Milo Panna Cotta

                           milo panna cotta with milo cereal rubble

Join me on Facebook

Ahhhh a food "earworm" ....

When I opened the tin of biscuit crumbs in last weeks post I thought "just like a Milo tin" and that's all it took for Milo, Milo, Milo, Milo to be stuck in my head. 

"Solved" with a trip to the supermarket where I bought myself a tin of Milo and a brand of gelatine sheets I hadn't tried before... all came together as today's Milo panna cotta. We have loved Milo here in Oz since it was first launched in 1934 at the Sydney Royal Easter Show, brainchild of Australian Thomas Mayne. 

Milo /ˈmaɪloʊ/ is a chocolate and malt powder that is mixed with hot or cold water or milk to produce a beverage popular mainly in Australia and New Zealand and some other parts of the world. wikipedia

'Milo' takes it name from Milo Of Croton a 6th century BC champion wrestler. Milo products to this day have sport related themes. 

Apart from the drinking powder, Milo comes in other products too like premix, ice-cream and the cereal I'm using today for the topping adding part of the much needed textural crunch. 

Lets start with gelatine leaves that are the setting agent in our panna cotta.

New to leaves? Leaves are used for a smoother mouth feel and/or a clearer finish. There is no gelatine after taste either. Great product for panna cotta. Somewhat confusing bloom strength grading system from bronze to titanium. Bloom strength is how firm your jelly (Jello) will be. 

I usually buy gold or occasionally titanium gelatine leaves from chef supply stores. I was happy to see gelatine leaves in the supermarket but surprised when I purchased it's not marked on pack what strength the leaves are. Checking McKenzies online I found out 'McKenzie’s Gelatine powder has bloom strength of 210 – 240 g (Platinum strength). McK Gelatine leaves have a bloom strength of 220 – 250g (also Platinum strength).'

Oh. That was my though "Oh" there may have been a slight expletive following that. Just a little suprised but I love McKenzies, it's the brand of baking powder and soda I use. 

McKenzies have a recipe for panna cotta with 6 gelatine leaves on their site. That's too much for our panna cottas so I made two batches with far less gelatine, one with 3 leaves and one with two... now I'd prefer two or less but for no fail getting the little ones out of the ramekins lets go with three where you still get a nice wobble particularly on the moulded ones. 

Panna cotta is easy, it's the same as making homemade jelly or Jello just with dairy for the liquid. This recipe makes four 125 ml serves (four 1/2 cups) or eight 1/4 cups. Set in glasses or in ramekins to turn out.

Ingredients Panna Cotta

250ml of double cream

250ml of milk (I use 2% because that's all I had)

I tsp of pure vanilla extract

15 grams of sugar

60 grams of Milo powder

3 platinum gelatine leaves

Fresh raspberries for top

milo cereal, lightly crushed cocoa nibs and freeze dried raspberries to top panna cotta

Ingredients for Chocolate Rubble 

Chocolate flake breakfast cereal (I used Milo cereal)

Cocoa nibs, broken roughly

Freeze dried raspberries 

Optional extra toppings

Chocolate sauce

Berry sauce

Vanilla whipped cream with Milo powder on top

Method 

Soak three *gelatine leaves in a bowl with three cups of cold water for 5 to 10 minutes. After that time you should be ready to use, remove leaves from bowl and squeeze out excess water. 

Put the cream, milk, sugar, vanilla into saucepan and heat until almost boiling but not... you know you can see teeny bubbles starting to form around edge of pan. 

Quickly add the milo powder and whisk to completely dissolve. 

gelatine leaves with water squeezed out

Swap the whisk for spoon you don't want to add extra air/bubbles at this stage.

Remove saucepan from heat and add the soaked gelatine leaves that you have squeezed the water from. 

Stir with spoon for at least 3 minutes, even when you think it's okay after one minute the *three minutes stirring ensures the gelatine is fully incorporated. 

Divide the mixture between the glasses or ramekins you are using. 

Leave to cool, then refridgerate (covered) for six to 24 hours. 

unmoulded from 1/4 cup ramekin Milo panna cotta

inside texture 

You want to serve your panna cotta chilled but not "fridge cold", leave glasses at room temperature for 10 minutes before topping and serving. To unmould panna cotta, dip the base/sides of each ramekin quickly into hot water and gently turn out. 

Top with chocolate rubble and fresh raspberries, don't worry if you don't have all matching glasses the same amount of rubble/raspberries will tie the dessert theme together. 

