Bake yourself a Cheese Cloud

Hello everybody ! Today I want to present to you a recipe for an edible cloud. It's called a Souffle ! I plan on baking many different flavours but today I'm writing about a Cheese Souffle. Yummy ! 

Ingredients : 

- Mature Cheddar Cheese (125g)

- Grated Parmesan Cheese 

- Plain Flour (45g)

- Butter (45g)

- French Mustard (1/2 tbsp)

- 5 eggs (5 whites and 4 yolks)

- Milk (225ml)

- Salt 

- Pepper

First I suggest preparing your space and your ingredients. I found it very helpful. Grate the Cheddar. Weight Flour, Butter and Cheddar and keep them in separate glasses so when you need one of them you just grab the glass. Separate the Egg Whites from the Yolks (remember that you need only 4 yolks, keep the fifth one in another container and put it in a fridge. You can use it later on for another recipe). Measure out the amount of Milk you need. Have the Salt, Pepper, Mustard and Parmesan close to you. You're ready to go ! 

By the way, I find a spiral whisk (http://homeware.fiskars.com/web/fiskarsweb.nsf/uk/utensils_functional_form_spiral_whisk_858150) the best to use when preparing the mixture for the souffle. 

In a small pot melt the butter. Add flour and stir until smooth. Cook it for a minute over a medium heat.

Pour in the milk and stir until the flour-butter mixture blends with the milk. When it's done bring it to the boil while stirring constantly until the mixture becomes thick and smooth. 

Remove the pot from the heat. Season it to your likings and add cheddar and mustard. Stir properly. Add the yolks bit by bit to the mixture and stir well. 

Preheat the oven to 190°C. Prepare a baking tray on which you will put the ready-to-bake souffle. 

In a large bowl whisk all the egg whites until it's stiff. Stir in a bit of the egg whites into the pot and stir well. Combine the mixture from the pot with the rest of the egg whites. Stir well. 

Grease the souffle dish with butter. Pour the mixture into the souffle dish. Sprinkle parmesan cheese over the top. Do not panic if at some point during baking, the souffle rises so much it breaks and starts to boil over. Just leave it alone, later on you can cut of the part that boiled over and eat them anyway. 

Bake for 20-30 minutes. 

When done serve immediately. The puffiness of the souffle goes away very quickly so you're trying to serve it as quickly as you can so your guests or family can see the souffle in a full glory. 

That's it ! Congratulations, you just made a cheese souffle ! 

Now hurry up and eat it while it's still hot. Enjoy this small piece of cheesy heaven. 

Bon Appétit ! 

Butterfingered Chef

Plain, Almond and Peanut Butter Christmas Biscuits

Busy, busy, busy. Little elves are running up and down, worrying if they'll manage to finish up all the toys for good children. I am as busy as they are. I've spend a whole day baking star-shaped biscuits in 3 different flavours : plain, almond and peanut butter. The oven has been working all day long without a break and it's proud of what it achieved !
These biscuits are great for getting your family in a christmas mood. They can also be used as a beautiful and edible decoration for your Christmas tree ! Come on ! No time to waste; heat up your oven and let's get this baking started !



Ingredients : Plain Biscuit

- 250g plain flour
- 125g demerara sugar
- 125g softened butter

- 1 roughly beaten egg

Ingredients : Almond Biscuit

- 250g plain flour
- 125g caster sugar
- 125g softened butter
- A tsp of vanilla powder
- A handful of almond sticks
- 1 roughly beaten egg

Ingredients : Peanut Butter Biscuit

- 250g plain flour
- 125g demerara sugar
- 125g softened butter
- 2 tsp of peanut butter
- 1 roughly beaten egg
- black sesame seeds to sprinkle on top



All the flavours follow the same pattern. First, you beat the butter with sugar in a bowl. Then you beat in the egg and the flavouring (vanilla/almonds/peanut butter). Next it's the time for flour. I find it easier when I add the flour bit by bit and also mix it in with my hands. When the dough becomes fairly soft put it onto a floured surface and knead it gently until smooth. Wrap it in a cling film and put it in a fridge for 1,5h-2h to cool.

Heat up your oven to 170°C with a fan. 

On a lightly floured surface roll the dough so it's 0.5cm. Use your cookie cutters to cut out shapes from the dough. Decorate with anything you want but I personally prefer simple almond sticks or almond flakes sprinkled with sugar. Lay the biscuits on a sheet of baking paper that you previously laid on a baking tray. Bake it in the oven for around 8 minutes. Keep checking on the biscuits. They should be ready when the sides are turning golden.

