Rum and Raisin Brownies

I was thinking its been a really long time I have not tried a chocolate recipe as I was using more of fruits and other stuff in my baking. I have tried a lot of recipes of which I have posted the pictures on my FB page but somehow couldn't post the recipe here on the blog. Something or the other just kept me away from writing the recipe and posting it on the blog lately. I promise all of these would get archived on the blog by end of next week. I am keeping my fingers crossed.

The day has been very packed for me as I was in the kitchen all day baking some homemade granola muffins to participate in a healthy cooking competition at the Golds Gym being hosted. I was excited about my first ever participation in any cookery competition. I didn't win, but enjoyed just being a part of it.

Once I came back from the competition, Mr. SD was waiting for me to go to the Volkswagen showroom to test drive the new car he finalised for us. By the time we came back from home, it was already 7 in the evening and I was completely exhausted. And that's when Mr. SD tells me that we would be leaving in precisely an hour for his friend's birthday dinner and wondered if I can make "something" for the birthday boy.
I was awestruck!

I realised cake was not an option considering the amount of time I had. I thought of something boozy as it was going to be an all adults dinner and something chocolate as that is the choice of anybody for a birthday no matter what the age. Hence, I thought of Rum and Raisin Brownies as it takes no time to whip up everything and much less time to bake and once baked you are done. I was good to go...Exactly what I wanted at the occasion.

And for this, I completely involved Mr. SD to whip things up. (Yes, he is very supportive of me...Lucky me!!!) I started off by melting butter, chocolate and brown sugar in the microwave...less than a couple of minutes. While Mr. SD was breaking the eggs and whisking them up with some caster sugar I added the melted chocolate butter mixture while continuing to whisk the eggs. I then got the bottle of rum and measured it to half a cup while Mr. SD was staring at the quantity of rum I was adding to the mixture. I know, it was in excess, but that's exactly what was required to make these brownies decadent and full of flavour!

These brownies were packed with the flavours and all the main ingredients i.e. chocolate, rum and raisins mingled so well with each other giving it a great dark dense taste and a gooey fudgy texture. I made 24 brownies and took half of them over to the dinner of 7 and was surprised to see that everybody took 2 helpings of the brownies and all of it was over even before we finished the dinner.

Such a success!!! Yayyy!!!

Lets get you the recipe of these decadent brownies so that you can also make and savour some boozy goodness with your dear friends this upcoming festive season..:)

(Print this recipe)

Rum and Raisin Brownies

Preparation Time: 10 minutes   

Baking Time: 25 minutes


Makes: one pan of 9' X 13' or
24 brownies 

Adapted minimally from: www.mabletan.com



Here's what you would need to make Rum and Raisin Brownies:

300 gms dark chocolate, chopped

200 gms unsalted butter

110 gms/ ½ cup brown sugar

120 ml/ ½ cup rum (I used 40% alcohol content rum)

4 eggs

½ cup caster sugar

½ tsp salt (ignore the salt if using salted butter)

130 gms/ 1 cup all purpose flour, sifted

110 gms/ 1 cup raisins/ dried cranberries (I used a combination of both)

For frosting:

Cocoa powder to sprinkle on the brownies

Here's how you can make it:

Preheat your oven to 350 F /180 C. Line a 9X13 inch baking pan with some parchment paper hanging out on the sides so that you can pull out the brownies very easily once they are baked.

• In a bowl, add all purpose flour, salt and raisins or cranberries and whisk it to mix it all together. The reason we are adding raisins in the flour is to get raisins properly quoted in flour so that they don't sink in the bottom of the pan while baking.
• In a microwave or on a double boiler, add dark chocolate, butter and brown sugar and melt it until nice and smooth. Stir it continuously after every 20 seconds. 
• In another bowl, whisk all the eggs with caster sugar until eggs become pale in colour. Do not over mix the batter as we don't want a cakey brownies. Mix just until the ingredients are combined nicely.
• Add the chocolate mixture to the egg mixture while continuing to whisk the egg mixture.
• Add the rum to the chocolate mixture and whisk until combined. It will be a very runny mixture at this in time.
• Add the flour mixture and mix it well using a plastic spatula or a wooden spoon just until all the flour are combined in the wet ingredient and you don't see any flour in the mixture.
• Pour the batter into the prepared baking pan and bake for 20-25 minutes or until a tooth pick inserted in the center of the pan comes out clean or with few moist crumbs.
• Take the pan out of the oven and let it cool on the wire rack for 10 minutes before taking out from the pan.
• Once cooled enough, take the brownies out from the pan by lifting the parchment paper overhanging on the sides and transfer to the wire rack to cool.
• Cut the brownies and sprinkle them with some cocoa powder passed through a sieve. 

