Showing posts with label chocolate. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chocolate. Show all posts

24.9.12

A rocky (easy) road to gluttony.


Well this weekend I decided to let my sweet tooth just do its thang and I just ran with it. And it ran straight into the nearest supermarket and bought up loads of ingredients for rocky roads. Always the obliging host I cooked (sorry melted) it up and it thanked me.

These were literally the easiest things to make, and not only easy, very very very tasty! I deviated from your traditional recipe to use ingredients that I wanted inside, so here is my take on your traditional rocky road :



Ingredients : 

Marshmallows
Honeycomb pieces
Shortbread biscuits
Giant jelly beans
Fudge
Raisins
Milk chocolate buttons

I smashed / cut a few of those ingredients down so they would be a bit more meshed together within the rocky road. I then melted the chocolate. Then came the tricky bit - listen up as this can be difficult without proper instructions... I then put all the ingredients into the melted chocolate and stirred. Complicated I know.


And voila! Pour onto a baking dish lined with cooking paper, and leave to set in the fridge for an hour or so.

Mmm mmm! Don't they look good? Yep they tasted good aswell. And they look pretty impressive. Next time I have to make something to take anywhere these will be top of the list. There pretty hard to screw up as there's no real cooking involved, so be prepared to wow at a party with a quick, stress free cake!

Rocky Road I salute you! (although my hips do not)

Emily x



23.7.12

Sugar highs, Leaving lows...



Three weeks at The Golden Door Retreat in Queensland left me invigorated, healthier, more energetic, and positive. Whilst their my eyes were opened to natural ways and means to cure your body, holistic health, the benefits of vegetarianism, and alternative therapies. Whilst there I embraced the life change and tried several of the treatments on offer : flower reading, naturopathy, feldenkrais, hypnotism. I tried to cure my sugar addiction, found out about my intolerance to gluten, attempted to realign my posture, and sort out bad sleeping habits.

I left the Golden Door with a spring in my step clutching my two sugar-free muffins determined to make some changes to my lifestyle and diet. I arrived home to Melbourne to find a welcome home spread of pick and mix, chocolate, cheesecake and wine. Needless to say I couldn't get to sleep until 5am that night...my body was so high off the sugar it hadn't had over the last three weeks I just could not sleep! Not even a bottle of wine was enough to put me into a slumber.

 Old habits die hard and I spent my last day in Melbourne with the girls re-toxing my body with cider in the sun, then crying into an open suitcase as none of my things would fit. A fair chunk of outfits had to get left behind in various friends wardrobes, and when I toddled off to the airport there was little weight difference between myself and the 50kg of clothes I 'had' to take with me.


Australia has treated me better then I ever could have hoped, and its a country I will always hold dear to my heart. But as the fortune teller at the Golden Door said to me : Australia is just a pit stop for myself. So on to the next one : New Zealand awaits!

Emily x

2.6.12

old places and faces...

So the month of May has gone past and I have neglected the blog. Again. I honestly cannot believe how fast time has flown, days turn to weeks which turn to months far too quickly!

This time last year I was out in Peru up a Mountain suffering from altitude sickness, having just finished my final year at University. 
 


Now I'm living in Melbourne with friends, and working my first proper job at Neighbours. The last year has been monumental and life changing. Life is what you make of it and that is what I am doing. Whether I stay or leave Australia in July is a decision that is wholly out of my hands, and I am at piece with the idea that if I don't stay in Oz fate only intends better things for me than I could get out of being here.

I took a walk down memory lane last weekend, going to visit one of my best friends Jenna at her hometown of Toowoomba. Jenna is a gorgeous soul, who lives her life with the mantra 'there is no such thing as luck, only preparation meeting opportunity'. And Jenna appears to be one of the luckiest people you could meet. I met Jenna when I studied in Brisbane for the year.

She picked me up at Brisbane airport and on the drive to her house we passed the bus route that I used to take back from Uni to my house. I love Brisbane SO much. Its a different vibe to Melbourne, a lot more relaxed, tropical and carefree.

Toowoomba is a small town about an hour out of Brisbane. I ate and shopped my way around the town. The best beef chilli pizza is there, as well as the most insane opshops. I bought a furcoat for 30 dollars and several other items which I do not need but I could not resist! All in all a lovely weekend, thank you to the Holmes for your hospitality!!

Emily x








8.12.11

Christmas is coming...



REINDEER CUPCAKES

INGREDIENTS
125g unsalted butter, softened
1 cup caster sugar
3 eggs
4 spoons of cocoa powder
1 ½ cups plain flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
¾ cup (185mL) milk
Put remaining Jaffa's in mixture 
ICING 
50g butter
 2 cups icing sugar
2 tablespoons milk
1pkt Jaffas for nose
  Smarties for eyes
Chocolate as eye dot
1 pkt pretzels

HOW TO…
1. Preheat oven to 180°C. Place cupcake papers in tray. Cream butter and sugar together before adding all the other ingredients.
2. Fill cupcake papers ¾ full. Bake cupcakes for 15-25 minutes and small cupcakes (until a skewer inserted into the middle of a cupcake comes out clean).
3. Allow to cool before icing

4. Cream butter until pale and smooth. Add the milk and half the sifted icing sugar. Beat until well combined. Add the remaining icing sugar and beat until mixture is light and fluffy. The mixture should be a spreadable paste; if it is too dry add some more milk, if too wet add more icing sugar.
5. Decorate
6. EAT AND ENJOY!!!



The sunshine and hot weather makes it easy to forget that its actually the run-up to Christmas. So nothing like a bit of baking to get you in the Christmassy spirit!
 

Slaved away over these last night...don't want to blow my own trumpet, but they are bladdy delicious! Feeling rather sick this morning however as half of the batter didn't make it into the oven, somehow ending up in my stomach instead!

Hope everyone is starting to feel festive! 

Emily x