Take them out and let them cool down. They're ready !

If you want the biscuits to also be a decoration for your Christmas tree simply make a small hole on top of a biscuit with an end of a paintbrush. A ribbon will fit through there perfectly. Just tie it and it's ready to hang on your Christmas tree !

I just realised it's 3 a.m where I live and with the last tray of biscuits I also realised how long I have not been sitting. My legs are dying.

I hope you'll like this recipe and have as much fun making those delicious biscuits as I did !

Merry Baking from,

Butterfingered Chef !

Homemade Christmas Muscovado Biscuits

Ho Ho Ho Everyone ! Well, not Ho Ho Ho yet but it's time to start getting ready for Christmas ! Many people are walking around wondering what to buy for their loved ones and find it very difficult. Well, let me make it easier for you. Christmas is about love and spending time with your family and what would ever be a better gift than spending time and energy and putting in all your love in making delicious homemade Christmassy biscuits. Yes ? Great ! Let's start baking ! 

Ingredients :  

- 2 teaspoons baking soda

- 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger 
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
- 1/2 cup baking margarine at room temperature
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
- 1 cup muscovado sugar (buy 2x500g - the rest will go for making a sugar syrup)
- 1 large egg
- 1/2 cup of sugar syrup 
- dry demerara sugar for sprinkling the biscuits before baking
- baking sheets

Sugar syrup will take a while to make and to cool down. Prepare it before hand. What you need to do is to pour a little bit more  than 1/2 cup of water into a pot and bring it to boil. Then turn the heat to small and start adding sugar bit by bit. Keep stirring ! Your syrup is ready when no more sugar is able to dissolve.

Start of by combining dry ingredients : baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, allspice, cloves, salt, cayenne pepper and flour together in one bowl. 

In another bowl put butter, margarine and muscovado sugar. 
A tip : don't put massive chunks of butter and margarine in a bowl. Cut them in smaller pieces. If the sugar has bigger chunks in it use a hand potato masher to smash it and mix it with butter before using a mixer. 

Mix the mixture with a mixer until fluffy. It should take around 3-4 minutes. Add an egg and the sugar syrup. To avoid making a mess add the flour mixture bit by bit each time mixing it in with a fork. This way ,when you finally use a mixer on a low speed to combine the ingredients properly together, the flour dust won't go everywhere. 

Preheat the oven to 200°C.

Take a small amount of dough in your wet hands and roll it until round and smooth. Put it on an ungreased baking sheet (place the sheet on a baking tray). Place the dough balls around 4-5cm (aprox. 2 inches) apart from each other. Sprinkle some dry demerara sugar on top of the dough balls. 

Now here comes a tricky part. When I was making my biscuits I had to "feel" my oven. Some of my biscuits burned a little bit when on a certain tray. I had to figure out if they come out better when baked 8, 10 or 12 minutes. Also an important role plays the position you place them in the oven. For me the biscuits came out the best when baked on a teflon baking tray on a top rack  for 8 minutes. I suggest you make sample biscuits and 'feel' the oven. 

After the baking time take the biscuits out and cool them down. They may feel a bit soft 
when straight out of the oven but do not worry they get crunchy when they cool down. 

Now the only thing left to do is figuring out how you want to wrap them up and putting them under a Christmas tree !

I hope you and your loved ones will enjoy this recipe. 

With Love, 

Butterfingered Chef

Pizza made with Love and Care

Hi ! I apologise for not posting any recipes recently but as a university student I concentrate mostly on my studies and I simply don't have much time for cooking. Well, except for today !

























 



 My friend from my course is staying over and I want to surprise her with something delicious (besides, I myself want something that is not from a take-away), but the problem is she does not eat any vegetables and apart from that the list of what she likes is very short...

- Meat
- Chocolate
- Water
- Tea
- Mushrooms
- Tomato if they're a sauce
- Raw Peas
- Potatoes (as chips and crisps)
- White Wine
- Bread
- Cheese

... and that's more or less about it. From this list I see only a couple of options and because it will be a girly night with movies and probably sewing (we're studying Costume Design and our Final Crit is coming to us with big steps) I decided to make a Mighty Meaty Pizza with Mushrooms and Chocolate Muffins. Also another friend of mine is coming and he doesn't eat pork so ham and pepperoni cannot make an appearance on the pizza. Let's get it started !

