Brownies

After being absent for half a year, which I apologise for, now the dark time of the year comes and cooking and baking is coming back to me. Let me start with fabulous brownies with a decadent chocolate frosting on top.

So here are the ingredients:

• 175 g of brown sugar
• 100 g unsalted butter at room temperature
• 2 large eggs
• 75 g of plain flour
• 50 g of cocoa powder
• 1 tsp of baking powder
• 100 g of chocolate chips (I use a mixture of dark and white)
• for the frosting you'll need 120 g of milk or dark chocolate and 100 g of full-fat cream cheese

And how to prepare them:

• line a brownie tin with grease-proof paper
• cream the butter with the brown sugar and stir in one egg after the other
• sift in the flour, cocoa and baking powder and mix
• mix in the chocolate chips with a spatula and spread the mixture evenly in the baking tin
• use your hands (slightly wet) to push the sticky dough into the corners
• bake for 30 mins at 175 degC
• when finished let cool completely
• for the frosting melt the chocolate and let cool to luke warm before mixing with the cream cheese
• spread the mixture evenly over the cake and cut into 16 squares
• refrigerate for at least 1 h before serving

Enjoy! 

Cakes, Cakes, Cakes - Marmorkuchen/Marble Cake

After finishing my teaching job, I wanted to say thank you to my teaching colleagues. What could be better than a home-baked cake. For this occasion I wanted to get back to a standard cake here in Germany as I haven't baked one of those in ages: Marble cake!

I loved it as a child and it is so easy to do...

Ingredients:

• 3 medium eggs
• 150 g caster sugar
• 150 mL oil (rape seed is good here)
• 250 g flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 150g full fat yoghurt
• 2 tbsp cocoa powder

And how to do it:

• beat the egg and slowly add sugar
• after you have obtained a light texture, slowly add the oil while stirring
• next combine the flour, backing powder and yoghurt and add to the egg mixture
• now line the baking tin with grease-proof paper or grease the tin thoroughly
• add half of the batter, then add the cocoa to the rest and mix
• layer the dark batter on top of the light one and marble both carefully with a knife
• now bake in a pre-heated oven at 200 °C for 40-45 mins.
• once cooled, either dust with icing sugar or cover with a chocolate coat

I hope you enjoy this, simple and so good :-)

Lebkuchen

In preparation for Christmas, my mum and I have started with some classic german recipes. This one will have to rest for 2-4 weeks, so made now, they will be ready for the Advent time. For the non-Germans that are not aware of what Lebkuchen is, I have undertaken a little research. Apparently, Lebkuchen has been developed in the monastries in the medival times and there are many local versions of it, some famous ones are Aachener Printen and Nürnberger Lebkuchen. The most important thing that they all have in common is that the basis is a honey cake that is spiced with at least cinnamon, cloves and anis. This recipe here is a family recipe that hasn't been made for a very long time, so this year, we wanted to try. I always thought, that Lebkuchen is very difficult to make, but once you have all the ingredients together, it is in fact rather simple.

Here we go, ingredients:

• 250 g honey
• 100 g sugar
• 100 g margarine or butter
• 500 g all-purpose flour (non-rising)
• 10 g potassium carbonate (Pottasche in German, makes the very sweet dough rise better), alternatively 1 heaped tbsp baking powder
• 10 g ground cinnamon
• 10 g ground cloves
• 5 g ground anis
• 5 g ground cardamom
• 1 pinch of salt
• 1 tbsp lemon zest
• 2-3 tbsp Rum (not necessary, but gives the dough some depth)
• 1 egg

You see, it's rather a long and unusual list of ingredients, however, the making is that much simpler:

• mix honey, sugar and margarine in a small pan and heat until completely dissolved
• cool until lukewarm
• meanwhile mix all the dry ingredients
• add the honey mixture to the other ingredients, make a smooth dough
• add the Rum and the egg an knead until you have a firm dough
• let rest for half an hour, then roll out to a 1 cm thick layer
• bake in a pre-heated oven at 200 °C for 20 mins
• now be quick and cut in shape before the cake cools down
• once cooled, the now very hard cake can be covered in either chocolate or any other icing
• and the hard part is: put them away for 2-4 weeks, best way store in an airtight metal box, test from time to time if the cake has softened enough

That's it!