kahlua and chocolate mousse

The first time I made chocolate mousse was when my sister had her wisdom teeth out, and for a week, she couldn’t eat anything solid. I would get up every morning and puree fruit for her breakfast, and I made a simple chocolate mousse for her desserts. I am a damn good little sister.

I made this chocolate and Kahlua mousse for my 18^th birthday dinner, where I also served baked churros. This recipe is from this book, it worked perfectly and was a very easy recipe, although I did change it slightly by replacing some of the Kahlua with water, as I didn’t want it to taste too alcohol-y. I served the mousse topped with some slightly sweetened whipped cream piped with a closed star tip, which is my favourite type of piping nozzle; I also dusted the mousse cups with cocoa.

mint and white chocolate mousse tart

This was the first tart I have ever made, and I was so pleased with the results. My mum was having friends over for dinner and cooking a recipe from the cookbook ‘Jerusalem’. Inspired by the Arabic theme of the meal, I decided to use mint, which is a popular flavour in Middle Eastern sweets. Although that’s about where the Arabic inspiration ends.
 

vanilla glazed doughnuts

In a previous post, I have outlined my love of cinnamon doughnuts, and although they will always hold the highest position in my heart, I cannot ignore all other flavours, that would be unethical. I decided to make some vanilla glazed doughnuts, and as I never follow recipes when making icing, they didn’t turn out quite how I expected.

 

I was aiming for a thin, pastel glaze in blues and pinks, and instead managed to way over pour the food colouring and ended up with very dramatic looking doughnuts. Although they weren’t what I was aiming for, I was still pleased as they just looked so pretty!

raspberry and dark chocolate macarons

Macarons are without a doubt one of the most fun, whimsical and pretty things that anyone can bake, they can be any colour, any flavour (as Adriano Zumbo is well aware of, vegemite flavoured!? I’m not that Australian,) and are incredibly impressive when tucked into a nice box or stacked on a cake stand.

 

Before I received this book for Christmas this year, my macaron adventures had been a bit wishy washy, sometimes I’d sit outside the oven bouncing and clapping my hands as I saw the feet forming, and other times I’d pull them from the oven only to see flat, cracked blobs of disappointment.

I made these raspberry and dark chocolate macarons for my sister’s boyfriend’s sister, whom I had never met, because they’re her favourite. I was particularly pleased with how these turned out, and the combination of a raspberry reduction and rich chocolate ganache was perfectly sandwiched between the pastel pink shells. I then used some pink, red and blue food colourings and vodka to paint hearts onto the macaron shells.

sugar cookies

The first time I made sugar cookies I had no idea what I was doing, I didn’t know about different piping consistencies and I couldn’t tell you what flooding was. Thanks to the fabulous Sprinklebakes recipe, they were delicious… although in an ugly sort of way. They were shaped like wonky lions and I made them for my sister’s 20^th birthday (she is a lion king fanatic). Although my Simbas were a bit funny looking, and my sister decided that sugar cookies sounded ‘too unhealthy’, dad and I happily devoured them.

Since then, thanks to a lot of practise (and a Sugarbelle tutorial), my cookie decorating skills have improved immensely. I love this lace design, and it works with any shape of cookie. I have made pale blue flower shaped cookies previously for my Grandma’s birthday, as well as some that unintentionally resemble Christmas jumpers. Sugar cookies are perfect for anyone who is as artistically challenged as me, yet still wishes to create impressive and pretty cookies. My pink and white martini glass cookies were a cute treat to take to friends 18^th, and decorating them was almost too easy, as all I had to do was pipe a triangle and a couple of straight lines.

This recipe makes a tonne of cookies so I usually halve it, and since the royal icing requires egg whites, I cheat a bit and use only 2 whole eggs and two egg yolks in the cookies, saving the other two egg whites for the icing. This cookie recipe is from Sprinklebakes and the royal icing is taken from the PMWU cookbook.

baked churros

I am a proud visitor of the yearly National Folk Festival in Canberra, where my family and I have spent every Easter for over a decade. The music is awesome and perfectly folky and each year we return home with a couple of new CDs. The highlight of the festival used to be the daily churros I would have, dipped in rich Italian hot chocolate. Until the churro stalls stopped coming.

 

I have always been a lover of all things doughnutty, however I can’t stand frying, I’ve fried churros a few times before and always end up with a few minor burns, dough all over my hands and a plate of tasty yet too-greasy churros. When I came across this baked version in my frequent trawling of the Sprinklebakes blog, I knew I had hit the Spanish jackpot, particularly since I was planning a Mexican themed 18^th birthday dinner (churros are Spanish, close enough?). My friends devoured them, perhaps because I am unusually pushy when trying to get people to eat my food and I peer pressured them into it, but the general consensus was that they were delicious.

browned butter and cinnamon doughnuts



When my friends gave me a doughnut maker for my 18^th birthday, I made doughnuts seven times in two weeks.  I have since made them frequently for bake sales, birthdays, and on one occasion simply because my friends and I were all feeling mopey and I thought we deserved a treat at recess. I LOVE doughnuts, like a lot. A lot a lot. I will almost always pass up a cupcake for the opportunity to sink my teeth into a delicious cinnamon-sugar doughnut, one time I had a krispy kreme and it blew my mind.







Thanks to my dislike of frying I had to find another way to make my doughnut dreams come true, and when I found the smitten kitchen breakfast puffs recipe, life became immeasurably better. My first batch of doughnuts were yum, but a bit ugly and flat, and how could I settle for anything less than doughnut perfection? I discarded the recipe that came with the doughnut maker, instead using my favourite recipe from Smitten Kitchen. The resulting doughnuts were light and fluffy and I’m only slightly ashamed to say I ate five.