmallows, dark and white chocolate chunks, pistachios and dried cherries.  And it worked really well.

The marshmallows gave the brownies a really chewy texture, the chocolate chunks added bite.  There was a little crunch and a great green colour from the pistachios and a sharp tang from the cherries.200

When the husband finally got to sample one, he then revealed that what he actually wanted was my signature whoopie pies (chocolate with Baileys cream in the middle), not brownies.  He thought because they were brown they were classed as brownies.

Hey ho.  Well at least I got a new recipe out of today!  And here it is:

Recipe - Makes 16

• 200g 40% plain chocolate (something like Bournville will do)
• 175g butter
• 3 eggs
• 175g caster sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
• 75g plain flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 2 tbsp cocoa powder
• 200g mixed fruit, chopped nuts and sweet things of your choice

• 20cm square cake tin, lined

1. Preheat the oven to 190c/170c fan.
2. Chop the chocolate and butter into small pieces, place in a glass bowl over gently simmering water and stir until just melted.  Set aside to cool.
3. Lightly beat the eggs with the sugar and vanilla.  Stir into the cooled chocolate mixture.  
4. Sift the flour, cocoa and baking powder into the chocolate mixture and stir well until just combined.  Mix in the fruit, nuts and sweets.
5. Pour into the cake tin, level the top and bake for forty-five minutes.  The cake should be just about set with a slight wobble in the middle.  If you use marshmallows, the edges and top are likely to be a little crispier than normal brownies.
6. Cool completely in the tin and then cut into sixteen pieces.

Lil Ms Squirrel's Hellman's Banana and Raspberry Blondies

I've written before about wondering how you can claim a recipe as being your own rather than someone else's.  I still don't quite understand the rules.  Having done a little research, opinion varies from website to website and person to person.  The most sensible advice I found was that if you change at least two ingredients (or quantities of an element - but not just doubling or halving the entire recipe) and then write the method in your own words, then technically you can claim the recipe as your own.

Cake for just 92 cals per piece?  Oh, go on then!

Of course, if you're a lovely and decent person, you might just want to provide references to books and if the recipe is online a link to it (or link to the book on Amazon or similar).  And if you're not lovely and decent then you probably should add references anyway - just in case the publisher comes a-calling with a nice shiny lawsuit.

I've tried to stick to this principle on my blog (although can't guarantee the earlier posts adhere to that because I never really thought about it at first).  And I hope that in doing this, the publishers have made the odd pound or two.  Certainly Fourth Estate who publish Short and Sweet have had lots of publicity from me on this blog now I've made 24 of Mr Lepard's recipes.  And given that I've since found the majority of them on the Guardian website where I could've gotten them for free, they were lucky to get £8 out of me.  Hell, I love it so much, I may even still buy the Kindle edition once my original copy falls apart.

Anyway, enough mentionitis about Short and Sweet.  On to my bake today.  Back in January when I decided to shed a few Christmas pounds, I found a recipe on the BBC Good Food website for 'Guilt Free Brownies' which I duly tried in this post.  I remember having seen this concept in an ad by Hellmans in a magazine and at the time thought 'Euuuuuw' but in my post Christmas desparation for something sweet and healthy and with a blog to write, I thought 'In for a penny, in for a pound'.  And they weren't actually that bad.  Less than 100 cals per piece and they freeze well too.

The cynic in me wondered if Hellman's had sponsored the recipe under the BBC banner given that the Beeb are now allowed to do product placement (I think?  Or is that just ITV).  But it was funny that the recipe specifically referenced Hellman's without saying 'Other low fat mayos work perfectly well too'.  And then I wondered if Hellman's had actually given the recipe.  But I've not seen it published in print since to compare like with like.  I just realised as I was typing I could check the Hellman's website - but I can't be bothered right now.

The not-so-secret ingredient.  Other mayos are available!

Moving on, now I've decided (again) that I need to address the amount of cake and other unhealthy stuff I eat, I thought this would be the ideal opportunity to make a recipe of my own.  I mean really make it.  Not just accidentally forget to add something that the recipe said I should and find that it either did or didn't really matter that I forgot.

