Secret Recipe Club: Peanut butter, almond and raisin cookies

My last Secret Recipe Club (SRC) post was back in November 2012 as we had a break for December and I had a break for January. I first joined the SRC back in Nov 2011 so this is officially my first post in my second year of SRC. For my first assignment I made peanut butter chip pillows and coincidentally I've used peanut butter chips again! You can tell I love my peanut butter :) 

Secret Recipe Club was founded by Amanda from Amanda's Cookin and is now run by April from Angels Homestead. Each month, we are assigned a secret blog where we choose a recipe to make and everyone posts on the same day of the month. This month, I was assigned Finding Joy in My Kitchen. It's run by SnoWhite who picked up cooking as a hobby at graduate school, looking to cook healthy, easy meals on a budget whilst managing her nut allergy. She started her blog during her first year of marriage for her mom. It was a place to document their cooking journey and now serves to be an inspiration to others. 

I had a great time browsing through her recipes - there are a lot of easy, simple meals and as usual it was hard to make a choice. The desserts & treats category was further subdivided into ice cream & cool treats; cookies & bars; cakes; special cakes, frosting & filling; cobbler, crisps & pies; other yummy desserts & treats. I felt like a kid in a candy store - what should I make? I narrowed it down to lemon raspberry cake, mint chocolate crinkles, zucchini cookies and frozen lemon tart.  In the end I decided on these oatmeal raisin cookies mainly because it said 'our favs' next to it. It's her husband's excellent cookie recipe and the best thing is that you can add any extras to the cookie that you like. 

I unpacked a few boxes and used what I had to hand which ended up being peanut butter chips, flaked almonds and raisins. I wasn't sure if it would work but it did. The cookies were really addictive and I was not surprised that the whole batch disappeared in no time! I'll definitely be making these again with different add ins. 

 what I found in my box

 amazing, crisp, addictive cookies

Recipe adapted slightly from Joy in My Kitchen

225g butter

175g brown sugar

180g caster sugar

2 eggs

2 teaspoon vanilla extract

330g plain flour

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

135g rolled oats

2 cups add ins (choc chips, raisins, cranberry etc) - I used 1 cup of peanut butter chips, 1/2 cup raisins and 1/2 cup flaked almonds

• Preheat oven to 180C.
• Grease and line a baking tray with parchment paper. 
• Cream butter and sugars until smooth.
• Add in eggs and vanilla extract.
• Sift flour, baking powder, salt and bicarbonate of soda and mix in.
• Stir in oats and other add ins.
• Use a small ice cream scoop to place scoops of cookie dough spaced apart on a baking tray.
• Bake for 10-12 minutes until golden brown.
• Allow to cool on the tray for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

English Madeleines

As you can tell, I've been on a bit of a baking spree lately! I decided to make another entry for this month's AlphaBakes. I looked through my books for 'E' inspiration and found this in my Mary Berry Ultimate Cake Book - English Madeleines.  I've made French madeleines before but never English Madeleines.  The main difference is their shape - the French ones are traditionally shell shaped whereas the English ones are made in dariole moulds and are covered in jam & dessicated coconut and topped with a cherry.

AlphaBakes is a monthly blogging challenge hosted this month by myself and co-hosted by Caroline from Caroline Makes. Each month, we pick a random letter and the idea is to bake something with that letter as the main ingredient or name of bake. This month, the letter is "E".  Today is the deadline for Feb AlphaBakes so make sure you've emailed them across.

 I knew I'd get a chance to use my dariole mould one day.

 dessicated coconut, glace cherries and strawberry jam. 

 ready to go in the oven 

 Have everything ready to assemble your madeleines. 

 Use a fork to hold the cake, brush jam over it, roll it in coconut and top with half a cherry.

 Cute little cakes

Recipe from Mary Berry's Ultimate Cake Book 

Makes 12 madeleines

100g butter

100g caster sugar

2 eggs

100g self raising flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

4-6 tablespoons strawberry jam, sieved

50g dessicated coconut

6 glace cherries, halved

• Preheat the oven to 180C.
• Place all the ingredients for the cake in a mixer and mix until smooth.
• Fill the dariole moulds until 2/3 full.
• Bake for about 20 minutes or until well risen and firm to the touch. 
• Allow to cool completely.
• Trim the bottom of the cakes so they stand independently. 
• Warm the sieved jam in a pan and set aside. 
• Use a fork to spear the base of the cake to hold them.
• Brush them with the warm jam, then roll in the coconut to coat.
• Add half a glace cherry on top to finish.

