Oreo oreo, here we go!

The first time we did brownie, it was a little burnt thus hard, yet very chocolatey.

We all agreed it could be a little more moist.

Determined to bake the best brownie ever, we found this enticing recipe!

Fudgy Oreo Brownies

Introducing the team players

Melted the butter and chocolate in the microwave.

The chocolate won't be completely melted so stir till it combines with the glorious melted butter :)

Added the rest of the wet ingredients, followed by all the dry ingredients.

Then, some muscles did some dancing.

All ready to go

The blobs you see in the brownie mixture are actually chunks of crushed oreo.

Lay it on the bed of aluminium

Sprinkle on plenty of blessings

(that means oreo to us or maybe to some of you too *wink*)

Let the steel box do its magic

After some time of oohing and aahing at the glass window of the steel box, it came out looking like thissss.

We thought it looked great, hopefully you do too. Yes, don't forget the but.

But, it was too dry. The oreo flavour created wonders with the chocolate. Yes.

Yet, it was more of a chocolate cake than a brownie. We like ours chewy, fudgey and chocolatey.

We wondered if reducing the baking time would do the trick. But that's another try for another day.

Nevertheless, here's the recipe :) 

Fudgy Oreo Brownies
(adapted from Pinch of Yum)

Serves 8

1/2 cup bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped
2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
1/2 cup or 8 tablespoons or 115g of butter (unsalted)
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 1/4 cups sugar
3 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 tablespoons strong brewed coffee or espresso
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup flour
15-20 Oreo cookies, crushed

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Prepare a 8×8 pan by lining the inside with foil, creasing it tightly at the inside edges and folding it tightly over the top edges (this makes it easy to take them out and cut when you’re all done).
2. Melt all three chocolates and butter in the microwave.  Stir and cool.
3. Whisk sugar, eggs, vanilla, coffee, and salt for about 15 seconds.  Add the chocolate mixture.  Add flour and stir until no streaks remain.  Add the crushed Oreos and mix.  Pour into prepared pan.
4. Top with extra Oreos and bake for about 30 minutes.  Be careful – they get dry around the edges if overbaked.
5. Cool completely before cutting and serving (yeah, right).

So, we're sadly excited to announce that our quest for the best brownie ever will continue!

HAA_JAA!

Love,

Rach and Via

The Great Banana Bread

There are many versions of the banana bread which is really banana cake shaped like a loaf.

We thought banana bread with some coffee in the breezy afternoon would do us some good.

Our first attempt at banana bread looked like this.

Please stay even after you've seen this.

We used too much flour and had too little bananas in the mixture. Not to mention, our electric whisk broke down in the midst of whisking! Horrified, we scrambled around for an alternative. The result was a certain pair of muscular arms and the metal whisk part from the electric whisk. Boohoo to blisters :(

Well, now this is our second attempt!! Cheers to not giving up!

It was moist, nutty and sat well with milk in our now bloated stomachs. Wait for the but. We always have one. But it didn't have enough bananas. Maybe just one more banana would do the trick. More banana would make the bread a little sweeter and richer with its flavour.

Introducing the actors of this play:

We mashed and microwaved the bananas for it to be moist and soft.

Then, mix all the wet ingredients together.

It smelled great at this point! So tempted to lick up the bowl but restrained.

Stirred in the flour and walnuts.

Pour batter into baking tin. Had a little design on top! All ready to pop!

That was fun and pretty manageable!! :)

Here, have a go!

Banana Bread

Serves six

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup butter

3/4 cup brown sugar

2 eggs, beaten

2 1/3 cups mashed overripe bananas

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.

2. Mash bananas and microwave them for 30 seconds.

3. In a large bowl, combine flour, baking soda and salt. In a separate bowl, cream together butter and brown sugar. Stir in eggs and mashed bananas until well blended.

4.Stir banana mixture into flour mixture; stir just to moisten. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan.

5. Bake in preheated oven for 60 to 65 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into center of the loaf comes out clean. Cover top with aluminium foil if it seems to be browning too quickly. Let bread cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack.

Have fun and go bananas!

Love, Rach and Via

We declared it Christmas, again!

Feeling all festive, we had to have a cookout!

So the entire gang came down, all decked in christmas gear and armed with gifts!

The Evening's Menu

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Super Mushroomy Mushroom Soup

Honey Roasted Chicken on Baked Vegetables

Beloved Gordon's Mushroom Mac and Cheese

Vanilla Ice Cream with Berry Compote

Chocolate Log Cake

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As you can already tell, we are crazy about mushrooms! It was mushroom, mushroom everywhere!

Turn around and you see one trying to sneak up on you.

We started with the baked vegetables first. They take the longest in the oven.

 This shot was at half time.

Then, went to work on Gordon's Mac and Cheese.

And it came out of the oven, looking like this! Hmmmmm....mmm

Took out the vegetables from the oven and placed the microwave heated honey roasted chicken on top!

(We wanted to save time so we bought a ready chicken instead of roasting one)

We are not so able as to cook the mushroom soup on our own. We just reheated the HEINZ cans and threw sauteed mushrooms in to bring the flavour up a notch. Also, to make sure cooking up a storm in the kitchen didn't translate to disaster on the dinner table *wink*

It was a jolly good time!

Too jolly, if we may add...

Anyway, here are the recipes if you wanna have your hand at them!