So I decided to makeover the made-over brownies and see if they worked as blondies instead.  As blondies don't really appeal, the only recipes I've ever perused are in the Original Hummingbird Bakery book and Short and Sweet.  I couldn't tell you whether or not the Hummingbird ones contain banana, but Dan Lepard's do.  So I guess that this recipe could be kind of linked to his.  Except the only similarity is that they have bananas in.  Oh and whilst trying to figure out if I should use baking powder (like Dan does) or bicarb (like the Good Food recipe does) I noted that rather than mashing his bananas, he chops them.  So I did that too.  And, having spent several hours reading up on the pros and cons of bicarb vs baking powder vs the pH content of bananas in varying states of ripeness, I settled for baking powder.  End of similarity as I used more in the end.  If you want to make Dan's - which will no doubt work perfectly and taste amazing (but be full of calories), you can find the recipe here.

Chopped, not mashed.

In the end, I guess I cheated a bit by using the same quantities as the BBC recipe does for a lot of the ingredients.  At the end of the day, however, certain recipes always require certain components.  Like a Vicky sponge always having a ratio of around 60g of butter, sugar and flour to every egg you add.  Plus a bit of vanilla essence.  When I make these again, I may adapt the recipe slightly once more.  I might try a little more flour or a little less sugar.  I left out additional liquid as I was using fruit.  I used self-raising flour as it was all I had (poor planning!) and then I added extra baking powder after reading up on the need for cakes to be roughly pH neutral and that the riper a banana, the more alkaline it is - and the more chance you have of your cake not rising.

Interestingly, I also finally discovered why I detest things that have bicarb in them.  Apparently certain brands contain an aluminium component which some people can taste.  I must be one of them as many a good biscuit has been ruined for me with a slightly soapy taste, even when I've followed a recipe to the letter.

I digress.  Back to my recipe.  All in all, it worked out just about okay.  The brownies are a little too sticky for my liking. And a little damp underneath which I attribute to the raspberries.  If I make them again, I'd either use dried cherries or just serve the raspberries on the side of the plate with a brownie and a little dollop of low fat yogurt.  I doubt they'll keep for more than a day or two (they won't have chance to anyway!) and I won't try freezing them as I expect the dampness will spoil them when they defrost.

Defrosted bananas - not pretty!

I had also intended to use some bananas that I'd previously frozen and defrosted just for the recipe.  This is a really good thing to do if you've got bananas that are too ripe for eating - just freeze them and then use them in banana loaf recipes or for cookies (I used this technique for Dan Lepard's Banana Fudge Cookies).  But when I clocked the result of these ones, they looked so icky and brown on the outside that they just didn't seem to suit the blonde ethos so they have been used in another banana loaf for the hubby and I used fresh ones for this recipe.

But I did like them a lot.  The sponge is really lovely and vanilla-y.  I think next time I might use a little less vanilla, but it certainly wasn't offensive.  The chunks of banana were all lovely and fudgy when they were baked.  I also didn't get those horrid little brown streaks - so commonly seen in baked goods containing bananas.  Dan doesn't say if this is because the bananas are chopped rather than mashed, but I did read that it can be to do with the use of bicarbonate of soda causing a reaction with the bananas - another reason I went with baking powder instead as I think that's quite ugly, especially in a bake that uses white rather than brown sugar.

Having just polished off my third as I type, I realised that they actually taste just like a fruit trifle.  My stepfather would love them, with the vanilla being reminiscent of the custard and the sharp contrast of the raspberry representing the jelly.

And best of all, according to MyFitnessPal.com, they come in at just 92 cals per piece.  Even less if you use Hellman's extra light.  I cut mine into 16 pieces, which is plenty enough (I ate the three spaced over several hours).  But you could cut them into 12 for 123 cals each or be really greedy and cut them into eight large bars and it would still only be 184 cals.  Far healthier than some Lorraine Pascale Granola Bars I calorie counted the other day which tipped the scales at a whopping 504 cals each! (But the blondies are probably less healthy)

I would also consider using chopped macadamias - which I love - in place of the raspberries.  Using the same 75g quantity that Lepard uses in his recipe would add another 40 calories to the 1/16 blondie and if you went for making the toffee to encase the nuts, the extra sugar would add another 20 calories so you'd be looking at 152 cals per piece.  Still not bad for a small, sweet treat.  I am definitely going to try that on another occasion and will duly report back.

Well if you've gotten to here, you have the patience of a saint.  The recipe is coming up very shortly, but first, a couple of good links about the whole baking powder vs bicarb argument that I found whilst idly surfing at 4am this morning.

First is an excerpt from a book called The Farmer's Wife's Cookbook by Voyageur Press which came back as a Google Books search result (hopefully the link works for you).

Second is an article by Giovanna Zivny which delves into the chemistry a little more.

