Bacon Madness

Thanks to random net surfing, I’ve recently stumbled across some unexpected bacon products. The first is deep fried bacon, simply the thought of this mortifies me….. For $6 (US), it’s now possible to acquire deep fried bacon as an appetiser. Rashers of bacon, dipped in egg wash, dusted with flour and deep fried in vegetable oil….served with a suspicious looking white “gravy”.

Now don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against deep fried food. I really enjoy the crunch of a good hot chip/calamari ring /spring roll, or the barely there crispness of freshly cooked tempura batter. I even appreciate that as a cooking technique, while being energy dense, deep frying offers a method of keeping food moist while adding another dimension to texture and flavour.

Of course there are many things deep fried that I never would have thought of frying - I’ve eaten a deep fried Mars Bar (I quite liked it lol) and my Scottish friends once told me that back home it’s possible to get deep fried pizzas, but still, the idea of deep fried bacon doesn’t appeal to me…

Don’t be fooled by the shirt

A quote from the chef: “Just hearing about it makes your heart skip a beat”. An understatement, at best… Yes I could easily get started on the dangerous effects of this appetiser on the human cardiovascular system……

The second item is the world’s first bacon flavoured chocolate bar – Mo’s Bacon Bar. Apparently a hit with the British palate, the option of having chunks of smoked applewood bacon and salt in your milk chocolate is so appealing that the entire supply in the UK was sold out within the first 48 hrs….

I recall a Simpsons episode (yes this ramble is Deep), where Homer can’t comprehend that an assortment of meats (bacon, pork, ham, hot dog) come from the same animal “Oooo a Magical Animal”, and am reminded that pig meat, is indeed versatile.

I guess I really can’t pass judgment until I’ve personally tried it… To be honest I’ve eaten much weirder things before and if the opportunity presented, I’d definitely be up for at least a nibble. That being said, I won’t be going out of my way to find them.

Chocolate Cake

So I'm entering into (Not Quite) Nigella's baking/chocolate cake competition:) Not because I'm a stellar baker, but because droolworthy recipes should really be shared:)

This is my favourite cake recipe at the moment. It’s moist and fudgy, with a dark rich chocolate flavour and is covered with mouth-watering ganache. The recipe can be found here from the Epicurious website and is designed to produce a double layered cake but I usually make two separate cakes (I get twice the amount of icing/decorating fun lol).

Coffee and chocolate mixture

At first I was a bit apprehensive about the coffee content in the recipe, but you really can’t taste it at all in the end product, it simply acts to bring out the flavour of the chocolate:)

Dry Mixture

Wet Mixture

The addition of buttermilk helps with keeping the cake moist, almost fudgy. Another great thing about this recipe for me is that the fat content is attributed to oil and not butter. Firstly, it’s better for our hearts, and secondly, it adds to the softer crumb and overall texture of the cake, which would otherwise be a little harder if butter were used.

Into the oven

I use two 20cm round cake tins and the mixture almost comes to the top of them.

Ready for icing

At this point, the cakes have been baked for just over an hour and have been left to cool completely. The recipe says at this stage you can wrap it up in cling wrap to keep overnight if you want to ice it later, but I never do – by this stage, I’m hungry for cake! Being the time efficient person I am, the ganache has already been made and ready for spreading:)

Chocolate for the icing

Ganache

The ganache is easy to make, simply heating up the cream, sugar and glucose syrup and then adding chocolate. The recipe also asks for some butter to be melted in afterwards, but I always forget and never seem to notice anything wrong

The first one was sprinkled with cachous. I’m sure other people will think of more creative and exciting ways to decorate a cake, but I love these silver balls – so pretty!

The second cake was topped with little coloured chocolate pieces, what better to dress a chocolate cake than...more chocolate!

Goodness inside

This is a great recipe, being easy to make and utterly delicious. I’ve considered cutting the recipe in half (to only make 1 singular cake), but having 1.5 eggs in a recipe is awkward and there’s nothing like the comfort of knowing there is More Cake, even if we finish this one lol.
I highly recommend this recipe - give it a go:)

Guylian Café, Circular Quay, Sydney

The story of Guylian (as I read from the wall of the café) is romantic. Belgian chocolatier Guy Foubert marries his true love Liliane and they set up a little chocolate factory in their home making truffles and pralines for local chocolate shops – they name the chocolates “Guylian”, a combination of both their names. How cute! Sorry, I’m a sucker for things like this…

So anyway, Goldilocks, Lady S, Chocchip, Daisy Moo and I are out for a quick morning tea to savour our last moments of freedom before we are all consumed by exam panic.

