Iced Coffee

After posting my last entry I was asked how to make the Iced coffee drink that was in the background of the pictures...

Its really really simple and quick to make and accompanies brownies (or anything else really) well!!

It doesn't really have any specific amounts for the ingredients and you pretty much have to go with taste.

Ingredients:

Instant Coffee

Whole Milk

Sugar

Vanilla Icecream (optional)

Cocoa powder

Serve with:

Whipped cream

Chocolate sauce

Method:

- Mix the instant coffee with sugar to taste and boiling water. (You have to use a generous amount of coffee because of the milk and ice cream that you will be adding)

- Pour the mixture, with a couple of pints of milk in to the blender. You can also add the vanilla ice cream (if you want to) at this point.

- Add some cocoa powder in to the mixture

- Blend it all together

- You can either store this in the fridge before serving so that it is chilled or if you have made this well in advance, freeze the mixture in ice cube trays and then blend them before serving.

- Drizzle some chocolate or caramel sauce in your serving glass and pour in your iced coffee, topping it up with whipped cream and more chocolate sauce.

Enjoy :-)

-S 

Brownies!

I finally have access to the internet!!! After a month!!!.. The past month we moved house and have been trying to settle in to it.. which has been a process slightly slower than times before now that everything I do takes double the amount of time!

Its so strange how dependant we've become to the internet. Without it, you're so cut out from the world. Literally. Its almost impossible to keep up with the news and also keep in touch with people.

And my blog!!

Its crazy how these months have been flying by. We're already in to October. The month I'm expecting the arrival of my little Baby inshaAllah. Please keep us in your prayers folks, because that's all we need now!!!

Anyway..today I'm going to post the recipe of one of the first three things I ever baked. Brownies!!! These simple, no fuss brownies never fail to make people happy. Over the years I've tried many other different recipes..Nigella's walnut brownies which are absolutely divine and many others..but for some reason this recipe has a very loyal bunch of fans. People who would much rather prefer these brownies to the decadent recipes that I have tried out as well.

I always have trouble taking pictures of brownies...or double chocolate chip cookies (that I have baking in the oven this very moment). For some reason, they never actually look appealing on camera.

Maybe its because I don't put too much effort in the pictures I take.

I really should!

This recipe doesn't require any real chocolate in it and somehow manages to end up with rich, chocolatey results that would leave you wondering how!

Here it is:

Ingredients:

1 cup Margarine/ Unsalted Butter

4 tbsps Cocoa Powder

2 cups Sugar

4 large Eggs, lightly beaten

1 and a half cups All Purpose Flour

2 tsps Vanilla Essence

Method:

- Preheat the oven to 350F / Gas mark 4

- Grease and line a pan. This makes quite a generous amount of brownies depending on the thickness.

- Melt the margarine in a pan under low heat.

- Remove from the heat and add in the cocoa powder. Stir it well and then let it cool till tepid.

- Mix the sugar, eggs and vanilla together with a hand mixer.

- Add in the flour in two additions and mix with a large mixing spoon.

- When it is just combined, add the cocoa and margarine mixture and stir them all together until completely combined.

- Bake for 30 minutes, but start checking at 20 minutes.

- The skewer that you pierce the brownies with to check should have some mixture stuck to it (so the brownies are not quite done). This is really important because over baking them can lead to dry results!

- Take them out of the oven and wait till it cools.

You can frost the brownies with anything that you like. For this recipe in particular, I prefer my mums Chocolate dropping recipe. Here it is:

Ingredients:

1 tbsp Margarine

2 tbps Cocoa

8 tbsps Icing Sugar

A little hot milk

Method:

-Melt the Margarine

-Add in the sifted Cocoa and Icing Sugar

-Mix it really well and then add in milk very little by little until you get a nice, glossy frosting in a thick consistency!

Pour the mixture on top. Sprinkle with Smarties (My personal preference :-P ) and enjoyyyyyy....

-S