Lemon Blueberry Yoghurt Loaf

I have always been obsessed with lemon cake, lemon syrup cake, lemon yoghurt cake, and all of the above.  I found this recipe totally by accident on pinterest.com and decided to make it because we had lots of blueberries in the freezer, and just that morning I had picked some lemons off our recovering tree (Mum had hacked away so much foliage that it didn't have any fruit for ages, but now it's bouncing back beautifully!).  Plus my cousin was staying so I wanted to make something special and yummy for us to all enjoy.

The hardest part about making this loaf was the waiting.  Waiting for it to cook.  Waiting for it to cool.  Waiting for the syrup to soak in.  Waiting for the glaze to harden.  Meanwhile it smells and looks AMAZING.  And surprisingly, all the baking, syruping and glazing wasn't as difficult as I thought it might be, since I like simple recipes with few steps.  But gosh, this was worth all the steps.  Honestly.

INGREDIENTS
 

For the Loaf:
1 1/2 cups + 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour, divided
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup  yoghurt (plain, or lemon flavoured)

1 cup sugar
3 large eggs
2 teaspoons grated lemon zest (approximately 2 lemons)
1 teaspoon vanilla essence
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 & 1/2 cups blueberries, fresh or frozen, thawed and rinsed

For the Lemon Syrup:
1/3 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/3 cup sugar

For the Lemon Glaze:
1 cups icing sugar, sifted
2 to 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
 

METHOD

• Preheat the oven to 180 deg C.
• Line one 9 x 5-inch loaf pans with baking paper.
• In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking powder and salt; set aside.
• In a large bowl, whisk together the yogurt, sugar, eggs, lemon zest, vanilla and oil. 
• Slowly whisk the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. 
• In a separate bowl, mix the blueberries with the remaining tablespoon of flour.
• Fold them very gently into the batter.
• Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake 50 to 55 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the loaf comes out clean.
• Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes before removing loaf to a wire rack, keeping it on the baking paper.

• While the loaf is cooling, make the lemon syrup in a small saucepan over medium heat.
• Stir together the lemon juice and sugar until the sugar is completely dissolved. 
• Once dissolved, continue to cook for 3 more minutes. 
• Remove from the heat; set aside.
• Use a toothpick to poke holes in the tops and sides of the warm loaf. 
• Brush the top and sides of the loaf with the lemon syrup. 
• Let the syrup soak into the cake and brush again. 
• Let the cake cool completely.

• To make the lemon glaze, in a small bowl, whisk together the icing sugar and 2-3 tablespoons of the lemon juice. The mixture should be thick but pourable. 
• Add up to another tablespoon of lemon juice if the mixture is too stiff. 
• Pour the lemon glaze over the top of each loaf and let it drip down the sides. 
• Let the lemon glaze harden, about 15 minutes, before serving.

OK, so I know in the past I have gone on about my detestation of lemon zest (see all my lemon poppyseed muffin attempts...) but honestly, I don't think it's as bad as I thought.  I barely noticed it at all in this loafy cake thing.  And WOAH was it amazing.  Seriously.  SO lemony.  I LOVE it.  I'll definitely be making this again.

My family enjoying it!

 

For this one, we didn't have plain yoghurt, but we had lemon flavoured yoghurt, so I used that, and I think it made it just that little bit more lemony.  AMAZING.  And the blueberries were little bombs of juicy flavour, and hand-staining colour.   I recommend eating with a fork.  It's quite a moist loaf too, so eating with hands is almost silly.  And the glaze, once it's dry and hard, makes a sugary lemony crunchy outer layer that is just incredible.  I cannot gush enough about this cake.  OMG.  It hasn't lasted long... 

Recipe Inspiration: http://sweetpeaskitchen.com/2011/05/15/lemon-blueberry-yogurt-loaf/

Double Chocolate Fudge Brownies

In honour of my mum's birthday yesterday, and also because I finally found the recipe I used to use all the time, I made some brownie muffins.  Really, it's just brownies, but instead of a big lump of brownie to be cut up, I make them in muffin tins because it's easier to deal with!  I love having the portion controlled for me in a muffin size! :D  

Argh why is this picture coming out sideways?  Does anyone know how to fix this?  Leave a comment if you do!

I LOVE this recipe, because it's super easy to make, and the brownies are always hugely chocolatey, and dense and moist and *drools* ok, so we get the picture, I love them.  However, they aren't the healthiest, this recipe uses heaps of butter and eggs and sugar, but oh my, it's totally worth it!  And if you wanted to kick it up a notch in the heart-attack stakes, serve it warm, with vanilla ice cream and some chocolate sauce, and you've got an amazing dessert right there!  Seriously, it's like mud cake.  

I can't rave enough about this recipe, you all just have to try it.

INGREDIENTS

250g butter

1 & 1/2 cups castor sugar

1 & 1/4 cups plain flour

1/8 tsp baking powder

3/4 cup good dark cocoa

4 eggs

1/2 tsp vanilla extract (I used vanilla essence, but this is optional)

chocolate buttons/chips/berries to top

METHOD

• Preheat oven to 180 deg C (fan forced)
• Place butter and sugar in a microwave safe jug, cover and microwave for 3 mins (800 watts).  Sugar should not completely dissolve
• Meanwhile, sift flour, baking powder and cocoa into a large bowl
• Make a well in the centre and add eggs and vanilla
• Pour in the butter mixture and gently mix until well combined, but do not over-mix (lumpy is good!)
• [EDIT] Put into square (or round) flat silicone dish - just found out that it makes them even better than in muffin tin omg.
• Place chocolate buttons/chips/berries on the top of mixture
• Bake for 20ish mins until just firm.  Stab with a toothpick - when it comes out clean, they're ready!
• Allow to cool for 10 mins before removing from the dish

INDULGE.

Seriously my favourite brownie recipe ever.  (Thank you, Tupperware... haha!)

Ambrosia

I love ambrosia.  Everyone has their own versions and recipes for ambrosia.  This is just a "recipe" I made up myself, because it's super easy, and I love berries and fruits and of course, DESSERT!  Who doesn't love dessert?  Really!  And so with these ingredients, you can eat dessert, satisfy your sweet tooth and not grow 3 dress sizes!!!  It's win-win!

It's perfect if you're asked to take a dessert to someones house, and it's not heavy, nor does it require tonnes of work.  Of course, it's open to interpretation and variations, but here's my version.  Sadly it doesn't photograph prettily, and I'm not really into food presentation (give me time, I might develop a knack for it ;) ) but yeah, I wanted to write about this because I love it so much, it's so simple, and it's one of my fave things to make! :)

Serves about 6 or 8, depending on how much fruit you put in.

INGREDIENTS

1kg pot of natural yoghurt (you can also use flavoured, but I prefer au naturel)

blueberries (rinsed, and manky ones discarded!)

strawberries (rinsed, diced)

marshmallows (pink and white - mini ones, or just chop up the big ones)

chocolate chips

METHOD

Chuck it all in a bowl together, and mix gently (to avoid bruising fruit).  

I had mine with a meringue and a cherry on the side... Om nom nom

I've left the quantities of each blank, simply because it is up to you what "yoghurt : fruit : other" ratio you want, and how much you have in your cupboard.


Voila.  SO easy.  Of course, you can add ANY fruit at all that you want!  We just had blueberries and strawberries in excess on hand, so we used up a whole bunch of them (about 250gm of blueberries... not sure how many strawberries...).  Some other fruit could be boysenberries (even out of a can), banana, nectarines, peaches, apricots... there are no limits!

We even had ambrosia left over (I know... left over dessert - how is that even possible?!) which I *almost* ate for breakfast!