A succulent chicken, seasoned with the simplest of ingredients (lemon, garlic, sea salt and freshly ground black pepper), roasted till its skin blistered, paper thin and golden brown. Parboiled potatoes, tossed with fresh rosemary, a generous dash of sea salt and black pepper and a drizzle of olive oil, and then roasted to get the perfect crisp outside, fluffy and tender inside texture.
And to round the meal off, a mixture of frozen berries thrown together with some lemon juice, a bit of flour and sugar, topped with a simple crumble mixture and baked till golden brown.
The weekend just doesn’t get much better than this.
Dear Blondie,
I suppose now’s as good a time as anything to confess.
Before I met you, I didn’t think very much of you guys. In fact, I always thought you were the plainer and- dare I say it- boring cousins of, you know the hunky, chocolate brown guys that everyone goes gaga over, the Brownies.
Which probably explains why I put off giving you babies a shot until now. It took a huge yearning for a toothsome, fuss free dessert, and of course that gorgeous picture of you guys in Martha Stewart’s Cookies deserves some credit for giving that final nudge I needed to make our acquittance possible, but it did finally happen.
And I’m glad it did.
With the fudgyness of a brownie and taste of a chocolate chip cookie, you guys completely blew my expectations out of the water. Coupled with your buttery flavour and hints of toffee from the browned butter and light brown sugar, I don’t think I’ve ever inhaled a batch of baked goods so quickly.
So what say you, forgive my rash judgement of you guys? I have a feeling we’ll soon become firm and fast friends, especially with a scoop of rich Vanilla Ice Cream and a drizzle of creamy Hot Fudge Sauce.
love,
Laureen
Brown-butter Chocolate Chip Brownies [adapted from Martha Stewart's Cookies]
Ingredients
300g unsalted butter
2 1/4 cups plain flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 cup light brown sugar
3/4 cup caster sugar
3 eggs, at room temperature
2 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup chocolate chips
- Preheat the oven at 175C. Line a 9″ by 13″ baking pan with aluminium foil and set aside.
- Over medium heat, cook the butter in a saucepan till golden brown. Remove from heat and let cool. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together and set aside.
- Using an electric mixer, beat the browned butter and sugars together. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well. Add the vanilla and then the flour in two batches. Fold the chocolate chips in till just incorporated.
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 30 to 40 minutes until a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. Cool completely before cutting.
While the arrival of Fridays are always enough of a reason to celebrate in itself, there’s quite nothing like starting the weekend with dinner, drinks and two of your closest friends.
Like most Friday nights which see us at a local pub drinking and chatting the working week away, we capped the night off at my place, peppering our conversation with snippets of gossip (karma’s so coming our way, darlings) and oohs and aahs over the online catalogue of a certain luxury brand.
So come Saturday morning, rather than do our usual rummage through the fridge and have whatever we find for breakfast, I thought it would be a nice change for us to sit down and have a proper breakfast to start the weekend right.
Now, I can’t speak for my darling friends but waffles ranks pretty high on my favourite breakfast food list. Especially when devoured in good company.
Here’s to more late Fridays nights to come and that trip to Manchester, darlings.
xxoo
Hazelnut Waffles with Warm Berry Coulis [adapted from Bon Appetit's August 2009 issue]
Ingredients
125g butter
1/4 cup honey
3 1/2 cups plain flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking soda
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups milk
1 cup sour cream
2/3 cups toasted hazelnuts, chopped
Warm berry coulis
2 cups raspberries, divided
1 cup blackberries, divided
1 cup blueberries, divided
1/2 cup sugar
1 tbsp lemon juice
A pinch of gelatin
- To make warm berry coulis Combine half of the berries with the sugar and lemon juice. Let stand for 20 minutes or till the berries softens and their juices released. Heat the berry mixture in a saucepan over medium heat and simmer for about 20 minutes till the berries break down. Strain the berry puree into a bowl, stir in the gelatin and mix the reserved berries in.
- To make the waffles Heat the butter and honey in a saucepan till the butter melts completely. Combine the flour, salt, baking soda and baking powder into a large bowl. In another bowl, whisk the milk, sour cream and eggs together. Mix the wet ingredients into the dry mixture and stir well till combine. Fold the chopped hazelnuts in.
- Using a electric waffle maker, cook as many waffles as you can get out of the batter. Serve warm with the berry coulis. Makes 8 large waffles