Ginger and chocolate oat cookies

As you know I've recently moved into a new place. More than half of my kitchen is still in boxes but it does not stop me from baking! I asked a friend and her dad to come over to help my build some furniture and thought it was only fair that I provide tea and treats. I chose to bake treats that would fit into my regular blogging challenges as I've missed participating in them. 

These cookies are for We Should Cocoa - a monthly blogging challenge run by Choclette from Chocolate Log Blog and Chele from Chocolate Teapot. This month, it's guest hosted by Jen from Blue Kitchen Bakes and she chose ginger as the ingredient to pair with chocolate. I decided to make cookies as it would be an easy treat to nibble on whilst working so I did a quick google search and got a recipe from BBC food. The cookies were really quick and easy to make. I tried one and actually quite liked it as it was not very gingery at all! It tasted more like a spiced oat biscuit which reminded me of Christmas. 

If I were to make these again, I'd add more ginger (for my ginger loving friends) and maybe some nuts to give it a bit of crunch. I'd also make half the recipe as the recipe says it makes 24 biscuits but I got more than double that amount!

 melt butter and golden syrup (left), lightly beat eggs (right), mix flour, oats, spices and sugar (centre) 

 The cookies look a little wet but don't worry...

... fresh, crisp cookies

 dipped in chocolate

Recipe from BBC Food website

I used 225g chocolate as I ended up with a lot of cookies! 

Raspberry and white chocolate muffins

I love the combination of raspberries and white chocolate. I remember making these muffins many years ago pre-blog but realised I've never made them for my blog so here they are. It's not quite the same recipe as I can't remember where I placed that one (it was handwritten on a piece of paper from a friend) so I used a recipe I found online. The muffins were moist and the tart raspberries paired well with the white chocolate.

I'm sending this to Calendar cakes hosted by Rachel from Dolly Bakes and Laura from Laura Loves Cakes. The theme this month is Achy Cakey Heart and these muffins would be perfect for a Valentine's treat or for an everyday treat!

 mix the wet and dry ingredients together 

 stir in the raspberries 

 dot a few raspberries on top 

 yum!

Recipe from BBC Good Food online

Makes 12 muffins of size shown 

300g self raising flour

100g caster sugar

100g unsalted butter, melted

2 eggs

200ml milk

150g fresh raspberries

100g white chocolate, roughly chopped 

• Preheat oven to 200C.
• Mix the flour and sugar together.
• In a separate bowl, whisk the eggs and milk.
• Pour the melted butter and egg and milk mixture into the flour/sugar mixture. 
• Stir to combine but do not over mix. 
• Stir in half of the raspberries.
• Add in the chopped white chocolate.
• Spoon the mixture into muffin cases and dot with the remaining raspberries.
• Bake for 15-20 minutes or until well risen, golden brown and a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean. 
• Allow to cool completely. 

Pistachio, Yoghurt and Elderflower Cake

I can't believe the end of Feb is fast approaching and I've not made anything for AlphaBakes yet. If  you haven't then you still have time as the deadline is Feb 25th. The letter this month is E which had me scratching my head for ideas.  One of them was elderflower and when I googled elderflower cake, a Jamie Oliver recipe came up which sounded great so I decided to give it a go. Unfortunately I burnt the cake as I'm still getting used to my new oven! Luckily icing hides all manner of sins and the cake still tasted great. It's really moist with a nutty flavour and it paired well with the yoghurt icing. I'm definitely making this again! 

As mentioned I'm entering this to AlphaBakes, a monthly blogging challenge that I am hosting this month and will be hosted next month by Caroline from Caroline Makes. There's a lovely prize up for grabs this month so do send in your entries if you haven't already done so.

 elderflower cordial, honey, greek yoghurt, pistachips, lemon, butter and ground almonds 

 adding in the pistachios - such a lovely colour! 

 ready to go in the oven

 slightly burnt...opps!

 cover with icing! 

 yum! 

