Chocolate Devils Food Cake

Chocolate Devils Food Cake - made by my wonderful husband! He wanted to make a cake for a family gathering and this is a recipe I've made a number of times before and it's always enjoyed by everyone.

Cake ingredients (double ingredients for a 2 layer cake):
2 cups of plain flour
2 cups of sugar
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 cups milk
1/2 cups of veg oil
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 eggs

Frosting
200g butter
1 pack of Philadelphia cheese
1 pack of icing sugar
1/2 cup cocoa powder
2 - 3 tsp vanilla essence

Raw Vegan Chocolate Caramel & Pecan Cake

If there's one downfall I have in life, it's my love of desserts. I love making them and love to eat them!! It doesn't help when I'm trying to eat healthy and still want more than a bowl of fruit and yoghurt. Don't get me wrong I love fruit and yoghurt, but sometimes it doesn't cut it.

Then on Sunday I had a friend over for dinner who has a million and one food allergies. I needed to avoid dairy and raising agents, whilst trying to make something that was healthy, so I didn't feel guilty eating it.

I came across a website with a variety of raw & vegan no bake cakes. I already had pecans in the cupboard, so decided to give the chocolate caramel and pecan cake a go.

I didn't have a right sized spring pan suggested in the recipe so used individual tartlet tins. The ingredients below was enough to make 3 cakes, so I made an extra portion of the recipe to make a 4th cake. I served with vanilla vegan ice-cream. The true test of how good the recipe was, was from my husband and he liked it (with the ice-cream).

Meringue Shell Recipe

I found myself with some left over egg whites and needed to find something to make to use them up. I have always made Pavlova, but wanted to try making individual meringue shells this time. I found the below recipe on the BBC website at this website - How to make meringues

The recipe says to use dessert spoons to scoop the meringue onto the tray. I wanted them to be more unified so I piped the mixture.

These were very straightforward to make and very similar to making pavlova. The key when making pavlova or meringue, is to whisk the egg whites on high speed until stiff, then slowly add in the sugar. It's important not to add the sugar in too quickly, you want each spoonful to dissolve before the next spoonful is added.

You could add fruit to these, or change the way you pipe the egg whites to make them into a nest like a mini pavlova. I definitely will make these again, especially if I'm having a dinner party and want to make individual portions.

Paul Hollywood's Cherry and Dark Chocolate Muffins

This is another recipe taken from Paul Hollywood's How to Bake recipe book. I needed something quick, easy and yummy to take to a friends house and these did the job.

Cadbury Creme Egg Cupcakes

I'm a little late with making these since Easter was almost 2 weeks ago, but I have been wanting to try them since last year and had everything ready to make them. So I was with 2 of my nieces at the weekend, I thought it was a good time to give it a go.

I did cheat with these and didn't make anything from scratch, but the same principles would apply if making them from scratch.

Chocolate birthday cake

A friend was having a party to celebrate her upcoming birthday and a birthday party isn't complete without a birthday cake.

So being the good friend that I am and looking for a new baking challenge I offered to make a cake.

Rice Krispie Chocolate Treats

I've made these rice krispie treats as part of a dessert bar for a wedding, click to see Wedding Sweets and Treats.

I wanted to try making some cake pops and these looked fairly simple to make. However when it came to putting the rice krispie treats onto the sticks, it proved a little more difficult than I first thought. But these still turned out really well and everyone loved them. With a little more time I'm sure I could turn these into Cake Pops, however on this occasion I was pushed for time, so decided that I would leave them as heart shaped rice krispie treats. Or as I've done on the photo above you can slice into squares. This way you don't have any waste.

Wedding Sweets and Treats

This week I started working back at a company I was working at up until the end of December last year. 4 times I was asked if I had brought cakes in with me. I think I may have created a bit of a reputation for myself while I was working at the company. That's not a bad thing, I can think of worse things to be remembered for. I think it's also safe to say that I enjoy baking and sharing those baked goods with friends.

English pancakes

Happy Pancake Day!!

Pancake day, other wise known as Shrove Tuesday, Pancake Tuesday, Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday) or Jif lemon day.

I've had the below recipe pinned on Pinterest for almost a year, so today seemed like the perfect day to try it out.

Wedding Dessert Bar

I was at a friends wedding in December, up in the North of England. Another friend and myself had arrived the day earlier to help put chair covers on all the chairs at the reception venue. There was a long table at one end of the room which I assumed was for food, but it was pretty none-descript with just a plain white table cloth on it. My friend and I commented that we could have done something to dress the table up a little if we'd known before hand. But we figured our friend would have said something to us if she wanted anything adding to the table.

Pear and Chocolate Crumble

I love to eat dessert, particularly fruity desserts and you can't beat a good crumble. This dessert is so easy to make and tastes so good, particularly with the added chocolate and nuts. I made this for a dinner party a few years ago and really impressed my guests. It's a nice touch to make them in small individual ramekins, so you can give each guest their own dish. I sourced this recipe from the Waitrose website.


Hope you enjoy this recipe as much as I do.

Cherry Garcia Brownies Recipe

I love Ben and Jerry's Cherry Garcia ice-cream, so this recipe screamed out at me to get in the kitchen and bake. I had to adjust the recipe as I couldn't find maraschino cherries, but it seems to work just as good.