Use to optional sauces or whipped cream as desired. 

Notes: 

* don't have Milo available in your supermarket, look out for it in your asian grocery store.

* if on the off chance after adding your gelatine and stirring 3 minutes you have a little gelatine undissolved in your mix you can put your saucepan on a gentle heat, stirring until it's melted. 

* you can omit the sugar completely if you don't have a sweet tooth, there is sugar already in the Milo. 

Happy Baking :) 

Basic Hearth Bread: Rose's Bread Bible Bakers

Basic Hearth Bread 'The Bread Bible'

Join me on Facebook

Yup, I'm running late with everything this month but I still had time to make this rustic bread from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Bread Bible'. 

A few simple ingredients are put together in a bowl....

white bread flour, wholemeal flour, instant yeast and *honey 

Warm water is added and the mixture is whisked to incorporate air. That's the dough starter (sponge) ready to be topped with more flour and a little more yeast. Off to ferment now, that's the sponge not me. 

Love this bit, the bubbles coming through the flour blanket.

Mixed altogether to form a rough dough. Salt is added, looks a lot in pic but it's only 10 grams. 

After seven more minutes mixing in the *KitchenAid the dough is smooth. 

There is rising time at this point, then business turning/folding going on and then more rising. 

After the rise and tying into the "running late" I was rushing and didn't take photos of the shaping/slashing bit, the instructions in the book are precise and detailed.  

The loaves went to rise for around an hour, before slashing and pattern making on the tops.

a lame: double sided blade used to slash loaves

I used a slightly concaved bread lame for the single cross slash and used round metal cookie cutters to cut a graduating circular pattern, I sprinkled flour on the circular pattern before baking. I also used a plastic Mickey mouse cookie cutter to "indent" a pattern in the smaller loaves I made.  Then they were all baked in hot oven on slipats, with trays and ice ... it's all explained in the book. 

And now the eating bit.

Fresh is good, Vegemite toast is better!! 

Vegemite on toasted hearth bread

I like the pretty edge that the circular cookie cutters created on the hearth bread, here topped with a Greek yoghurt beet and mint dip, pickled beet, feta and cashews.  

Would I change anything? No, this bread is a great all rounder everyday bread. I do want to bake this bread in a loaf pan as Rose suggests it would make a great sandwich bread. 

Notes

*Rose does include instructions for making the bread by hand. 

*Subsitute the honey for golden syrup for a vegan loaf of bread. 

Happy Baking :)  

Today has been one of the 'Rose's Bread Bible Bakers' bakes where a group of fabulous bakers get together and bake from the pages of 'The Bread Bible'.

The Bread Bibleby Rose Levy Beranbaum is available from Amazon and all discerning book stores. 

You might also be interested in quick and easy Chocolate Peanut Butter Spiders

The Monkey's Paw cupcake

                                                         'The Monkey's Paw' cupcake

Join me on Facebook

"The first man had his three wishes, yes," was the reply. "I don't know what the first two were, but the third was for death. That's how I got the paw."                          W. W. Jacobs 'The Monkey's Paw'

The Monkey's Paw: Ahhh haaaa my step son Dan and I love this tale, a supernatural/horror story by W. W. Jacobs first published in England in 1902. 

In the short story, three wishes are granted to the owner of the monkey's paw, but the wishes come with an enormous price for interfering with fate

And proving yet again I've watched too many episodes of 'The Simpsons'...'Treehouse of Horror 2' season three, episode seven. 'The Monkeys Paw' :)

The Monkey's Paw itself is described in the short story as "it's just an ordinary little paw, dried to a mummy."

Ok, lets make a little mummified paw.

I went with 50% fondant / 50% white modelling chocolate... I used "orange" just so the demo photos are clearer, that or I was thinking of Bart's shirt.  You could use 100% dark modellling chocolate and do away with colours. 

Started with a ball

Squished the ball on one side and roughly sliced my monkey "fingers" into the rounded opposite side. 

Shaped my paw into what I thought I mummified monkeys paw would look like. I mainly used the toothpick to apply the details. 

The wrist was trimmed at this stage and I added a jagged cuff cut from rolled 50/50 mixture. 

After the paws were dry, I used a black food pen to mark out features then dusted with a little nutkin brown petal dust and finished with dogwood brown petal dust.  If you used 100% dark modelling chocolate, a brush of cocoa and drinking chocolate will add interest without have to add colourings.  

