GINGERBREAD ANGELS || BLOGMAS

You Need:

• 145g Unsalted Butter

• 150g Light or Dark Brown Sugar 

• 200g Molasses 

• 2 Large Eggs 

• 1 TSP Vanilla Essence 

• 370g Plain Flour

• 1 TSP Baking Soda 

• Pinch of Salt 

• 1 TBSP Ground Ginger 

• 1 TBSP Ground Cinnamon 

• 1/2 TSP Allspice 

• 4 TBSP Golden Syrup

Instructions:

- In a large bowl beat the butter for 1 minute with an electric whisk until completely smooth. Add the brown sugar and molasses to the butter, and mix until it is combined. Then beat in the eggs and vanilla essence until the mixture looks creamy and there are no sugar lumps. I forgot to get rid of all the lumps of hardened sugar, and well parts of the biscuit was particularly sweet.

- In a separate large bowl, whisk together all the dry ingredients; the flour, baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon and allspice. Add this mixture to the wet ingredients sensibly, adding in a quarter first and mixing it, then adding in another quarter. Once you have mixed all the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, add the golden syrup and mix it in too. 

- At this point, the dough should be thick and slightly sticky. At his point you could either 

a) divide the dough in half and wrap each half in clingfilm and then chill the dough for +2hours 

or b) don't bother because ain't nobody got time for that and continue with the recipe.

- Preheat the oven to 350°F or 177°C and line 3 large baking sheets with parchment paper.

- Take a half of the dough and begin to roll it out with a rolling pin, until the dough is 1/4 inch thick. THEN GO CRAZY WITH YOUR COOKIE CUTTERS! I chose some festive angels and Christmas trees, but you can choose whatever takes your fancy. Place these on a baking tray about an inch apart (but don't worry, the cookies don't grow too much) and do the same with the other half of dough.

- BAKE! for 8-9 minutes.

- Before you start to decorate them (preferably with royal icing) I would really suggest waiting until the cookies are cold as otherwise the icing will simply melt and you don't want that! My sister and I went a bit wild with the icing and unfortunately I don't have the photos to share with you, but we iced them to look like Victoria Secret Angels! 

CHRISTMAS COOKIES

First of all, can I just apologise for the lateness of this post. I knew exactly what I wanted to write, i just couldn't type it out right. Secondly moving onto the post, Emma and I felt the need for a day to really get into the Christmas spirit, so we made these wonderful creatures! They're so easy to make and very fun 'n' funky for Christmas. Here's what you need to do to make them:

To make the Melting Snowmen you will need:

- Digestive biscuits

- 225g of sifted Icing sugar

- Marshmallows

- Chocolate Writing Icing 

1. First of you'll need to make the powered sugar icing which is super simple as all you need to do is add 2-3 tablespoons of water to the icing sugar and stir it around until the mixture is smooth.

2. Pick your marshmallows (sadly I was left with the pink tinted ones as Emma's chose all the white ones! Honestly (; ). Once you have chosen them, I decided to ice a little smiley face onto all of them and personally I think they all look adorable!

3. Ice the biscuits and pop a marshmallow on each of the biscuits slightly to the side, which will be helpful for later on when decorating.

4. Add a few 'buttons' in a row just in front of the marshmallow. I used tiny golden stars which I found in my cupboard, but you can use whatever you fancy.

5. Then using your writing icing, ice little stick arms to the side and SHAZZAM! There you have your own melting snowmen which look simply adorable and taste fab!

I then decided to have my own take on these snowmen guys and made reindeer versions instead. The recipe is very simple and pretty much the same as the snow men, so if you want to have a go, here it is:

To make the Chocolate Reindeer's you will need:

- Digestive biscuits

- 225g of Milk or Dark Chocolate

- Marshmallows

- Pretzels

1. For the chocolate, put all the chocolate into a bowl. Put the bowl over a saucepan half filled with water and heat on a low temperature until the chocolate melts.

2. Cover the biscuits in chocolate and then dip a marshmallow into the chocolate and place it onto the middle of the biscuit. 

3. After this you'll need to break up the pretzels into antler like shapes and push them into the marshmallow, then quickly pop them into the fridge until the chocolate hardens.

4. After 10-15 minutes take them out and Ta-Dah! You've got these beautiful edible nibbles which you can make and eat with your family and friends. They're so easy and look very impressive.

A GINGERBREAD VILLAGE

My mum bought my sister and I a Gingerbread House Making Kit, which came with four separate possible houses that you could create. Whilst fangirling over the smell of a cinnamon Christmas, my sister and her friends were already building three different houses, leaving me with one of the smallest ones, of course!

Anyway, I started creating my little house and I have to say I'm so proud of it! All I'm saying is that it is actually still standing as I type this compared to the others, but then again I haven't had the heart to knock down my baby of a creation!

A LOVE FOR CHOCOLATE BROWNIES

I LOVE baking and it's a great activity to do either with your friends or just to do something over the holidays or weekend when you're bored. This week I have been on a constant search through the cupboards, to find something tasty to nibble on, however this week, there has literally been nothing in the kitchen. So I thought it would be a good idea just to bake something yummy and very easy. So here you go, my favourite simple brownie recipe of all time (:

Traybake tin: 30 x 23cm

275g softened butter

375g caster sugar

4 large eggs

75g cocoa powder

100g self-raising flour

100g chocolate (you can use which ever chocolate you prefer)

Preheat the oven to 180*C/fan 160*C/gas 4. Put the baking parchment in the bottom of the tray.

Measure all the ingredients into a large bowl and whisk the mixture until it is evenly blended. At this point the mixture tastes AMAZING. Not even joking so just try a tiny weeny bit (lets be real now, we all know that that is never gonna happen, so take a lot, it tastes like heaven). Spoon the mixture into the prepared tin and evenly spread it using a spatula, so that the top is even.

Bake in the oven for 35-40 minutes, so that the your brownies have a slight crispy layer on the top, and a skewer can be inserted into the middle and come out clean. Let the brownies cool and then cut them into whatever sizes you want, I made about 24 using this recipe.

Nomnom

NATIONAL WAFFLE DAY

On the 26th of March was National Waffle Day (the day in which heaven came down to earth).

Of course it was only obligatory to make waffles! So I made waffles with a few of my friends which meant serious amounts of whipped cream, toffee sauce and banana... And a lot of mess.

The recipe we used was:

450g Plain Flour

3 eggs

75ml of Corn Oil

350ml of Warm Milk

Basically put all the ingredients in a bowl and give it a whirl, but do make sure the liquids are put in after the dry ingredients. 

Our secret ingredient for this was a waffle machine, which is a gift sent by God, and it was a lot quicker and easier. However, you can buy waffle baking holder things which you can easily just pop in the oven and bake for a while.

Then the fun part. We used loads of toppings: fruit, toffee sauce, whipped cream, and sprinkles. My favourite was definitely the what I called 'Fruity Collection With A Twist', consisting of whipped cream, bananas, strawberries and lots and lots of sprinkles!