Truly Gorgeous Apple and Cinnamon Muffins

I don’t really have much to say about these….I just had a hunch and it worked. Please try them, they are glorious- and I’m not taking credit- apple and cinnamon just works.

Ingredients

Ingredients

For the muffins:

360g Self Raising Flour

370g caster sugar

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

• 200 ml Semi Skimmed Milk
• 200ml Sour Cream

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla extract

75g butter, melted

1 1/2 tsp cinnamon

2 cooking apples

30g butter and 30g dark brown sugar

Ramekin filled with half cinnamon and half dark brown sugar.

Method

Preheat the oven to 180c.

Mix the flour, cinnamon, sugar, salt, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda.

Mix the milk, sour cream, egg, and vanilla together.

Pour into the flour mixture and beat until all the ingredients are incorporated.

Melt the butter, add to the mix and beat until the butter has just been incorporated.

Mix with electric whiskers until it is smooth and shiny.

Peel and core the apples. Dice one of them into small cubes.

Heat the butter and the dark sugar in a pan until it forms a dark caramel sauce.

Add the diced apple and cover with the caramel.

Cook for a couple of minutes.

Add the caramel and apples to the muffin mix.

Spoon the mix into a muffin tray until 2/3rds full.

Cut thin slices from the second apple, and place a couple on each muffin.

Sprinkle the cinnamon sugar over the top.

Bake in the oven for 20-25 mins or until a skewer comes out clean and the muffins are golden brown. 

Stay Unchained ❤

Ready, SET……go!!

I’m bloody knackered!! My charming American boyfriend both started new jobs, and have therefore been tagging in and out and barely seeing each other. So we pledged that during our one day off together, we have to really, really enjoy ourselves, spend a bit of money and not think about anything stressful like visas, work, money, life, the universe etc.

This week we hit the Forest of Dean cycle trails for our first ever bike ride together. We cycled 10 miles along the river and through the deepest parts of the forest. It was so good to be out exercising, sunning ourselves and frantically pedalling down, and manicly straining up the hills, until we finally got back to the rental shed and collapsed.

Another excellent part of this weekend has been the American Baking Competition. Although initially I resisted this with the force of a Kitchen Aid mixer, slowly I have become addicted. It lacks the simplicity and honesty of the English GBBO, there is no Ryan, and the addition of a 250,000 dollar prize means that one guy in particular is a total tool, but it still has enough of the original charm to pull me in. I like to see American dishes and American takes on things I like to bake. I’m backing James and Elaine- with Francine as a wild card just for sheer sauciness. Inspired by their ‘custards’ challenge (teehee), I promised my American Creme Brulee tonight 🙂 That’s the reason for the title of this blog- setting a custard can be an actual bitch.

Nigella’s Creme Brulee recipe here: http://www.nigella.com/recipes/view/creme-brulee-193

…except I baked these for about an hour at gas 3 before adding the sugar.

Stay Unchained<3

Chilli Chocolate and Oat Biscuits.(Diabetes-friendly)

After a trip to the new Cheltenham Wholefoods supermarket- essentially my new home over the last few weeks- I picked up an intriguing item. The reason I call these diabetic friendly, is that it completely replaces the actual sugar in the recipe, and the chocolate is a very high percentage. Even so, they are still a treat. ❤

Time for a little experimenting!

Livi’s Chilli Chocolate and Oat Biscuits

125g Butter

100g Sweet Freedom

1 Egg

1/2 tspVanilla

140g Plain Flour

1/2 tsp Baking Powder

1/2 tsp Salt

75g Oats

1 tbsp Cocoa

Milk

100g Chilli Chocolate- I used Montezuma 73%- the less sugar the better

Blend together the butter and the Sweet Freedom (great name no?) until creamy.

Add the egg and blend.

Add the flour, baking powder, salt, oats and cocoa- and milk if it’s too dry.

Chop the chocolate into chunks, and mix (by hand) into the mixture.

Bake for 25 minutes at 180c/ gas 4 until a skewer comes out clean.

Stay Unchained<3

Blog Inspiration: Chocolate Mint Fish Biscuits

This blog post is a tribute to a rather lovely blog I discovered recently called ‘Playing with Flour’. In addition to its fantastic name and beautiful photography, it has thee most gorgeous chocolate biscuit recipe.

Here is my (much messier) attempt! And check out the blog….it’s lovely!

Chocolate Mint Fish

These are crunchy chocolate biscuits with a chocolate and mint ganache, covered in mint chocolate. Brilliant. I couldn’t find mint chocolate on short notice, so I used Lindor with peppermint essence to make the filling. ‘Playing with Flour’ used these beautiful flower cutters, but I only had pigs or fish. …Since you ask, a result of purchasing a bizarre collection in which I only really needed the heart cutter. I used both, but the fish are cutest (pigs are still pretty cool though). I started with a delicate brush of chocolate, but I had so much left, and I wasn’t really trying to impress anyone- so I threw the remainder alllll over.

Crunchy Choc-Mint Cookies

Stay Unchained<3

Americana!!!

Due to my handsome American boyfriend moving and living with me, I am gearing up for my first ever Thanksgiving. As it was Halloween as well, it was definitely time to rise to the baking challenge…………can you tell what it is yet?

ahhhhh it has that ‘new pumpkin’ smell….did I mention I love October?

Whipping up some quick sweet shortcrust pastry.

So…there are all these fancy ways of decorating pumpkins now…but nothing screams Halloween like the traditional triangle zigzag formula. BACK TO WORK.

Roasted, blended pumpkin drying out

This next stage involves removing any trace of pumpkin taste from the pie…I used maple syrup, cinnamon, mixed spice and ginger….and evaporated milk with two eggs.

What’s going down here

…

Aha! A pumpkin….or should we say ‘Jack o Lantern’ pie. I enjoyed mine with a cold bottle of Ol’ Jeremiah Weed’s Sippin’ Brew. America…this one’s for you.

Stay Unchained<3