Mars Bar Brownies

As I browsing the internet for more recipe ideas, I found this recipe for Mars Bar Brownies on Cafe Lula. Since Mars bars are my favourite chocolate bar I knew I would have to try out the recipe! This recipe makes incredibly rich and ohhh so chocolatey brownies! 

To start off with preheat the oven to 180°C/355°F or 170°C/340°F for a fan oven.

SOOOOOO MUCH CHOCOLATE!!!

 In a pan over a low heat melt together the butter, finely chopped Mars bars and chocolate. Keep stirring with a wooden spoon and make sure to break down the nougat-y parts of the Mars by mashing them with the wooden spoon. When the mixture has melted and is smooth, remove it from the heat and let it cool slightly. 

Pour in the sugar and stir together. Then sift in the flour, cocoa powder and baking powder and mix together until it has fully combined. Next beat in the eggs, until you have a smooth mixture, then fold in the chopped slices of Mars bar.

 

Pour the mixture into a lined square baking tin and spread it evenly, making sure to level off the top of the thick mixture.

Bake this in the oven for about 30-40 mins until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out with a few sticky crumbs on it.

Let the brownies cool in the tin until they are warm. Remove them from the tin and when they are cool, you can cut them into pieces. 

The chopped slices of Mars bar folded in at the end add so much to the texture as well as taste of the brownie and as you can see there are some trails of caramel left, which adds another layer of flavour. They come out soft, goey and just delicious!

Ingredients:


Mars Bar Brownies: A Cafe Lula recipe:


2 Mars Bars (or Milky Ways) chopped small
200g/7oz/1.75 sticks butter, cut into chunks
100g/3.5oz Dark (bittersweet) chocolate, broken into pieces
100g/3.5oz Plain (semisweet) chocolate, broken into pieces
65g/2.3oz/1/2 cup+2 tablespoons Cocoa Powder
75g/2.65oz/1/2 cup Plain (all-purpose) flour
1 teaspoon Baking powder
250g/8.8oz/1 cup+2 tablespoons Caster sugar
3 Large eggs
2 Mars Bars (or Milky Ways), each sliced into about 10 pieces.


Cafe Lula recipe and instructions can be found here.


Keep it Sweet!


Aneesa

Mascarpone and Raspberry Swiss Roll

This is a desert I made yesterday. I am currently preparing for and taking my exams, so as a way to de-stress and take my mind off things I decided to bake something. I saw there was some mascarpone in the fridge and so this recipe came to mind straight away! The raspberry jam just adds some extra tang, easing up on the sweetness of the dish. Anyway, here's the recipe:

Firstly preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 4/356°F.

Mix the eggs and sugar together in a bowl until the mixture is pale, thick and the whisk leaves a trail in the mixture. This might take quite a while so I would recommend using an electric mixer for this!

Once the eggs and sugar have been combined, sift the flour into the mixture a little at a time. Make sure to fold in the flour using a metal spoon; this will ensure that all the air you put in the mixture when whisking it is not lost. This will help keep the sponge base light.

When all the flour has been incorporated, carefully pour the mixture into a lined swiss roll pan. I just used one of the baking sheets I had that had a little depth to it - worked just as fine!

Put the tin into the preheated oven for about 10-15 minutes until the sponge is firm.

Cut a piece of greaseproof paper that is a little bigger than the baking tin you are using and sprinkle 2 tablespoons of sugar evenly on it.

Once the sponge has cooked, remove it from the oven and carefully flip it out onto the sugared baking paper. The lining of the tin should be facing up now, so just peel off the paper and using the baking paper it is lying on, roll up the swiss roll and leave it to cool completely. This is done to ensure the sponge won't crack when it is rolled up after putting the filling in.

 

Once the sponge has cooled down completely, unroll it and spread the mascarpone in an even layer on the sponge. Next spread the raspberry jam on top of the mascarpone. Then in the same way you had rolled it earlier roll-up the sponge and the swiss roll is done! As a garnish you can sift over some icing sugar to finish it off.

