Effortless Chocolate Walnut Biscotti

Having friends over for tea or coffee, and you don't have a clue of what to serve?

I'll tell you, Biscotti!

These traditional italian cookies are easy, tasty, and most important CHEAP!! And what's more, you can add to the dough whatever you want, dried apricots, pistachios, hazelnuts, cranberries, white chocolate chips...ANYTHING!

They are absolutely perfect to have with anything, with a warm drink in these cold autumn days, or a delicious ice-cream in a hot summer day.

Remember if you want to give a great impression in a dinner or at home, without having to spend hours and hours in the kitchen baking, these are great!!

Ingredients:
85 grs softened butter
2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cups cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 cup walnuts (or any other ingredient you want)

1. Preheat the oven at 180ºC.
2. In a medium bowl whisk flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt. In a bowl of an electric mixer cream the butter and sugar until it's light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time and beat until it's well combined. Add the flour mixture and stir to form a stiff dough. Finally add the nuts.
3. Transfer the dough to a baking sheet (with butter and flour if necessary) and form into a log flattened (careful this can be a little messy!). Bake for 25-28 minutes.
4. Let it cool for 5-10 minutes and cut into pieces. Once done, re-bake for 8 minutes (that's why they are called biscotti, because it's twice baked!).

Et voilà! Enjoy!

Cream Cheese Brownies

Yes, I declare myself a huge fan of brownies! But not any type, only those that are super moist, fudgy, sweet, and will make you more and more addicted as you take a bite after another.

For a while now, I wanted to try and bake my own cream cheese brownies, just to give it a try and see if it  really was worth becoming addicted to them too. And thank god I decided to go for it! These brownies totally ROCK!

Searching for the perfect recipe I came across these by Martha Stewart.
I modified it just a little bit, and they turned out fantastic! They really were a huge hit in a dinner with friends.

So once again, thank you Martha for coming up with such a great brownie recipe!

Recipe (adapted from Martha Stewart)

Ingredients:
140 grs butter (113 grs for the brownie and 28 grs for the cream cheese mix)
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons flour
1/4 cup baking cocoa
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups caster sugar 
226 grs baking chocolate
113 grs cream cheese
3 eggs plus 1 egg yolk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract (one for the brownie batter and the other for the cream cheese mix)

1 - Preheat the oven at 180ºC. In a bowl whisk flour (just the 1 cup), baking soda, salt and cocoa. Set aside.
2 - Melt chocolate with butter in a heat proof bowl. Once it's melted add 1 1/4 cups of sugar, mix, then add one egg at a time and a tsp of vanilla and mix until well incorporated. Finally add the dry ingredients, but be careful not to overmix!
3 - For the cream cheese batter, whisk the cream cheese with 2 tablespoons of butter. Add 1/4 cup of sugar, egg yolk, tsp of vanilla and 2 tablespoons of flour.
Alternately spoon the chocolate mix and the cream cheese into a pan. With the tip of a knife swirl to marble.
4 - Bake for 50 - 60 minutes aproximately.

Et voilà! Enjoy!

Cuban Merengón - or how to enjoy a cheap & chic dessert!

This morning when I woke up and switched the television on all I could see in every channel, was news about the strike that is taking place in Spain.

Protesters all around the country rioting against the cuts the current government has been forced to made in order to solve the deep economic crisis we are suffering.

Prices keep on rising (electricity, gas, food, etc) what ends up on families having to cut expenses, specially on the grocery list.

This made me think: what does absolutely everyone have at home in their fridge or pantry and isn't expensive? Milk, eggs, sugar?
YES! And can a delicious (and easy) dessert be made from these 3 basic ingredients?
WELL OF COURSE!

So what is the name of this sweet and cheap dessert? MERENGÓN!

Merengón is a traditional Cuban dessert, very similar to the Portuguese Molotov. There is no difference between each other, just the name, so just like the egg and the chicken, you really don't know which came first!
The dessert is made out of egg whites beaten with sugar (in order to make a regular meringue), then caramel is added to the mixture and it is cooked in the oven in a water bath. With the remaining egg yolks a custard or creme anglaise is made to have with the cooked meringue. So nothing goes to waste!

The result is an absolutely delicious, light, airy and delectable dessert everyone will love!

Come on people, let's put a little touch of sweetness on these bitter and sad times we are living, and let's bake! Just like Frank Ocean's song, it is after all a "Sweet Life"

Find below the recipe!

Serves 8 people, you wil need:
For the meringue:
21  tablespoons of caster sugar ( 14 for the meringue and 7 to make the caramel)
6 egg whites

For the custard:
6 egg yolks
6 tablespoons of sugar
500 ml whole milk(or more depending on the consistency, if you want it less thick)

1 - Butter the pan (you can use a bundt pan, or if not a regular round one)
2 - Beat 6 egg whites with 14 tbsps of sugar. In a saucepan add the remaining sugar and cook it until you have a caramel sauce (do not add water!).
3 - Once you have the egg whites and sugar in the right consistency add the caramel and keep on beating until it us well incorporated. Bake in the oven in a water bath for 20 minutes.
4 - Put the milk in a saucepan, once it has started to boil remove from heat. Whisk egg yolks with sugar, and blend. Gradually whisk the hot milk into yolk mixture. Return custard to saucepan. Stir over low heat until custard thickens and leaves path on back of spoon when finger is drawn across, about 5 minutes (do not boil). Strain sauce into bowl. Cover and chill.

5 - Once the meringue is ready, unmold and serve it chilled with the custard.

Et voilâ! Enjoy!

Tejas De Tolosa

  So here is the first post of my blog dedicated to Braulia (my grandmother's cook).
Her love and passion for cooking and food itself was so immense she transmitted it to my mother, and so on my mother taught both my sister and I that love for the culinary world.

 Las Tejas de Tolosa (Tiles of Tolosa) are a traditional cookie from the north of Spain, to be more exact from the town of Tolosa in the province of Guipuzcoa (Basque Country). The name tejas is due to their resemblance to roof tiles.

They are very similar to a butter or sugar cookie, but with toasted almonds. Whenever travelling around the basque country you will find them in every bakery shop, or served after lunch as a "petit four" to have with coffee or tea.

So in honour of our beloved Braulia, my mother and I baked some delicious and crispy Tejas. Scroll down for the recipe!