Finally (yes the recipe is coming!) I am hoping to get this included in Alphabakes, a monthly blog challenge hosted by Ros and Caroline.  Each month they challenge bakers to submit the product of baking recipes (of their own, or someone elses) that start with a particular letter.  I'm hoping to be cheeky and get these in under H for Hellman's.  Of course, other mayo brands work perfectly well!  Check out Caroline's great blog, 'Caroline Makes' where you'll find the round up of this month's challenge from the 25th onwards.

Right, on to the recipe!

Makes 16

• 85g white chocolate, broken into squares
• 85g self raising flour
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla bean paste (because I like the flecks, but vanilla extract is fine)
• 150g caster sugar
• 100g Hellman's light mayonnaise
• 1 egg
• 200g bananas, divided into four lengthways and then chopped into small pieces
• 100g raspberries 

Really - serve these as a side rather than baking them in!

1. Preheat the oven to 190c/170c fan/gas 5.  Line a 20cm tin with foil backed baking parchment (I use Lakeland's - but regular baking parchment will do)
2. Put the chocolate into a medium sized bowl.  Add about an inch of water to a saucepan that the bowl will sit over (without the base of the bowl touching the water) and heat until simmering.  Place the bowl over the water and turn off the heat.  It's really important to melt white chocolate carefully as the low cocoa content can cause it to go grainy or burn.
3. Once melted, leave to cool for about five minutes.
4. Once the chocolate has cooled, beat in the vanilla and sugar.  It may go a bit grainy, but this is fine.  Beat in the egg and mayonnaise which will slacken off the mixture.  Don't worry if you have the odd small lump or two of sugar (but not loads!)
5. Stir in the banana pieces then sift the flour, salt and baking powder into the bowl and mix until combined.
6. Finally, carefully fold in the raspberries (or leave them out and just serve them on the side once the brownies are cooked).
7. Pour the mixture into the prepared tin and level out.  You will need to scrape every last bit out of the bowl as this is a low fat recipe and bowl licking is prohibited.
8. Bake for 30 minutes until well set but slightly wobbly in the middle.
9. Cool completely before cutting into sixteen and serving.

Nigella's Bacon Brownies

For some reasons, lots of software developers seem to have an infatuation with bacon.  Don't ask me why.  I used to be a developer myself and I am partial to a bacon sandwich.  But some developers seem to worship the stuff.  To the point that the majority of their test user names and passwords are bacon related.  Or if they want to choose something different, then they'll use something sausage-related.  I have a password sheet in my desk drawer at work for all the test systems our developer has worked on and every single password on it is related to a pork product.

There really is bacon in there

Developers of a feather flock together.  We're (and I use we because I still consider myself part of this elite club) are generally thought of as long-haired nerds or weirdoes.  If you've seen Graham Linehan's IT Crowd, characterisation absolutely captures the stereotypical view of IT workers.  In fact, I am often referred to as being Moss' long-lost sister.  A little hurtful, but probably true.  I even used to sport that hairdo and I did once have glasses like that too.  I think that's why I get along so well with M and wanted to make this recipe just for him (well okay I had one too)

A few months ago, I came across a recipe for Bacon Jam from Not Quite Nigella.  M, our developer, was having a bit of a bad time and so I promised to make him some.  Of course, life got in the way and with me working at a different site for the last four months, I've not managed to keep my promise.  More recently, I happened across this recipe for Bacon Brownies on Twitter and just knew I'd found a recipe that might just go down a storm with everyone.  Or not.

Yep, I really did put bacon in there

I lined up the ingredients for the first shot and wavered a little when I realised that I had the makings of bacon and eggs and I was going to potentially be wasting that as a meal option plus a whole bunch of chocolate to boot.  Then I remembered my love for Canadian pancakes with crispy bacon and maple syrup and kept going.

The bacon was hard to dice finely so I snipped it into tiny squares, fried it off and then chopped it up with my big cook's knife once it was a bit crispier.  I substituted maple syrup for the golden syrup and, having forgotten I'd run out of bicarb, used 3 tsp of baking powder instead.  There was so much chocolate in the recipe that I was worried that the bacon flavour would be lost.

The finished brownies were beautifully soft and gooey and the salty nuggets of crisp bacon gave a wonderful contrast.  I'm not sure if you'd know it was bacon in there if you weren't told up front.  It could equally have just been flakes of sea salt.

Being a Nigella recipe, it's the antithesis of the Guilt Free Brownies I made back in January.  And of course, it's not veggie friendly.  But there are plenty of other brownie recipes on this blog for my lovely veggie friends to try.    

