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It was my friends birthday so I decided to bake her a chocolate cake because lets be honest, who doesn't love chocolate cake? The cake was super moist and rich! The recipe is from here. The iced cake Sift dry ingredients and add oil, coffee and milk Mix for about 2 minutes on medium speed Add eggs and vanilla Beat for 2 more minutes Put into cake tin and bake!
These muffins don't have ANY butter and only 2 tablespoons of sugar in the whole batch! If you love peanut butter like I do then you'll LOVE these muffins. They aren't that sweet but they still taste AMAZING so do try them :) the recipe is from this website. The muffins! Put and egg, sugar and peanut butter in a bowl Whisk away! Add the milk and whisk The mixture with all the
Don't you just love old recipes from when your grandparents were young? I think that with baking especially some of the best recipes are the oldest! This is a old-fashioned gingerbread recipe that I came across when I had a craving for gingerbread. I got the recipe from here. What's also great about this recipe is it has less butter and sugar than traditional gingerbread so you can feel good
I had some dates in the pantry that needed using up do I made this deliciously devine sticky date cake. It has an amazing caramel sauce to go with it. If you love sticky date pudding like me you'll adore this cake! It's really moist and gooey and it hits the spot. Served warm with vanilla ice-cream this is HEAVEN. The recipe if from here. Soak the chopped dates in hot water with baking soda
Whoopie Pies are all the rage at the moment! I made these as part of my food technology project: to make a healthier alternative to party food :) These taste really good and the banana works really well as a butter substitute in this. I also loved the cream cheese icing that sandwiches these togther. These were really popular with my friends at school too and they couldn't even tell that they
I'm currently doing a unit on desserts at school for food technology (I know! The coolest course ever!) My mission: Come up with an alternative to the unhealthy junk food that is usually served at birthday parties that still tastes awesome! I'm having a lot of fun with this unit and this is the first of my trials that I made. I got the recipe from here http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/
I came across this recipe for peanut butter eggs and I instantly wanted to try it. It's nice knowing what is actually going into sweet treats! The filling is a little sweeter than reese's peanut butter cups but the recipe is still packed with protein and the sweetener is honey so it is healthier than store bought ones :) I also decided to use white chocolate rather than dark chocolate as one of
It cheesecake. It's cake. Its a cheesecake cake!! With oreos!! Need I say more?? I made this for my friend's birthday. This is indulgent and absolutely worth the time to make it. It has a cake layer and that is split in half. Then in-between the cake there is a cookies and cream cheesecake filling. It is topped off with white chocolate butter cream. I got the recipe from http://
These mini cupcakes are amazing!!!! Why you ask? They have all the flavour of a carrot cake in cupcake form AND they have icing AND they are still healthy! The recipe is from Dr. Oz believe it or not : P get it here http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/georgetown-cupcake-50-calorie-mini-carrot-cupcakes The iced cupcakes! Dry Ingredients, sifted in a bowl Honey and Apple sauce Add an
Chocolate and peanut butter are a match made in heaven! These cookies are really clever because they are a delicious chocolate cookie and fill it with a yummy peanut butter filling. You'll find it hard to stop at one! I got the recipe from http://www.bakeorbreak.com/2007/12/chocolate-peanut-butter-munchies/. I love this blog, it has some great flavour combinations and just looking at the
I've recently discovered the amazingness of cinnamon sugar!! They really make these bars something special :) These aren't heavy and dense like normal cookie-bars but are lighter and more cake like. I found this recipe over at bake or break. I love these bars and I love the recipes on bake or break too! It's definitely worth a look, if you haven't heard about it already. Start with butter
Happy ANZAC Day everyone! For those of you who live outside NZ and Australia, ANZAC day is a public holiday where we remember the members of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps who fought in WW1. You may be wondering why I'm mentioning this in my blog. Well with the extra day I had today I made ANZAC biscuits. Originally ANZAC biscuits were made to be hard and last a long
Hi guys. Sorry I haven't been posting in awhile... I've been SUPER busy starting year 11 this year! For us high school kids that means our first year of NCEA exams! Dun DUN DUNNNN!!!! So yeah, that's why I've been away. Don't worry though! I'm back now (mainly because it's holidays) and I've missed blogging! So I'm going to try and keep posting regularly :) Now to the slice... It was baking for
Okay, okay I admit... I made up the name for these bars. Somehow 'pecan slice' just didn't quite cut it for these delish bars! As the name suggests, the caramel in the bars is really sticky and gooey - in a good way. I stored these in the fridge and they were great cold! I also toasted the pecans to give it a bit more of a crunch to them. Find the recipe here! Yum! The finished product!