Thread a toothpick into the palms of the paws and attach to your fondant or frosted cupcakes. 

Happy Baking :) 

You might also be interested in making a 'Catrina' for Day of the Dead.  

Woody's Black and White Brownies Rose's Alpha Bakers

Woody's Black and White Brownies (with a touch of green) 'The Baking Bible'

Join me on Facebook or view my Flickr gallery 

 Stuart's video brownie review Flickr. 

Little Stuart is eight years old and has autism, each week he asks me "is it chocolate yet?" This week it is chocolate!! Woody's Black and White Brownies. 

Stuart wanted to take the brownies to school tomorrow, so the we had to veto the bourbon in the ganache topping and no nuts (nut free school).  This caused an hour or three problem as Stuart kept repeating "the recipe says bourbon" but we settled on mint largely due to Stuart loving 'Peppermint crisp' chocolate bars. :)

peppermint crisp bar a popular chocolate bar in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa... often used in desserts. 

Chocolate and butter were melted in a double boiler and scraped into the mixing bowl of the stand mixer.

Cocoa and sugar were added and mixed until incorporated.

Eggs and vanilla were beaten in, the mixture became thick and glossy.

Cream cheese was added and beaten until small bits remained and the mixture was spread evenly in the lined baking pan. I added a handful of choc chips, well just to surprise Stuart really. 

Hmm, I wondered at this stage were you supposed to be seeing the little bits of cream cheese?

Brownies were baked until the batter was set one inch from the edge.

Next was making the white chocolate custard base that would be a compontent of the white chocolate buttercream. I used small callettes so I didn't have to cut chocolate into pieces.

I had never made a custard from melted white chocolate and butter until this recipe, interesting technique. 

White chocolate and butter are melted over a double boiler.

Whisked eggs are added and cooked until slightly thickened (you have custard), it's then strained and cooled.

white chocolate custard ready to be cooled

Butter is whipped until creamy, custard gradually mixed in. Beaten to stiff peaks form and covered and popped away for a couple of hours. 

Frosting is them rebeaten briefly and vanilla added.

Time to spread frosting on cooled brownie base. 

Next up "dark chocolate ganache glaze", cream and chocolate are melted together (there is bourbon in this bit if you are using) and ganache is spread on frosting. I sprinkled the crushed peppermint crisp chocolate bars on top at this stage. 

The brownies are back to fridge now to chill at least one hour before unmoulding and slicing.

Straight from the fridge the texture is like this. The brownies are much easier to slice. Once returned to room temperature the white chocolate frosting is extremely soft and will squelch out as you bite. I'd like a firmer white layer more in line with denseness that is "a brownie". The brownie base is great, fudgy without being cloying. You can still see the little pieces of cream cheese, not sure what that is about but hey "it's good'.  

Stuart studying his brownie, he absoloutely loved them... as did his Dad.

How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

Would I bake again? All the elements yes, but not together. Great tasting brownie. Great tasting white chocolate custard frosting. Just not the two together.  

Would I change anything? Yes, I would make the brownie base alone and top with ganache. Maybe incorporate the cream cheese fully because it's not visually appealing.

The Baking Bible available from Amazon and all discerning book retailers. 

You might also be interested in chocolate twirly swirly decorations 

Double Damage Oblivion chocolate cake Rose's Alpha Bakers

            Double Damage Oblivion chocolate cake 'The Baking Bible'

Join me on Facebook

Renowned chocolate cake lovers, the single dad with his eight year old autistic son picked up the Double Damage Oblivion cake that I baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible' today ... I just got the review back "You've got a good cake here".

The guys review contradicts my opinion of the cake and once again illustrates different people have different likes and dislikes and it all comes down to personal preference and knowing your audience. 

Today's bake calls for baking two different cakes, starting with the Chocolate Oblivion by first melting chocolate and butter together over a pot of hot water.

Then with a long handled whisk, eggs were beaten over a pan of simmering until warm, before being beaten in a mixer until light and billowy. 

The whipped eggs are folded into the chocolate mixture. 

The tin was a springform, greased a third of the way up and base lined with baking paper. 

The sides and base of tin were double wrapped in aluminum foil and the cake baked in a water bath until set but still wobbly in the centre. Then the cake was covered and popped in the refrigerator overnight.