If you're looking for a talking point, it's definitely one to try.  You can find the recipe online at Emerald Street.  Hopefully M will appreciate them.  And another brownie-fearing colleague has also expressed an interest in trying one for the experience.  I'll update the blog with feedback later.  Oh and it'll be interesting to hear the husband's opinions too!  I won't be telling him what the secret ingredient is until he's finished eating it.

Update 23/04/2012 - Well the husband had a bacon brownie and was warned it contained bacon and he ate it without fuss, without gagging, without complaining.  His only comment was that it was more cakey and less fudgy than my usual brownies.  I am impressed!  I think it was just the sheer amount of chocolate that one him over.  As for M?  Well he took all six home to share with his cats.  I still await his verdict.

Bacon, eggs and chocolate

Bacon Brownies Recipe

• 125g thin rashers of streaky bacon, scissored into small pieces and then chopped fine
• 2 tsp of golden or maple syrup
• 150g of soft unsalted butter
• 250g of soft light brown sugar
• 75g of best cocoa powder
• 150g of plain flour
• 1 tsp of bicarbonate of soda
• 4 large eggs, beaten
• 150g of dark chocolate, chopped, or dark chocolate chips/morsels

1. Preheat the oven to 190°C and get out a 25cm square tin and line it, or (as I prefer) a throwaway foil baking tray measuring 30cm x 20cm x 15cm.

2. Heat a heavy based (preferably non stick) frying pan and when warm, add the bacon bits and cook, stirring occasionally until beginning to crisp. Add the syrup, stir again to mix and transfer the sticky bacon bits to a cold surface, either on some foil or a plate. The syrupy bacon juices left behind are just delicious when mopped up with some bread: a cook’s treat!

3. Melt the butter over a gentle heat in a medium sized saucepan and when it’s melted, add the sugar, stirring with a wooden spoon.

4. Now take the pan off the heat and add the cocoa, flour, bicarbonate of soda and stir, then add the beaten eggs and stir again to mix.

5. Add the chopped dark choc or chips and the bacon bits, breaking them up with your hands if necessary. Fold together then pour and scrape into the tin.

6. Place in the oven to cook for 20-25 minutes; you want a little gooeyness inside still.

7. Transfer the tin to a wire rack and sit until cooled a little (but not to the point of coldness) and cut into 16 squares.

Miss A's Triple Ginger Gingerbread

Baking gingerbread has now become a weekly ritual in our house.  It's the only kind of biscuit Miss A will eat.  We've tried shop-bought organic and ones full of E-numbers (I'm kidding - but see sconegate anyway) and I've tried a variety of home made offerings - triple chocolate cookies, peanut butter cookies, Banana Fudge Cookies, Easter Biscuits, Christmas Biscuits and Cheese and Black Pepper Buttons - all of which she's had a hand in making, none of which she's liked.  So we always come back to Gingerbread.

I've been using a recipe from my Marks and Spencers Food 4 Kids book.  Every time I make them, I always forget that the recipe seems to need far more flour than it states as the mixture is extremely sticky.  This frustrates me.  You'd think I'd remember. But every time, I slavishly adhere to the recipe, go to roll it and then get flustered because I forgot the extra flour.

So today, I figured 'how hard can it be to make up a biscuit recipe that works?'  And decided to have a go at making the recipe myself.  Of course, having made the other recipe so many times, I had an ingredient list in my head, but I wanted to see if I could improve on it.

First off, I started with the butter and syrup.  I wanted to make a large-ish quantity of dough because I believe that someone other than Abigail eats all the 'big bu-fwys'.  I often get complaints that nobody likes 'li'l bu-fwys'.  Hmmm....

I heart my bunny biscuit jar

We started off by melting butter with some golden syrup and then for good measure, I decided to use some stem ginger in the biscuits so I added two tablespoons of the ginger syrup too.  My brown sugar had gone rock hard so I lobbed that into the pan to melt as well.  There were a few tiny bits that wouldn't dissolve (see the picture) but all in all this worked well.

While the butter and syrup mixture was cooling, we sifted some of flour into a bowl.  Added some bicarb to keep it soft and plenty of ginger and cinnamon for flavour.  I also chopped up three balls of stem ginger for some contrast in the texture.

Not every gingerbread recipe uses an egg, but with my egg-cracking assistant at the helm, I had no choice but to add one in.  After adding the cooled butter mixture and mixing to combine, the dough cracked a lot on rolling so with a bit of faffing around trying to work out if it needed more syrup or flour we got ourselves a dough that was good enough to roll and cut.

