Cocoa Waffles with Whipped Coconut Cream

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This was originally going to be red velvet waffle receipe which I was going to post – nicely timed – on Valentine’s Day. 

But when I started making the waffle batter and it came to adding the red food colouring I realised I didn’t have any!

I was a little disappointed at first but then I thought, I’ll just add more cocoa and make cocoa waffles instead and enjoy them with some whipped coconut cream and doused in icing sugar. 

So there we are:

  • 2 cups plain flour
  • 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
  • 6 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder
  • 4 teaspoons baking powder
  • a pinch of salt
  • 1 3/4 cups milk
  • 2 Tbsps white vinegar
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/4 cup butter, melted
  • 2 tsp vanilla extract
  • a can of full-fat coconut milk, refrigerated over night
  • icing sugar to serve

Combine the milk and vinegar and set aside for 5 minutes.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt. 

In another bowl or jug, whisk together the vinegar-milk, eggs, butter and vanilla. Pour this liquid mix in the bowl with the dry ingredients and stir together until evenly combined.

Preheat your waffle iron as per manufactures instructions and get baking. 

As the waffles bake, take the can of coconut milk out of the fridge and skim off the thickened layer of coconut cream that is on the top of the milk (it will have separated in the fridge). Whisk it for about 3 minutes (with some more vanilla essence if you fancy) until it becomes a fluffy consistency.

Top the baked waffles with icing sugar and a dollop of the whipped coconut cream. 

Black Rice Pudding with Coconut Milk

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Ladies and Gentlemen, please, may I present to you my vegan, gluten-, dairy- and even sugar-free brunch treat that I have been announcing in the last two posts: black rice pudding with coconut milk.

I have only once been to Thailand and only for a stopover but I still made sure I had some of the famous sticky rice and mango and this dish is very much inspired by it. However, I didn’t have mangos around but thought papaya would work just as well and I was right. For colour I also added kiwi and pomegranate and I’m sure you can use any kind of fresh fruit you fancy on top of the rice.

Just remember that you have to start by soaking the rice overnight, so start making your breakfast in the evening.

For 4 people you’ll need:

  • 1 cup black rice, soaked in water overnight
  • 1 can coconut milk
  • 1/2 cup water
  • a pinch of salt
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence
  • 1 Tbsp of agave syrup
  • 2 papayas
  • 2 kiwi fruits
  • 1/2 pomegranate
  • and/or any other fruit you fancy

Drain and rinse the rice that has soaked overnight.
Place the rice in a heavy bottom sauce pan and cover it with the coconut milk and water. Add the pinch of salt and vanilla essence and bring to the boil.

Reduce the heat and let the rice cook for about 25 – 30 minutes until most of the liquid is absorbed and the rice is tender. 

While the rice is cooking, prepare your fruit, so you have it ready to serve with the rice pudding.

When the rice is cooked, stir the agave syrup under and plate the rice pudding into bowls.
Top it with the fresh fruit and pretend you’re on holiday in Thailand!

Chocolate-Pecan-Oat-Coconut Cookies

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I know I said that I might give you a receipe for something healthy this time…
And I actually made a dairy-/ gluten-/ sugar- free rice pudding that I will tell you about very soon but I didn’t have time to photograph that one yet, so instead here’s one more naughty treat!

I recently saw a receipe for oat and pecan cookies which was very similar to my snow day cookies which went down a treat and I decided it’s time for another batch of cookies, chocolate-pecan-oat-coconut cookies! The oats and coconut give them a nice extra chewy texture, the pecans add some crunch and for the chocolate kick I mixed sweet white chocolate with bitter dark chocolate to balance each other out.

In America, it seems quite common to have cookies and milk before bed but I like it in the morning too…you could always swap the milk for a coffee if you prefer.

For 18 cookies you’ll need:

  • 110g unsalted butter at room temperature
  • 110g white sugar
  • 110g dark brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
  • 150g self-raising flour
  • 80g of rolled oats
  • 40g desiccated coconut
  • 100g white chocolate, chopped into chunks
  • 125g dark chocolate, chopped into chunks
  • 50g of pecans, roughly chopped
  • a pinch of salt

In a large bowl cream the butter and sugar together until they are smooth, then beat the egg and vanilla essence in.

Add everything else – the flour, oats, coconut, white and dark chocolate, pecans and pinch of salt – and mix everything together.

Using an ice-cream scoop, portion little dough balls on to a baking sheet lined with baking paper, leaving space between each of them as they spread when they bake (I had 2 baking sheets with 8 cookies each), and flatten them a little with the palm of your hand.

Chill the unbaked cookies in the fridge for about half an hour, then pre-heat the oven to gas mark 6.

