Chocolate Blueberry Pie

Chocolate Blueberry Pie

Last year I was given the Mast Brother’s recipe book and I’ve not made enough from it. I decided to right that and bake one of the more unusual recipes from the book. This came in the form of a Chocolate Blueberry Pie. I love blueberry pies and I’ve put one up on the blog before. Adding chocolate, both to the filling and the pastry, makes this a much heavier and richer pie, but it’s something ideal for a cold winters evenings. Cover it with cream, or have it with some ice cream and you’re on to a winner.
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Salted Caramel Chocolate Tart

Salted Caramel Chocolate Tart

This is my last post before Christmas, and I’ve saved a pretty great recipe for my last of the year. I’m sat on a train from Glasgow Central to Oban to catch a ferry over to the Isle of Mull to see my parents for Christmas. It’s the perfect time to write up a recipe, with lakes disappearing off into the distance out of one window and snow topped mountains out of the other. I’ve just demolished the emergency rations of leftover Salted Caramel Brownie from this month’s cake care package deliveries and it feels apt, as this particular recipe is for a Salted Caramel Chocolate Tart, which I baked for our friend Christmas last weekend.
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Brownie Crackle Cookies (Snowball Cookies)

Brownie Crackle Cookies

Brookie? Crownie? What’s the best abbreviation for brownie cookies? Is there one that doesn’t make them sound mega lame, because both of those options aren’t so good and I’ve had people saying them at me for the last week. Last year I was sent a recipe by my girlfriend which we both made about 3 times in the weeks running up to Christmas. The recipe easily makes about 50 cookies, doesn’t take all that long to put together and its icing sugar shell makes it a perfect fit for a Christmas treat. You roll them in icing sugar just before you bake them, which causes them to crack and gives a lightly dusted, snowball like shell. They’re pretty intense; gooey and chocolatey like a brownie but with a crunch of a cookie.
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Cardamom & Chocolate Braid

Chocolate & Cardamom Loaf

I’ve just returned from a week up in Scotland at my parent’s on Mull. I’ll be writing up a travel diary of the week soon, after part 2 of my New York trip, but while I was away I baked a number of things. Rainy days on the Isle of Mull are ideal for baking. You’re not going to get much else done, apart from a quick walk of the dog around the loch all wrapped up in waterproofs, so what better way to spend a day than in the kitchen baking? I made a number of things on this trip, but with the Great British Bake off well underway (and the possibility that it could all go to shit with a move to Channel 4) and bread week featuring a challenge for baking chocolate bread, I thought I’d start with the Cardamom & Chocolate loaf we made on the first day.
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Chocolate & Whipped Cream Pie

Chocolate Pie

I haven’t blogged in a month, and with good reason. There’s more on that later but for now, lets talk chocolate. I was given the Mast Brothers cookbook for my birthday and, as much as they may have been surrounded in controversy in December, that doesn’t effect the quality of the book. It is still packed with a great range of chocolate based recipes. From the simple all the way through to the more complex. I wanted to make something that wasn’t just one of their basics, but wasn’t in the mood to properly spend the time tempering chocolate. This left a few intriguing looking recipes, and with the realisation that I’ve not made a proper chocolate tart since last summer, I decided to make their Chocolate Pie with Whipped Cream.
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