Recipe from Jamie Oliver Magazine online 

Giant Vanilla Blueberry Cupcake

Hi everyone, sorry for the long absence. It's been quite hectic getting used to a new place and a new job.  It's also hard to bake when most of my stuff is still in boxes! I was asked by a friend to make a special cupcake for a colleague who just had a baby boy. Of course I couldn't say no and it gave me an incentive to unpack some of my kitchen boxes. The request was for a giant vanilla raspberry cupcake but as it's for a baby boy, I suggested blueberries. I also decided to try out using white chocolate fingers to decorate the base which worked really well. I hope the recipients enjoyed the cake - congratulations on the new arrival! 

I used the same recipe as my giant vanilla raspberry cupcake but substituted the raspberries with blueberries. There was some extra batter left so I baked it and got to try some of the cake. It was light, moist and full of berries. I'll definitely be making this cake again in a regular cake tin! I was really pleased with how the giant cupcake turned out - my best effort so far at decorating them :) I have been busy baking ever since so will try to post daily or every two days this week.... the bakingaddict is back! 

adding gorgeous blueberries to the mix

 ready to go in the oven 

 I trimmed the top and bottom of the cake to make them level 

 I also sliced the bottom half in two and spread some buttercream in the middle

 I used more buttercream to stick the white chocolate fingers to the base

 This is what it looks like with a crumb coating on top. 

 I coloured the buttercream blue and piped swirls and stars on top of the cupcake and finished it with some coloured sugar pearls 

 The finishing touch - a bright blue ribbon!

For the cake
375g butter
375g sugar
6 eggs
375g self raising flour
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
150g fresh blueberries

For the icing
500g icing sugar
120g butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4-6 tablespoons of milk
blue gel paste 

coloured sugar pearls to decorate
Preheat the oven to 180C.

• Cream butter and sugar until pale and fluffy.
• Add the eggs one at a time and mix well between each addition.
• Mix in the flour and vanilla extract.
• Finally stir in the fresh blueberries.
• Fill the cupcake mould until 2/3 full - do not overfill!
• Bake for approximately 40-45 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
• Allow to cool completely.
• Make the icing by beating all the ingredients together until smooth. 
• Decorate as shown above

Alphabakes February 2013

Thanks to everyone who entered AlphaBakes last month - D was a slightly tricky letter and I do apologise for not visiting everyone's blogs as internet access has been very limited. I should be back online within a week or so if everything goes smoothly :) Do check out the excellent round up on Caroline's blog. 

So what's in store for us this month? Well our trusty random letter generator has churned out ... E! Please note that eggs would not be an acceptable 'E' for this challenge unless it's an egg based dish or it's the name of a bake ie not just because eggs are in the ingredient list!  Examples that are acceptable are Eggs benedict, Easter cookies, Eggless sponge.  As usual, I look forward to your creative entries. 

We have another lovely prize for you this month sponsored by PGUK publishers who have generously sponsored Booze Cakes in December, On A Stick in January and Pure Vanilla for this month! I have written a review of Pure Vanilla on my blog - check it out here if you are interested. The prize is only available for UK and Ireland participants and as usual a winner will be selected at random. Please remember to email your entries to alphabakes@gmail.com by 25th Feb 2013 otherwise it won't be included in the round up or the prize draw!

A quick reminder of the rules....

1. Post your recipe on your blog and link it to The More than Occasional Baker and Caroline Makes, stating the relevant month's host. If you do not have a blog, email us a picture and a brief description of your entry which we will include in the round-up at the end of the month.

2. You can use your own recipe or someone else's recipe. The recipe can be sweet, savoury or a mixture! Anything goes as long as the random letter is predominantly featured in the recipe as one of the main ingredients or flavours or in the name of the bake itself (i .e . not as a garnish , or using 'flour' for the letter F!) You can also republish old posts/recipes but you must include the information for this challenge as stated in these rules.

3. Add the logo to your post and add 'alphabakes' as a label to your post.

4. Email your entries to alphabakes@gmail.com by midnight (GMT) 25th of each month. Please include:

• Your name (that you want included in the round up or we will use the name of your blog)
• Your blog post URL
• Recipe title
• Photo of recipe (to be included in the round up)

5. You can submit as many entries as you like.

6. You do not have to participate every month to join in.

7. You may submit your entry to other challenges as long as it complies with their rules.

8. If you use twitter, please use the tag #alphabakes and mention @bakingaddict and @Caroline_Makes. We will retweet all those that we see.

9. Have fun! :)