Peanut Butter and Snickers Brownies and a Giveaway!

I decided to try yet another adaptation of my beloved best brownies in the whole wide world! And as I'm really into Snickers at the moment, I decided to pair it with peanut butter (naturally) and voila! - another great brownie. One thing I would do differently is chop up the Snickers into larger pieces as they disappeared in the baking process and people were surprised to learn that they contained any. I have recommended slicing them in the recipe below.

Speaking of baking (yup I know - as if we would be speaking of anything else on my BAKING blog ;p), I've got this great book 'Baking Bible' to give away. It is a great first baking book as it has recipes for EVERYTHING! From muffins to cakes and biscuits. It is a pretty hefty book too! Here is an excerpt from the Amazon blurb:

"There's a special joy that comes from creating home-baked treats. And there's nothing quite so satisfying as sharing them, fresh from the oven, with your friends and loved ones ... Boasting more than 470 recipes and 200 gorgeous colour photographs, it provides an outstanding resource for any kitchen. 'Baking Bible' has a recipe for every cake, pudding, tart, pie, slice and muffin you'll ever want to cook. There are loads of old-fashioned favourites, as well as plenty of inspired new ideas. Whether it's rich chocolate rum cake for a family birthday party, moist apricot and almond muffins for a weekend morning tea, sun-dried tomato and cheese slice for a lunchbox snack, or butterscotch date biscuits for the school fete, there's something here for every occasion"

For details of how to enter, see below the recipe. Good luck!

Ingredients
300g dark chocolate (At least 70% cocoa solids)
250g unsalted butter
4 x regular (58g) bars of Snickers, each bar sliced not too thinly, not too chunkily
175g plain flour
1tsp baking powder
4 large eggs, lightly beaten
1 tsp vanilla essence
325g caster sugar
1 tablespoon instant coffee granules
3 tablespoons smooth peanut butter (I only had crunchy at home as you can probably tell in the photos)

Here's how NOT to chop up your Snickers

1. Preheat oven to 170C/325F/Gas Mark 3
2. Grease and flour a 30x20cm baking tin
3. Break the dark chocolate into pieces and melt with the butter in a bain marie
4.  Combine the flour and baking powder in a bowl and set aside
5. When chocolate and butter is melted, remove from bain marie and stir in sugar and instant coffee granules
6. Stir in the eggs and vanilla essence
7. Fold in the flour
8. Lastly, fold in the Snickers pieces, give it one turn and pour mixture into the prepared tin. Do not stir too much as you don't want the chocolate to melt
9. Put your peanut butter in a microwaveable bowl and heat in the microwave for 30 seconds or until it  is soft and easy to stir. Using a spoon, drop dollops of peanut butter randomly on your brownie mixture until all the peanut butter is gone
10. Using a table knife, drag it lightly across the surface of your brownie batter marbling the peanut butter in with the brownie mixture
11. Bake in the oven for 25 - 35 minutes or until a skewer inserted comes out pretty much clean
12. Allow to cool in the tin and then cut into squares

I'm giving away a copy of 'Baking Bible'. There is one mandatory way to enter and additional ways to gain entries into the giveaway (Tip: Each comment only counts as one entry so you're giving yourself more chances if you leave a different comment for each entry e.g. Answer the question in one comment. Tell me you're following me in a different comment etc)

CLOSING DATE - Midnight on FRIDAY 24TH FEBRUARY

Rules and How to Enter

• The giveaway is open to everyone with a UK mailing address
• For the mandatory way to enter, leave a comment telling me something you would like to bake
• For another entry, follow my blog using the Google Friend Connect 'Follow' button on the right of my blog. Leave a separate comment to tell me you have done this or that you're already following my blog
• For yet another entry, follow me on Twitter @vickii373 and leave a comment here to tell me you're following me on Twitter and your user name. Also leave me a comment if you're already following me on Twitter.

Good luck!

Lemon Sugar Cookies and a Giveaway!!!

Let's talk numbers.


At last count, I had about 40 cookbooks on my book shelf...
At least 15 of those, I've never made anything from...
I have another 14 cookbooks biding their time till they become a part of my book family on my Amazon wishlist...
I have about 40 recipes bookmarked on my computer at work...
At least another 200 bookmarked on Ella Mac (my laptop)...


My (very long-winded) point is that I have lots of cook books that are brand new, that I've never cooked/baked from and if I'm honest, probably never will. So I'm going to start to give them away! 
The first book I'm giving away is called 'Indulgence Cupcakes: A Fine Selection of Sweet Treats'. Please see the bottom of this post for details on how to enter the giveaway.

Now, onto today's post. It is another recipe from Sweet Pea's Kitchen - whose recipes are always on point! I'm trying to take advantage of the season known as summer in other countries to make lighter, more refreshing recipes taking advantage of all the lovely fruit around and these fit the bill. Lemon is one of my favourite flavours and these cookies are bursting with it. They're also sweet and light and soft; everything a cookie should be. 