Note: we consumed these brownies when these were slightly warm and everybody loved it. You will like them even when cooled I bet.

Hope you would also enjoy making this recipe as much as I did.

If you like this recipe and if want to be updated with the new recipes updated on the blog, don't forget to subscribe on email or like me on FB or simply post a comment about the blog below.

Happy Baking!

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

I have been spending a lot of time at my office lately as there are some projects which needs completion asap. I know...too boring! Also, Mumbai has witnessed some heavy rains lately making the weather so beautiful and also making it even more difficult to concentrate on work. My time away from my oven coupled by the weather is making me so uncomfortable to work at office flipping through the various excel spreadsheets, reviewing the work of my staff. 

Gosh!!! I need some comfort. 

I need some cookies at my office so that I can collect my brains to concentrate on the work I have been trying to finish while sipping the hot cuppa tea and looking at the clouds pouring down heavily and heavenly. 

Talking of comfort, nothing has given me more comfort in my life than having Peanut Butter on toast for breakfast and rush for office for over 6 years now. That's the way I go whenever I am running late and there is always a jar of Peanut Butter sitting on my kitchen counter to save me from hunger. 

This is the first time that I have used PB in my baking and I am completely smeared by it. I loved the PB in cookies as much as I like it on my toast. Not only me, everybody in the house enjoyed these cookies so much as the jar of cookies was over the next day it was made and I had to bake the second batch of cookies the next day, the dough for which I had kept in the freezer. Yeah, these cookies are perfect for freezing and you can enjoy freshly baked cookies any time you want. 

Lets not wait more and have a look at the recipe I used.

Print this Recipe

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Makes: 45 cookies approx.

Here's what you would need to make Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies:-

Ingredients: 

3/4 cup/ 170 grams unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup/ 105 grams light brown sugar
1/2 cup/ 100 grams caster sugar
1 large egg
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3/4 cup/ 185 grams peanut butter (smooth or crunchy) (I used Smooth)
2 cups/ 260 grams all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt (omit if you using salted butter)
1/2 cup chocolate chips

Here's how you can make it:

Preheat oven to 350°F/180°C. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

• In a bowl whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt. 
• In the bowl of your electric mixer (or with a hand mixer), beat the butter and sugars until light and fluffy (about 2-3 minutes). 
• Beat in the peanut butter. 
• Add the egg and vanilla extract and beat to combine. 
• Add flour mixture to the peanut butter mixture and beat until incorporated. 
• Fold in the chocolate chips. (If the batter is too soft to form into balls, place in the refrigerator for about an hour or until firm.)
• Roll the batter into 1 inch (2.5 cm) balls. Transfer the cookies to the prepared baking sheet, placing them about 2 inches (5 cm) apart. Then, using the tines of the fork that has been dipped in white granulated sugar, make a crisscross pattern.
• Bake the cookies for about 10 to 12 minutes, or until the cookies are lightly browned around the edges. 
• Remove from oven and place on a wire rack to cool completely before transferring to an air-tight cookie jar. 

How to freeze the cookies to bake later

• Place the ready to bake cookies on a baking sheet and place the baking sheet into the freezer to for 20 minutes to chill the cookies.
• Once chilled, transfer the cookies into a ziplog bag and write the date of freezing on the bag.
• When you want to bake the cookies, take out from the zip log bag. Let it come to room temperature and bake as described above.

Hope you would also enjoy baking these cookies as much as I did.

Happy Baking!