I <3 these cookies. Seriously they are amazing! It says on the recipe A glass of milk is the ideal accompaniment to these drop cookies. Besides white chocolate, the cookies are also chockablock with oats, coconut, golden raisins, and walnuts. I definitely agree with the glass of milk part! They are great to dunk in a glass of milk or coffee! These aren't the chewy type of cookies; they are nice
I am always looking for recipes to use up leftover ripe bananas. It seems that in my house we always buy too many, thinking that we will eat them but then we never get round to it! I did a little looking on the internet and I liked the look of this recipe because it has peanut butter in it and it's healthy! Admittedly it could use a little more peanut butter as I couldn't really taste it. I
If you like white chocolate and brownies then you'll LOVE blondies! Especially these ones! They are incredibly moist and fudgy! They are rich rich also so it's best to cut them into small pieces. I made these to take to a big family gathering around christmas time. I've included the recipe in this post but I originally found it on this website. Ingredients 100g butter (if using unsalted
For Christmas gifts this year I wanted to bake some home-made treats. After looking around on the Internet I decided on rocky road. I made two batches a week apart. This recipe is so easy and versatile! The first batch I made had too many ingredients for my liking. I had loosely followed the recipe from this website. It was still really yummy but I felt it didn't have enough chocolate in it!
It's baking for hospice time again! This is when once a month many people around Auckland take their baking to a drop off point to be delivered to the North Shore hospice here. This month had a Christmas theme and I decided to make shortbread cookies as they looked really pretty on this website. They were so easy to make and when I tried a little bit they were super yum! Fresh out of the oven
I had a craving. A craving for ginger crunch! I had made this recipe once before years ago and I remembered how good it tasted then. So of course I had to make it again! This is called Takata Ginger Crunch and it is probably the most famous recipe for ginger crunch in New Zealand. It has rolled oats in the base so you can feel healthy when you eat it hehe! Ingredients for base: 150 g
One weekend I had nothing to do so I thought that I would make a Christmas fruit cake. People say that the longer you leave a fruit cake once it's baked the better it tastes so I thought that I might as well be prepared for Christmas! I had never baked one before so I just found this recipe online. I was quite pleased as it smelt great and my dad said it tasted good! I can't wait till christmas
It's baking for hospice time again! You might remember last month I baked some rugby themed cupcakes for the north shore hospice. This month the theme was spring and after looking around online for a bit I decided to bake a rabbit cake! I got the idea and recipe from this website. I was very happy with this because: a. It looked pretty good (if I do say so myself hehe) b. I got the off cuts!