We managed to get fourteen butterflies from this and I think it would make about eight decent sized gingerbread men.  Some of the dough was lost through 'rolleee cuttee' but the dogs enjoyed it.

The result was a thick, soft gingerbread, nicely spiked with bits of ginger.  And surprisingly, Miss A loves bits of chopped stem ginger straight from the jar, despite its subtle spicy heat.  That girl is going to have a good palate one day.

Recipe

• 300g plain flour
• 125g self raising flour
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 2 tsp ginger
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 140g butter
• 3 tbsp golden syrup
• 3 balls of stem ginger, chopped plus 2 tbsp of syrup from the jar
• 100g soft, dark brown sugar

1. Preheat the oven to 190c/170c fan.  Lightly grease two baking sheets.
2. Sift the flour, bicarb and spices into a bowl.
3. Melt the butter, sugar and syrups in a small saucepan, taking care not to let it boil. Leave to cool for a few minutes.
4. Crack the egg into the flour mixture, add the chopped ginger and loosely combine.
5. Add the cooled butter mixture to the flour and mix quickly to a firm dough.
6. On a floured work surface roll out the dough to about 4mm thick.  Cut shapes as desired, gathering and re-rolling the cuttings until all the dough is used up.
7. Place the shapes on the baking tray and backe for 8-10 minutes until slightly risen and golden at the edges.  
8. Leave to set on the tray for five minutes and then transfer to a cooling rack.

PS: The triple ginger comes from the ginger powder, the chopped ginger and the ginger syrup :)

Hummingbird Bakery Black and White Chocolate Cheesecake Bars

Cake envy.  It's not a good emotion.  And it's something I'm guilty of breeding in my office.  I'm sure those of you who bake have experienced this.  Once upon a time, I only used to bake for my work colleagues on high days and holidays.  But since starting this blog, baking for the office has become an 'easy win' way of ticking off one recipe a week (and meaning at least one day a week, I can eat a normal tea, rather than having to eat something new).

Since January, I've been seconded onto a project at one of our other sites.  I've made lots of new 'friends' at the new office because I am the bringer of cakes.  I have known informal meetings to be interrupted because someone has spotted an email on their Crackberry proclaiming there to be homemade cake on my desk.  And at times, I've used cake as an incentive to coerce my colleagues from my home site to attend meetings at the new site (if senior management are reading this, they'd've come anyway - and the sugar they consume makes them more productive!)

But now the cake envy has started.  My regular colleagues get emailed pictures of whatever goodies are on offer just to make them jealous.  My project manager has been bragging to an old colleague of mine who now works at another site about how much cake he's been plied with over the last few months (and there's not an ounce of fat on him - I dislike him very much for this!)  Said colleague is now not speaking to me.

Unusually today, a plan was in place to visit my home site and take the weekly bake with me.  I forwarded pictures of the cake, but when the meeting was cancelled, I got a short shrift from my colleagues saying the cake didn't look like it was anything special anyway.  I know that's just pure cake envy because they always taste good, even if they're not aesthetically pleasing.

For every friend I've kept through baking, I have a feeling I alienate those who aren't lucky recipients.  I post pictures of my baking on Facebook and every time, my stepdad hopefully comments that he'd like to get some next time I visit.  Invariably he's out of luck because it's been shared with someone else instead.

I get cake envy too now I idle away so much time on Twitter, but it's certainly broadening my cake eating horizons (and my bottom!)  I love looking at the fabulous baking other people tweet about.  There is such amazing baking talent in this country, I seriously don't know how supermarket cake survives.  I don't think I'd ever be envious of that.

Anyway, enough waffling and on to the bake.  Interestingly I baked this after watching the Baking Mad episode on tray bakes.  The recipe calls for the base to be mixed using a mixer, but the lovely Mr Lanlard says "...shouldn't be using mixers, shouldn't use too many pieces of equipment, if it's too sophisticated or elaborate, it's not a traybake any more..." so it was all mixed by hand.  This had the added bonus of not annoying the husband who hates my mixer nearly as much as he hates Manchester United.

I also had a bit of an issue with my local Waitrose.  For a tiny Waitrose Local (or whatever they call it) it has an excellent selection of food.  But they don't sell cocoa.  Do the people of my town not bake or something?  I can buy it in my local Tesco Express, but not in posh old Waitrose! (I'm not posh, it was just supposedly convenient)  I have complained about this so hopefully it will be rectified shortly.