Bake in a preheated oven for 12 – 15 minutes, careful not to over bake them, as you want them to contain a little chewiness in the middle.

Remove from the baking sheet straight away and cool on wire rack – if you don’t eat them straight away they should keep in an airtight container for a few days!

Greek Yoghurt Pancakes

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Happy New Year my dear readers!
Since it’s January and everyone is on a bit of a health kick I was thinking of posting a super healthy and energy boosting receipe as the first one in 2015 here but… I’m not.

Maybe for my next post I will but for this one I ended up making pancakes as I wanted something comforting on a dark and grey January morning and tucking in a pile of pancakes seemed just right.

The pancakes I opted for are made with yoghurt which might have some health advantage over the classic American ones – if nothing else it guarantees your pancakes are light and fluffy.

For around 8 pancakes you will need:

  • 1 1/4 cup flour
  • 3 tbsp sugar
  • 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • pinch of salt
  • 2 tbsp melted butter
  • 1 egg, lightly beaten
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 1 cup plain Greek yoghurt

To serve (optional)

  • 1 1/2 cups of frozen raspberries
  • butter
  • maple syrup

Combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and soda and pinch of salt in a large bowl. 

In a jug, mix the yoghurt with the milk until there are no lumps, then whisk in the melted butter and the egg. Pour this liquid mix in a well in the dry ingredients and combine everything with a balloon whisk.

Heat up your pan on a low to medium heat and lightly butter eat (repeat this after each batch, so the pan doesn’t get sticky). Use about 1/3 cup of the batter per pancake and bake them for 6 minutes on a low heat until flipping them over for the same time on the other side.

I served them with some frozen raspberries that I heated up on the hob, a drizzle of maple syrup and a little knob of butter.

Stollen Bites

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Britain has their mince pies, in France it’s Bouche Noel and Germany has Stollen – alongside all the other Lebkuchen and Christmas cookies, which are all together traditionally served on a ‘bunte Teller’. Literally translated that means ‘colourful plate’ and that is very much what people create with all their varied baked treats in the Advent season and for Christmas itself.

But baking all the traditional cookies takes quite a few evenings and making a good Stollen is also rather laborious, so I was quite pleased when I discovered a receipe for what’s almost like a combination of the two – bite sized Stollen nuggets made with quark, that due to their size are quite cookie like. 

Stollen usually contains some candied fruit and orange peel but as I’m not the biggest fan of either my Stollen bites here only have dried cranberries and raisins, some marzipan and nuts, resulting in a Cranberry-Orange-Marzipan flavour.

I keep nibbling away at them as I write this but they get even better if you leave them in a cookie tin for 1- 2 days and keep for a week.

For one baking tray / around 22 Stollen Bites you’ll need:

  • 40g raisins
  • 40g dried cranberries
  • 2 tbsp orange juice
  • 2 tbsp rum
  • 50g butter, softened
  • 75g quark*
  • 150g plain flour
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 1/4 tsp cinnamon
  • 1 pinch ground cardamon
  • 1 pinch ground ginger
  • grated zest of half an orange
  • 40g sugar
  • 50g marzipan, chopped into small pieces
  • 1/2 vanilla bean
  • 15g pistachios, roughly chopped
  • 15g chopped almonds
  • ca 20g butter
  • icing sugar 

(* Quark is a German mildly tangy low-fat cheese, similar to curd cheese and you get it in most of the big supermarkets in the UK and delis in the US) 

THE EVENING BEFORE YOU’RE BAKING, soak the raisins and cranberries in the orange juice and rum overnight, or, if you are baking in the evening, you could leave them to soak during the day, which should be just about long enough too.

Start by draining any excess fluid out of the quark – some people even drain the quark in a muslin cloth lined sieve but you should be fine to just pour the liquid off that has collected on top of the quark, before measuring the needed amount from the drained quark.

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees and line a baking tray with baking paper.

In one bowl mix the flour with baking powder, cinnamon, cardamon, ginger. In another bowl whisk the butter and sugar together with the orange zest and the scraped out seeds of the vanilla bean, until creamy. Then add the quark and whisk again to incorporate. Add the flour-spice mix and gently whisk it in.

Drain the raisins and cranberries of any excess liquid and add them with the pistachios, almonds and marzipan and knead everything together into a smooth dough.

Roll the dough out on a floured surface, to a thickness of around 1,5 cms and cut out squares of 3×3 cms. Line the squares up on the baking tray with a little space in between and bake them in the oven for 12 minutes. 

Melt the butter and brush the baked bites generously with it when they are still warm then thickly dust them with icing sugar. Once the Stollen Bites are cool, keep them in a biscuit tin.