There recently was a taste of NZ festival where some of the best restaurants and chefs in New Zealand come together to cook for the public! I went on the last day (Saturday) and enjoyed it immensely! Here are some of the highlights of the festival. From the Rick Stein Malaysian kitchen: Nasi Goreng with BBQ chicken. I loved this spicy dish, especially the chicken which was flavoured
I went to Piko recently for lunch with my parents. It is run by the Auckland University of Technology students. I wanted to eat here as I had dined at their more 'fancy' restaurant before and I enjoyed it. I think this a great place to dine as you get amazing quality food for less of the price as the students are cooking for you! I especially enjoy all of their deserts when I go : D Manuka
When I was in Singapore I got to go to a dessert bar! I have never been to anything like this place before - they open at 8pm and close at 2am! I loved this place as they take the meaning of dessert to a whole new level! I would definitely come back again and recommend this place to everyone, even if you don't have much of a sweet tooth as there is something for everyone on the menu! 'Twix' -
I'm back from a great 2 week holiday and I just wanted to share some of the awesome food that I had while I was away! So please enjoy :) Asian dishes! This is roti canai, one of the most popular dishes in Malaysia. You eat the roti (bread) with a curry sauce This is one of my favourite Malasian dishes! This is a typical Malaysian dessert called ABC. It has shaved ice, sweet corn,
These cupcakes are soooooo sweet and amazing! They are the ultimate snickers cupcake! It starts with a chocolate cupcake and then it gets filled with snickers and caramel. Then to finish it's topped with a caramel butter cream and caramel sauce. It's decadent and sweet but the saltiness of the peanuts in the snickers contrasts well with the sweetness. I made these for my friend, Amy! 4 of the
I had some leftover blue butter-cream icing to use up so I thought that I would bake some cupcakes to decorate! I wanted light and fluffy cupcakes because the icing was quite sweet and rich. I decided to try this recipe from the healthy food guide because I had made them once before and they weren't to sweet. An added bonus, these are fat free and low calorie (without the icing!) Some of the
I had leftover milo that I need to use up so I decided to bake some milo biscuits! They are sooo nice and soft, their texture reminded me of a ginger kiss! I think this is due to the fact that I halved the recipe but still used one egg. I also used baking spread instead of butter which may have effected it. Either way i'm glad they turned out like that instead of a harder biscuit! Check out the
To promote Auckland's food at the Rugby World Cup, Auckland chefs have teamed together to give the visitors a taste of New Zealand! My family and I decided to go and check it out! It was pricey... $54 will give you the choice of 8 dishes and drinks to go with it. All the dishes are entrée sized so that you can try more! Just how I like it! The cloud is the new building built for the RWC in
Looking for a great brownie recipe? I have the perfect one! I made a batch of these and they were all gone within two days! I had wayyy to many pieces of these so be warned! If you make them you may want to share with friends otherwise you will find they somehow make their way into your stomach! An added bonus is that they are only about 90 cals a piece so if you do over indulge you don't have to
A close family friend of ours was going away so we decided to take her out to dinner. My mum and I had heard great things about De Grand, which is a Thai restaurant near our house. I loved their curries! If you come here I definitely recommend you try at least one curry! Their website is http://www.degrand.co.nz/ The table set out Pretty centrepiece! On to the food! Prawns wrapped in
If you love cream cheese and brownies then look no further! I have the ultimate recipe for you!!!! These are sweet and creamy and taste AMAZING! Trust me! The recipe is from here. The brownie with the icing before it had been baked! Making the brownie!!! Melt the butter and chocolate Set aside to cool once melted Put sugar, vanilla and eggs in a bowl and beat! add food
For Father's day my family and I went to Wagamama for dinner! It is like a casual restaurant and while the prices are more like a restaurant, it's soo worth it because the portions are quite substantial and the food is great! (Of course it also helped that I had a $45 voucher so it definitely made the food worth it!) My mum ordered the ebi goyza - deep fried prawn dumplings. I'm not to keen
For my friend, Sulin's birthday I made her a lemon coconut cake and iced it with lemon butter-cream. The cake was so easy to make because you just put all the ingredients in a food processor and whiz it! This cake has a strong coconut flavour from the shredded coconut and I think it goes great with the lemon. I got the cake recipe from the Epsom Girls Grammar School cookbook, called Blend. The
I went to a buffet dinner at Acacia restaurant for my birthday. While all the food was AMAZING I think they didn't have that much variety to choose from. Overall I had an awesome dinner and enjoyed the meal heaps! Find out more about the restaurant here. The table presentation Pasta salad Another type of pasta salad, I loved the olives in this one! Potato salad! With yummmy bacon!
YAY! It was my birthday last week and I have done sooooo much stuff to celebrate! (Mainly eating hehe!) I had 3 birthday cakes, can you believe it!? When I woke up my mum surprised me with a delish, moist dark chocolate cake from eves pantry! It was probably the best tasting cake of all the cakes I had for my birthday! It was sooo good!!!!!!! Yum! My birthday breakfast! (and no, I
This past weekend I have been very busy baking for charity! I baked 33 chocolate chip cupcakes! I decorated all of them with black fondant. These cupcakes were all for charity so unfortunately I don't know what they tasted like! Storing them overnight. The long process! The cupcakes about to be baked! You can just see the chocolate chips in them! Some of the baked cakes!