Whilst re-reading the recipe, I realised I messed up and used baking powder rather than bicarb which meant my base was a little more puffy than it should've been but no less tasty.  In fact, I don't normally like bicarb in things because whilst I know it has a purpose, I can always seem to taste it and I find it sometimes spoils my enjoyment of the cake.

This may also be why the bits of crumbled dough on the top seemed to leak a little bit of butter grease across the top of the cheesecake but it tasted fine. I also think the direction to keep 1/4 of the dough to use in the topping is excessive.  I probably used only half of this

You need to make sure you bring it to room temperature before serving although it doesn't say this in the book.  I found it really hard to cut and was worried that the base would be all horrible and dry, but a couple of hours in a tin on my desk and it was all lovely and fudgy again.

Very popular with the natives who are big fans of brownies.  I'd probably bake again, but my favourite Hummingbird Brownie recipe is their Raspberry Cheesecake Brownie - you can find that recipe here.

Recipe: Makes 12-15 generous bars (adapted from Hummingbird Bakery Cake Days)


For the base

• 250g unsalted butter
• 420g caster sugar
• 2 eggs
• 380g plain flour
• 60g cocoa powder
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1/2 tsp salt

For the topping

• 80g good quality white chocolate
• 300g full fat cream cheese (ie Philadelphia)
• 60g icing sugar, sifted
• 1 egg

1. Cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Add the eggs one at a time and mix until well incorporated.
2. Sift together the flour, cocoa, bicarb and salt.  Tip into the batter in two batches and fold in until well combined.  You may need your hands to bring this together as it's more like a firm dough than a batter.
3. Reserve about 1/5 of the dough for topping and put in a plastic bag and refrigerate.  Line a 23x30cm baking tray with parchment and press the remaining dough into the tray and allow it to set in the fridge for 20-30 minutes
4. Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 170c/150c fan/325F/Gas 3.
5. Remove the base from the fridge and bake for 20-25 minutes.  Allow to cool completely in the tin before adding the topping but keep the oven on for cooking the finished cheesecake.
6. Melt the chocolate in a glass bowl over a pan of simmering water.  Remove from the heat and allow to cool slightly.  Beat the cream cheese and sugar until smooth (don't over mix as it can split).  Add the egg and mix thoroughly, then stir in the melted chocolate.
7. Spread the mixture onto the cooled base, crumble over the reserved dough in large pieces.
8. Bake for about 25 minutes or until the cheesecake has set.  Cool completely then refrigerate for a few hours.  Cut into bars and bring to room temperature before serving.

BBC Good Food: Guilt Free Brownies

Pre-baby I always had a savoury tooth.  My favourite ever lunch would be bread with lots of unsalted butter, cheese and crisps.  My foodie holiday heaven would've been France as we used to eat that pretty much every lunchtime on childhood holidays.  Sure I liked sweet things.  But given the choice between, savoury won every time.

So far, so normal. Chocolate, sugar, a touch of coffee

Even in the early months of pregnancy, I was convinced I was having a boy because I craved red meat (now know that's due to anaemia).  But the minute I had my scan, it was almost like the switch governing my sweet tooth was flicked to 'On - hyperdrive mode' and I found myself daydreaming about puddings, baking and chocolate.

And that's why I'm currently having daily arguments with myself over the need to lose weight vs the need to eat cake.  Yesterday, I fell in love with the idea of a chocolate and beetroot cake on Twitter.  I've been trying to disguise vegetables in various ways for the child (childless people, you have NO idea how stressful this is) and so I've been researching vegetable cakes.  This particular notion was flaunted in front of me by the lovely Lisa aka @HarbourHussy although I have a feeling I've also seen a post from Laura aka @Philosophobia on the subject of beetroot brownies *makes mental note to tweet Laura for the recipe*

Anyhow I just had to have some chocolate cake.  And thanks to the wind keeping me awake most of the night, I had plenty of time to do some research into low fat chocolate cake.  I remember reading somewhere about the idea of putting mayonnaise into brownies.  Sounds disgusting.  But a little Google revealed a recipe on the Good Food website that uses exactly this and it has a five star rating after 98 reviews.

I had all the ingredients in my cupboard - it doesn't use butter which is good as butter is banned at the moment - so it seemed worth a shot for the purposes of this blog.

In goes the mayo!

And I have to say that as disgusting as they sound, the 98 people are right.  The brownies are really quite light but still a bit fudgy.  I do like my brownies dense and fudgy and brimming with chocolate chunks or nuts, but to have brownies on a diet that I can potentially eat on a day when I don't run without starving myself, these are really good.