Cake two is the Deep Chocolate Passion. You can tell we are up to the second part of a recipe because I forgot to take photos :P

A cake tin with greased bottom only, is then lined with baking paper. Cocoa and boiling water is beaten until smooth the cooled. Oil and eggs are added to the cooled mixture and beaten until smooth and shiny. Flour is added an resulting batter spread evenly into the tin and baked.

Oh my... this next part made me nervous, after running a flat knife around the edge of the hot baked cake you have to turn out the hot cake!! Yep, nervous for no reason the cake came out easily and it was time to peel the away the baking paper and reverse cake so the top is ummm, on the "top".  

Dang, don't take photos of the paper liner when your hot cake is the wrong way around on the rack... you will get this effect "a cross hatch cake".

There is ganache; yes you make ganache and spread it on your chocolate oblivion, which is topped with the bottom layer of deep chocolate passion cake... then reversed... more ganache on the now top of oblivion and then the final layer of cake is laid on top.  

Now you will see your chocolate oblivion layer needs trimming to be the same size as your cake... once you have trimmed, a hot knife is run around cake until you have a smooth and shiny finish. 

Sprinkle sifted cocoa powder and eat!

Here is the inside texture of cake, all the layers look super moist but what I found was it ate "dry", after a mouthful you felt like you needed a drink, second mouthful more drink, third mouthful maybe I'll just drink my coffee. The chocolate oblivion layer tasted like a ganache truffle but doesn't have the melt in mouth truffle feel.  

Would I bake again? Not sure, there is other Rose's chocolate cakes I like more. 

Would I change anything?  There was an option to use jam rather than ganache to join the layers but either way if I baked again I would have preferred the cake to be syruped. A coffee liqueur syrup, or orange or perhaps chambord would have been nice. A thin water gel or berry gel layer would be good too. 

How it works... now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

Happy Baking :) 

Award winning author Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Baking Bible is available from Amazon and other good book stores worldwide.  

You might also be interested in Baci chocolate Ice-cream recipe

Double Chocolate Oriolos Rose's Alpha Bakers

                                                       double chocolate oriolos

Hmm, two surprises with my second bake as an alpha baker from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. One: why is this cookie entitled "double chocolate" when the "chocolate" comes in one form from cocoa? Two: Never would I have guessed that such an unassuming cookie could be so feather light in texture.  

The light texture of the double chocolate oriolos cookie is bordering on ethereal, it disappears in a cloud of buttery cocoaness (not a word but should be)... pair with milk or better still an icy cold kahlua milk shake. 

Three:  ok I didn't mention a three... but I skinned my walnuts today, now this might not rock your boat but for me it was an "ahhh haaaa" moment. Many times I've skinned hazelnuts by roasting in the oven and rubbing the heated nuts between a clean tea towel to the remove the brown skin, but I had never thought of doing it with walnuts until I read Rose's recipe. The bitterness: it stops the bitterness you sometimes get when baking with walnuts. 

That's how the recipe starts, skinning your walnuts. 

Cubed chilled butter is processed through cocoa, walnut, sugar mixture until absorbed. 

The resulting dough was divided into three parts. Chilling is an important step in this recipe to ensure your cookies keep their shape.  

Working with one disc of dough at the time and keeping the remainder chilled, I divided and rolled 12gram balls of dough. On your lined baking sheet you press each ball with a flat bottomed glass/tumbler that has been sprayed with cooking spray and dipped in granulated sugar.  

Brush away any excess sugar on your tray with a soft brush before going into to bake.

Yes, they might look unassuming but these cookies are a taste/texture treat. I made a double batch as I promised step son Dan that I will make him bourbon pecan butter balls with a pulversied batch of these cookies. 

Would I bake again?: Yes

Would I make any changes?: Goodness, maybe a pinch of salt to accentuate cocoa flavour... but I think if you are looking for a plain cocoa biscuit/cookie these are pretty perfect as they are.

How it works; now I've joined the fabulous existing alpha bakers, once a week I will post about what I have baked from Rose Levy Beranbaum's 'The Baking Bible'. This won't include the recipe due to copyright and publisher restrictions however, I will be posting how it went and photos of making/baking the gorgeous baked goods.

 The Baking Bible

Happy Baking :) 

Liquorice Lovers!! here is your ice-cream recipe. 

Pink drizzle isomalt how to... isomalt drizzles pretty and versatile sugar finish. 

