Churros (gluten free!)

Last year we I discovered how amazingly quick and easy it is to make churros - Spanish doughnuts - from scratch at home. I made them a lot during the summer, including for breakfast in the garden on Sunday mornings after the twins had had friends for a sleep-over - they were a huge hit! Yesterday the kids helped me make them as an after-dinner treat for Valentine's Day (and we used up some leftover chocolate ganache from our recent lemon and courgette cupcakes), and we all ate them in front of the fire while we watched a movie.  

Traditionally you would use a piping bag fitted with a star-shaped nozzle, but I have found this can end up in a great sticky mess. It's far simpler to roll chunks of the dough into sausage shapes instead, and works brilliantly. The thicker they are, the more soft and doughy in the centre - but we've all agreed that we prefer them quite thin when they are extra crispy. The best part is the cinnamon sugar they are rolled in while still hot. 

Lemon and courgette cupcakes with chocolate ganache (kids vlog edition)

These little cupcakes have a secret ingredient - courgettes make them lovely and moist. The idea of lemon and chocolate might sound strange at first, but the combination really worked. Here's Frankie to show you how...

Chocolate brownies (Frankie's vlog)

Today Frankie shows you how to make delicious chocolate brownies. (We made ours with gluten-free flour and baking powder but you can swap these for ordinary wheat flour if you like.)

Salted chocolate hazelnut crispy cakes

These are vegan, gluten free chocolate and hazelnut crispy cakes, given an extra special twist with a pinch of pink Himalayan salt.

Clotted cream tiramisu

Lu loves tiramisu and always orders it when we go to Italian restaurants, but I realised recently that for some reason I’ve never made it!  For her birthday, I decided to give it a try, but unfortunately couldn’t find any mascarpone at the shops.  Instead, I made it with clotted cream – and Lu says this was the best tiramisu she’s ever tasted, so for now on this will be how I always make it!

Chocolate yule log

I've never made a yule log or a swiss roll before, so I scoured the internet and found this brilliant Guardian guide to how to cook a perfect yule log - I like it because it shows the process I often go through in developing my recipes, researching classic recipes and combining the best bits of several to come up with what I was looking for.  In the end, this recipe is basically my favourite Delia Smith black forest gateau mixture - eggs, sugar, cocoa (it's a flourless recipe so great for those who can't eat wheat), but with Christmassy spices of cinnamon and nutmeg, and soft brown sugar instead of caster for a more caramel/ fudgy taste.  The ganache is made with a mixture of Galaxy milk chocolate and a little dark chocolate, so it's not too dark and rich.   Rolling it really isn't difficult either - just follow the steps in the recipe below...

Ingredients

6 large eggs, separated
5 oz soft brown sugar
3 tbsp cocoa powder
Pinch of salt
½ tsp cinnamon
½ tsp ground nutmeg
1 tbsp caster sugar (for sprinkling)

For the filling
8 fl. oz double cream

3 tbsp icing sugar
1 tbsp brandy

For the icing
8 fl. oz double cream
6 oz Galaxy milk chocolate, chopped
2 oz dark chocolate, chopped

Pinch of sea salt

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C and grease and line a 30x20cm swiss roll tin.
2. In a large mixing bowl, beat the egg yolks and soft brown sugar until you have a smooth, thick mixture.
3. Sift in the cooca, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg, then beat to combine.
4. In a separate, large bowl, whisk the egg whites to soft peaks.
5. Fold the egg whites into the rest of the mixture.
6. Pour the mixture into the tin, spread out evenly, and bake for 30 minutes until springy to touch.
7. Place a clean tea towel on a wire cooling rack and cover with a piece of greaseproof paper. Sprinkle this with caster sugar.
8. As soon as the cake is out of the oven, run a knife around the edges, then shake it out on to the greaseproof paper. Peel off the lining paper, and then, using the tea towel to help, roll it up tightly and leave to cool on the rack.
9. Meanwhile, place the cream, icing sugar and brandy in a mixing bowl and whip into soft peaks.
10. Make the ganache by heating the cream to a bare simmer, then take off the heat and add the chocolate pieces and salt. Leave for a minute or so, then stir to a smooth paste, and allow to cool to room temperature.
11. Once the roll is barely warm, unroll it on a board, remove the paper, and spread with the brandy cream. Roll up again, and place on the serving plate.
12. Spread with the ganache, and, as it cools, use the tines of a fork to create a bark effect – you can add more ganache for a thicker coating once the first layer has cooled if you like.
13. Dust with icing sugar for a snowy effect before serving.

Chocolate pistachio caramel cream muffins

We're still ill. And thoroughly fed up of feeling hot and cold, achey and shivery. I decided we needed a chocolate fix. No chocolate in the house, and it's too cold and dark to venture out for some.  But in the pantry, I did have cocoa, and caramel, and pistachios. So I decided, muffins - about the quickest of all baking, no need for an electric whisking, just the bare minimum of a quick stir of wet ingredients into dry, and 15 minutes later, warm, chocolatey, nutty, caramel goodness.  We were also almost out of milk, so I substituted with double cream, for extra cheering up!

