Oreo Cheesecake-Pie

 Firstly, just to clear up the kind of funny name, this lovely dessert was originally called (Creamy) Oreo Pie. Apart from being made in a pie dish this was, in my opinion, in no way a pie..it was a cheesecake! A delicious refreshing no-bake cheesecake..in a pie dish. I got too many people asking/cheekily mocking about this being a 'pie' to not make a little change of name :)

Now thats over! On to the important stuff. This by FAR exceeded my expectations. I like Oreos as much as the next person but, as you might do, wondered how such a simple recipe with so few ingredients could make anything particularly noteworthy, nice maybe..but not very memorable. How wrong I was! This was definitely noteworthy, and so so easy that I will not hesitate to make it again in the future if I need a last minute impressive dessert that looks like it took hours to make :)

Rolo Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookies

 Oh do I have a treat for you today! :) I have to say, I have always steered pretty clear of making my own chocolate chip cookies. Im not entirely sure why, but I would say its down to the fact that my first few attempts (a long longgggg time ago) produced overly sweet poor imitations of bakery cookies which just didn't float my boat. These however, putting my Gran's ginger biscuits to one side, I am pretty darn sure are my favourite cookie discovery to date. I am rather proud of them I have to say!

Baileys Chocolate Cake

 Hello all! It has been rather a long time hasn't it, but I am incredibly happy to be back blogging again :) Sorry I did not manage to post at all during my last year at uni, a bit more hectic than I imagined it would be! But I have a fair few bits and bobs to share with you, including my first recipe post as a free lady out of academia! 

Where to start, so final year was much tougher going than I anticipated but I thoroughly enjoyed it (I did Biology for those that don't know, specifying in Zoology). I completed my exams a few weeks back so now its just a waiting game for the results! Fingers crossed :)

Mini Bakewell Tarts

I'm not really sure how to go about this post. I have not been baking or posting as much as I would like recently and there are a few reasons for this which I feel I should probably share with you lovely people that for some reason continue to delight me with your presence on my blog :)

Earlier this year, a few months before I started food blogging, my Dad very sadly passed away. He had had a lot of heart attacks in the past (11 in fact, he was a walking miracle!) but since a triple by-pass in 1998 he seemed to be absolutely fine. On the 9th February this year, my Mum and her partner turned up on my doorstep in University just before midnight, sat me down, and told me that he had been found at his home on the sofa, with his newspaper in hand (he always did the daily cryptic crossword, my Mum still has the paper from the day of my birth and he somehow managed to complete it whilst she was in labour!) and my little sausage dog Penny rather anxiously by his side. He had suffered a massive heart attack and most likely knew nothing about it, the only comfort really is that if he could have chosen that is probably how he would have wanted to go, content and at home. It has taken some time to sink in, well in all honesty I don't think it truly has yet. He left me as a main executor of his will so recently I have been rather busy dealing with a lot of legal stuff that mostly goes over my head in all honesty! We unfortunately have no option but to part with the house, so I have had to learn rather fast about equity releases, mortgages, solicitors/estate agents and their fees (greedy bums.) etc and this means I have had a lot less time to do what has been my distraction, rather successfully!, for the past few months - baking of course :)

Brandy Snaps

Brandy Snap's - they are an absolute classic and I truly believe they are a great last minute dessert to master that can be whipped up faster than any other cookie with only one dirty saucepan, a lazy bakers dream :) They can be customised to your hearts desire and, although it admittedly took me pretty much until my last batch to perfect the method, now I know the tricks they really are soooooo very easy to make. We ate them ALL the day I made them, so I made another batch the morning after as we are greedy Welshies and second time round, now I knew what I was doing, resulted in 15 uniform tubes (much better than my first go which resulted in 3 pretty ones, 4 passable ones, 3 slightly fat rejects, 1 pretty cup, 1 reject cup and 3 that we just should talk about) 

In all seriousness, if you have shied away from trying them before now I assure you, they are so much fun and you can definitely make these!

Oh yes, and they are SO VERY ADDICTIVE :)

Cheese, Ham and Olive Bread

Quick bread, what a magical thing it is! You can whip up a loaf in just the same amount of time it takes to make the simplest of sponge's and hey presto, 40-odd minutes later you have something that looks and tastes far more complicated and impressive than it really is! I have had a really major urge to do some bread baking lately and, although I reallyreally want to do some yeast work soon, my urge had to be satisfied there and then so quick bread to the rescue! In particular I wanted a loaf stufffeedd full of savoury bits 'n bobs, I was playing with the idea of different additions, especially caramelised onions and bacon (mmm), basically anything imaginable that could be shoved in a bowl of eggy mix and baked to create an all in one meal!

And that is what this is in essence, an all in one snack loaf that is great for that much needed energy boost around 11am and 4pm (or is this only me...I simply MUST have a mini-meal around these times, probably just being greedy!) I didn't need to fiddle much with the original recipe in the end to have exactly what I was craving :)

Cookies and Cream Cookies

I swear I have 2 people living in my brain, or little food gremlins if not people, one that has an insatiable sweet tooth and one that is a sugar allergic diabetic. Or maybe i'm just incredibly indecisive, both are realistic possibilities. In the case of these cookies, upon first bite my sugar hating gremlin decided that these were not the cookies for me. They seemed a bit too sweet, as if the overall taste was simply a plain sugar cookie and slightly letting down my, admittedly rather high, expectations. After that first cookie (emphasis on first) my alter-ego gremlin wouldn't let me rest until I had 'sampled' another..and another..I had 6 cookies the day I made these, embarrassing but true, SIX. That shouldn't be legal, and my dentist may have a few stern words to share with my tooth-rotting gremlin when I see him later today..

Even if these cookies did not quite fulfil my initial expectations, they went down a total storm in my house. My Mum is pretty hard to please as far as cookies go and after the beginning few munches exclaimed 'mmmm, they are just so LIGHT!' A weird adjective to choose I thought, but after pondering about it she has a point, it's far too easy to go back to the cookie jar multiple times without realising and the texture...oh what a hard one to describe! They are soft and slightly chewy, the Oreo pieces soften upon cooking but retain a slight crunch to create little pockets of texture throughout. Yeah, it's safe to say these grew on me and were horrifically addicting. Make at your own risk!