Yield - about 3 dozen cookies


Ingredients
2 and 3/4 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
Zest of 2 large lemons
1 and 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup granulated sugar for rolling cookies

1 - Preheat oven to 180C / Gas Mark 4 / 350F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats
2 - In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Set aside
3 - Using an electric mixer, beat the butter and sugar until smooth and creamy. Add lemon zest, egg, vanilla extract and lemon juice; beat at medium speed until combined, about 30 seconds.

4 - Add the dry ingredients and beat at low speed until just combined, about 30 seconds, scraping down the bowl as needed.
5 - Place the 1/2 cup sugar for rolling in a shallow bowl. Roll a heaping tablespoon of dough into a 1 1/2 inch ball, roll the ball in sugar, and then place it on the prepared baking sheet. Repeat with the remaining dough, spacing the balls about 2 inches apart

6 - Bake until the cookies are slightly brown around the edges and their centers are just set and lightly coloured, 8 - 10 minutes.
7 - Cool the cookies on the baking sheets about 2 minutes; using a wide metal spatula, transfer them to a wire rack and cool to room temperature. Store in an airtight container at room temperature.


To keep cookies soft, store them with a slice of bread in an air tight container.


Now for the GIVEAWAY!

I'm giving away the copy of 'Indulgence Cupcakes: A Fine Selection of Sweet Treats' There is one mandatory way to enter and additional ways to gain entries into the giveaway (Tip: Each comment only counts as one entry so you're giving yourself more chances if you leave different comments for each entry. e.g. Answer the question in one comment. Tell me you're following me in a different comment etc)


CLOSING DATE - Midnight on FRIDAY 5th August


Rules and How to Enter
1) Giveaway is open to everyone with a UK mailing address
2) For the mandatory way to enter, leave a comment below telling me what your favourite cupcake flavour is.
3) For another entry, follow my blog using the Google Friend Connect 'Follow' button on the right of my blog. Leave a separate comment to tell me you have done this or if you are already following.
4) For yet another entry, follow me on Twitter @vickii373 and leave a comment here to tell me you are following me on Twitter and what your username is. Let me know if you're already following me.


GOOD LUCK!!!!

Cook Book Review and A Giveaway!! James Ramsden's 'Small Adventures in Cooking'

Before I started writing this review, I Google-imaged James Ramsden's name.


"Why?" you might wonder. Well, because I wanted to see a photo of him.
"Why is that?" you might again ask. And the answer to that is that I had an image of him when I finished reading his 'Small Adventures in Cooking' and I wanted to see if I was correct.
In my head, James Ramsden looked not unlike a young(er) Jamie Oliver and I pictured him pottering around a (rather small) kitchen in surfer shorts and flip flops (yeah yeah I know they're not appropriate kitchen footwear). Because his food philosophy seems to be chill out. The only rules of cooking are there are no rules. Oh except for have fun. And if you're not having fun, you're doing it wrong.

In his debut cookbook, Ramsden demystifies cooking. With eight sections ranging from 'Corner shop capers' (Fare for when you've been drinking and/or are hungover) to 'Surfing the stumbling blocks' (recipes for those foods that can give even experienced cooks slight heart palpitations - souffle anyone?), 'Small Adventures' is a guide that will see you through most cooking scenarios.


His recipes are interesting yet not too complicated, impressive but totally achievable. And best of all, they're for me and you; people with jobs who don't have hours to spend cooking a meal which will be devoured in minutes. People who can find their way round a kitchen but don't have culinary school training. And it is food that covers all sorts of food genres - there are curries and chicken livers, English muffins and meringues. On my 'To make ASAP' list are the Thai pork patties, cheese toast with a twist, goat curry, 6 cheese and ale fondue and the chocolate, chili and cardamom tart!


One of my qualms with this book is not to do with the content but rather the design. Don't get me wrong, it is very cool. But that's exactly it. It feels too much like a boys book. I like my cook books with a huge picture of some glossy, mouthwatering dish on the cover that makes me want to lick it because I know that my version will never look that good. But perhaps that is the point, that the book isn't intimidating. Like the content, the cover and design isn't setting standards so high that the reader can't fail but fall dismally short of.


Oh, you're probably wondering if the picture of James Ramsden looked like the surfer my imagination produced. He didn't. Which is a good thing - my surfer dude probably couldn't string two sentences together (he's wearing flip flops in a kitchen after all!); much less write a very good cook book.


Now for the GIVEAWAY!


I'm giving away the copy of James Ramsden's 'Small Adventures in Cooking' which the lovely people at Quadrille Books sent me. There is one mandatory way to enter and additional ways to gain entries into the giveaway:


CLOSING DATE - Midnight on FRIDAY 1st JULY (Giveaway now closed)


Rules and How to Enter
1) Giveaway is open to everyone with a UK mailing address 
2) For the mandatory way to enter, leave a comment below telling me what your speciality dish is. Y'know, that dish you cook when you're trying to impress, or on short notice?
3) For another entry, follow my blog using the Google Friend Connect 'Follow' button on the right of my blog. Leave a separate comment to tell me you have done this or if you are already following
4) For yet another entry, follow me on Twitter @vickii373 and leave a comment here to tell me you are following me on Twitter and what your username is. Let me know if you're already following me.


GOOD LUCK!!!!