Chocolate and Peanut Butter Fudge

Its the season of santa,eggnog,carols and rumcake,yup its the holidays,and what better way to welcome the freezing weather and the joy of christmas cheer than by eating a pan of fudge.In Guyana an aunt of mine used to make fudge that was melt in your mouth perfect,it was never too sweet never too hard it was just little squares of heaven.

Before you go on,i must warn this is not any fudge this is like the superman i mean wonderwoman of fudges,and it has chocolate ANDD peanut butter in it.So i hope you get the massivness of this recipe before you go on.

Now with my family being away i've been trying to bring in as much holiday cheer as i can into the house,whether its wearing a hideous christmas sweater or learning to make eggnog,i'm trying everything.So making fudge seemed like a right of passage i just had to cross.Now i attempted a similar recipe for peanut butter and chocolate fudge combined,it was great except it would'nt set in the pan so hence turned out to be a peanut butter dip that everyone ate with pretzels and stuff.None the less it was yum but i knew i had to learn to make a good fudge and i had to make it right.

Now when i was looking for a good fudge recipe first thing i have to admit,i decided i was not going to go grocery shopping so i had to find a recipe which had all the ingredients and flavours i wanted.Next when you are looking for a recipe always specify the texture,i wanted a soft fudge because when i see the tough jaw breaker fudge i'm more tempted to throw it at someone than eat it.This fudge the best part is you put it in the fridge it becomes tough but yet edible (without breaking any teeth) or you can leave it out and get a chewy fudge.

This fudge may seem intimidating but trust me it is worth it,i am not a person to eat alot of my own food,but it's simple so delicious and trust me when you make it everyone will think you're a professional.And heres a secret i always tell people when working with chocolate,always use something that tastes really good and is a good quality one.I used hersheys for my base,but you can use any dark chocolate.I am in love with the combination of peanut butter and chocolate soo this just feels like my version of a square of heaven.

Ingredients:

1 tin sweetened condensed milk

1 1/2 tbsps butter

1 1/2 tbsps creamy peanut butter

2 1/4 cups grated chocolate

RECIPE:

1.  Heat a small pan, add peanut butter and 3 tbsps of condensed milk. Stir to make a smooth creamy mixture on a very low flame. Turn off flame. Allow to cool for a few mts.
2. Melt chocolate in a double boiler. Alternately, heat a stainless steel vessel with about an inch of water, bring to a boil and lower the flame completely. Over the stainless steel vessel, place another vessel (the bottom of this vessel should not touch the water of the stainless steel vessel) such that is rests on the rim of the lower vessel. Place the grated chocolate in the upper vessel. The chocolate will melt due to the steam released from the hot water. Keep stirring till the chocolate melts completely.
3. Turn off the flame, remove the vessel which has the melted chocolate and keep it aside.
4. Take a square baking pan, grease and line with parchment/butter paper such that the paper is longer than the pan. (Once the fudge is set, its easy to lift out the fudge with the ends of the parchment paper). Pour the creamy peanut butter mixture and spread all over to form a thin layer. Use a flat spatula to spread it out evenly.
5.  In another pan, add 1 1/2 tbsps butter and let it melt on low flame. Add the remaining condensed milk and mix. Add the melted chocolate and keep stirring for appprox 2-3 mts.. Turn off heat.
6. Over this layer, pour the chocolate mixture and allow it to spread all over the pan evenly using a spatula. Let it cool before setting it in the fridge. (I use a large bowl filled with 1 1/2 cups of cold water to place the baking pan so that it cools down before placing in the fridge to set).
7. Once it cools, cover the baking pan with a plastic wrap and set in fridge for 3-4 hours.
8. After the fudge is set, remove from fridge. Using the ends of the parchment paper, lift it out of the baking pan and place on a plate. Cut into squares and store in an air tight container. It will stay for 3-4 days.

Recipe credits:http://www.sailusfood.com/2011/06/27/chocolate-fudge/
Note:I doubled the quantity of the peanut butter layer because thats the way i like it,but you can stick to the recipe if you wish.And i flipped the flavours unstead i made the chocolate first and peanut butter later.But it's all up to you

Finally i would like to give a hugeee shout out to all my  awesome friends and family for all the suport and being my guinea pigs and allowing my to increase your blood sugar levels.You guys are amazing

Enjoy the holidays guys,be good to one another.

STAY SWEET!

