Rouge et Noir Cookies {Recipe}

YOU HAVE TO TRY THESE COOKIES. Trust me. I had to go to two supermarkets to get some raspberries (is everyone suddenly craving them?), and it was SO worth the extra walk!

These are not dieting cookies, these are yummy-melting-in-your-mouth-I-could-eat-them-all-cookies, which is definitely not dieting friendly. But you know what, I am happy to spend the extra Propoints on them. And what is even better is that they are super easy to make, no complicated baking manoeuvre to impress involved. I even tried to take nice pictures to make you want to bake some, how can you refuse!

You are going to need (I managed 15 big cookies - 6 Pro points by cookies, I may make 20 next time – which would be 4 Pro points!!) :

-125g of slightly salted butter (room temperature)

- 170g of dark brown soft unrefined cane sugar

-190g of plain flour

- 35g of Cocoa powder (I used Cadbury Bournville one)

- 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

- 1 egg

- ½ teaspoon of bicarbonate of sodium

- 100g of dark chocolate roughly chopped (I used Menier dark chocolate at 70%)

- 125g of fresh raspberries

- 2 teaspoons of baking powder

How do you make these?

Preheat your oven at 180°C (fan oven).

Mix the butter, with the sugar, the egg and vanilla extract together. You should get a nice dough. Add the flour, bicarbonate of sodium, baking powder and cacao. Mix well. Add the chocolate and raspberries.

Make cookies from a tablespoonful of mixture and place on lined baking trays. Beware to leave some space as they spread.

Bake for 12 minutes (that is quite important to make sure they stay soft inside). They will still be soft on the inside when you take them out – they will harden on the cooling rack. And they are ready to be eaten, nom nom nom…

So Mr MiH has not had a chance to test them yet, but my carpenter took 4 of them (in one go) and did say they were lovely. Recipe approved as far as I am concerned! Bon appétit!

* Do not forget to enter my {knitting} giveaway here *  

Heart of Raspberry Cakes {recipe}

The very gooey brownies are now all eaten and there is no Nutella left in the house  - probably a good thing for my calorie intake. The baby is now allowing me sweet treats - it had been only savoury snacks for 4 months. By mixing a few recipes, and what I actually had in my fridge - I came up with this Heart of Raspberry cupcakes recipe.  

Not sure there are really cupcakes but it is the nearest to what these little ones taste like. 

Here is the recipe (to make 6 big ones)

I made a smaller version of these by using the same ingredients and measures  - but for 12 cupcakes - you get a raspberry sponge cake layer at the bottom of the cupcakes. 

To make hearts of raspberry: blend a pack of fresh raspberries and freeze the mixture in a ice cubes tray. 

Ingredients for the cupcake mixture (taken from BBC food website)

• 110g/4oz butter, softened at room temperature
• 110g/4oz caster sugar
• 2 free-range eggs lightly beaten
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 110g/4oz self-raising flour
• 1-2 tbsp milk

Icing: melted white chocolate with crunchy bits (I suppose you can use whatever you want but I liked the combination of raspberry, vanilla and white chocolate) 

How to make these? 

1. Preheat the oven to 180C and line a 6-hole muffin tin with paper cases

2. Cream the butter and sugar together in a bowl until pale. Beat in the eggs a little at a time and stir in the vanilla extract. 
3. Fold in the flour using a large metal spoon, adding a little milk until the mixture is of a dropping consistency. 
4. Spoon mixture into the paper cases until they are half full
5. Add a frozen heart of raspberry in each case
6. Spoon the rest of mixture on top of the frozen heart of raspberry
7. Bake in the oven for 15-20 minutes, or until golden-brown on top and a skewer inserted into one of the cakes comes out clean.
8. Set aside to cool for 10 minutes, then remove from the tin and cool on a wire rack
9. Add your choice of icing

Let me know whether you try these, I would love to know. 

Bon Appétit!