Delia Smith's Chocolate Bread and Butter Pudding

I’ve been hideously busy recently but the good news is that in a few days I will be free for Christmas and free to bake ALL the things! I have however had a little run of Christmas shindigs so here’s a pudding I made for one with my course mates. The first time I had it was at a Sunday dinner where my friend introduced us all to the magic that is chocolate bread and butter pudding. It is a Delia recipe, so you know it’s got to be good.

Ingredients

9 slices of white bread, preferably a tad stale

5oz dark chocolate

3oz butter

15 fl oz whipping cream

4 tablespoons of dark rum (which I omitted because I had no rum)

4oz caster sugar

Large pinch ground cinnamon

3 large eggs

Big pot of chilled double cream to serve

Now first things first, this pudding is better if you assemble it at least 24-48 hours before baking so that the bread soaks up all the chocolatey cream, so give yourself time to do it.

Find a large casserole type dish. Cut the crusts off the bread then slice each into half to make triangles.

In a heat proof bowl gently melt the chocolate, butter, whipping cream, rum, sugar and cinnamon over a pan of simmering water.

Remove from the heat when the chocolate is completely melted. In a separate bowl or jug whisk the eggs.

Add the whisked eggs to the chocolate mixture and whisk everything together until well incorporated.

Now here’s a tip which my friend decided to share with me after I made the pudding…pour enough mixture in to cover the bottom of your dish. Then dip each slice of bread individually into the mixture and place in the dish in overlapping rows.

Or what you can do is place half the bread in overlapping rows and pour half the chocolate mixture over it, and then repeat until everything is completely covered.

Cover the dish with cling film and leave the pudding at room temperature for two hours before chilling in the fridge for at least 24, preferably 48 hours.

Another tip…don’t leave the pudding at a tilt all night in the fridge or it will set all squished up to one side and generally look a bit messy like mine…

When you’re ready to cook heat the oven to 180⁰C. Bake on a high shelf for 35-40 minutes and leave to stand for 10 minutes after that before serving with the chilled double cream.

Despite mine looking a bit of a state it tasted nice, I swear!

Gingerbread Men

Gingerbread biscuits signal the coming of Christmas in my house. My mum even makes gingerbread decorations for the tree (which last about two days). As I have about a week left until I have to hand in my dissertation, anything snack related is a godsend so I thought I’d make something Christmassy to get me through.

The only cookie cutter I could find without having to go into town was this absolutely mahoosive one so these gingerbread men are MEN. Also yes, I am aware that they look like they’ve been decorated by a five year old. That is just how gingerbread men are supposed to be, okay?

Ingredients

350g plain flour

1tsp bicarbonate soda

2tsp ground ginger

1tsp ground cinnamon

125g butter

175g dark brown soft sugar

1 egg

4tbsp golden syrup

Firstly, this is all done very easily if you have a food processor. Sadly, I am a poor student so have to do these things by hand. It still works; it just takes a little longer.

Combine the flour, bicarbonate soda, ginger and cinnamon in a large mixing bowl.

Tip in the butter and combine everything together using your fingertips until the mixture becomes fine crumbs.

Stir in the sugar.

Beat the egg and golden syrup together and then add it to the mixture. Combine everything together, sticking your hands right in there if you need to.

Wrap the ball of dough in some Clingfilm and chill in the fridge for at least half an hour.

Preheat the oven to 180⁰C. Line a couple baking trays with baking parchment.

Roll the dough out on a lightly floured work surface until around half a cm thick. Use the cookie cutters to make the men. If like mine your cutter doesn’t include legs, use a sharp knife to create a slit. Place them on the baking tray, leaving room for them to grow.

Bake in the oven for 12-15 minutes, watching carefully to make sure they don’t catch. Leave them on the tray to cool for around 10 minutes before decorating.

To decorate mine I combined some icing sugar with a little water, and then went a bit mad with any random decorations I had lying around. You can make them look a bit more professional and neat if you want but in my opinion that’s just a bit boring…

NOTE: I had an absolute spaz this morning because when I went to write up this blog post it wouldn’t let me upload any photos. It said basically that you only get 1GB free storage space with Picasa, and wanted me to spend money every month for more space. Personally I think that is absolute bollocks. So after going through a mental list of which family members I could guilt trip into buying me Google space for Christmas, I thought I’d just well, Google the issue. I’m glad I did because some helpful person pointed out that for some reason Google doesn’t count photos which are under 800 pixels as part of your storage.

This means that although it’s a bit of a faff, it’s still happy days because I can carry on blogging for free! Just open the photo in paint and click ‘resize’, and there’s a pixel option where you can set it to under 800. I hope this helps for anyone having the same issue, because it is a pain in the arrssse.

Gingerbread Brownie

It’s that time of year when everyone’s run out of money, deadlines are looming and you just need something a little Christmassy to see you through.

I wanted to use up ingredients that I had lying about and I wanted something that tasted ‘like Christmas’. I suppose adding nuts and fruit would make this more festive, but you know sometimes you just can’t be bothered with that nonsense.

So this is a recipe that I completely made up. As a result it’s a bit…weird. It’s sort of cakey in texture, but not, and not really like a brownie at all. It does taste like gingerbread though so hey ho that’s something. We poor people don’t judge, as long as it vaguely resembles a cake-type thing.

Ingredients

200g butter

150g milk chocolate

50g white chocolate

300g dark brown soft sugar

3 eggs

200g plain flour

1 tsp cocoa powder

½ tsp cinnamon

½ tsp mixed spice

½ tsp ground nutmeg

Preheat the oven to 170⁰C/gas mark 4. Butter and line a rectangular tin with baking parchment.

Melt the butter in a saucepan over a gentle heat and cook for around 5 minutes until it turns golden brown. Cool for a few minutes before adding half of the milk chocolate. Leave it to melt for a bit before stirring until smooth. Leave to cool to the side.

Use an electric whisk to mix the brown sugar and eggs for about 3 minutes in a large mixing bowl.

Add the flour, cocoa and spices and fold in gently using a spatula.

Pour in the cooled chocolate butter.

Coarsely chop the rest of the milk chocolate and milk chocolate and stir into the mixture.

Pour into the tin then bake for 40-45 minutes until dark brown on top.

Leave to cool in the tin for a bit then transfer it to a wire rack. I haven’t actually tried this but I reckon a square would go down a treat with some hot custard.

Cinnamon and Nutella Cupcakes

I was going to make some sort of Halloweeny Cupcakes on Wednesday but I was too busy getting my zombie awnn. So instead I’ve gone for the Bonfire Night theme. These are adapted from a Nigella Lawson recipe for a big hazelnut cake, but I couldn’t be bothered to go to the shop to buy nuts…

Ingredients

200g self-raising flour

175g caster sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

175g butter

3 eggs

4 tablespoons milk

4 tablespoons Nutella

For icing

Cream cheese

Butter

Icing Sugar

Nutella

Cinnamon

Preheat the oven to 180⁰C. Line two muffin trays with cupcake cases.

In a large mixing bowl combine all the cake ingredients using an electric whisk.

Fill the cases ¾ of the way. Bake them in the oven for 12-15 minutes or until springy to the touch. Cool on a wire rack.

To make the icing, cream a nob of butter with a nob of cream cheese.

Add a big spoonful of Nutella, and then sift a small amount of cinnamon. Sift lots of icing sugar until the consistency is stiff enough to pipe.

Spoon the icing into a piping bag and pipe swirls on each cake, finishing with some chocolate sprinkles.

Eat one with a steaming cup of hot chocolate!