Almost-all-chocolate cake

This is my aunt's chocolate cake, and it's exactly the one for chocoholic like me ;)

Ingredients

• 250g dark chocolate
• 140g butter
• 210g sugar
• 3 eggs
• 3 tablespoons cocoa powder (unsweetened)
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 100g sour cream
• 4 tablespoons all-purpose flour

Directions

Grease a circular cake tin with butter, then add a bit of flour and let it stick to the butter. Throw away the flour in excess, and put the tin in the fridge.
Preheat oven at 150°C
Melt butter and chocolate into bath water. Let it cool a bit (it must no be cold, but just not hot ;)
Into a bowl, beat well the sugar with the eggs. Add the cocoa powder, and beat carefully. Then add the flour mixed with the bakin powder.
With a spoon, add the chocolate/butter cream, beating every time you put a couple of tablespoons into the bowl. At the very end, add the sour cream.
Take the tin out of the fridge, and fold in the cake cream. Put into the oven for about 35 min.
Let it cool properly before serving.

Happy holidays!

Happy Holidays!

Chocolate & Ricotta muffins

Ingredients

• 1 cup ricotta cheese
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1/3 cup unsalted butter
• 50g dark chocolate
• 50g white chocolate
• 2 medium/large eggs
• 2 1/3 cup all purpose flour
• 2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup sugar

Directions

Melt dark chocolate and butter into a bath water. Let them cool at room temperature. In a bowl, mix together ricotta and eggs, one at time. Then add sour cream and the butter/chocolate mix. Put aside.
In a large bowl, put flour, sugar, baking powder, salt. Add the cream you prepared before.and mix them together trying to be quick. Divide the batter into muffin cups. Reduce the white chocolate into chips, and sprinkle them over the muffins.
Bake them at 170°C for about 20 min.
Let them cool before serving.

Cinnamon and icing sugar cookies

I love spiced cookies, and cinnamon is my fave spice, so here's my recipe :)


Ingredients

• 120g all purpose flour
• 100g unsalted butter
• 1 egg yolk
  
• 40g sugar
• 2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 3 spoon icing sugar (for covering)

Directions
Take the butter out of the fridge 30min before starting. Put it into a large bowl together with other ingredients, and melt together with your hands. The faster you are, the better. Put the dough into the fridge for 20/30 min. Take the dough oout, smooth it out with the rolling pin, cut with a knife or cookie cutters. Bake in the oven for about 10min at 170°C.
Put the icing sugar into a mug, add 1 spoon of water, melt up to have a cream. Spread the cream on the cookies, let them dry for about 1 hour.

Chocolate moelleux

I found many recipes to bake this, but too many eggs were on them, so I decided to create a recipe myself.. and here it is!

Ingredients

• 80g icing sugar
• 50g all purpose flour
• 100g unsalted butter
• 100g dark chocolate
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon

Directions

Put a bowl into hot water bath, and melt chocolate and butter. Add icing sugar, and keep stirring. Take te bowl out of the water, and add eggs, on at time, stirring well. Add a mix of flour and cinnamon, mixing well.
Put the mix into little pans, filling half the pans. Cover with thin-film. Put in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours.
Turn on the oven at 180°C.
Take the pans out (as many as you need, you can leave the others in thre refrigerator), put them in the oven and bake them for 12min. (this depends a lot on the oven, so take a look at the cakes when they are baking..)
Upset the cakes onto plates, sprinkle with icing sugar and serve warm.

Apple spiced muffins

Ingredients

• 60g unsalted butter
• 40g brown sugar
• 40g white sugar
• 1 medium egg
• 200ml milk
  
• 200g all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 2 apples

Directions

Melt the butter into a saucepan or microwave. Peel and cut the apples into small pieces. Mix with a spoon of flour.

In a large bowl, mix the sugar with egg, butter and milk. Add the flour with cinnamon and baking powder, quickly. Add the apples and mix them into the dough.
Put the dough into a muffin pan, then sprinkle the top with a bit of brown sugar. Bake them at 170/180°C for about 20/25 min.
Serve warm or cool, with ice cream if you want, or spiced tea.

Baci di dama (hazelnut cookies)

This is a regional recipe, from Pedimont, north-west of Italy. The translation of "Baci di dama" is "Kisses of a lady", and I read the first one was baked in 1893 in a city called Tortona. There are, of course, loads of recipes about these cookies , and this is mine ;)

Ingredients

100g chopped hazelnuts
100g all purpose flour
80g white sugar
80g butter
80g dark chocolate

Directions

Let the butter melt out of the fridge for about 1 hour. Add all the other ingredients but chocolate, and mix well with your hands. Put the dough, well covered, in the fridge for 2 hours.

Take the dough out, and start making little balls of dough with your hands. Put the on a buttered baking-pan, not to close one too close one to the other.

Put in the oven at 150°C, for about 8/10 minutes. Let them cool on the baking-pan.

Melt the chocolate into a bowl. Put some chocolate on the flat side of the cookie, then put another cookie over, so you will form a kind of sandwich. Do the same with the others. Let the chocolate cool, and serve.