Chocolate Soil

crystallised chocolate soil 

Join me on Facebook or view my Flickr Gallery

A two ingredient chocolate soil, I'll give you all the dirt today (ok couldn't resist) on how make it with the least amount of cleaning up.  

With chocolate soil you can add crunch and texture to a plated dessert, make pot plant cupcakes, set up a garden scene for your cake or perhaps just sprinkle on your favourite ice-cream. 

Flavour it up; you can use a flavoured dark chocolate i.e. blueberry, orange, mint etc for flavoured soil or add your own flavour by stirring in cinnamon, ginger, chilli flakes, a drop or two of peppermint oil or whatever takes your fancy. 

We are aren't going to use a *candy thermometer, we are going to do this by eye... a photo will act as your guide. 

Here we go...

Chocolate Soil 

Ingredients

100g (3.5OZ) Caster Sugar

75g (2.6OZ) Dark Chocolate roughly chopped (even if you don't usually like 70% dark chocolate, I would recommend using it here because your are adding sugar to counteract the bitterness)

Tools.... a wire whisk and a baking tray lined with non stick paper ready for you to tip your completed soil on. 

Method

On you stove top in a small to medium saucepan add the caster sugar, gently pour in 2 tablespoons of cold water. We are being gentle so we don't splash sugar crystals on the side of the pan.

Turn on your heat to high and you are going to just let it do it's thing without stirring, the sugar will dissolve and bubble and boil until you see "golden brown edges". 

the center of the boiling sugar is still clear, the edges have changed to golden brown. 

have your roughly chopped chocolate ready to go

Immediately remove saucepan from the heat and all at once whisk in the chocolate, along with any flavouring if using. Don't forget to whisk around the edges. Whisk until all the chocolate is coated, this doesn't take long ... a couple of minutes.

it starts to look like "soil" almost instantly 

Yep, you're done, it's finished and ready to poured onto your non stick paper prepared baking tray to cool.

finished chocolate soil

Once cool, store in an airtight container for up to a week, or freeze up to a month.

*I've adapted this recipe from Heston Blumenthal's chocolate soil... halved the sugar and made it a simpler soil. His recipe has many more elements and is part of his wickedly delicious tiramisu recipe. Check out Hestons tiramisu on SBS food. 

Clean up tips: Remember how we cleaned up our sugar work saucepans? It's the same today, fill your saucepan with water, bring to the boil, empty the water out and wash as per usual. Clean your whisk the same way, boiling water will remove any stuck on crystallised chocolate.

*really want to, need to, use a candy thermometer... 135 cel or 275 F. 

Happy Baking :) 

You might also like to make fast bubble sugar decorations/toppers.

Make quick and easy faux gingerbread mushrooms. 

You've made the soil now make the dust... Nutella dust 

a change from chocolate? Make a fondant gold fish! 

Chocolate Scones

                                   chocolate chip hazelnut scones

Join me on Facebook

I didn't go to high school, I went to a technical school which is a trade school. We had no english, literature, history, geography classes, learnt no languages, no grammar (you've just had that ahhh haaa moment haven't you?) instead we had the all encompassing "humanities class". Then there was shop classes, yes I learnt woodwork, sheet metal, electrical practice and so on... plus cooking. In cooking class we made preserves, fondant covered fruit cakes, choux pastry, doughs and everything in between including copious batches of scones.

I made this scone cutter in sheetmetal class, I still use it to this day

This is a tradional scone dough like I made at school, the type where the butter is rubbed in, with the addition of dark cocoa powder and Nestle choc bits that my step son Daniel liked to add to every single thing we baked when he was little. 

Chocolate Scones 

rich and chocolately but not over sweet, top with nutella or cherry jam and whipped cream... don't forgot an expresso or a cup of strong tea 

Pre heat oven to 180c (360F) 

line a baking tray with a non stick baking paper

Ingredients

2 1/2 cups self-raising flour (self rising flour)

1/2 cup dark cocoa powder

pinch of salt

1/2 cup castor sugar (superfine sugar)

80g of chilled butter cubed (2.8oz) 

1 cup of milk ... plus a little more if needed

250g bag Nestle dark choc bits (8.8oz dark choc chips)

1/2 cup of toasted skinned and roughly chopped hazelnuts *you can leave them out if you don't like nuts

Plus a little cocoa sifted through flour to sprinkle on bench top

Method

Sift together the flour, cocoa, castor sugar and salt into a bowl. Add the chilled butter and rub through with your finger tips until it resembles breadcrumbs. 

