dense fluffiness

For those whose don't like traditional, dense, heavy and very chocolatey brownies, this is a nice alternative. As I'm having people over, i decided to make this as well as the traditional brownie so people have two options to choose from. To take this up a notch and make it even more cake-like, its topped with a chocolate cream cheese frosting. 

40. frosted brownie

The way ingredients are treated and put together greatly affects the end product. The ingredients were more or less the same as the traditional brownie, but here, the eggs and sugar were beaten together till light and fluffy. This made all the difference as well as the absence of dark chocolate. Dry ingredients were added and beaten in. 

happy happy happy

Happy 52nd independence day to my country Nigeria! Well its tomorrow(monday) but I'm not in Nigeria at the moment and there isn't a public holiday here so sunday is a perfect day to have a few people over and try this recipe. 

39. traditional brownies
This was a very simple and tasty process. Melted some butter and dark chocolate and then stirred in all the other ingredients one after the other. No mixer needed just used a tablespoon, quite stress free. 

Didn't even need to grease a pan, just lined it with baking paper.

Once it was ready, out and cool i cut them into squares and dusted some icing sugar over them.

bloody pie

As determined as I am to go through every single recipe in this book, all these yummy treats might be affecting me physically. I think I'm putting on a few so I cut this recipe in four just so i could try it. I don't need two large pie sitting in my fridge pressuring me into eating them so I 'don't waste food'.

38. blueberry pie
Blueberries with lemon, sugar and cornflour this was a pretty simple recipe. I moulded a pie base for this filling in half of a loaf pan and used some folded foil to support it.
  

After sealing it, i stabbed the top twice to let out steam during baking. It was oozing this beautiful purple juice as it baked. Its amazing how this rich colour comes out of such dull blackish purple fruits. On the other hand, the flavour of this fruit is not as rich. 

apple caramel

37. apple pie

The chopped apples cooked in butter, cinnamon and sugar probably weren't on as long as they were meant to be as there was still a syrup in the pot. I stopped cooking though, because i thought it was soft enough considering it was going to cook in the oven again. Instead of wasting all that lovely juice or pouring it into the pie and making it too watery, i decided to cook it further without the apples. The result was a delicious, gooey apple caramel which i drizzled over the apples before covering it up with another pie crust. I pressed down the edges to seal the pie and make slits on top to let out steam. 

It still came out with a bit more juice than it was meant to but was tasty all the same. I need some vanilla ice cream for my next slice though. 

sweet sweet monkey

Dulce de leche (an ingredient i needed for this pie) is basically a milk caramel made by reducing sweetened milk. I had heard of it but i had no idea what it was made of and how simple it was to make. Instead of buying it i decided to try making it myself and it turned out good. I got a recipe online and i simply had to heat a can of condensed milk for hours. It was unevenly coloured when it was done, but once i mixed it up it looked just as it was meant to. It was amazing to see it go from condensed milk to dulce de leche right there in my kitchen. I would still like to taste the store bought dulce de leche so i know if there is actually a difference.

36. banana cream pie

This pie was made using so many different techniques. The pie crust was blind baked(fully baked) and was the only thing that was baked. There was a custard filling and this is the first time I've ever made custard from scratch using egg yolks, corn flour, milk and a few other ingredients. I cooked the custard in a saucepan until it was thick and then left to cool completely. The dulce de leche was then spread at the bottom of the pie crust and slices of banana were arranged over it. 

The custard was poured over the bananas and put in the fridge overnight. Although the custard was not thick enough and did not set in the fridge as it should have, it tasted good anyway. A slice of this pie had to be served in a bowl as it turned out to be pie crust and bananas in a pool of custard. I whipped some cream to serve.