Of course, they'd be better with some additions or warmed with a scoop of ice cream on the side and some warm cherry compote on top, but you can't have everything if you are trying to shift some pounds.

I used Hellmans Light mayonnaise and despite an initial worry that it contained things like mustard, vinegar and paprika and that these would spoil the taste, you wouldn't know there was anything untoward in them at all.  I suppose at the end of the day, it's not much different to using eggs and oil in the recipe.  This now has me wondering if it's just a gimmick and if you could create a similar low fat brownie without the need for mayo?  Maybe some experimenting coming on.  Of course, I would hate anyone to think I'm intimating that Hellmans would get the BBC to promote their products...

As it was the first time, I stuck to the recipe, save for two things.  I only had a mix of half 50% plain chocolate and half milk.  If I made it again, I'd probably go for a full 60% or 70% flavour, but it was still very chocolatey - just a little too sweet for my liking.

The finished article. Not bad, if I do say so myself.
(Mug from LF Designs, designed by @JotStudios!)

I also had a panic about the lack of vanilla essence in my cupboard so ended up using a teaspoon of amaretto flavoured coffee syrup.  This added 20 calories (shock horror!) to the entire recipe.  I then realised I had a tub of vanilla bean paste in the fridge, but no matter.  The amaretto flavour came through really well and if you're trying to keep calories down, it's worth experimenting with other syrups for flavouring.  You could always drop a teaspoon of sugar to compensate.

By using light mayonnaise and cutting the brownies into 16 pieces rather than 20 pieces, they came out at just 110 cals each.  I personally think that the size was okay, but you could cut them bigger and it would still be a lower calorie treat than a regular brownie.  But will someone please tell the Good Food team that you cannot cut 12 squares from a cake that is square in the first place.  They will be rectangles.  Or if not, my junior school teachers failed me somewhat.

This is the recipe from the Good Food website, but if you're not dieting or want a real treat, I've also posted my own recipe below.  Incidentally, mine come in at just shy of 300 cals if you cut them into 16 or only 150 if you make tiny triangles (but who'd want to do that?)

Guilt Free Brownies

• 85g dark chocolate , 70% cocoa solids, chopped into small pieces
• 85g plain flour
• 25g cocoa powder
• ¼ tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 100g golden caster sugar
• 50g light muscovado sugar
• ½ tsp coffee granules
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 tbsp buttermilk
• 1 egg
• 100g mayonnaise (I used Hellman's Light)

1. Heat oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Pour enough water into a small pan to one-third fill it. Bring to the boil, then remove the pan from the heat. Put the chopped chocolate into a large bowl that will fit snugly over the pan without touching the water. Sit the pan over the water (still off the heat) and leave the chocolate to melt slowly for a few mins, stirring occasionally until it has melted evenly. Remove the bowl from the pan, then let the chocolate cool slightly.
2. Meanwhile, lightly oil and base-line a 19cm square cake tin that is 5cm deep. Combine the flour, cocoa and bicarbonate of soda. Using a wooden spoon, stir both the sugars into the cooled chocolate with the coffee, vanilla and buttermilk. Stir in 1 tbsp warm water. Break and beat in the egg, then stir in the mayonnaise just until smooth and glossy. Sift over the flour and cocoa mix, then gently fold in with a spatula without overmixing.
3. Pour the mixture into the tin, then gently and evenly spread it into the corners. Bake for 30 mins. When a skewer is inserted into the middle, it should come out with just a few moist crumbs sticking to it. If cooked too long, the mix will dry out; not long enough and it can sink. Leave in the tin until completely cold, then loosen the sides with a round-bladed knife. Turn out onto a board, peel off the lining paper and cut into 16 squares.

Rebecca's brownies

• 185g 70% Dark Chocolate
• 185g unsalted butter
• 40g cocoa
• 85g plain flour
• 100g white chocolate
• 275g golden caster sugar
• 3 large eggs (at room temperature)
• 100g chocolate chunks - mixture of dark, milk and white (I use the Cooks Ingredients ones from Waitrose)