August is a popular birthday month! Another one of my friends birthday was on the 30th. (One day before mine!) She mentioned that she loves peanut butter so I thought I would make her a peanut butter cake! After looking online I decided to use this recipe. It smelt sooo nice as I was mixing the batter and I thoroughly enjoyed licking the bowl afterwards! The YUMMY cake with super-thick icing
For my friend, Amy's birthday today I decided to make her a massive cookie instead of a cake like I usually would! She doesn't like cake! Can you believe it!? My dad called this a bis-cake because it looks like a cake but tastes like a really chewy cookie! I got the idea when I was looking at food blogs (as I regularly do lol!) The original recipe is for m and m bars. They looked sooooo delicious
I came across this recipe online and I thought I would try it. The recipe says chocolate muffins and while their texture is more like a muffin than a cupcake, my ones looked more like cupcakes. These are soo easy to make! You basically just put everything in a bowl and stir! They were really quick to make and they are only 123 cals per cupcake! I found that these didn't have quite the same
Whoohoo! It's my blog's one month blogoversary!!! It's crazy to think that only one month ago I started this blog, thinking no-one would read it. I'm now proud to say that I've had over 440 page views since I started! Thanks to everyone who reads this and all the support I've gotten from my friends and fellow bloggers : ) Now - the pasta! I came across this recipe online yesterday and I just
It was my piano teachers birthday this week and I wanted to bake something for her. I decided to make cupcakes because who doesn't love a great cupcake? However it almost didn't work because my cupcake tin didn't support the liners enough and my cupcakes grew enormously outwards, not upwards! Thankfully after I decorated them they ended up looking pretty good! I would love to learn how to ice
In the weekend my best friend Rachel had a sleepover with me! She was going to a shared dinner and so we decided to make some hawaiian pinwheels for her to take. We saw the recipe in the Donna Hay (isn't she awesome?!) kids magazine and just had to try it! Preparing... Rachel grating the cheese... and chopping the ham! Me rolling out the dough. Putting it together... The rolled
Last night my family and I dined at the Four Seasons, which is a fine dining restaurant run by the students at AUT. The students are in training to be chefs and waitresses and the small restaurant is where they can put their skills to the test and serve the public! Even though they were students the food was really good and amazingly presented : D Head to: http://www.aut.ac.nz/study-at-aut/
I had some really ripe bananas that needed to be used up so I thought I would make a banana cake. My mum has been using this recipe for as long as I can remember and it was one of the first things I learnt how to bake. Whenever I bake this cake it's smell reminds me of when I was really young! Taa-Daa! The finished cake :) BEFORE YOU START: Pre-heat oven to 180c and line a 'normal sized' cake
I just wanted to share some cupcakes I baked and decorated. I went to a holiday cupcake baking and decorating class a couple of days ago and I had so much fun! I learnt how to cover cupcakes with fondant (that's the ladybug) and how to pipe a basic swirl onto a cupcake (the chocolate ones.) I also made a little bumble-bee and some mini flowers out of fondant! Hehe the cute cupcakes I decorated!
Whoo! Today was the long-awaited (by me) preview day of the Auckland food show! I was so excited as I walked through the doors of the ASB showgrounds. There were soooo many stalls and products! The best part? Sampling and buying all of the products! Hehe I also enjoyed the cooking demonstrations that I saw. Here are some pics I took while I was there :) The sushi-cake! Yes, it's a massive
Yesterday I went to Giapo in the heart of Auckland City. It makes the best ice-cream I have ever tasted!! It's to dieee for, trust me. It's smooth, creamy and sweet! Much better than Baskin Robbins, Wendy's, NZ natural, Movenpick and Ben and Jerry's!! After tasting it I simply don't want any other ice-cream!!! (I'm thinking for my birthday I'll just get one litre of it and eat it all day!) I
