Valentine's collection 2014

The Valentine's Collection for Marie's Bakehouse is now available for ordering.

 

Chocolate chip heart shaped cookies, available in white, milk or dark chocolate, and covered in heart sugar sprinkles.
6 wrapped in a gift box, £5, one flavour choice for order.

 

 3 fudge hearts wrapped in a gift box £6.50.

Available in many different flavours including milk chocolate, white chocolate, dark chocolate, milk choc and orange, white choc and lemon, milk choc with fruit and nut, dark choc and peppermint.......and many others besides.....one flavour choice per order.

 

 3 Tiffin hearts £6.50
Both available in a variety of flavours such as Malteser, Mint Aero, Orange Aero, Rolo, Smartie.....

or another one of your choice.
  Order consists of one flavour choice.

Tiffin hearts also available in a large size, same flavours available as before.

Gift wrapped for £13.

 

Large fudge hearts, flavours available as previously, gift wrapped for £13.

Large Brownie Heart- Crispy on the outside, dark and gooey on the inside.

My daughter's favourite thing that I bake!!
Gift wrapped for your Valentine! £12

and finally.....

 

Let me know if you would like to order! Last orders taken on Sunday 9th February.

 

Marie x

 

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marie@mariesbakehouse.co.uk

 

 

Review of Lakeland's Silicone Chocolate Box Shapes

Another Lakeland toy to play with? And it involves chocolate? Definitely count me in!

I've had experience with making chocolates with a hard plastic chocolate mould before, but not with silicone, so it required a bit of thinking about how to go about it, as the methods I used for a rigid mould wouldn't work so well with a flexible one.

I decided to apply the melted chocolate with a paintbrush which helped get the chocolate in all the places required, especially with the more intricate designs. In hindsight, it may have been better to let this harden, and then apply a second coat, as a couple of the chocolates didn't come out without breaking, but that's something to try next time.

I made a caramel sauce, and poured it into the chocolate mould once they had been in the fridge for about an hour (I was busy doing other things at the time, I don't think it necessarily needs this long). I left a space at the top of each mould- I didn't fill it completely to the top.  And then popped the mould back into the fridge.

After about half an hour, I melted more chocolate and added this on top of the caramel, then it went back in the fridge again to set. I tried to pop them out after half an hour, but this perhaps wasn't quite long enough as a couple of them cracked on coming out, so I chilled them for a bit longer (this could have been down to having too thin a coat and not the chilling time- I will need to experiment with this).

Second time lucky, the rest popped out without a problem, by pushing the mould from underneath.

I'm really pleased with how they look!

 

Not perfect, but pretty fab for the first attempt I think!

 

I'd definitely use this mould again. The chocolates would be great for presents, not just at Christmas time, but for birthdays, Mother's Day, and I'd also think about using them on my dessert tables.

I'm looking forward to trying out different flavour combinations- I think salted caramel and a chocolate orange ganache will be two I'll be trying out soon!

If you fancy giving them a go, you can buy them from Lakeland here: http://www.lakeland.co.uk/16442/Silicone-Chocolate-Box-Shapes

I was not paid to write this review, but was sent the mould free of charge. All views are my own.

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How to make a stripy vanilla and chocolate bundt cake

 

I've seen a few stripy cakes around recently, and after treating myself to a bargain bundt tin this week (£1.99 from Home Bargains!!!) I decided I needed to use it, instead of putting it in the cupboard and not using it for months. Not that I EVER do that with new equipment. NEVER. *ahem*

 

So here's the recipe for the stripy vanilla and chocolate bundt cake!

 

What you need:

280g butter or baking margarine

280g caster sugar

5 eggs

280g self raising flour

2 tsp vanilla extract

2 tbsp. cocoa powder

100ml double cream

200g milk chocolate (I used Cadbury's Dairy Milk for this recipe)

 

What to do:

 

1. Cream the butter/baking margarine and sugar together.

 

2. Add the eggs one at a time beating thoroughly.

 

3. Add the vanilla extract and the self raising flour and beat again until thoroughly combined.

 

4. Take half the mixture and put it in another bowl.

 

5. Add the cocoa powder to the remaining half and beat until it has mixed fully.

 

6. Grease the bundt tin. I used Wilton Cake Release, and can't recommend it highly enough.

 

 

7. Add a dollop of the vanilla mixture to the tin.

 

8. On top of the vanilla mixture, add a dollop of chocolate mixture.

 

 

9. Next add another dollop of vanilla, on top of the mixture already in the tin. The mixture will start to spread.

 

 

10. And then another dollop of chocolate. Keep adding alternate dollops of mixture until you have used all the mixtures in both bowls. If it doesn't spread as well as you need it too, just shake the tin a bit and encourage the mixture to spread round to the other side of the tin.

 

 

11. This is what it will look like when you have finished adding the mixtures.

 

12. Bake for around 30 minutes at 160 degrees. Check around 25 minutes- your oven may bake differently to mine.

 

 

13. Leave it to cool for about 20 minutes in the tin, then turn it out onto a wire wrack to cool fully. (How fab does that look?!)

 

14. Once the cake is cool, chop the chocolate into small pieces and put it all in the bowl, and heat the cream until it just reaches boiling point, and pour the cream over the chocolate. Leave it for about 30 seconds to start to melt the chocolate, then beat it together until it has combined to make a smooth ganache. Pour the ganache over the top of the cake and leave to set.

 

15. Stick the kettle on, cut and slice, put your feet up and enjoy :)

 

I am definitely going to make this again, but try different flavour combinations too. Chocolate and orange, coffee and caramel, white chocolate and lemon, dark chocolate and mint......so many new ones to try!!

 

If you make it, I'd love to hear what you thought!

 

 

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