Cocoa Delight Brownies

It was the time when I was going home, as in my mother's home. Sometimes, I feel sad when people tell me that after marriage my mother's home is not my home anymore. But, how could I just stop saying or believing that home, where I lived so long, where I took my first breath, my first steps, spoke my first words, made my first friends and the place that gave me comfort for more than 21 years of my life when I knew nothing would go wrong as long as I am here. I certainly believe in calling my hubby's home "my home" as I am making this home with tender love and care for the people who will be there with me for the rest of my life. But still, my mother's home will always be my first home. 

I know it became too sentimental, this topic is very touchy for every Indian girl I think, who loves her family.

Okay, so when I was going to my 'first home', I got a last minute request from my younger brothers to bring some of my delights, especially brownies, as both of them are die hard chocoholics. I just had a couple of hours and had to pack my bags (yeah, I do everything at the last minute!!!) and make some brownies before I left to catch the train.

The recipe I chose to make was very simple and was so quick that I was bang on time with my hot brownies and my packed bags to leave. These brownies do not need tempered chocolate as the flavour comes from cocoa powder. Yet the taste of the brownies is dense chocolate-y and soft. I even need not wait for the butter to come to the room temperature as the butter needs to be melted which just took a minute and a half in the microwave and it was all it took to proceed with the recipe immediately. These were so yummy that all of these brownies were finished in less than 3 days. :)

Please spare me for the poor quality of the photos here as the pics were taken at night and in great hurry.

Brownie Recipe adapted from Hershey’s

Makes: About 18 brownies.

Here's what you would need to make Cocoa Delight Brownies:

1 cup/ 226 gms (2 sticks) butter

2 cups/ 400 gms sugar

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

4 eggs

3/4 cup/ 75 gms HERSHEY’S Cocoa Powder

1 cup/ 130 gms all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup chopped walnuts (optional but I recommend)

Here's how you can make it:

Heat oven to 350°F. Grease a 13x9x3-inch baking pan with butter or line it with a parchment paper leaving some extra paper from the sides so that its easy to take out the brownies when they are done.

• Place butter in large microwave-safe bowl. Microwave at HIGH for 2 to 2-1/2 minutes or until melted. 
• Stir in sugar and vanilla and whisk for 2 minutes until well blended. 
• Add eggs, one at a time, beating well with a whisk after each addition. 
• Add cocoa; beat until well blended. 
• Add flour, baking powder and salt; beat well. Stir in nuts, if desired. 
• Pour batter into the prepared pan and level the batter using an offset spatula.
• Bake for about 30 to 35 minutes or until brownies begin to pull away from sides of pan. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Cut into bars. 
• I dusted snowy icing sugar over my brownies. Optionally, you can frost the brownies with chocolate ganache.

Hope you would enjoy making these brownies as much as I did!

Happy Baking!

The Best Eggless Chocolate Truffle Cake Ever!!!

I love to try different cake recipes especially if the recipe does not include eggs in them. Well, for some, its hard to like an eggless cake but being from a family where not everybody eats eggs, eggless recipes are always welcome! I found one such recipe when I was browsing though the net and I immediately knew I had to give this recipe a try.

Fortunately, I did not have to wait for a long time as I had my newly wed cousin visiting me last week. I thought this was a perfect opportunity to bake him this Chocolate Cake in celebration.

I have not named this cake as Best for no reason. I have tried and tasted a lot of Eggless Chocolate Cake recipe, but this was simply amazing! So soft, so moist and so easy to make. This cake uses unsweetened cocoa powder which is so easily available anywhere and gives an intense dark flavour that satisfies any cocoa lover. This cake also uses some lemon juice which reacts with cocoa powder and gives this cake a texture like a red velvet cake.

Enough of bragging about this cake. Now, lets get straight to how you can also replicate this at your home.

Here's what you would need to make this Best Eggless Chocolate Cake:-

For Chocolate Cake:

• 195 gms (1½ cup) all purpose flour
• 25 gms (¼ cup) unsweetened cocoa powder (I used Cadbury's)
• 200 gms (1 cup) caster sugar
• 1 tsp baking powder
• ¾ tsp baking soda
• ¼ tsp salt
• 75 gms (1/3 cup) vegetable oil (You can use any flavourless oil or melted butter. I used vegetable oil.)
• 240 ml (1 cup) warm water
• 1 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract

For Chocolate Ganache Frosting:

• 250 gms semisweet chocolate, chopped
• 200 gms low fat cream (I used Amul Cream)
• 2 tbsp butter

For sugar syrup

• ¼ cup sugar
• ¼ cup water
• 2 tbsp dark rum (optional)

Some chocolate shavings for decoration 

Serves - 8 people

Here's how you can make it:-

Preheat your oven to 180°C/350°F. Line an 8 inch round cake pan with baking parchment paper.