Ingredients:

Sponge:

3  Large Eggs

2 3/4 oz (75g) Caster Sugar plus 2 tablespoons for sprinkling

2 3/4 oz (75g) Plain Flour - sifted

Filling:

9oz (255g) Mascarpone

4-5 tablespoons Raspberry Jam


Keep it sweet!


Aneesa

Pizza Braid

As I was flicking through Pinterest a while ago, I came across this idea of a pizza braid. I loved it instantly and knew I would have to try it soon, so I put it on my to-bake list. I finally decided to make them today and they were delicious!! It was incredibly simple and would be great to impress people at a dinner party or when entertaining guests since the presentation of the dish is something to be admired, and i'm sure it will be a hit taste-wise too - who doesn't like pizza after all!!

To start with I made the filling for the braid, this is what would traditionally be the topping for the pizza. I chose to make a chicken and mushroom filling for mine. At this point make sure to preheat the oven to 180°C/Gas Mark 4/356°F

The next step is to prepare the pizza base. I just used a packet of pizza base mix, that I just needed to add water to to form the dough. Follow the directions given and prepare the dough as instructed on the packet. or if you know how you could make your own pizza dough! Once the dough was formed, I rolled it out into a rough rectangle shape, ready for the filling.

Transfer the dough onto a baking sheet, with GREASED baking paper. I stress the 'greased' part because the first pizza braid that I made the dough got stuck to the grease-proof paper and it was very problematic!! So for the second try I just put a bit of oil onto the sheet and spread it around - this sorted out the sticking issue and it was easy to remove from the paper after it was cooked as well.

On the rectangle of dough, using a pizza cutter cut medium sized strips, of equal size out of the sides of the rectangle. Make sure to leave a solid space in the centre for the filling to be placed and then on either side of this space cut out the strips. These will be used to create the 'braided' effect. 

Fill the whole centre strip that you left for the filling. To add a little more flavour I decided to add some jalapeños to the filling and of course, do not forget to add the cheese! No pizza dish would be complete without cheese. For my pizza braid I just used some cheddar cheese but you could just customise it and choose whatever cheese you wanted!

Now for the braiding part!! Just take a strip from one side and cross it over the filling. Next grab a piece from the opposite side and overlap it over the first piece, so that they form a cross. Continue crossing over alternate strips until you reach the end. For the ends of the braid, I just folded up the strips at the end and joined them with the dough at the top of the braid to ensure it was sealed at the ends and the filling wouldn't leak out whilst cooking.

Once the dough has been braided place it in the preheated oven for about 15-20 minutes, until the top has gone a little golden-brown and the dough has formed a hard crust.

Once I used up all the dough I needed for the braid, I realised I had some dough and filling leftover, so I decided to make these mini-pizza pies. I just cut small circles of the pizza dough and placed a circle into the bottom of a greased cupcake pan. I filled it with the chicken and mushroom mixture, jalapeños and cheese. Then I just place another circle of the dough on top of the filling and secured the edges, by pinching together both of the circles to seal the 'pies'. 

The presentation of this dish is something to be admired, so I would recommend serving it as it is. Just place the pizza braid onto a dish and serve it! Once everyone has admired the 'supposed' hard work it took to make the dish, you can cut it into pieces, by cutting horizontally and making rectangles of the pizza braid to serve it.

Ingredients:

An ingredients list is hard to make for this dish since you could make it with any filling you wanted! For my pizza braids (I made 2) I used:

4 pizza base mixes (2 for each pizza braid)

Roughly 4/5 chicken breasts

About 150g - 250g of mushrooms

Cheddar cheese - about 1 1/2 to 2 cups per braid, but this can be adjusted to taste.

Jalapeños 

This is a really rough list of the ingredients I used for my pizza braids, but you can create your own and add whatever filling you feel like! 

Keep it sweet!

Aneesa