1. Preheat oven to 160c fan/180c/gas 4
2. Line the base and sides of a 20cm (8") square cake tin (approx 3" deep) with baking parchment
3. Melt the dark chocolate and butter gently until liquid.  Leave to cool to room temperature
4. While the chocolate mixture is cooling, chop the white chocolate into small pieces. 
5. Sift the flour and cocoa into a bowl
6. Whisk the eggs and sugar with an electric mixer until thick and pale and fluffy.  When the mixture is ready, the beaters should leave a trail on the top of the mix when you lift them up.  This takes anywhere from 4-10 mins depending on your mixer.
7. Using a rubber spatula, fold the cooled chocolate into the egg mixture using a gentle figure of eight motion.  Try to combine well without over-mixing.
8. Sift the flour and cocoa (again) into the chocolate and egg mixture, and mix using a figure of eight motion.  
9. Finally stir in the chocolate chunks until evenly distributed
10. Pour into the pan and bake for 25 mins.  
11. Bake for 25 mins then pull the shelf out a bit and gently shake the tin. If the brownie wobbles in the middle, it's not quite done, so slide it back in and bake for another 5-10 minutes until the top has a shiny, papery crust. (I also double check the middle with a cocktail stick) Take out of the oven.
12. Cool in the tin until completely cold, then cut into sixteen squares and demolish!!  

Chocolate, Cranberry and Macadamia Brownies

I'm still on a thrifty drive, trying to use up Christmas leftovers rather than just erm...disposing of them.  Obviously I try to use everything up ordinarily and any meat based products that are past their best are usually well received by our two dogs.  But every year, I buy cranberry jelly.  Every year, the husband has one spoonful with his Christmas dinner.  Every year, I put the jar in the fridge with the intention of using it for something else.  Every June, I have a mass clear out of the fridge and discard it because the back of the jar says to only keep it for two weeks after opening.

Finished brownies - sorry for the poor lighting!

But this year, given the current challenge, I thought I'd do something different.  I had a little yesterday with my baked Camembert lunch.  I then leafed through several recipe books looking for something to do with it, but all the recipes wanted dry or fresh cranberries or just served the sauce on the side.

So back I went to BBC Good Food.  They're really good at recipes for recycling Christmas leftovers and they recommended a fab recipe for post-Christmas pie to me the other day which you can find here.  Would have loved to make this, but the husband doesn't like any meat-based pie that doesn't come from the chippy - classy!

A quick look at the rest of their post Christmas recipe collection turned up Cranberry and Macadamia Brownies.  Result.

Despite struggling to fit into my jeans and having not run for a week because of a nasty cold that's been kicking around, I had plans to make brownies today.  My hubby is a photographer and was doing a shoot for Miss Laura Mai, professional singer and one of our regular models tomorrow.  She (and lots of other people) say I make the best brownies ever and I promised her I'd make some next time she was in.  Sadly she crashed her car today (she's fine thankfully) but I'd just taken the brownies out of the oven when she texted to say she couldn't make the shoot so I'm being good and popping them into the freezer for the lucky guys I work with when I go back in the New Year.

Jewel red cranberry sauce going in

I did have a little taster when I cut out a piece to take a picture for the blog (the picture's rubbish because of the poor light in my kitchen this time of year) and the edge piece was lovely and soft, with the sharp taste of cranberry complementing the sweetness of the brownie.  I also loved the buttery crunch of the macadamias (my favourite nuts).    I don't often use nuts in my brownies for various reasons but really should experiment with nuts a bit more - pistachios being one nut I'd love to try out.  Once cut, the inner sections also had a very promising fudgy look to them.  Perfect.

The original recipe can be found here on the BBC Good Food website

I made a couple of modifications to the method based on my own brownie recipe.  It worked well for me.

Cuts into 16 (original recipe says 12)

• 150g dark chocolate , broken into chunks
• 200g butter
• 200g soft brown sugar
• 150g self-raising flour , sifted
• 40g cocoa powder , sifted
• 3 large eggs , beaten
• 50g dried cranberries
• 100g macadamia nuts
• 60g cranberry sauce

1. Heat the oven to 180C/ 160C fan/ gas 4 and line a 20cm x 20cm baking tin with baking parchment. Melt the dark chocolate with the butter in the microwave or in a heatproof bowl over just simmering water.  Leave to cool slightly.
2. Using a mixer, whisk the eggs and sugar until thick and creamy and the raised beaters leave a trail on the surface for 3-4 seconds.  This may take anywhere between 3 -8 minutes so perserver.
3. Fold the cooled chocolate into the eggy mousse and fold in using a spatula in a figure of eight motion.
4. Fold in the flour and cocoa powder, again using the rubber spatula and a figure of eight motion until combined - take care to not overmix.
5.  Stir through the dried cranberries and macadamia nuts, then swirl through the cranberry sauce.
6. Pour into the tin and smooth the surface. Bake for 25 - 30 mins. Allow to cool before slicing.