• In a large bowl, sift all purpose flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt and whisk it all together.
• Make a well in the center of your flour mixture and add warm water, lemon juice and vanilla extract and mix it all together with a rubber spatula.
• Add vegetable oil/ melted butter and mix it until all the ingredients come together.
• Pour the batter into your cake pan and bake it for about 30 minutes until a tooth pick inserted in the center come out clean. The cake will spring back when lightly pressed.
• Remove from the oven and let it cool completely.
• Once the cake is cooled completely, serve it with some icing sugar sprinkled on top of it. If you would like to frost the cake like me, keep the cake in the freezer for an hour to chill completely before you cut and frost the cake. This helps to reduce crumbs while slicing the cake.

For Chocolate Ganache Frosting:-

• Melt chocolate and butter in microwave until completely melted. Add low fat cream and mix until the cream is completely mixed into the chocolate. Let the ganache cool to room temperature slightly.

For simple syrup:- 

• Put water and sugar in a saucepan and let it simmer until the sugar completely dissolves. Once cooled to the room temperature, you can add dark rum (optional).

Assembling:-

• Using a long serrated knife, cut the cake in two layers. Keep the cake right side up.
• Soak the bottom layer of the cake with simple syrup and cover the layer with some chocolate ganache. Smooth out the surface using an offset spatula. You can also add some chocolate shaving.
• Place the top layer of the cake on the base layer. Again, soak the top layer of the cake with simple syrup and pour a big dollop of chocolate ganache on top and sides of the cake. Smooth out the top and sides of the cake with the help of your offset spatula. 
• Clean the offset spatula and mark the tip of your offset spatula from the edge of the cake towards the centre in one single stroke. Repeat the process to cover the entire cake.
• Decore the sides and top of the cake with some chocolate shavings.

Hope you enjoy the cake as much as I did!

Don't forget to share your experience by way of your comments here below or on FB!

Happy Baking!

Triple Chocolate Cookies

I love Chocolate, I love Cookies and I so love the cookies which has not a single, nor double but triple chocolates in them! These cookies are simply irresistible as these are soft textured cookies and perfect to dunk in a glass of cold milk or even with a cup of strong cup of coffee. These cookies go one step ahead from the delicious Chocolate Chip cookies as they have melted chocolate, cocoa powder and chocolate chips, all in one. These cookies are beautifully cracked, crunchy around the edges, soft and chewy in the middle, and full of deep, caramelized and chocolate flavor.

These cookies make a perfect option for gifting, as it would be very hard to find someone who would not love these cookies. Make these cookies once, I guarantee, you will make these cookies again.

Here's what you would need to make Triple Chocolate Chip Cookies:-

• 226 gms (1 cup/ 2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 250 gms (1¼ cup) brown sugar
• 100 gms (½ cup) granulated white sugar/ caster sugar
• 70 gms (2/3 cup) unsweetened cocoa powder
• 3 large eggs, at room temperature
• 200 gms (1 cup) melted semi sweet chocolate chips
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
• 325 gms (2½ cup) all purpose flour 
• 1 tsp baking soda
• ¼ tsp salt
• ¼ tsp cinnamon powder
• 165 gms (1 cup) semisweet chocolate chips
• 160 gms (2/3 cup) caster sugar, for rolling

Here how you can make it:-

• Preheat your oven to 180°C/350°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper/ grease with butter.

• In a large bowl, sift flour, baking soda and cinnamon powder and mix it to come together.

• In the bowl of your stand mixer (or with hand mixer), cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Sift cocoa powder and beat it until incorporated.

• Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla extract and melted chocolate and beat until well incorporated. 