Make a well in the centre and add milk, choc bits and nuts. Use a butter knife or flat bladed metal spatula to lightly mix the ingredients into a soft dough. If it seems a little dry, add another tablespoon of milk.

Turn out the dough onto bench top that you first sprinkled with flour/cocoa. Don't knead the dough, but rather softly pat together. Pat or lightly roll the dough until it is 2cm (a little under 1 inch) thick. 

Using a 5 cm (2 inch) round cutter, cut scones and transfer to lined baking tray. Lightly pat or roll together extra dough between batches. 

Bake for 12 to 15 minutes. Serve warm with topping of choice.

Happy Baking :) 

 you might also be interested in quick chocolate dessert 

Fat Witch Brownies book review

                   fat witch brownie with added chocolate on top

Come join me on Facebook

Books make such fabulous stocking stuffers, I thought I'd review a few cookbooks in the lead up to the holidays. Starting with one that's been out for a while, 'Fat Witch Brownies: Brownies, Blondies and Bars from New York's Legendary Fat Witch Bakery'. 

This book is extremely well reviewed on Amazon , many of the reviewers compare the bought brownies from the bakery with the recipes from the book so I'll keep my review short and sweet.

The leafy outer suburb of Melbourne is worlds away from New York's Legendary Fat Witch Bakery, but it's here that I baked half dozen recipes from the Fat Witch book... three of which I'll be talking about today.

The small format book is full of promise, beautiful photos, 50 plus recipes, smart use of one 9x9 inch cake pan for all recipes (closest 22 cm in Oz) and a warm chatty tone that emanates from author Patricia Helding. Unfortunately, it doesn't quite live up to expectations starting with the disappointing "Fat Witch" brownie that is more cakey than fudgy. I baked this one twice, the second time pictured at top of page was sprinkled if chocolate pieces to add more flavour. Look, it's not awful... but it's not that flavourful either, plus it's a cake brownie not the promised chocolately fudgy hit I was expecting. That said, my best friend Jacinta liked this brownie and it's made it's way to parties where it has been well recieved. 

The cocoa brownie on the following page is "ok" too... but not "wow!". 

frozen cream cheese brownie

Step son Daniel loves cheesecake so next up was the frozen cream cheese brownie. This tasted more like a brownie, but I did change the filling the second time around adding vanilla and sour cream. I'd make these again with the adjusted filling.

banana bread brownie

Then we tried the banana bread brownie... which in no way resembles any brownie I've ever seen/tasted. Dense, moist with good flavours, this will probably end up on my "goodness, the bananas have gone brown" rotation. It's is an odd one, particularly texturally!! 

The book contains a wide selection of brownies, blondies and bars, plus frostings and glazes and tips. It is a nice slice/bar book, but not the "I'll never need another brownie recipe" book I was expecting. 

Later today, yes today!.... there is another brownie story coming up, plus a competition to win a stocking stuffer recipe book.

Until then, happy baking :)

Chocolate Peanut Butter Spiders

                                     chocolate peanut butter spiders

Join me on Facebook! 

Finishing off "easy ideas" week with Chocolate Peanut Butter Spiders. Five minutes and three ingredients, that's all you'll need to make 24 crunchy and chocolately mini spiders. 

If your an Australian with kids you have probably made these or eaten these before, they are made with the popular fried noodles made by 'Chang's'. This is pretty much the recipe you will find on the packet and I added black cachous on the dark spiders for the extra crunch of "spider eggs" ;) 

Chang's Original Fried Noodles

Ingredients

1 pkt Chang’s Original Fried Noodles 100g (3.5oz)
2 Tablespoons Crunchy Peanut Butter
200g (7oz) chopped Milk or Dark Chocolate... this can eating chocolate like I used today or cooking chocolate or even compound chocolate/candy melts if you prefer. 

Optional: black cachous 

Method

Microwave chocolate and peanut butter in microwave safe mixing bowl for about 30 seconds on high. If not melted, then microwave again in 5 second intervals. Stir until smooth. Add noodles, stir lightly with a metal spoon until well coated. With a teaspoon, spoon the mixture onto non-stick baking paper or mat. Using heaped teaspoons, this mixture will yield 24 to 40 spiders. Top with black cachous if using. 

black cachous for spider eggs

Place in refrigerator until set. Package as gifts or just eat them straight away!!

Happy weekend baking :)