Pomegranate molasses cookies

These cookies were an experiment to try using pomegranate molasses in baking. It's got an amazing but really unusual flavour - an almost sweet and sour tang - so I added some lemon zest, spices (cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg) and sweetened it with a little cocoa and white and milk chocolate chips. 

Chocolate courgette brownies

These might sound weird but they taste absolutely amazing. You'd never know there was a load of grated vegetable in them, but you will wonder how they are so gorgeously moist! TThey also don't contain any eggs or butter, so are suitable for vegans. I used yellow courgettes fresh from my mum's allotment, which of course made these extra special.  I took them to Plymouth for a weekend away with the girls. I think they are the best brownies I've ever made - deliciously rich, gooey, chocolatey, and a perfect light and fluffy texture. Try them!

Amazing yellow courgettes from Mum's allotment

Chocolate malted milk Malteser cake

I made this cake for dinner with friends this week.  The cake is made with cocoa and Horlicks (malted milk powder), based on a Nigella Lawson recipe, but then I filled and iced it with a whipped ganache made from Horlicks-infused double cream and solid milk chocolate. The whole thing tastes like a giant, cakey version of Maltesers, one of my favourite guilty pleasures!

Chilli hot chocolate muffins with whipped chocolate coconut cream frosting

I'm still feeling a little under the weather and decided to try spicing up some chocolate chip muffins with a kick of chilli powder, ginger and cinnamon. We'd run out of milk so instead I experimented by using the liquid from a chilled tin of coconut milk - then I whipped the solidified cream with melted chocolate to make an amazing chocolate fudge frosting!

Chocoholic’s fantasy cake

My dad is a huge chocolate lover and so for a meal for father’s day, my sister Lizzie suggested I make a death-by-chocolate style cake.  As she’s coeliac I decided to make a a version of the flourless chocolate cake I’ve made previously, Torta Gianduia, but instead of hazelnuts, this time I used ground almonds.   

I made three layers of cake – each one made with a different bar of chocolate: white, milk and dark chocolate.  A sweetened whipped cream and a chocolate whipped cream sandwiched the layers together, and then the whole cake was iced with a chocolate buttercream.  To finish, I piped lines of shiny dark chocolate ganache on top, then sprinkled shavings of each type of chocolate over it.  Happy father’s day, Dad!

Cadbury’s Crème Egg Brownies

I saw this recipe on Facebook of all places and just couldn't resist trying it when our friends Cath and Gregg came for dinner. They kind of sum up what Easter is all about for me - oodles of chocolate! Apart from being adorned with ever-so slightly melted Cadbury’s crème eggs - which I love - the basic brownie recipe that sits beneath them is gorgeous.  

Chocolate truffle cookies

Since Christmas we've had a small box of milk chocolate truffles in the cupboard and miraculously they've not been eaten. This has to be a record in my house, as I normally can't resist scoffing all the chocolate in sight, on sight! I decided to roughly chop them up and turn them into cookies - a good way to make them go a long way, and producing the most decadent chocolatey cookies ever. Unlike the box of chocolates, these definitely won't last long in our house!

Giant chocolate button cookies

Our friends Emma and Geraint and their two little ones have just moved back to our home town.  It's so nice to have them round the corner!  We popped in today to welcome them to their new home and I made them a batch of these cookies as a house-warming present. The recipe is based on a Millie's Cookies recipe on the BBC Good Food website, and I used some brilliant giant chocolate buttons, but it would be just as good with ordinary chocolate chips or chunks of your favourite bar.

Chocolate Smarties cookies

The shops are filling up with Christmas chocolates. Unable to resist, I bought a big tube of Smarties the other day, and decided to use them to make a batch of cookies. These are also irresistable!

Rolo mini muffins

The other treat I made to take away with us to Cornwall this weekend are these chocolate mini muffins (based on the same recipe using sour cream as my fabulous Oreo mini muffins) - but these each contain a Nestle rolo. It was a complete experiment to see how these turned out, but they worked really well - the rolo mostly melts, adding a rich caramel centre to the muffins. Yummy!

Ginger and milk chocolate chunk cookies

This recipe is a mixture of the ginger biscuits I made a couple of days ago and my dark chocolate ginger cookies – this time adding chunks of milk chocolate and a little drinking chocolate rather than dark cocoa powder. These are a delicious combination of warm and spicy ginger with gooey, oozing milk chocolate. They disappear fast!

Peanut butter milk choc chip shortbread cookies

OMG. These are amazingly good, melt-in-your-mouth, salty, sweet, chocolately, peanutty shortbread cookies. They are also incredibly easy and quick to make. You stick the dough in the fridge for an hour or so and when you're ready to bake they take no time at all to produce delicious, crumbly, soft cookies full of flavour. Even if you're not a big fan of peanut butter (and I'm not especially, normally) you will LOVE these, I promise!

Kitchen sink cookies

These cookies are so-called because you can chuck in any mixture of chocolate, nuts and dried fruit you have in your cupboards.  I used a mixture of Galaxy chocolate (milk and cookie crumble), toasted macadamias and pecans, dried cranberries and natural glace cherries.  You could substitute this for anything else - white chocolate, dark chocolate, crystallised ginger, pistachios, peanuts, hazelnuts, dried apricots, pears, peaches, fudge, mini marshmallows... These are lovely chewy, soft cookies and will disappear quickly!