Chocoholics Heaven

So the other day I had a bit of a chocolate craving. You'll find a lot of people tend to get these when they're sad or what not. Me, I'm a true chocoholic! I don't need a reason, I just need chocolate. Besides butter, chocolate is one of the most amazing foods I can think of. It something that goes with so many things and has the ability to bring a smile to our face, and some would even say it makes us feel like we're in love. I don't really care what it is, all I know is chocolate is AMAZING and seems to inspire so many creative recipes. One of my favourite combinations is chocolate and hazelnuts, hence why I made the following. The following recipe is from here. You'll probably notice that I use this site a lot and that would be because it's fast becoming one of my favourite sites. This recipe I have made a few alterations to, so I guess just choose whichever takes your fancy.

Ingredients:
handful of hazelnuts
1/2 cup cake flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup cocoa
1/4 teaspoon salt
400grams dark chocolate
1/4 cup unsalted butter
1 3/4 cups white sugar
4 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
200grams milk chocolate
220grams white chocolate

Step 1: Chop the hazelnuts and the milk and white chocolate, place in a bowl to the side.

Step 2: Melt the dark chocolate and butter in a glass bowl over a saucepan of simmering water, stirring until smooth. Remove from heat and set aside.


Melting the chocolate. Mmmm... Chocolate *drool*



Step 3: Beat the sugar and the eggs, with an electric mixer, until thick and yellow. (Takes approx 3-5mins). Beat in the melted chocolate mixture and vanilla extract.

The egg and sugar mixture after I added the chocolate.

Step 4: Fold in the sifted dry ingredients to the chocolate mixture, mixing until incorporated. Stir in the chopped chocolate and hazelnuts.

Without the hazelnuts and chopped chocolate.

Step 5: Cover with glad wrap and refrigerate for about 30minutes.

All glad-wrapped up and ready to go in the fridge.

Step 6: Preheat the oven to 180degrees Celcius and line some cookie trays.

Step 7: Roll the batter into balls and place onto the lined cookie trays at evenly spaced intervals. With moist fingers press the batter down.

Step 8: Bake the cookies for 12-14minutes, until the tops of the cookies become dry and cracked but are not shiny. Becareful not to overbake.

Step 9: Remove from the oven and leave to cool on a wire rack. Once cooled, they are now ready to serve. :)


I took them into uni today and by the end of the day they were gone.



Dinosaurs Go RAWR!!

One of my dear friends is ever so lucky and has decided to become a teacher. This means that as part of her degree she has to learn how to teach kids things in a fun and entertaining manner. That's where I come in. Her assignment was to do with dinosaurs, something to do with activities that will engage and interest kids and teach them stuff at the same time. So she decided that as one of their tasks the kids were going to ice dinosaur shaped cookies. Now guess who was responsible for making those cookies, that's right... ME! I didn't go with a traditional cookie-cutter recipe, simply because they never taste any good. Instead I went with M&M cookies and decided to see what happens. We all know that kids love bright colours, so I thought this was a great idea at the time. I didn't really make any alterations to the original recipe but you should still check it out here. 

Ingredients:
2 cups plain flour
1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup unsalted butter (NOTE: I always use unsalted butter, it's better if you season to taste)
2/3 cup white sugar
2/3 cup light brown sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup M&M's

Step 1: Preheat the oven to 180degrees C and line two baking trays with baking paper.

Step 2: Beat the butter and sugars with an electric mixer until light and fluffy (2-3mins). Add the egg and egg yolk, beat until well combined. Remember to scrape the sides of the bowl as you go. Beat in the vanilla extract.

The mess that is created when you add eggs.

Step 3: Next we add the flour and mix away until it is all incorporated, remembering to scrape the sides of 

the bowl so it all comes together.

Check out how nicely it all mixes together, means we're up to the fun  part. :)

Step 4: Spread out a heap on your tray, really just as big as your cookie cutter, press you cookie cutter firmly into the dough, remove the access and repeat. Repeat this basically until you're out of dough. You don't have to make this with cookie cutters. You can just place balls onto the tray and flatten them if you're going for the traditional approach. I did this as well and it really doesn't matter, they taster just as good.

Step 5: The most IMPORTANT part, basically the 'hero' of your dish. Your cookies should all be prepared on your trays and now you want to place the M&M's on them. You can make patterns, draw a face or just go with a random placement. It doesn't matter how you do this, it's really as you see fit.

The traditional cookies...

...and the dinosaurs inspired to teach!

Step 6: Put them in the oven for about 15mins, rotating the tray halfway through. Remove from the oven when they're lightly golden and just set.

Now the most important part...

                                                                                                               ...the finished product!

Almost completely devoured this was all that remained after just one day.

Looks like a dinosaur to me! And was very entertaining for a gorgeous, young girl to ice with green icing.

A Simple Start

This first post isn't going to have any recipes or anything like that, it's sort of an introduction, like the official start to my blog. I've always liked to cook and I'm not completely useless at it, as long as you don't insult my food too much I'm more than likely going to cook for you again! I cook for those I love and when I feel the need to just take a breather and calm down, hence procrastibaking as I normally need to calm down when avoiding assignments and what not. One of my friends has a procrastibaking blog, check it out, and she inspired me to start my own. I don't cook everyday, I don't really have time for that but I procrastibake often enough to make a blog out of it. So here are a few snaps of the things that I've made recently, you'll notice that most of it is cakes, this is because I was cooking for my gorgeous little sister to help her celebrate her birthday.

A cute idea I stole from a friend and incredibly fun to make, as well as incredibly popular with anyone still in touch with their inner child.

This was for the family celebration, all the cakes that went out were eaten.

Before the kiddies devoured them.

I think you might be able to guess, but my sister likes soccer.

A time-consuming masterpiece which I made with a friend, took forever but well worth the effort.

Made for the boys at uni as they were slightly jealous when the didn't get any cake.

So I think that's it for now, nothing really more to say except that you should expect to see some fun cooking blogs from me soon :)