For a muffin recipe click here http://butterfingered-chef.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/quick-easy-and-delicious-muffin-recipe.html 
To make a fully chocolate muffin melt chocolate and add to the mixture.


Ingredients for the pizza : 

- Slices of beef
- Champignons
- Cheddar Cheese
- 7g of Dried Yeast
- Tbsp of Sea Salt
- Tbsp of Golden Caster Sugar
- 1kg of Strong Bread Flour
- Lukewarm Water (650ml)
- A can of Peeled Tomatoes
- Oregano
- Pepper
- Sugar
- Damp Cloth

Start of by pouring lukewarm water into a large bowl. Slowly add yeast, caster sugar and sea salt while stirring with a fork. Add flour in small amounts. Keep stirring. Keep adding the flour until it creates a spongy dough. On a dusted with flour surface knead the dough with your hand until smooth. Put a dough into a flour-dusted bowl and cover it with a damp cloth (the cloth should touch the dough). Keep it in a warm room until the dough doubles in size. It can take around 30-40 minutes for the dough to expand. Pour the can of peeled tomatoes in a small pot and cook it on a medium heat. Add in normal white sugar, pepper, salt and oregano (the measurements for this are up to you). Preheat the oven to 200°C. Dust a baking tray with flour and pop the dough in. Depending on how big is your tray and how thick you like your pizza this portion of dough can be enough for two trays of pizza. Normally you should stretch and flatten the pizza dough before popping it on a tray but for those who like really thick pizza base I suggest skipping that part. I skipped it and popped my dough straight on a tray and spread it around it with my hands. This created a very thick and delicate base. Spread a thin layer of the sauce on a pizza dough. Now add the toppings. Cheese goes first, then beef and mushrooms. On top of that add more cheese. Pop the pizza in the oven. It should take around 20 minutes for it to be ready. 

Voila ! Very thick, super delicious and as my friends described it "awesome !" pizza. A delicious way to show your friends that you truly care about them. 

I hope you'll try this recipe out and that your friends will love it as much as mine did.

With Love,

Butterfingered Chef 

Quick, Easy and Delicious Muffin Recipe !

The last time I tried to make muffins nothing worked out the way I planned. Well I did not give up and I made them again. This time they came out perfect ! 

I used the same recipe as in the previous post and perfected it a bit. 

Ingredients : 

- 1 egg
- 200g plain flour
- 100g caster sugar
- 2 teaspoons of baking powder
- 120 ml milk
- 4 tablespoons olive oil
- 1/2 teaspoon salt

I also made 4 different kinds : plain, coconut, raisins and dark chocolate. 

Before I started doing anything I heated up the oven to 180°C. 

I mixed all dry ingredients in a bowl. In a separate bowl I mixed milk, olive oil and an egg. I combined the two but I tired not to over-mix it. I separated the mixture into 4 glasses. To the first one I didn't add any additional ingredients. To the second one I added a teaspoon of coconut shreds. Unfortunately it was too little and I couldn't really taste it in a muffin so I suggest using around 3 teaspoons of coconut shreds. To the third glass I added a handful of raisins and to the fourth glass big pieces of dark chocolate. 

After everything was ready and the oven was hot I poured the mixture into plastic muffin cups. I filled only 2/3 of the cup (remember that they will grow in the oven and you don't want them to spill out of the cups). 

I've put them in the oven at 180°C for 13 minutes. I was checking every 5 minutes if it's already dry inside by stabbing it with a long toothpick. If the toothpick came out dry that meant the muffin was ready. Just in case after those 10 minutes I left it in the oven for another 3 minutes and then I took it out and left it to cool down. 

 The muffins came out really soft inside. The plain muffin can be eaten with butter and is great for tea-breaks. It has a very neutral flavour so it can be eaten with something sweet or with something salty. 

The coconut muffin didn't come out the way I planned as it actually tasted like a plain muffin. As I wrote before more coconut shreds are needed for this muffin. It still came out delicious though ! 

The raisin muffin is the sweetest. Great with strong coffee. 

Dark chocolate muffin is my favourite. Sweet with big pieces of dark chocolate that just melts in your mouth. I think it's great for meetings with friends for a coffee or as a small homemade gift when visiting someone. 