Baked Vegetables

Serves eight

1 bag of mixed potatoes (Purple Peruvian/ Red Bliss/ Brown)

1 bag of long beans

i box of baby tomatoes

2 cloves of garlic

olive oil

thyme

salt and black pepper

1. Preheat oven to 180 degree celsius. Scrub clean and chop potatoes into quarters or halves (up to your preferance) Chop long beans into halves. Peel and wash garlic. Wash baby tomatoes.

2. Place potatoes, long beans, garlic and tomatoes into roasting tin.

3. Drizzle olive oil. Sprinkle thyme, salt and pepper. Stir to coat potatoes with oil mixture well.

4. Bake for 30 mins. After 15 mins, take it out to stir and return to oven. Check if thyme is burnt. If it is, remove from vegetables mixture. Thyme has a bitter taste when burnt.

5. Stir and serve!

Gordon's Mac and Cheese

Serves eight

2 shallots, finely diced
250g dried macaroni
1 tablespoon olive oil
100g shitake, trimmed and sliced into pieces
1 sprig of thyme, leaves removed
200ml double cream
4 egg yolks
200g cheddar cheese

100g Parmesan
25g butter
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
Olive oil

1. Add the macaroni to a large pan of boiling salted water with the olive oil and cook for 7-10 minutes until just tender. Drain and rinse under cold water to remove excess starch. Return to the pan and set aside.

2. Melt the oil in a small frying pan. Add the mushrooms and fry until golden brown, add a small knob of butter and the thyme, cook for another minute then season with pepper. Drain the excess oil from the pan and then add the shallots and cook for a further 2 minutes or until softened.

3. Bring the cream to a gentle boil and add it to the mushrooms, add the egg yolks (a little at a time, stirring well to prevent egg from cooking), and parmesan, mix well and crumble in two-thirds of the cheese. Add the macaroni to the cheese sauce and stir until everything is fully incorporated. Heat gently for a few minutes to melt the cheese. Season with pepper.

4. Butter the ovenproof dish, and pour in the mixture. Top with some cheddar and parmesan and transfer to oven for 15 minutes or until the top is golden brown, remove and leave to stand for 5 minutes or so, then serve!

 The next time we go this crazy, will have to be Chinese New Year!

HAA--JAA!

Merry Merry Christmas <3
Love, Rach and Via

A Sweet Midnight to Christmas

On the Eve, Rach and I decided to bake our midnight away into Christmas!

We decided it had to be something sweet, creamy and simple!

(because we could only manage amateur recipes at the moment, to more hard yummy work ahead!)

So, Oreo Cheesecake it is!

Love the red the strawberries brought to the cheesecake! Hmmm...

And now, introducing the ingredients...

Mix, mix and more mixing. Remember to stir in only one direction.

Pour the cheese mixture onto the oreo base in the tray.

Spread it evenly with a spatula.

Initially, we wanted to use the remaining cream cheese we had to write 'Merry Christmas!'

The plastic bag didn't work well, thus a heart filled with strawberries was born!

Here's the recipe, if you wanna try it out!

Oreo Cheesecake

Serves eight

2 (250g) packages PHILADELPHIA brick cream cheese, softened

18 OREO cookies, mashed (depending on how oreo you want it to be)

2 tablespoons butter, melted

3/4 teaspoon vanilla essence

1/2 cup sugar

2 eggs

1. Place 12 of the cookies in resealable plastic bag. Flatten bag to remove excess air, then seal bag. Finely crush cookies by rolling a rolling pin across the bag. Place in bowl. Add butter; mix well. Press firmly onto bottom of 9-inch springform pan or tray.

2. Beat cream cheese, sugar and vanilla in large bowl with a whisk/ spatula (we used a spatula) until well blended. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating just until blended after each addition.

3.Chop or crush remaining 6 cookies. Gently stir half of the chopped cookies into cream cheese batter.

4. Pour over prepared crust; sprinkle with the remaining chopped cookies.

5. Bake 45 min. or until centre is almost set. Cool. Refrigerate 3 hours or overnight. Cut into 12 pieces. Store leftover cheesecake in refrigerator.

Our cheesecake was yes, sweet, creamy and utterly oreo-y. But it was too soft. Our mistake was that we used the soft PHILADELPHIA cream cheese in tub instead of blocks. So, do look out for the right type and have fun!

'Till our next bake!

Love, Rach and Via

The Midnight Bake!

Here, you see Rach's favourite dessert- the easyfussfreeyummysosogood or so they say. Add a scoop of rich vanilla ice cream and it's sliding down your throat faster than you can say A-HEY! This is our virgin attempt- toasty on top, filled with one too many bittersweet chocolate chips and a little too soggy at the bottom. So, let's work backwards as with most solutions to solving a problem.

In the oven for 45 mins at 200 degrees celsius.

All soaked in the buttery,sugary, chocolatey goodness. Tasted the mixture and was good so far. But this might have been too soggy. Looking back, draining 2/3 of the mixture would do us some good.

All the ingredients we prepared. Had a mixture of chocolate swirl, chocolate cake and danish bread. This might have been our downfall. The chocolate cake and chocolate swirl bread was too soft.

Mix. Mix. Mix.



It smelt and looked good though it didn't pass the taste test. Bb gobbled a whole plate of it! That sight's a sure motivation to continue baking! For our next attempt, we'll rewind and succeed!

Have a good night!

Love, Rach and Via