Rainbow cupcakes with Condensed Milk frosting

It has been awhile since i posted something i cooked,and my deepest apologies but usually when something is baked its usually out of sight before i can even take a picture of it.Now to make rainbow cupcakes you can use two methods:

1.Use a white cake mix(which i usually do)

2.Make it from Scratch

Now the gathering of ingredients isn't much of a problem it is a very basic recipe,the part that is tricky is seperating the batter.You have to seperate the batter into seperate bowls depending on the colours you want to use.The fun thing about these cupcakes is they're customisable,whether you want to show your patriotic side by using the colours of the flag or the colours of your favourite football team,the options are endless.I first tried this recipe using the food colouring in liquid form,not the best idea.The problem with using liquid food colouring is it adds to the water content in the batter and in the end even after emptying out half the bottle,your cake comes out looking like depressed rainbows,because all your colours look like a brown with maybe a tinge of green or purple.Now the trick to making these cakes are to use gel food colouring.They are pretty easily accesable and one tiny cup can last you a very long time.

For those of you who want to be on the safer side and use the cake mix technique heres what you have to do:Just make the batter as prescribed on the box and split the batter into the seperate bowls:one bowl for each colour.Then mix in a different colour in each bowl and finally in the cupcake put a spoon of each colour evenly in the cupcake tins.Bake it as usual and you're done.

I will post the recipe below for thoose of you who want to bake it from scratch,this recipe may seem really simple but the cupcakes come out reallyy moist and taste really really good.At the end you can finally say:"I tasted the rainbow and it was swweeeetttt".

I baked these cupcakes because two of my closest friends who are twins :Amy and Emily were celebrating their birthday this week and all they wanted was rainbow cupcakes,now i usually would run down to the store and get the cake mix,but unfortunately i couldnt find any so i decided to bake it from scratch and boy am i happy i did.Now alot of you may say why work extra hard by baking from scratch for results that may or may not come out right:well why not,its the best feeling seeing your cake actually rise in the oven and that amazing aroma that fills the house,that amazing feeling you get when you know all of this magic is happening from your hard work.

The magic though is the icing,no doubt the cupcakes are great plain,but coming from a person who doesnt like icing or frostng,you have to try this recipe.I had some condensed milk left at home,and i knew i couldnt make a birthday cupcake without frosting,and being a person who does'nt like vanilla buttercream i needed an alternative.Soo hence the search began and i finallly found a recipe that worked really well,perfect in texture,perfect in taste and the great part is you dont realllyy need to make massive quantities like the recipe asks,you can lessen it.

So get ready to ride the rainbow:

Rainbow Cupcakes

• 1/2 cup (125g) caster sugar
• 125g unsalted butter
• 2 eggs

1 cup (125g) self-raising flour (or 1 cup all purpose flour ,1 1/3 teaspoons baking powder,1/3 teaspoon salt combined)

• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
• 3 tablespoons milk
• 4 bottles food colouring, red, blue, yellow, green

1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees C. Line a 12 hole cupcake tray with patty cups.
2. Cream the sugar and butter until pale and fluffy.
3. Beat the eggs in one at a time adding a little flour in each time until the ingredients are mixed.
4. Add the vanilla essence and mix. Then add the milk 1 tablespoon at a time mixing after each addition.
5. Divide the mixture into 6 bowls:
   In Bowl 1 - Add half a cap of red colouring
   In Bowl 2 - Add half a cap of red and half a cap of yellow
   In Bowl 3 - Add half a cap of yellow
   In Bowl 4 - Add half a cap of green
   In Bowl 5 - Add half a cap of blue
   In Bowl 6 - Add half a cap of blue and half a cap of red
   Mix colouring into each mixture after adding.
6. Divide the purple mixture between the 12 cases. Repeat with the other mixtures in this order: Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange, Red.
7. Bake in the preheated oven for 10-15 minutes.

Credits to: Rainbow Coloured Cupcakes recipe – All recipes Australia NZ

Condensed milk frosting

150g butter, softened
300g pure icing sugar, sifted
100ml condensed milk

1. Mix butter till it becomes light and fluffy,then gradually add the icing sugar .When the two are combined completely add the condensed milk.Finally in the end when everything is combined check to see if frosting needs more sugar.When cake is cooled frost it.Enjoy

Finally please do remember mistakes happen sometimes your cupcake might come out looking like soup other times like a green eyed monster.But finally one day you'll get it right and that day all the failures would have been worth it.Soon i will be sharing pictures of my chocolate and peanut butter fudge,trust me you don't want to miss it.

Please do share your experiences below when you try out the recipe.

STAY SWEET!