Hope you'll try to make them cause they're really easy , very quick and super delicious. 

Have fun, 

Butterfingered Chef

Little breakfast muffins... Fail...

Sometimes I have problems deciding what I would like to eat for breakfast. But few days ago it had to be something quite sweet, soft and good with a cup of coffee. So what else could it be other than muffins ? Well... I wish I made myself a sandwich...

Ingredients : 

- 1 egg
- 200g plain flour
- 100g caster sugar
- 2 teaspoons of baking powder
- 120 ml milk
- 4 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 1/2 teaspoon salt

For this recipe you will need a muffin tin which you should grease unless you have bun paper cases.
You beat the eggs and pour in the milk and oil. In the other bowl you mix flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Combine both bowls but do not over-mix. When you pour the batter into a muffin tin or bun paper case remember to fill only 2/3 of it (the batter will grow in the oven). You're suppose to bake the muffins for 20 minutes.

This recipe was suppose to be for big muffins but because I didn't have a baking tin good enough for making them I decided to use the baking tin for small muffins. Unfortunately I completely forgot that small muffins bake faster than big ones (duh...) so as the recipe said I held them in the oven for whole 20 minutes.... As you can guess they burned. Also I didn't have bun paper cases so I just greased the tin. It probably would work if not the fact that I baked the muffins for too long. In addition to that I wanted to make my muffins in different flavours so before pouring the batter into the muffin tin I've put some dry fruits in the tin. Of course when I finished baking and tried to take the muffins out the burned fruits stayed in the muffin tin...

So, at the end of the day I ended up with burned, one flavoured muffins. It could have been worse. These were at least still edible.

I'll try to make them some other time once again. I will not repeat the mistakes I made. Now I know I have to bake them half the time, I probably should buy the bun paper cases and I will mix the fruits with the batter.


If you have any tips that could help me in learning how to make muffins share them in comments
below !

Don't burn anything,

Butterfingered Chef

My First Cake Ever - Carrot Cake !

Today I made my first cake ever and because carrot cake is my favourite I decided that that's what I will try to make. I thought it would be much more difficult than anything else I ever cooked but surprisingly I made it in no time. The recipe is very simple and I think nobody can get it wrong.  

Ingredients for the cake (without the cream): 

- 2/3 glass of flour
- half a glass of sugar
- a teaspoon of bicarbonate
- 3/4 teaspoon of baking powder
- 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon of ground clove 

- 1/4 teaspoon of ground nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon of ground allspice
- 1/4 teaspoon of salt
- 1/3 glass of oil of olive
- 2 eggs
- 1 glass of thinly chopped/mashed/ground cashew nuts
- 1 glass of dry cranberry
- 1 glass of grated carrot


Equipment : 
- bakery paper        - baking tin        - hand mixer
   

Cover your baking tin with bakery paper. To make the paper stick to the baking tin butter the tin.

You'll need two bowls. In the first one you'll mix all the dry ingredients. Salt, flour, sugar, baking powder, bicarbonate and all of the spices go to the same bowl.

In the second bowl you'll mix oil of olive and 2 eggs.

Combine the two bowls.

Add the carrot, nuts and cranberry and mix well. Put the mixture into the baking tin and spread evenly.

Bake in the oven at 175ºC for 40-45 minutes.

As you can see I chose a very wide baking tin that is why my cake came out so thin.

Normally it should be much thicker and then you cut in half and in between the top and the bottom you put the cream.

But because my cake is thin I've cut it differently. And then I've but both tops on top of each other.








Cream Ingredients : 

- 300 g of cream cheese
- 6 spoons of butter
- a teaspoon of vanilla extract
- 1 cup of sugar powder (pass it through a sieve)

Mix it with a hand mixer until the texture of it is smooth and without any clumps.

As I told you before my cake came out too thin so I've cut it into two tops. One of the tops will use as the bottom of the whole cake. On this piece I spread a thick layer of cream.

Then I covered the bottom piece with a top piece. The rest of the cream went on the top of the cake.

Decorate your cake with some ground cinnamon and chopped cashew nuts.

Voila !

This cake takes an hour to make and I bet everybody who loves sweets will find it delicious.

If you never tried the carrot cake before trust me it doesn't taste like a carrot. It's sweet, soft, the cranberries add some sourness and the cashew nuts some crunch.

Hope you enjoy it ! 

Butterfingered Chef