Seeing as we all love chocolate, the Guylian Café offers up a perfect destination. It was a bright day, nice and warm; we sat outside and the table was surrounded by summer dresses:)

Milk Chocolate and Hazelnut Torte

Lady S had this yummy creation, which was served warm and gooey. Despite having a raspberry inside, it was quite rich, and she didn’t manage to finish it. Not that it went to waste, the rest of us were more than happy to help:) Everyone who has seen this photo has commented on the supposedly ‘evil’ face that the white chocolate flakes make, and his Guylian ‘bib’ lol. I think it’s hilarious.

Waffles with fruit and chocolate

Daisy Moo, Chocchip and Goldilocks all had the waffles - safety in numbers?. You can get 3 types of chocolate served, each with varying amounts of cocoa and all three of them had the “Asian”, which was 56%. I had a taste, it was really good. Daisy Moo commented that her chocolate had a red tinge to it – fruity??

Enjoy in

I had this pink beauty, which had a raspberry and hazelnut mousse on the outside, which enclosed a chocolate centre, all atop a crumb base and covered with raspberry jelly. Divine.

We had a looksee inside:

Goodies for sale

The fabulous chocolates

Goldilocks bought a couple and ate them before we even left, they were that good:)

Another dessert option

I’m trying this one next time I go:)

I really wanted this in miniature form, but couldn’t find it on the menuL doesn’t it look fabulous? I was salivating as I read the description lol.

Praline Cream Liqueur

The trademark seahorses, filled with chocolatey alcoholic goodness.

Apart from Antwerp, Sydney’s the only place that has a Guylian Café – how lucky are we? Eating delicious desserts 2 steps from the Opera House, with awesome company and views from the Harbour – is it really a surprise I had a lovely morning?

Guylian Café
East Circular Quay
Shop 10, Opera Quays
3 Macquarie St
Sydney, NSW, 2000
Phone: (02) 8274 7900
http://www.guyliancafe.com.au/

Cheesecake Brownie

If there is one brownie recipe you try, make it this one – you’ll never look back:) I am by no means a pro baker and even I managed to make this mouthwatering recipe! I found this recipe during a trawl through the Taste Website.

Starting the base

The usual suspects in an indulgent bakery treat – fat, sugar and eggs. I use a regular electric hand beater and the sheer amount of sugar meant I was standing there for a very long time…wishing I had one of those fancy ones that mix All By Themselves.

Putting together the brownie mixture

It really was a simple brownie mix, because after all that initial beating, all I had to do was add some melted chocolate. Licking the melted chocolate bowl is good...

So then it was time to make the cheesecake bit.

Time to pull out another mixing bowl

While mixing the eggs, sugar, cream cheese and vanilla extract together, the dietitian within me started screaming. I shuddered when I realised the recipe had effectively amounted to almost ½ kilo worth of fat, most of which was saturated.

For the record, I bought extra light cream cheese and always advocate the use of margarine instead of butter when cooking, so while this brownie was indeed energy dense, heart damage capacity was still significantly reduced:)

Assembling the brownie

Putting it together was quite easy. Most of the brownie mixture was spread on the bottom and then layered on top with the cheesecake. The remaining brownie mixture is then swirled through the top. Size wise, I used a shallow rectangular baking tray (about 20cm long) and it was fine.

Fruit!

The recipe asked for raspberries on the top, but our fridge offered up strawberries and our freezer had a box of frozen blackberries, so I used those instead.

It’s baking time!

I found that it took a little bit longer to bake than the recipe stated, not long, only about 15 min which I guess is due to oven differences.

Time to eat!

An apology for the poor, poor shot above, it does no justice to the recipe at all! Impatience may have led me to prematurely slicing and eating before adequate cooling :S

But wow was it fantastic! Even in theory, a slice with brownie AND cheesecake was always going to be good, but this exceeded my expectations. The whole thing was gone within a few hours, and no, it wasn’t entirely due to myself, I must give credit to Daisy Moo, Chocolate Queen, Herr Moutarde and Sindel for their time and effort lol.

Sindel and I had a moment when we thought we might actually be drooling – classy…

Anyway, the recipe was found here

Enjoy!