• Mix 1 to 2 tbsp of flour from your flour mixture and mix it in chocolate chips so that the chips gets completely coated in flour (this process prevents chocolate chips from sinking to the bottom of the mixture). 
• Add the flour mixture and mix it with the rubber spatula (only if using hand mixer like me, else mix using your stand mixer). Add the chocolate chips and mix until all the ingredients starts to come together.

• Using a small ice cream scoop, scoop out the dough to form dough balls and roll them in caster sugar kept for rolling. Place the dough balls on the baking tray lined with parchment paper keeping a gap of few inches. Flatten the cookies with by gently pressing with your hands.
• Bake the cookies for 11 to 13 minutes depending on your oven. The cookies are done when they are set in the center. Let the cookies cool for a few minutes on the baking tray before transferring them on to wire rack to cool completely. 

Enjoy these cookies!

Hope you also enjoyed these cookies as much as I did!

Don't forget to share your experiences by way of comments here below or on FB! :)

Happy baking!

Chocolate-chip Cookies

My first connection with chocolate-chip cookies was at Subway. I like these cookies so much that I never order a subway without these cookies. I have gone alone many a times to Subway to eat a loaf and the chocolate chip cookies all by myself. Hence, when I started baking, this was the first ever cookies that I made. By far, I have made them so many times (and gifted to a lot of my friends) and never got bored of the taste. 

I remember the first time I made these cookies was in a very small Morphy Richards OTG that could bake only two cookies in one batch and I had to bake these cookies for almost half a day (9 batches! Can you believe it?). This gave me sufficient reason to buy a new oven. I grabbed this opportunity totally and got myself a great looking, gorgeous Samsung CQ138S and have been totally in love with it from the day it arrived at my home. Now, I can bake all these cookies in just two batches. Life is so much more beautiful with  yummy food and sexy gadgets.

These soft and chewy cookies need a combo of white and brown sugar. It is easy to find brown sugar these days in India, you can get Bluebird Dememera sugar at your nearest grocery store or D Mart, Hypercity. Hence, there is abosolutely no challenge in making these cookies at home.

Chocolate-chip Cookies

Here's what you gonna need to make Chocolate-chip Cookies

113 gms/½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter (at room temperature)

45 gms/ ¼ cup caster (superfine) sugar

100 gms/ ½ cup light brown sugar
1 egg
½ tsp vanilla extract
175 gms/ 1½ cups all purpose flour 

½ tsp baking soda
¼ tsp salt (leave the salt if you are using salted butter)
175 gms/ 1 cup chocolate chips
50 gms/ ¼ cup walnuts, roasted and chopped (optional) 

Yield - 24 cookies

Here's how you gonna make it

Preheat your oven to to 170° C/ 325° F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

• In a large mixing bowl, beat the butter until nice and creamy using your hand mixer.
• Add sugar and beat until light and fluffy.
• Add egg and beat in the batter until combined. In case you are doubling the recipe, add one egg at a time and beat.
• Add vanilla extract and you guessed it right, continue to beat.
• In another bowl, sift all purpose flour, baking soda and salt (if using unsalted butter) and stir. Add chocolate chips and walnuts and stir.
• Mix the dry ingredients in the butter and egg mixture and fold it with the help of a rubber spatula giving your hands a nice workout. Fold the dry ingredients until it is combined together with the wet ingredients.
• If the dough is very soft, keep it in the refrigerator for 30 - 40 minutes.
• With the help of an ice-cream scoop or using two spoons, scoop out the dough into the baking sheet keeping a gap of 3-4 inches between the cookies as these will spread while baking.
• Bake for about 10 -14 minutes or until the cookies edges are golden brown. Let it cool completely on wire rack.
• Store these cookies in an air tight container for few days.

Variations:- 

You can do so many variations of these cookies. Few of these variations could be - 

• All chocolate cookies - Substitute 15 gms/ 1tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder for the equal amount of flour.
• Mocha - Use coffee essence or 1 tbsp of strong black coffee instead of vanilla extract.
• Hazelnuts - Substitute whole or coarsely chopped hazelnuts for the equal amount of walnuts.
• Dried fruits - Substitute chcolate chips and walnuts for the equal amount of chopped dried fruits such as raisins, almonds, cranberries, glaced cherries etc.

Hope you will also enjoy making these cookies as much as I did!

Cheers!