Apple and Maple Cookies

This recipe originates from one in the Great British Bake off cookbook (sticky maple and apple tray bake). It is absolutely divine! Recently I was looking at that recipe thinking,
"hmmmm should I make this again?" but then I saw a recipe for cookies in the latest Good Food magazine and that made me think again. I really wanted cookies... So I use the maple and apple flavours with the cookie recipe.

The cookies themselves just have apples in them and it is the icing which is used to stick them together that gives them the maple flavour, much like the tray bake where the icing is the only maple flavoured component.

Before I made them I was a little worried about whether or not apples would actually work in cookies and I can confirm that they do! But first you must cube your peeled and cored apples then sauté them in butter and brown sugar. This gives them a lovely butterscotch-y coating and cookies them through a little, taking away the bite that raw apples have. This means that when your cookies are finished the apples are delicious and soft just adding little sprinkles of extra flavour and texture throughout the cookie.

My only complaint would be that the icing needs to go in the fridge if you are keeping them, but generally I would say try and eat them all on the same day as baking. What am I saying!? "Try and eat them on the same day" I'm sure you'll have no issues!

Hope your all having a nice week? On the plus side its half way to the weekend! *Woop woop*

Much Love
Alex-Rose xxx

Salted Caramel and Chocolate Chiffon Cake

Dear Snow,

I admit, at first you were fun and we had a nice time. You caused chaos but that was fine because it felt like Christmas always! 

But now, oh no, you are cold and wet and windy and bloomin' freezing! Not enough for sledging but enough to make it feel like the Arctic! Except it's not the North Pole; it's England! I mean for god's sakes it's Spring, officially spring! 

So I am hoping you understand that it's now time for you to clear off, and clear of for good! I have summer/spring clothes that want wearing! Also it's my birthday in just over a weeks time, I dont want snow on my birthday; my birthday in April!

So, bye bye, ta-ta, au revoir, good day, guten tag, despidida!

Much appreciated,

A frozen English girl xx

Anyway, rant over. As you can probably see/have heard, the snow is back! Yay, (sarcasm)! But this does have one benefit, good excuse for cake! So, whilst outside it was awfully frozen I was toasty and warm baking the most delicious cake, ever, Salted Caramel Chocolate Chiffon Cake! It's just perfect. And this is coming from someone who doesn't usually like chocolate cakes. 

The recipe is from the most recent Good Food magazine and is an adaptation of John's final show-stopper bake (from the Great British Bake off 2012) the heaven or hell cake. After watching the episode (and drooling over his gorgeous cake) I was itching to bake my own one, so as you can imagine I was thrilled when Good Food released this simple-r version!

It is so good. The method isn't too difficult either, I was scared about making the caramel but that was fine! The biggest problem that I encountered was mixing the butter and the caramel to make salted caramel butter cream. I don't really know what i did wrong but it was much too runny and just would thicken, so in the end I whipped some double cream and then added the runny salted caramel butter cream to that, making a delicious butterscotch-y cream.

The bitter dark chocolate ganache on top, the light sponge and the sweet cream just make the most heavenly combination. Honestly, I could quite easily eat the entire cake (I didn't though, don't worry)!

I honestly don't think the photos do it justice because the spiked piping to decorate looks really dramatic and striking in real life; you can't really tell that well on the pictures hut you'll just have to take my word for it!

Much love Alex-Rose xxx