Oatmeal Rolls

I wanted to make these rolls for a while as I liked the fact that they contained cardamom which I love! The recipe is from a Danish magazine.

I thought this set-up looked very professional - 

I didn't really use the wooden spoon much - it's more there as a prop.

The first batch - the second one is in the oven at this point.

These rolls were easy to do and I liked the consistency of them. The next time I bake them, I will add more cardamom. They freeze and defrost well.

Marble Cake

Stefan had a friend visiting Sunday afternoon, which gave me the opportunity to make a cake which would not only be shared between Paul and me...(Stefan and his friend, Noel, were more interested in eating some shop bought biscuit than this warm wonder of a homemade cake.)

Marble cake with limited 'swirl'.

I had an old recipe for a marble cake which I almost followed: Instead of icing sugar, I used Stevia which has been a successful substitute when making bread, but I must admit, I didn't like the aftertaste it seemed to leave in this cake. Paul said he thought it was a bit dry, so perhaps this was also because of me not using the 'right' sugar? As the picture demonstrates, the marble effect is a bit lacking, hence I need to find out how to improve that.

Cheese and Onion Soda Bread

Me choosing to make this bread coincided with the discovery of several bags of grated cheese in our fridge. Some people make sure they never run out of liquorice, lip balm or socks, in our household it's grated cheese. Even after I had made this bread - with its 75g of cheese - we still had four bags left...

Anyway, I decided to try out this recipe which is from a Paul Hollywood book enigmatically titled: 100 Breads.

Two lumps of dough criss crossed with a knife.

There's an appearance of bread here...

As I'd made such deep cuts with the knife at dough stage, it was very easy to break the bread into suitable pieces using our hands only. 

Considering how easy this bread was to make (just mix everything together, no proofing, no worries about making it look pretty), I didn't expect it to be as delicious as it was! And it was even great the following day. I'll definitely make this again - perhaps without the onion and cheese just to see if that works as well.

Smørbirkes / Special Danish Morning Rolls

These rolls were incredibly easy to make, once I got the hang of the 'folding'. They weren't as 'puffy' as the ones, you can by at the baker in Denmark, but I still thought they tasted really well. I froze some of them, and they were delicious warmed up.

I love it when I get to use my rolling pin.

As I didn't have any poppy seeds, I used caraway seeds, which worked well.

The finished product.

I really want to make these again soon.

Chocolate Cookies with Chilli

Since I saw the recipe for these cookies a while back, I've wanted to try them out. But due to a disaster with some store-bought, ready-made cookie dough a couple of years back, I've been shying away from throwing myself into the art of making cookies, as I was convinced this was something I would never master.

Stage one: Getting the ingredients ready (which includes my mixer wearing a collar).

Stage two: The dough is being mixed using the correct tools and expert folding technique.

Stage three: Yumminess on a plate (with the mandatory glass of milk).

I decided to subject one of my therapy groups to my first batch of homemade cookies, and their comments were very encouraging. I didn't necessarily understand everything they said, but I returned home more or less empty-handed which in this case is a positive. And one of them asked for the recipe! Personally, I must admit I was a bit disappointed. I'd been looking forward to the chocolate / chilli combination but didn't think it worked that well. However, I am so excited that I managed to make cookies which didn't need to go directly from the oven into the bin...